Yankees spring training report on Florial, Andujar, Torres and others

Much, Much Better Than Last Year

Greg Bird might have earned the starter’s spot, be he has also proven it prudent to retain at least two very good back-ups.

Enter Adam Lind. I cannot sum up his 2017 season any better than Randy Miller did for NJ.com, so here he is:

"Playing for a 2017 division winner, Lind hit .303 with 14 homers in 59 RBIs in 267 at-bats as a first baseman/left fielder who played in 116 games and started 61. He hit .303 against righties, .310 against lefties and batted .356 in 45 pinch-hit at-bats. A Washington Nationals staffer added that Lind “was loved, loved, loved by his teammates.”"

That provides a much-needed level of insurance, and better bet than last season’s Chris Carter experiment. But the idea is still to keep the youth movement going. There, at first base, is an already on-going battle between Yankees youngsters Tyler Austin and Billy McKinney.

Coming in to camp, both men had positives and negatives. The positives for Austin are that he has big league experience and almost as much talent as any young hitter. He has yet to show it at the big league level with any consistency, but it is there nonetheless.

His downfall is his health. He could have taken the job away from even Bird last year but he could not stay on the field, appearing in only 20 games.

An Open Door Policy

That opens the door for Billy McKinney.

McKinney came over two years ago in the Aroldis Chapman trade, the same one that brought Torres. Always suspected of being too streaky of a hitter, Billy has hit consistently enough to post appealing numbers for the last two seasons. Plus, he has missed little time.

He split his season between Double- and Triple-A last year, the best part being that he improved against better competition.

He played 55 games at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and posted a .306/.336/.541 to go with his 10 home runs and 13 doubles; all of those were slightly better than his showing at Trenton. That earned him a chance to play in the Arizona Fall League in order to work more at first base.

Now the 23-year old is battling to be higher on the depth chart than the 26-year old Austin. His biggest obstacle is his limited time above Double-A and at first overall. But at least his numbers so far are at least comparable.

Austin has an ERA of .154 and OPS of .968 with two home runs. However, one of those was a game winner. Mckinney, meanwhile, has a .167 ERA and OPS of 1.000, with two 2 home runs of his own. But one of those was off of Pat Neshek, a true MLB late inning reliever.

Right now it looks like a draw.