Yankees face a stark warning in FanGraphs’ 2024 forecast

Friday July 28, 2023

For the Yankees, the 2023 season has so far been one of the worst in their franchise history. FanGraphs projects that their 2024 season even may not be better and the Yankees would face further offensive regressions.

FanGraphs released a list of the biggest offensive regressions expected in 2024. They used their projection system to evaluate players’ talent before the 2023 season and compared it to how they’re performing now, just after the All-Star break. This helps them predict which players might not perform as well in the future and their forecast covers the Yankees’ offensive spearheads.

The not-so-good news is that FanGraphs predicts Aaron Judge, DJ LeMahieu, and Giancarlo Stanton will face significant declines in their performances in 2024. And the analysis they provided includes some concerning warnings that these performance drops are not even the Yankees’ main problem. It means that not only are some of their top players getting worse, but there are even more significant issues in other parts of the team. Oh boy, that’s not the best reminder to hear.

Setback projected for Yankees slugger Aaron Judge

According to these projections, Aaron Judge is third on this list, but it’s not a bad thing. FanGraphs expects him to do well next season even after his toe injury. They thought he might achieve a score of 7.2 in 2024 before the 2023 season began, but now they predict he’ll get a score of 5.8. The experts believe Aaron Judge will still be a good player, but they’re not sure if the Yankees slugger will play the entire year or perform as amazingly as he did in 2022.

But there’s something to consider – in 2023, Aaron Judge was playing really well and seemed to be getting back to his previous performance levels. Unfortunately, he collided with the right-field wall at Dodger Stadium, which affected him. Despite that, there’s a chance that the Yankees slugger might continue to perform better than people expect for the next two or three years. Yet if he fails to, he’ll still be a pretty good player.

Anthony Rizzo and Aaron Judge are in a somber mood after German allowed 10-0 lead to the Mariners against at the Yankees on June 22, 2023.

Will there be an overall Yankees regression?

Among the players facing bigger performance drops, DJ LeMahieu’s projected stats are decreasing significantly to 2.4 fWAR, and Giancarlo Stanton’s are also expected to fall from 2.1 to 1.1. With no improvement in defense, this could be a real problem for the Yankees. They might be better off having Randal Grichuk, who costs $25 million less, in their lineup instead.

Yankees outfielders Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Judge, and Harrison Bader — Yankees/FB

Next year, Yankee fans might have to face some disappointing things. Despite Aaron Judge being a standout player and DJ LeMahieu being a decent regular player, the real problem is the high cost of keeping LeMahieu and Giancarlo Stanton on the team, and they will likely stay. On top of that, there are other concerns like Anthony Rizzo’s performance dropping, Harrison Bader becoming a free agent, Carlos Rodon’s injury, Luis Severino probably leaving the team, Nestor Cortes Jr. and Jose Trevino’s decline in performance, and Anthony Volpe’s inconsistent progress. All of these factors make it really hard to predict how well the Yankees will do next year.

FanGraphs’ predictions for the Yankees are not very positive. It’s not exactly reassuring but with new young blood from their farm system, a turnaround can’t be ruled out.

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