In 2018, the young Yankees won the AL Rookie of the Year polls. New York’s Third Gunner Miguel Andujar and short laner Gleyber Torres finished second and third respectively Vote rookie of the yearlost two-way phenom Shohei Ohtani of Angels.
Ohtani beat home 22 times and posted a 0.925 OPS throughout his rookie campaign, while also recording a 3.31 ERA. And yet, somehow, Andújar still got five votes in first place. There are 5 voters who believe Andújar has had a better rookie season than Ohtani, and that proves how highly touted Andújar is. While he’s certainly not an elite puncher by any metric, he’s driven in 92 runs for a playoff team and was a big reason they got their post-season spot. right from the start. Obviously there were some flaws in his swing, but nothing that couldn’t be fixed. It is therefore reasonable to assume that Andújar will only improve as his career progresses.
Four years on, Andújar appeared in only 90 games, won only 319 championship titles and has scored 62 OPS-plus. He barely got a chance to play. Injuries have derailed his 2019 season. He wasn’t able to recover in time from that tattered lab to be productive in 2020, and in 2021 his swing even further back propels Andújar further into the obscurity of the world. Yankees, making the once-promising star a footnote in baseball history. Now, in 2022, after appearing only 12 times in plays, Andújar has officially requested a transfer. Why? Of course, lack of opportunity.
But does Andújar even deserve the chance to play consistently at this point? The man has a walking percentage of 3.8 as of late 2018. I feel like I don’t need to acknowledge how terrible that percentage is. In fact, since the beginning of the 2019 season, it is 11th worst percentage of anyone with at least 300 occurrences on the plate. While the likes of Tim Anderson and Salvador Perez can make up for a lack of discipline with force, Andújar cannot. Of all the people over that three-year period with a walking rate of less than 5 percent, Andújar had the fourth lowest percentage of isolated energy (0.95) – also known as ISO – ranked ranked only behind Erik González (0.084), Dee Strange-Gordon (.070) and Nick Madrigal (.077). However, at least those guys are either people with strong relationships, half-doers, or in the twilight of their careers. Andújar, 27, doesn’t have any of those excuses. He’s not good anymore.
So, is there any team willing to trade half a pretty good prospect for Andújar? Sure is not. The Chicago White Sox have endured some pretty lousy third-base games this year. Their third base team has scored -1.2 rWAR this season, worst in MLB. However, I would still trust Yoán Moncada or Jake Burger over Andújar at this point. The Washington Nationals’ Third Base Troops recorded the second-worst rWAR this year (-1,1), and they can really use Andújar as a piece of depth, because awesome like name of Lucius Fox, he hasn’t shown anything at Major League level. Without Fox, Maikel Franco is the only player on that list who could actually play in third, and he’s not as stellar either. That being said, why would the Nats be willing to trade a prospect for a piece with depth instead of just giving Fox more playing time to see if he can figure out what’s making him sick. on record or not? It’s not like the Nationals will compete for the knockout stage this year, especially if they transaction Juan Soto go (i know Matt Rizzo quells those rumors, but I still don’t rule out that possibility). Commerce BECAUSE anything other than high-profile leads that aren’t on the table. Unless they can get rid of Patrick Corbin’s contract, that will be the exception.
Miguel Andújar is a cautionary tale about a man with a lot of promise, who broke out faster than the flames of grease at a department store that sold lids. I’m sure the Yankees would love to trade him, but he’s over a million dollars to be a disadvantage vehicle on the plate and on the field. Good luck finding someone willing to pay that contract, or give up anything more than a few warm supple bears for him.
I used to like Andújar very much. I thought he and Torres were a hilarious pair worth watching on the left side of the Yankees in 2018, but as the years go by, he’s become nothing more than a name to mention while you casually yell Shout out random athletes to your friends at the pub. I hope he gets traded. I hope he finds a place where he can get some consistent playtime, but I wouldn’t bet on that.
