SARASOTA, Fla. — The draft scouts called it years ago. Austin Wells had a left-handed swing built for Yankee Stadium, a bat that could drive the ball over the right-field wall on a regular basis. The glove, though, was another story. Back then, the whisper around the league was that Wells would eventually land somewhere other than behind the plate.
He proved them wrong. Sort of.
After two full seasons in pinstripes, the 26-year-old catcher has flipped the script in a way nobody expected. His glove has become elite. His bat, the thing everyone was counting on, has not delivered the consistency the Yankees need. And now, with a major rule change about to alter how catchers are evaluated, the conversation around Wells has taken on a new and uncomfortable urgency.
The catcher nobody thought Wells would become
The scouting report on Wells when the Yankees drafted him 28th overall in 2020 out of the University of Arizona was blunt. Good bat. Shaky glove. Project him to a corner outfield spot or first base if the defense does not develop. Wells heard it, resented it, and then went to work.
When he opened his locker in Sarasota this spring, he was refreshingly candid about where things stood back then.
“I think the measurable skills as a catcher I was terrible,” Wells said. “I was not good at framing, probably below average blocking. I was OK throwing.”
That is a remarkable admission for a player who, by 2025, ranked third among all major league catchers in framing runs per Baseball Savant, saving the Yankees an estimated 12 runs simply by stealing strikes on the edges of the zone. His framing rank sat in the 96th percentile. That number did not appear overnight. It was built brick by brick through work with the Yankees’ catching instructor Tanner Swanson and a program that has kept New York near the top of the framing charts since at least 2019.
“Coming to the Yankees, their thing is framing,” Wells said. “They’ve been the best in the league since 2019, probably since as long as they go back. So they were able to work with me a ton. They built my framing from a one-knee-down setup into everything that I am now and we’re always looking to do more and get better.”
Manager Aaron Boone watched the transformation in real time. He noticed it before Wells even reached the big leagues.
“The one thing I remember about him from his first big-league camp was a presence to him just being around him guys,” Boone said. “I was like, ‘All right, the guy’s a big leaguer.’ This is when he was not a big leaguer. He just had an ability to interact with guys, had good conversations with guys.”
The bat that was supposed to lead has fallen behind
Here is the problem. The bat that carried Wells to the first round of the draft and was supposed to anchor his value in the big leagues has not held up its end of the deal. Two seasons in, the numbers tell a story the Yankees can no longer look past.
In 2025, Wells slashed .219/.275/.436 across 448 plate appearances in 126 games. He hit 21 home runs, tied for fifth-most among qualified catchers in the majors, and posted 71 RBIs, second-best at the position. On the surface, those look like respectable totals. Dig one layer deeper and the picture changes.
His wRC+ fell from 107 in 2024, a mark that represents above-average production, down to 94 in 2025, which sits below the league average line. His xwOBA was .294, ranking in just the 14th percentile. His expected batting average came in at .214, fourth percentile. Both figures suggest his .219 actual batting average may have been flattering. His strikeout rate was 26.3 percent against a walk rate of just 6.7 percent, per Empire Sports Media.
The contact problem runs deeper than raw strikeout totals. When Wells chases pitches outside the zone, he pays a steep price. According to Pinstripe Alley’s in-season analysis, his chase contact rate sat at 49.5 percent, well below the 57.6 percent league average. He batted just .087 on swing attempts at pitches outside the zone after accounting for whiffs and foul balls. Against non-fastballs, his wOBA dropped to .215, 13th percentile, compared to .288 in 2024.
Boone did not hide from it at spring training.
“Let’s say his reputation was as a defender,” Boone said. “It’s like, ‘Oh, we’ve got this defensive catcher and he’s popping 20 homers a year.’ And he does have good at-bats. That being said, I expect a lot more out of him offensively, as does he.”
Wells himself pointed to a mental challenge that is specific to the catching position. His focus on managing pitchers and calling games pulls his attention away from hitting preparation in ways that other positions do not experience.
“It’s definitely a challenge for me when I prioritize my pitchers and my defense and being there for them because that’s such a huge part of the game,” Wells said. “I’m still a work in progress on trying to find different switches I can flip to be able to move quicker into my at-bat so that I feel ready to take on my at-bat with a clear mind.”
A rule change that removes his biggest defensive weapon
The timing of Wells’ offensive struggles could not be worse. MLB’s Automated Ball-Strike system arrives across the league for the 2026 season. Human umpires will no longer make ball-strike calls on borderline pitches. Instead, a camera-based system will call those pitches automatically.
That single change wipes out the skill that made Wells one of the most valuable catchers in baseball. Framing, the ability to present a pitch to an umpire in a way that turns a borderline ball into a called strike, becomes irrelevant under ABS. The 12 framing runs Wells saved the Yankees in 2025 go to zero. His 96th percentile framing rank means nothing when there is no umpire to manipulate.
Without that edge, what remains is a catcher who ranks 39th percentile in pop time and 45th percentile in blocks above average, per Baseball Savant. Those numbers describe a slightly above-average defender at best, not the elite backstop his framing totals had suggested. The defensive case for Wells as a top-tier catcher rested almost entirely on framing. That case disappears in 2026.
Boone acknowledged that Wells has to improve his offensive approach specifically. “Better control in the strike zone, better swing decisions,” the manager said, per Empire Sports Media.
Wells knows what he has to fix and says it is there
Credit Wells for being clear-eyed about his own situation. He has not deflected or made excuses. He is aware of the gap and says he has the tools to close it.
“I know what I’m capable of,” Wells said. “I feel like I’ve shown what I’m capable of in spurts, whether it was in ’24 or last year at times. I know it’s in there. It’s just about keeping it consistent.”
His underlying exit velocity data supports the belief. His average exit velocity of 90.6 mph ranked 63rd percentile league-wide in 2025. His barrel rate of 10.2 percent sat at the 60th percentile. The raw power is real. The problem is swing decisions that bleed at-bats before the power can show up.
Wells added a personal milestone to the spring mix. He became a father in December when his wife gave birth to a daughter named Lucy. He is also scheduled to leave the Yankees’ camp March 1 to catch for the Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic, representing his mother’s homeland. He will miss roughly two weeks of spring camp as a result.
Boone is not thrilled about losing his starting catcher during camp but said the returning pitchers Wells already knows help make it manageable. Wells himself called it a worthwhile tradeoff.
“I do think it’s a smart thing to do to go play, to get some outside experience, but it’s definitely hard because I love being here and I love being with the guys,” Wells said. “I do think it’s going to benefit me a lot being able to go and play with such a great team.”
Year 3 has to be the breakout the Yankees have been waiting for
The Yankees’ patience with Wells has been built on a foundation that is about to shift. For two seasons, his elite framing gave the team cover to wait for the bat. In 2026, that cover is gone. What remains is a catcher who hits for real power, struggles badly against breaking balls and pitches outside the zone, and needs to improve his approach simply to be a league-average offensive player.
His communication skills with pitchers, the quality that impressed Boone before Wells even threw on a big league jersey, remain his strongest non-statistical asset. Wells described it as his foundation from the start.
“The communication, the presence and understanding the game behind the plate was always what I was best at,” he said.
That matters. But it does not show up in a box score. The Yankees need Wells to show up there too. He spent two years proving scouts wrong about his glove. Now the challenge is proving himself right about the bat. The window to do it has never been narrower.
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