Just Play Spencer Jones in Center

By EJ Fagan

September 2026

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The following post comes from EJ Fagan's Substack, Baseball Is Life. It is shared with permission.

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Trent Grisham broke out in a big way in 2025. His 34 home runs and .812 OPS were a massive boost to a Yankees lineup that was feeling the loss of Juan Soto. It made sense for him to bat leadoff against right-handed pitchers to start the 2026 season. But it also allowed everyone to ignore his declining defense.

At 26.8 ft/s sprint speed, he’s also the second slowest. He has one of the better first step reaction rates in baseball, but takes some of the least efficient routes. This all adds up to -5 FRV, third worst qualified centerfielder in baseball this season and down from being merely below average last year.

All of that would be tolerable if Grisham were mashing like he did in 2025, but he’s not:

His .336 xwOBA looks good on paper, but Grisham pretty much always undershot his xwOBA by 20 or so points. The .704 OPS is real. He gives off real Aaron Hicks decline years vibes, other than the always injured part. The Yankees can do better.

And they have better available to them. Spencer Jones has been a better all around player this season, even counting his early season growing pains:

The .327 xwOBA and .739 OPS are strong on their own, but since his late July callup he’s been hitting an expected .273/.326/.472 compared to Grisham’s .214/.301/.369. Jones’ strikeout rate ticked up a little bit in mid-August, but he brought it back down to a healthy 31.1% since his third callup.

Jones’ numbers aren’t exactly stellar on defense, but I think we can chalk that up a bit to playing out of position and small sample sizes. Jones’ sprint speed is right up there with elite centerfielders like Brendan Doyle. He also played 342 of his 377 minor league games in center but has played mostly in the corner in the majors. He’s a pretty strong bet to be better than Grisham in center.

For now, the question has been mostly moot. The Yankees needed to play both Grisham and Jones on most days. But Judge’s return will eventually force the issue.

An alternative path would be to believe in Jones’ stark reverse platoon splits and make him the centerfielder against left-handed pitching. Jones has a crazy 1.124 OPS against lefties (ugly .650 OPS against righties*), but that’s in a super small sample. I’ll believe in massive reverse platoon splits when I have a lot more data. Grisham has pretty flat platoon splits in 2026.

*Jones hasn’t been great since July 1st against righties, but did post a .519 xSlg. Some bad luck in that .650 OPS.

Subbing out Grisham would also necessitate a realignment of the lineup. There isn’t an obvious replacement leadoff hitter on the roster. My guess is that against right-handed pitchers, the Yankees go with something like Rice-Judge-Garcia-Bellinger-Jones at the top of the lineup. Grisham becomes an interesting lefty bench bat in the playoffs. Maybe he rebounds with rest.

Aaron Boone will be tempted to do his thing and default to the veteran. Trent Grisham won two Gold Gloves! But come on, man. We can all see an over the hill, slightly checked out center fielder. Choosing him over the rookie is loser stuff. Do we really think that the Rays, Red Sox or Dodgers would default to the limp veteran? No way. Winners are ruthless.

And more importantly: Trent Grisham is a free agent. Spencer Jones is the future of the Yankees at the position. With only a month of regular season baseball left, the potential harms to Grisham’s veteran ego are now immaterial. It’s time to pick your best horse and ride them to the finish line.