Yankees activate Harrison Bader off IL, insert OF into Tuesday's lineup

The Yankees finally caught a good break. The parade of players to the 10-day injured list didn’t continue on Tuesday. Instead, the club actually got someone back.

Centerfielder Harrison Bader was activated in the morning and written into the No. 5 spot in the batting order for the Yankees' game against Cleveland at Yankee Stadium on Tuesday night. Bader had been on the IL for the entire season due to a left oblique strain.

“I'm just really excited to be back and I'm just there's always a job to be done so I'm excited to get back in the lineup and just start playing some baseball and helping these guys win,” Bader said.

“As long as I am healthy, I can do a lot of things to help this team win,” he added.

Bader comes off a minor-league rehab assignment that began April 21 with Double-A Somerset and proceeded to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes Barre. At the plate, he was a meager 3-for-25 for the two teams. However, that doesn’t mean he might not be a lift for the listing Yankees offense that scored six runs in the four-game losing streak it brought into the game.

Bader, remember, provided an unanticipated spark to the Yankees in the 2022 postseason after he was acquired from the Cardinals in a trade deadline deal for lefthander Jordan Montgomery. Bader was out with plantar fasciitis at the time of the deal, but returned to play 14 regular-season games. He batted .300 with five home runs and six RBIs in nine playoff games against Cleveland and Houston.

Boone said that he was aware that Bader hadn’t had much success during the rehab assignment but added “by all accounts, he is hitting the ball hard.”

“Especially when you're talking about established big league players, maybe . . . they're down there kind of really checking boxes (and) working on different things,” Boone said. “I know Harrison early on talked about wanting to see different pitches and how do you move through it with coming back from the injury.

“I think you see that with established pitchers sometimes and established hitters, where they're going to have the courage and the freedom and the confidence to kind of work on the things that they want to do (on rehab assignments).”

The addition of Bader will certainly help the Yankees in the field as he won a Gold Glove in 2021 and is considered an elite centerfielder. In the club’s first 30 games, the Yankees started either Aaron Hicks or repurposed infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa in 14 of them. While Kiner-Falefa acquitted himself well, Bader is something entirely different as an outfielder.

Bader’s return could be considered ahead of schedule. Boone mentioned Monday that he’d played in back-to-back games and that there was some consideration before bringing him back as to whether the Yankees wanted to see him do it once more at the minor-league level. However, he didn’t sound like there would be any restrictions.

Boone said that with the Yankees have Thursday off and with a plan to play Bader in two of three games in the weekend series at first-place Tampa Bay, there were no concerns.

The biggest thing in the decision to activate Bader was that he had confidence that he was ready.

“It's just like getting over those final hurdles, which are almost mental hurdles, when you're coming back,” Boone said. “Can I really shut things down? Or make that awkward, unexpected move and feel good about it? And I think from a confidence standpoint, he's been there now for several days.”

By Roger Rubin

roger.rubin@newsday.com@rogrubin

Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.