Four reasons for Yankees’ hot start as win streak stretches to seven: Giancarlo Stanton’s resurgence and more

The first few weeks of the Juan Soto era couldn’t have been better for the New York Yankees. Sunday’s defeat of the admittedly terrible Chicago White Sox (NYY 7, CWS 2) was New York’s seventh consecutive victory. It is the team’s first seven-game winning streak since September 2022. The Yankees have the best record (33-15) and run differential (plus-79) in the American League.

“We just clicked on all cylinders,” utility Jon Berti said after digging deep into Sunday’s victory (via MLB.com). “Starting pitching, bullpen, offense, defense. It’s a lot of fun when you play baseball like that.”

The Yankees have won seven straight and are playing so well mainly because Soto is amazing and Aaron Judge got his season on track after a slow start. You have a chance to win every day with these two in the lineup. Additionally, Carlos Rodón has recovered from a nightmarish debut season in stripes. Sunday’s win gives him a 3.27 ERA in 10 starts.

Six times during their winning streak, the Yankees have held their opponent to two runs or less and are allowing just 3.21 runs per game in 2024. That’s the best mark in baseball and 0.22 runs better than second-place Los Angeles Dodgers. The Yankees allow the fewest runs per game and score the fifth-most runs per game (4.85). That’s a great combination.

The Yankees are racking up early-season wins because they are a run-preventing powerhouse and because their hitters are hitting like stars. Here are now four other reasons why the Yankees got the hot start they needed after last year’s disappointing 82-80 season, New York’s worst record in three decades.

1. Gil and Schmidt leveled up

A year ago, Gerrit Cole won the AL Cy Young while posting a 2.93 ERA and averaging 6.33 innings per game. Every other Yankee starter had a 5.06 ERA and averaged 4.74 innings per game. So when Cole suffered nerve inflammation in his elbow this spring, it was fair to think the Yankees were in trouble. No team can afford to lose their ace, especially the Yankees after 2023.

Instead of wilting, New York’s rotation has risen to the challenge without Cole. The starters have a 3.00 ERA, third-best in baseball, and are averaging 5.63 innings per game. That’s seventh best in baseball. Rodón has been very good and is improving as the season progresses, and veterans Nestor Cortes and Marcus Stroman have been solid in every game.

New York’s best starters this season haven’t been veterans. Young Luis Gil, who replaced Cole in the rotation, and former first-round pick Clarke Schmidt took the next step and became mainstays of the rotation. Gil struck out 14 White Sox last Saturdaysetting a new single-game franchise record for strikeouts by a rookie.

Gil underwent Tommy John surgery in May 2022 and did not play in the big leagues in 2023 while he completed his rehabilitation. The Yankees moved him to minor league camp earlier this spring, then Cole was injured and Gil impressed enough in a late March audition to earn the rotation spot. He has allowed two total runs in his last four starts and has thrown at least six innings in all four.

The Yankees reportedly pursued Blake Snell in March and Gil’s game is very similar to Snell’s. He walks more hitters than you’d like – he walked 13.6% of hitters faced, second-highest among qualified starters – but he makes up for that by being an excellent hitter and being so hard to hit in general. Gil is holding opponents to a .152 average. Only Dylan Cease (.137) is better.

Schmidt, meanwhile, has made 32 starts in 2023 and reached league average in his first year as a full-time rotation member. In nine starts this season, Schmidt has a 2.49 ERA and one of the biggest year-over-year strikeout rate increases in baseball. Here are the biggest increases in strikeout rate among pitchers with at least 150 innings in 2023 and 50 innings in 2024:

In his most recent start, Schmidt pitched eight shutout innings against the Minnesota Twins. It was the first time in his MLB career that he went seven innings, let alone eight. The cutter Schmidt picked up last spring has become an indispensable weapon and his ball-spin rates have always been among the best in the league. He learned how to turn spin into outs.

Gil and Schmidt have combined to average 5.54 innings per game and that’s even with Gil being in pitch counts early in the season as he continues his spring preparation. They have a 2.44 ERA. The underlying numbers are not exactly what good, although very good: 3.29 FIP and 3.34 xERA. Gil and Schmidt went from having guaranteed rotation spots to being robust.

2. Stanton is recovering

At age 34, the MVP version of Giancarlo Stanton will likely never return, although the Yankees need more from him than the .202/.286/.442 line he put together from 2022-23 (.191/.275/.420 in 2023). To that end, Stanton lost weight over the winter—he was very stocky and muscular, not out of shape—and also slightly changed his hand position during preparation at the plate.

Nearly two months into 2024, Stanton owns a .252/.301/.516 batting line with 11 home runs, including five in his last 10 games. New bat tracking data from Statcast tells us that Stanton leads baseball in bat speed, and not by a small margin either:

1. Giancarlo Stanton, Yankees: 80.2 miles per hour
2. Oneil Cruz, Pirates: 77.9 mph
3. Kyle Schwarber, Phillies: 123.1 km/h
4. Christopher Morel, Puppies: 76.7 miles per hour
5. Ronald Acuña Jr., Braves: 76.7 miles per hour
   (MLB Average: 72.0 miles per hour)

Stanton displays the traits we often see in aging hitters who sacrifice contact and on-base ability for damage (think late-career Albert Pujols), namely a low career walk rate and the highest strikeout and chase rates since the beginning of his career. career. That’s about what Stanton’s skills allow him to be now, a 30-homer bat whose on-base percentage will hover around .300.

You don’t want this guy as your best or second best hitter, but as your No. 5 hitter behind Soto and Judge? This might work. It’s also much better than what Stanton gave the Yankees the last two years. Make your proposal and you will get him out of there. Make a mistake, though, and Stanton is a threat to score. For the first time since 2021, he is dangerous in the area.

3. Weaver has become a bullpen force

The Yankees have been one of the best in baseball at building bullpens for several years. There were times when it looked like they could pull someone out of the stands and get 50 innings with a sub-3.00 ERA. This year, the Yankees have the lowest bullpen ERA (2.49) and the highest bullpen win probability added (4.02) in baseball. Another year, another great Yankees bullpen.

The latest revelation from New York’s bullpen is Luke Weaver, who had a 6.40 ERA in 123 2/3 innings for three teams last year, including the Yankees, following a waiver claim in September. They re-signed him to a one-year, $2 million contract over the winter, with the intention of making him a full-time reliever. Weaver was never stretched this spring nor given the opportunity to replace Cole.

There was reason to believe Weaver could be a sneaky depth addition, namely its revived cutter and versatility. He quickly became manager Aaron Boone’s go-to setup reliever ahead of closer Clay Holmes. Weaver has a 2.25 ERA and a 0.68 WHIP in 28 innings across 16 starts, and his last 10 starts have been out of this world: 17 1/3 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 23 K.

Weaver regularly gets 4-6 strikeouts and hitters missed 43.3% of their swings against his changeup, the highest changeup rate in baseball (minimum 100 changeups thrown). That’s what the Yankees do. They put together a group of non-roster invitees and junk pitchers and turn it into one of the best bullpens in the game. Weaver is this year’s discovery.

4. The bottom of the order has increased

Last season, the Yankees ranked 29th in batting average (.227) and 27th in slugging percentage (.304). Their offense was Judge, who missed two months with a toe injury after running into the wall at Dodger Stadium, and Gleyber Torres. That’s it. They had no offensive depth and the lineup was full of easy exits. The 2023 Yankees were very easy to pitch.

That doesn’t happen anymore thanks mainly to Soto and Alex Verdugo, the two big offseason additions, and also because the guys at the bottom of the lineup have been much better and more competitive. Berti and Oswaldo Cabrera have done an excellent job filling in for the injured DJ LeMahieu and the catchers – Jose Trevino and rookie Austin Wells – have been very productive.

See what the Yankees accomplished with their 7-8-9 hitters this season:

Trevino, in particular, has stood out. The 2022 All-Star is a defense-first prospect and he missed the second half of last year with wrist surgery. He started this season with a 1-for-18 skid as well. However, since April 13, Trevino is 24-70 (.343) with more home runs (five) than strikeouts (four). This is the kind of unexpected production the Yankees simply haven’t achieved in 2023.

And maybe it won’t continue. Perhaps Gil and Schmidt are peaking early and will return to Earth as the entries accumulate. Maybe Stanton will get hurt again. Maybe Weaver is a May mirage. It’s perfectly possible. We only need to look at the 2022 Yankees to know that it’s not how you start, it’s how you finish. That team started 49-16, finished 50-47, and then was eliminated in the ALCS.

The wins are in the bank and that’s all you can do at this point in the season. The more you earn now, the easier life will be at the end of the season. In short, the Yankees have the best record in the league without the reigning Cy Young winner throwing a pitch.