About Spring Training: Meanderings of My Mind

About Spring Training: Meanderings of My Mind

By Tim Kabel

March 9, 2026

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The Yankees were eliminated from the postseason in the ALDS last season. Spring Training is well underway. The games have begun. Opening Day is a little more than two weeks away. Since I don't have any games to recap, I will now move from topic to topic with reckless abandon since I now have an extra hour of daylight. Apparently, when John Wayne uttered the classic line, “Hurry up, you're burning daylight.” in The Cowboys, it must have been before daylight savings time.  

·      I am trying to be upbeat regarding the 2026 season for the New York Yankees. However, I must admit that I am very concerned about the offense. Let's take a closer look.

Austin Wells has yet to prove himself as a major offensive player. He is streaky and inconsistent and can disappear for lengthy stretches. Perhaps that was injury related. With the Yankees and their habit of not disclosing things, that could certainly be the case. However, Wells is clearly not an offensive stalwart at this point in his career.

Ben Rice looks to be on the cusp of becoming a tremendous offensive player. Reportedly, he has worked very hard on his defense at first base as well.

Jazz Chisholm, junior is certainly a very reliable and dynamic offensive player who has already reached the 30-30 plateau and may surpass that if he remains injury free.

Anthony Volpe will be on the IL until some point in May. He has been an extremely streaky and inconsistent player and is certainly not a reliable offensive player. I realize he suffered a major injury last year. However, his own manager claimed that it did not adversely affect him offensively. Mediocrity seems to be about all we can expect from Volpe.

Jose Caballero may be an upgrade over Volpe and also brings a tremendous amount of speed to the equation. However, we all know that once Volpe returns, Caballero will return to the bench.

Ryan McMahon is essentially a left-handed hitting version of Volpe when it comes to offense.

Cody Bellinger is a very solid offensive player. That should continue to be the case for the foreseeable future, barring injuries.

Trent Grisham seems likely to revert to his pre-2025 form. After all, he was an awful hitter far longer than he was a good hitter. It is much more likely that the 2025 season was an outlier and will not be repeated.

Aaron Judge is a perennial Most Valuable Player and there is no reason to suspect that he will not put up another tremendous year.

Giancarlo Stanton is injury prone and streaky under the best of circumstances. Currently, he claims that his elbows hurt so much that he can't even open a bag of chips. He has had a total of five at bats in Spring Training. It is hard to have a lot of confidence in him going into this season.

So, to summarize, the Yankees can realistically expect strong offensive numbers out of Rice, Chisholm, Bellinger, and Judge. That is four out of the nine players in the lineup. The other five spots are question marks that lean toward negative answers. That makes being optimistic difficult.

·      Recently, there was a big kerfuffle when the CEO of McDonald's, Chris Kempczinski, appeared in an ad Introducing McDonald's new burger, the Big Arch. Apparently, this is a very large hamburger with cheese and multiple garnishes and condiments. To say that Mister Kempczinski was less than enthusiastic would be an understatement. He took a bite as if he was afraid he was going to be poisoned. He barely split his lips and nibbled tentatively on the burger, claiming that he was going to eat it later for lunch. Watching him reminded me of Hal Steinbrenner and his level of enthusiasm for his own baseball team. The question regarding Mr. Kempczinski is simple. If he's not excited about the burger, why should we be? There should have been someone at McDonald's with enough common sense and gumption to put a halt to that and to have either Mr. Kempczinski or someone else eat the burger with gusto. That didn't happen. My question regarding the Yankees is the same, if Hal Steinbrenner isn't enthused about the team or interested in putting the effort in to improve the team, why should we as fans be excited? Perhaps they could give away a Big Arch burger to all the fans who go to Opening Day.

·      Saint Patrick's Day will be here soon, and I can't wait to cook my corned beef. I have always liked corned beef and when both of my sons are home, it disappears very quickly. My first wife refused to eat corned beef because no matter how long I boiled it, it was still pink, and she insisted that meant it was raw. However, she loved pastrami, which as we all know is corned beef that has been smoked. Needless to say, Saint Patrick's Day was always a rather contentious time in my household during that period of my life.

·      I think that if Jasson Dominguez and Spencer Jones played for almost any other Major League team, that team would be putting forth an entirely different message than the one the Yankees are. The Yankees seem dedicated to downgrading and minimizing their young players and earmarking them for the minor leagues. The Yankees seem more interested in pushing Trent Grisham, a fading Giancarlo Stanton, and Randal Grichuk on the fan base than they do in allowing their fans to become excited about the potential of Dominguez and Jones. I am sure that there are people reading this who are saying, “Well the Yankees are focused on winning. They can't be concerned about developing youngsters”. While that may be true, I don't know if Grisham and Grichuk are the answers. If they are the answers, I don't know what the question is. Grisham did have a very good year in 2025. His season last year was better than Dominguez’s. However, the year Dominguez put up last year was better than all three of Grisham’s previous seasons. In addition, Dominguez is 23 years old and is very likely to improve. Spencer Jones seems to have a world of potential. Instead of running with that and allowing the fans to become excited and dream about the futures of these youngsters, the Yankees prefer to shove them into the back corner of obscurity and trot out mediocre veterans. That does not seem to be a recipe for a successful present or future.

·      I do believe that the Yankees pitching staff could be very good this season, particularly when Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodon rejoin the rotation. However, that will not happen immediately, and it will take both of those pitchers a while before they are built up to their previous levels of performance. Having Cam Schlittler for a full season and the potential of Ryan Weathers also bodes well. However, if the team struggles to score runs, that may negate the strength of the pitching staff. Also, the bullpen remains a work in progress at this point. The other thing to remember is that if the offense is not particularly strong, managerial decisions can become much more important. If the manager is effective at using his bench and pinch hitters and in correctly utilizing his pitching staff to avoid big innings by the opposition, it would be a great strength, especially if the offense is not particularly strong. I must remind you that the Yankees manager is Aaron Boone. Managerial decisions are not his strength, to put it excessively kindly. I think this will be a very long year.