The lineup card hanging in the Yankees clubhouse on Wednesday night had a different look with slumping first baseman Anthony Rizzo was in the seven hole after batting fourth, fifth or sixth all season.
Rizzo hadn’t been since low in 13 years.
As a rookie with the Cubs in 2011, he hit seventh 15 times and eighth three times, then he was never that low again until the middle game of this week’s Yankees-Angels’ series.
“Part of that is just the personnel we have back now,” manager Aaron Boone explained.
That’s true. The Yankees’ lineup did become deeper Tuesday night when third baseman DJ LeMahieu made his season debut.
Also, the Angels’ scheduled starting pitcher was lefty Tyler Anderson, and for games against southpaws Boone likes flipping the righty-hitting Giancarlo Stanton from fifth to cleanup and left-handed-hitter Alex Verdugo from fourth to fifth.
Boone then moved up Gleyber Torres, a right-handed-hitter, from seventh to sixth and dropped the lefty-swinging Rizzo from sixth to seventh.
“Just want to split up the lefties,” Boone said.
So that’s your explanation, but Rizzo probably still would be hitting fourth and fifth most of the time if he was putting up his usual offensive numbers.
He’s not.
After going 0-for-4 (with a costly fielding blunder) in Tuesday night’s 4-3 loss to the Angels, Rizzo was batting .245 with seven homers, 25 RBI and a career-worst .680 OPS in 55 games.
His OPS also ranked 16th among 24 MLB qualifiers.
Boone downplayed that stat.
“We’re still in a lot of ways very early in the season and he’s on the cusp of a good week or 10 days of that (OPS stat) being a lot different,” Boone said. “He’s got some home runs and run production. It’s not like he’s sitting there hitting .190 and not getting on at all. So he’s got to keep grinding. Get that good feeling going and hopefully we see that steadily climb.”
Boone says Rizzo is just going through some struggles that all players deal with over the course of a 162-game season.
“It’s part of being a player,” he said. “It’s part of being a player that has a long career. There are adjustments to be made. There are peaks and valleys that you go throughout a season, throughout your career. You’re constantly working in the best of seasons, and seasons where you struggle to try and get it to click.
“I trust that it will with Rizz. He’s not far from being in the midst of a really good season. He’s had a couple of weeks stretch here where he hasn’t got a lot of results, but it’s certainly in there for him to do it.”
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