NY priority shouldn’t just be an SS

All eyes are on the Yankees’ need for a good shortstop next season. However, this is not the only thing the Bronx Bombers need to improve.

Beyond a shortstop, the Bronx team has other needs that from my point of view may be more essential than a good shortstop.

The Bombers at this time do not have a center fielder. Aaron Hicks, who on paper is the incumbent of that position, has not played more than 100 games in a season since 2018 and in his nine-year career, he has played a hundred games, just twice.

Thinking that Aaron Judge could spend an entire 2022 as a Yankees center patrol is not the solution and could even end in an injury to the Bomber giant. Judge is a perfect right fielder, but not the answer to this vacancy.

Unlike at shortstop, the Yankees don’t have the same depth in the minors as they do with figures like Oswald Peraza and Anthony Volpe on farms. The center fielder is something that seems to be sought in free agency and that costs money to a team that already passes the luxury tax.

The team’s starting rotation needs a second starter. I mean that pitcher who is stable, devouring innings and who can deliver the Yankees and a good season with health and results. That second starter doesn’t seem to be on the team. While Luis Severino (who is coming off an injury), Luis Gil, Domingo Germán, Néstor Cortes Jr., Jordan Montgomery and Jameson Taillon are very young and talented arms, none paints a profile of second in the starting rotation.

This is not to say that you don’t need a good shortstop. Undoubtedly a better option is needed than the current one, because Gleyber in that position did not do the job and sacrificing one of the best third basemen in the game in Gio Urshela and putting him to cover that gap, is not what should be done in the next major league contest.

Perhaps the Bombers are looking for a short-term option and not a long-term option as many predict. This is where Aaron Judge’s contract comes from, which by 2022 will bill 17 million, but then ends his agreement with the Yankees and it seems crazy that they are not going to offer him a giant contract for life as “The Judge” of baseball deserves.

Names like Andrelton Simmons, Freddy Galvis and José Iglesias could be much more interesting and compelling to the Yankees world than many can imagine.