Leg bruise keeps Alex on bench
The Yankees scratched Alex Verdugo from Sunday’s lineup with a left leg bruise, a day after the outfielder was hit by a pitch.
Verdugo was originally set to bat sixth and play left field in Sunday’s spring training game against the Tigers, but the Yankees released an updated lineup three hours before first pitch at Tampa’s George M. Steinbrenner Field. The move was “precautionary,” YES Network reported
Orioles pitcher Cole Irvin plunked Verdugo during the first inning of Saturday’s exhibition in Sarasota, Fla., but Verdugo remained in the game. Verdugo went 0-for-2 before he was lifted with the other regulars before the bottom of the sixth inning.
Brandon Lockridge, a 2018 fifthround pick by the Yankees, replaced Verdugo in Sunday’s lineup as the left fielder while batting seventh, with catcher Austin Wells sliding up one spot in the order.
Acquired in December in a rare trade with the Red Sox, the 27-year-old Verdugo is poised to begin the season as the primary left fielder in a rebuilt Yankee outfield that also added Juan Soto over the offseason. Soto is expected to primarily play right field, with Aaron Judge sliding over to center field, as was the case in Sunday’s lineup.
A career .281 hitter, the lefty-swinging Verdugo brings contact hitting and balance to a Yankees offense that was overwhelmingly right-handed in 2023 and finished with a .227 batting average that ranked 29th among the 30 MLB teams.
“I can kind of be wherever in the lineup,” Verdugo said during an introductory Zoom call in December. “I could be at the top of the lineup to work at-bats, see pitches, get on base. I could be in the middle of the lineup for when some of the guys are on base. I can shoot a hole. I can hit a gapper. Every once in a while I run into one where it will leave the park, but I just feel like my bat-to-ball skill is a really good thing.”
Verdugo, like Soto, is set to become a free agent after the 2024 season. Verdugo has one hit in eight at-bats over four games this spring.
The Yankees optioned right-handed pitchers Luis Gil and Yoendrys Gómez to Triple-A and re-assigned fellow righties Chase Hampton and Art Warren to minor-league camp Sunday in a flurry of roster moves. Hampton, Gil and Gomez represent young organizational depth for a Yankee team that traded seven pitchers over the offseason to acquire Verdugo and Soto and lost three more in the Rule 5 Draft.