TAMPA — The way I put it to an influential Yankees person on Monday is probably unfair to Josh Donaldson, who was actually delightful in his first news conference with the team. But the source got my point.
“Is it oversimplifying,” I said, “to say that this team has had the same basic core for several years and could use an as—– to shake things up?”
“No,” the source said, surprising me (sources usually resist our easy narratives). “I don’t think that’s oversimplifying it.”
The Yankees have been an excellent team since 2017. But whatever burst of hope greeted the arrival of the Baby Bombers of that era has fizzled.
It has long been obvious that Aaron Judge, Gary Sanchez, Greg Bird, Miguel Andujar, Clint Frazier and Gleyber Torres would not be the exact combination of players to lead the Yankees to their next championship era.
Of that group, only Judge — and probably Torres — has proven a keeper. It’s normal to see attrition among a group of prospects, but what seemed to set in with the team during 2020 and 2021 was more troubling: Staleness.
The Yankees made the playoffs in each of the past two seasons, but endured long stretches of ugly baseball. Whatever the core had evolved into now felt, if not complacent, at least uninspired.
There were times when it appeared the inability to reach a World Series bore down on the Yanks, creating a heaviness around the group. I can’t prove it, and club leadership has downplayed it. But it sure did appear that the Yanks were playing a less joyous version of baseball with each passing year.
Judge has re-established his health and superstar status, but is placid by nature, and his authentic self is not quite the leader that a face of a franchise is expected to be. Giancarlo Stanton is in possession of gravitas and maturity, but isn’t particularly vocal either. Gerrit Cole is a starting pitcher.
Manager Aaron Boone exhibits a special level of empathy, and more tough love than the public sees. He has created a positive culture, even a loving one — but one that could also use one kid in the back of the classroom shooting spitballs at the teacher and putting a whoopie cushion on his chair. A person intense and disruptive enough to ensure a healthy level of discomfort.
A person who is, as Donaldson described himself on Monday, “relentless.”
Last summer, when the Mets were close to a trade for Donaldson, the front office consulted with some of his former teammates.
They came away with this scouting report, per a source: Donaldson was brutally honest, sometimes to a fault. He was unafraid to call out teammates who deserved it. He once nearly came to blows with a teammate — and that guy wanted to play with Donaldson again.
As a Yankee source put it, “I heard he has loud opinions and competes hard.”
Donaldson’s arrival sent an immediate jolt into Yankeeland. The topic of the day Monday was his comments last summer about Cole and so-called “sticky stuff.”
At the time, Donaldson rankled Cole and his teammates. The two spoke on Monday in Boone’s office, and declared the air cleared. Brian Cashman referenced how the Yankees clubhouse had once “hated” Roger Clemens and an opponent, then loved him as a teammate.
Later, a reporter referenced Cashman’s comment to Donaldson.
“Well, I don’t think there’s a lot of guys in there that hate me,” he said with a hint of a smirk, applying verbal italics to the offending word. “That would be an unfair comment that you’re making.”
“I’m not saying you,” the reporter said.
“Well, you’re implying that,” Donaldson.
“Don’t infer that, because I didn’t imply that,” the reporter said.
“Well, that’s how I interpreted what you said,” Donaldson said.
“Okay,” the reporter said.
The exchange was funnier than it was awkward. It also sent a signal that if we on the Yankee beat worded questions that Donaldson disliked, he would challenge us. He would not allow us to become too comfortable.
Is a similar discomfort what the Yankees themselves need?
After watching them play for the past two years, I thought so. And on Monday, I learned there were some in the clubhouse who agreed.