MOOSIC, Pa. — The Yankees’ most expensive infield question is not being answered in the Bronx. It is being answered 120 miles away, in a minor league ballpark where a former can’t-miss prospect keeps hitting baseballs a very long way.
Jazz Chisholm Jr. arrived in 2026 talking about a 50-50 season. He is instead limping toward free agency in the middle of the worst full year of his career, hitting in the low .200s with an OPS that would embarrass the 30-30 version of himself from a season ago. He is playing on a one-year, $10.2 million contract, and the Yankees have not opened extension talks. When the season ends, so could his time in New York.
That backdrop has quietly turned a Triple-A infielder into one of the more interesting names in the Yankees’ pipeline. The organization needs to know whether it has a cost-controlled, right-handed answer waiting in case Chisholm walks, or in case the club decides his down year is not a fluke. The market for star second basemen is thin, and the Yankees have been open that they want to get less left-handed.
So the audition happening at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre carries more weight than a typical September farm report. The RailRiders have been one of the most productive lineups in the minors, stocked with names the Yankees care about. One bat in that group has forced its way into the conversation with a stretch of raw power that is hard to ignore.
A cost-controlled bat launching baseballs at Triple-A
That bat belongs to Marco Luciano. The 24-year-old right-handed hitter, once the top prospect in the San Francisco Giants system and a top-100 name in all of baseball, has spent the past several weeks punishing Triple-A pitching for the RailRiders and putting his power on full display down the stretch.
Luciano’s story is one of near-misses. He was a highly touted teenager who never translated the hype into major league production, in part because he could not stick at shortstop. He bounced through three waiver claims last offseason, from the Giants to the Pirates to the Orioles, before the Yankees claimed him in January and outrighted him to Triple-A. He is out of prospect shine but very much in the prime of his athletic life.
The Yankees are getting the version they hoped for. Promoted to Triple-A on May 8 and slotted near the top of manager Shelley Duncan’s order, Luciano has been a middle-of-the-lineup force. By late August he had reached 23 home runs across Double-A and Triple-A on the year, matching his career high, with three of them coming in a single series against Worcester. He entered the final week of the RailRiders’ season riding hot, driving in runs in bunches and leading the team in average over a five-game stretch.
Under-the-hood trend that matters more than homers
Here is the part of Luciano’s surge that should interest the Yankees more than any single blast. The knock on him has always been swing-and-miss, the same flaw that stranded him in the Giants system. That is the number quietly moving in the right direction.
His whiff rate has been trending down while his in-zone contact rate has climbed, a combination that suggests the approach is maturing rather than the results simply being loud. A right-handed hitter who starts making more contact inside the strike zone while keeping his elite exit velocity is a very different prospect than one who sells out for power and lives with the strikeouts. For a Yankees lineup that has leaned heavily left-handed, a righty bat trending that way is exactly the profile the front office has said it covets.
The versatility strengthens the case. Luciano has logged time at shortstop, second base and left field, giving the Yankees a defender who can slide into the infield mix rather than a bat with no home. That flexibility is what makes the Chisholm comparison practical instead of theoretical.
Why timing lines up with Yankees’ infield crossroads
The Yankees are already improvising in the infield at the big league level. Chisholm has been benched against left-handed starters in favor of Amed Rosario. Ryan McMahon missed time with a thumb injury. Jose Caballero has bounced between shortstop and second base. George Lombard Jr. has dealt with a knee issue. The everyday alignment has been anything but settled.
Chisholm’s contract situation sits underneath all of it. General manager Brian Cashman has said he is open to a conversation about value but has not engaged Chisholm’s representatives, and Cashman historically lets his players reach the open market. Chisholm has said he does not want to leave New York, yet a down platform year makes the math harder for both sides. Outside projections have already floated him landing elsewhere in free agency.
That uncertainty is the whole reason Luciano’s September matters. If Chisholm departs, the Yankees will need internal, affordable options to fill the void while they spend their money elsewhere. A controllable right-handed bat with power and infield flexibility is precisely the kind of piece that lets a team absorb the loss of a star without overpaying to replace him.
None of this guarantees Luciano is the answer. He has a major league track record that is thin and unflattering, with a .217 average and a sub-.600 OPS in his limited big league time. Triple-A dominance has humbled plenty of prospects who could not carry it to the Bronx. The Yankees have seen this movie before with bat-first infielders who raked in Moosic and stalled under brighter lights.
A crowded RailRiders roster and a decision that waits
Luciano is not the only intriguing bat on the RailRiders. The roster has featured Jasson Dominguez, Anthony Volpe on assignment, Lombard Jr., and, most recently, veteran outfielder Jarred Kelenic, who signed with the organization and reported to Scranton. It is a logjam of names the Yankees are evaluating all at once, and Luciano has stood out inside it.
For now, he remains a Triple-A player whose case is built on production the Yankees can measure but have not yet tested at the highest level. The RailRiders are closing out their season, and roster expansion has opened the door for the Yankees to look at depth pieces in September. Whether Luciano earns a look this month or becomes a spring storyline, his timing could hardly be better.
The Yankees will make their real decision on Chisholm this winter, weighing a fading contract year against the price of a long-term deal. The player forcing his way into that conversation from the minor leagues is a former top prospect who, at 24, may finally be figuring it out. The Yankees are watching closely, and the next month will tell them more about what they already have.
What do you think? Leave your comment below.
First, this is the last week of A Ball. SWB has another 2 weeks. It’s only been this way since 2021.
Both Luciano & Kelenic can declare for free agency at the end of the season. The question that needs to be asked is: do they put him on the 40, or re-sign him to a minor league deal with an invite to Spring Training (whenever that will be)?