CHICAGO — Three weeks into Giancarlo Stanton’s reintroduction to the outfield, it has gone just about as well as the Yankees could have hoped.
They are still playing with fire starting the veteran slugger in right field on most days as they wait for the training staff to clear Aaron Judge to play the field for the first time since suffering a flexor strain.
In the interim, Stanton has held his own.
“It seems to be going well,” manager Aaron Boone said before Saturday’s 5-3 win over the White Sox in 11 innings, when he had Stanton on the bench after playing back-to-back games in right field at Rate Field. “We had the one where I played him that [three] days in a row before the last trip, probably took a little out of him, and he missed the St. Louis series with it. But even that was not that big a deal. I feel like, physically, it’s gone well. He and I communicate well around it.
“So I’ve been pleased.”
The 35-year-old Stanton still is limited in how well he can move around because of his history of lower-body injuries, but so far, his presence in right field has not yet burned the Yankees.
Coming into Saturday, Stanton had started 11 games in right field (and appeared there in two others) since Judge returned from the injured list and tied up the DH spot.
One thing he will not do, at least not in the Yankees’ upcoming series at Houston, is play left field.
The last time Stanton played the field in Houston — Game 3 of the 2022 ALCS — he started in left, where the Crawford Boxes jut out and make for a smaller area to cover.
But Boone said on Saturday he did not have any plans on flipping Stanton to left field in Houston.
“We’ve talked about Houston a little bit, but Houston’s not a real big right field, either,” Boone said. “Houston’s big in the middle of the diamond.”
Boone said Fenway Park — where the Yankees will play a series in two weeks — is “the one extreme” with a spacious right field, meaning Stanton could “possibly” play left field there, as he has done in the past.
It is also possible the Yankees have Judge playing the field by then — he had a “light day” of work on Saturday after throwing to second base again on Friday — but a timeline for that to actually happen remains under seal.
“I think he continues to progress and continues to get a little bit better,” Boone said. “I still don’t have a day for you.”
Austin Wells started a second straight game behind the plate Saturday, having recorded three hits and a walk in his previous two games as the Yankees try to get him back on track offensively.
He followed that with a 1-for-5 night that included a solo home run in the seventh inning.
“Hopefully, he’s getting it going a little bit too because he’s a talented hitter that’s gone through it a little bit,” Boone said. “When he’s going well, then you start to get that real length in the lineup.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
