The Yankees can no longer ignore this Gold Glove caliber infielder.
The New York Yankees, as of last Thursday, are likely to give the third base gig to veteran infielder and former Gold Glove award winner DJ LeMahieu. Despite the fact his offensive ceiling is very much limited at this point, LeMahieu still has the highest floor among candidates to start at the hot corner.
However, the Yankees can’t ignore infielder Oswald Peraza as they did in large portions of the 2023 campaign anymore. They should give him a fair chance to win at least semi-regular at-bats with the Yankees in 2023 or use him as a trade piece so he can kickstart his career somewhere.
So far, Peraza has been too good for Triple-A and too bad for MLB, but 248 total plate appearances in the majors is not enough sample to write him off as a bust. In those, he has hit .216/.298/.306 with a 75 wRC+, but to be fair, Anthony Volpe has an 84 wRC+ in 601 trips to the plate, which is better but not by much.
One of them received every chance to struggle, slump, and adjust, and the other was optioned very, very quickly during his bad stretches. We are not saying that Peraza is a better prospect than Volpe, but the former was a top-100 guy less than a year ago and deserves a chance, if not for the offense, for his incredible, Gold Glove-caliber defense.
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