The New Guys! Looking at the 2022 (2021) Strat-o-Matic Yankees
by Paul Semendinger
February 26, 2022
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It is one of my favorite days of the year… the newest Strat-o-Matic cards arrived in the mail. These are the 2022 issues and they cover the players from the 2021 season.
I get the newest Yankees cards every year. It’s a sure sign that spring is coming.
I love to look at the cards and see if anything jumps out at me. These cards, as fans know, represent the performances of each player based on how well they did in a host of areas the previous year.
I always like to see what the cards say about the Yankees players. I wonder if the card makers see the same things I saw.
Here are some findings I have from the newest Strat-O-Matic Yankees cards:
For defense, a player’s range cannot be better than a 1. The players with the best range at their positions earn a 1 (on a scale of 1-5). Anthony Rizzo is a 1 at first base. Aaron Judge is a 1 in right field. (In centerfield, Judge is a 3.) D.J. LeMahieu is still a 1 at second base. Joey Gallo is a 1 in left or right field.
The worst Yankees fielders include Gleyber Torres (ss-4), Gio Urshela (ss-4, he’s a 2 at 3b), Rougned Odor (3b-4, he’s a 3 at 2b), and Giancarlo Stanton (lf-4, rf-4).
The fastest runners in the game usually rank as a 1-17 for speed. I’ve never seen a player rated faster than that. The fastest Yankees in this set are Tyler Wade (1-17) and Brett Gardner (1-15). The slowest Yankees are Kyle Higashioka (1-8), Luke Voit (1-8), and Gary Sanchez (1-9). There is not a lot of speed on this team. Players will not be taking extra bases on hits.
Players are rated A-E (like a school report card) for base stealing and bunting. The following are the only A’s, the Yankees have in the set: Tyler Wade (stealing) and Joey Gallo (bunting). It seems that the Strat-o-Matic Game Company also sees this team as poor fundamentally.
Some other things that jump out at me for offense include:
Gary Sanchez and Kyle Higashioka will strikeout a lot.
Joey Gallo has strikeouts on his card all over the place. I don’t know if I have ever seen so many.
Aaron Judge, for the most part, will either homer, single, walk, or strikeout. It’s not an exciting card.
Luke Voit’s card will see him get injured a lot.
On the pitching side, pitchers are rated for their ability to pitch a certain amount of innings before getting tired. For example, Christy Mathewson would be able to go 9 innings as a starter, Goose Gossage, three innings as a closer. Domingo German, as a starter, gets tired in the fourth inning! Gerrit Cole only gets six innings in this area. Corey Kluber is also a four-inning guy. The Yankees have a bunch of relief pitchers (including Aroldis Chapman) who get tired in their first inning of work.
Gerrit Cole has a card where he’ll strikeout a lot of batters.
Aroldis Chapman too, but he will walk too many right-handed hitters.
Clay Holmes will be great against right-handed hitters. He’s almost unhittable against them.
Jonathan Loaisiga will be good, but not as great as I hoped.
Nestor Cortes will be better against righties than lefties.
Chad Green should dominate.
It’s always fun to see how the “new guys” shape up.
I also ordered Strat-O-Matic’s new 1947 season set. I’ll do a similar “walk-through” with that club and publish it here tomorrow..
But, the best news is that with the new cards and their arrival it is a sure sign that spring is definitely coming! Let’s hope baseball arrives with the spring!
