PHILADELPHIA — This World Series is a rebuke of how the Yankees handled shortstop this season.
There were three doors from which the Yankees could have chosen:
1. They could have pounced on an established shortstop in an elite free-agent class, such as Carlos Correa. He left the defending AL champion Astros and instead (we will get back to this) signed with the Twins.
2. They could have done what the Astros did after losing Correa — entrust shortstop to a rookie (Jeremy Peña).
3. They could have done what the Phillies did — recognize the veteran who was starting at shortstop (Didi Gregorius) was inferior to a rookie alternative (Bryson Stott) and hand the rookie the job with a few months left in the regular season.
Instead, the Yankees went with Door No. 4, sticking with Isiah Kiner-Falefa despite growing signs on and off the field that he was not up to the job. Then in the ALCS they went with a Shortstop of the Day program with Kiner-Falefa, Oswaldo Cabrera and Oswald Peraza laced with indecisiveness rather than inspiration.
So in case you are keeping score over the last three years — since the Yankees rightfully decided that Gregorius was losing range and it was time to replace him — the Yanks for two seasons force-fed a second baseman (Gleyber Torres) at shortstop before turning to a utilityman (Kiner-Falefa) to fill the role.
By late in the 2021 season, the Yankees recognized they had made a mistake with Torres and were using Gio Urshela and Andrew Velazquez at short. Velazquez started the wild-card loss to the Red Sox. The Yanks believed they could take him off the 40-man roster and not lose him. They did lose him, to the Angels.
Velazquez was not a long-term answer, but as overall value goes (a bit more power, a better defender) he was similar to Kiner-Falefa. And he played for $700,000. It is not only that Kiner-Falefa cost $4.7 million, but to gain access to him and Ben Rortvedt, the Yankees had to assume the two-year $50 million ransom of Josh Donaldson. And by clearing out Donaldson from the Twins’ payroll, the Yanks provided the financial path for Minnesota to basically sign a one-year, $35.1 million pact with Correa — which would have been available to the Yankees if they just retained Velazquez and/or decided to see if Peraza or Anthony Volpe could handle the big job.
The Yanks did not believe Peraza or Volpe had enough minor league experience — and there is no doubt that the 2020 minor league season wiped out by the COVID pandemic impacted the development arc. But that arc hit Peña and Stott too, though to be fair that duo, born 14 days apart in 1997, are three years older than Peraza.
The Astros went with Peña from the beginning of this season, though he only had 30 minor league games above Double-A. Peña did play winter ball after both the 2020 and 2021 seasons and was on the Astros taxi squad throughout last year’s playoffs. Houston believed in the defense, power potential and person. The reward was a 4.8 WAR season, nearly as good as Correa’s 5.4 with the Twins. Plus, he hit three homers in the first two rounds of the playoffs, including for the only run in the Game 2 18-inning 1-0 elimination of the Mariners.
“He’s exceeded our expectations, but not his potential,” Houston GM James Click said.
Peraza played very well in 79 games at Double-A last year and his defense was superior to Kiner-Falefa. But the Yanks deemed him not ready, and then they had some concerns that he was not in peak condition when he arrived in spring training.
Fine. But Kiner-Falefa was exhibiting worrisome signs. He was thrown by social media barbs. Plus, his defense had bouts of shakiness that worsened with the meaning of the game and the later it became in the season. The Yanks kept talking about him rebounding, but that he had to rebound was shouting a warning.
Stott had barely more games above Single-A than Peraza to begin the season, yet he was on the Opening Day roster as a backup infielder before being briefly sent to Triple-A at the end of April. The Phillies stuck with Gregorius through the Aug. 2 trade deadline, released him on Aug. 4 and made Stott the starter, from which he had a .756 OPS to the end of the season — seventh among shortstops.
“We knew he doesn’t let the game speed up on him and that he is wise beyond his years,” Phillies general manager Sam Fuld said in explaining trusting Stott to take over the shortstop slot. “He became our quarterback out there. He was 24 [years old] going on 34 in terms of maturity.”
The Yanks either missed or ignored the Kiner-Falefa issues. They didn’t address shortstop in a trade. They said Peraza was not called up quickly to see if he could secure the starting job because he had not finished off his minor league development plan yet. But aren’t the needs of a major league contender more vital than the last bit of Peraza’s development plan? Did Peraza really get that much more refinement before being called up Sept. 1?
This is far from the only reason that the Yanks failed to win a pennant. But the 118th World Series does feature the first-ever matchup between teams with rookie shortstops. Houston and Philadelphia trusted rookies at different times on the 2022 calendar — with great rewards.
