MLB.com | Bryan Hoch: After winning the AL Rookie of the Year award in 2024, Luis Gil’s 2025 season was not what he wanted. Limited to just 11 starts last year due to injury, Gil’s looking forward to 2026 and so far the early returns of spring have been encouraging. Hoch also has some notes about Jasson Domínguez working to improve his hitting from the right side and the competition for the final spot on the bench with the rest of it mostly figured out.
NJ.com | Randy Miller: With a lot of hype surrounding
the World Baseball Classic, it’s easy for players who aren’t participating to get some FOMO. Max Fried, recently announced as the Yankees’ Opening Day starter, spoke on this adding that anyone would want to play that type of competitive baseball, but he passed on the opportunity because he felt he wouldn’t be able to properly build up to that level of competition for March.
New York Post | Dan Kelly: A day after the news broke that Spencer Jones would start the year with Triple-A Scranton, he clobbered his fourth home run of the spring. Barring any significant injuries on the depth chart ahead of him, there was always almost no chance of him breaking camp with the big league club. Still though, his success this spring has given Jones a boost of confidence and he knows his task is not to focus on what he can’t control, but to focus on what he can. He wants to build off his breakout last year and work on being consistent.
NJ.com | Randy Miller: Speaking of the last bench spot, Randal Grichuk took some time to discuss his disappointing 2025 season which saw him garner almost no attention as a free agent. Supposedly the Yankees had initially offered him a major league contract towards the beginning of free agency, but he opted to see what his options were, and the Yankees went on to re-sign Trent Grisham and Cody Bellinger, which left him settling for a minor league deal with the club. He seems to think his down year was just a fluke and that he still hit the ball hard. He feels confident in having a path to that last bench spot with the team and definitely feels like he can be a contributor.
