Boo Aaron Hicks all you want; he's the last player the Yankees want to see
Aaron Hicks of the Orioles bats during the second inning against the Yankees at Yankee Stadium on Monday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
The problem with kicking somebody to the curb, as the Yankees did with Aaron Hicks, is that they can wind up on the next block.
Or in Hicks’ case, the same division. On the second-place Orioles, with a three-game edge (and the top wild-card spot) even after Monday night’s 6-3 loss to the Yankees.
That’s not how these things are supposed to pan out. Ideally, DFA’d players go resurrect their flailing careers far, far away, preferably on the West Coast and for some bottom-feeder — the A’s, for instance.
Now, after getting booed out of the Bronx and stripped of his pinstripes, Hicks has the potential to be the Yankees’ worst nightmare. Don’t forget, whatever he does to help the Orioles — a team essentially on the same “Survivor” island as his former club — Hal Steinbrenner is picking up the $27 million tab.
Hicks is due what’s left from the original seven-year, $70 million deal that runs through 2025, and the Orioles get what appears to be a switch-hitting, bona fide impact outfielder for the prorated portion of MLB’s minimum $720,000 salary (the Yankees are off the hook for that small fraction).
On Monday, with Hicks starting in leftfield, the sellout crowd at Yankee Stadium showered him with loud boos during each at-bat. The anti-Hicks vitriol red-lined in the middle of the second inning when the centerfield screen showed a tribute video — his best moments in a Yankees uniform — and the fans booed that, too. He received exuberant cheers for his pop-up, strikeout and groundout.
In the eighth, however, Hicks had a moment. His two-out single again triggered boos but also sent fans scurrying for cover when storm clouds dumped rain on the Stadium, almost on cue the instant Hicks made contact.
The Yankees knew Hicks was going to wind up somewhere when they cut him loose May 20 — two days after his only three-hit game of the season, when he helped spur a 4-2 victory in Toronto. But it was reasonable to question whether or not Hicks would respond to a change in scenery, considering how lost he looked in pinstripes.
You can’t say the Yankees whiffed on this one. Hicks couldn’t stay in the Bronx, not hitting .188 with one homer and a .524 OPS, a dismal stat line exacerbated by the boos he heard any time he approached the batter’s box. But just as the Orioles were sweating the temporary loss of centerfielder Cedric Mullins, the Yankees unknowingly gifted their AL East rival the perfect reclamation project.
Hicks was granted a second chance at the age of 33, and his revival was stunning in its swiftness. He slugged four homers in his first 20 games, hitting .307 with a .983 OPS. Though he has cooled some since and Mullins has returned, the Orioles continue to rely on Hicks for the corner outfield spots and DH duty. If this hasn’t been a perfect match, it’s the next-best thing.
As Jordan Montgomery said after last year’s trade to St. Louis, “The pinstripes are heavy.”
Hicks is benefiting from the lightness now, and when I asked him Monday if during his lowest points in the Bronx he ever doubted this bounce-back could happen, he shook his head.
“No,” he said. “I just think opportunities and injuries and stuff like that just kind of happened and I went down a struggling road which I really couldn’t get myself out of it. Then I felt like when I started to have success, I really wasn’t given an opportunity. Now that I’m over here, I’m getting a lot of opportunities and I’ve been trying to make the most of it.”
The Yankees had moved on long before actually jettisoning Hicks, shifting their focus to Triple-A Scranton options such as Oswaldo Cabrera, Jake Bauers and Billy McKinney.This season figured to be his final audition, and when Cabrera beat him out in spring training for the leftfield job, the clock was ticking. This decision was based on lengthy trends of declining performance, not just months.
“Obviously, the last couple of years, he was one of those guys that got in the crosshairs a little bit,” Aaron Boone said. “And a lot of it was not his own doing. He had some injuries that derailed him, cost him some time, and was unable to find that consistency. But he did a lot of really good things here too.”
A number of those things were jeered maliciously during the tribute video, but Hicks harbors no animosity toward the Yankees. Deep down, he realized it was time to go, but he never asked for a trade or his release.
Hicks said he texted Aaron Judge after his toe injury, making sure he was OK. He’s also kept in touch with Willie Calhoun, one of his replacements. “When you change teams, you want your friends to do well,” he said.
Maybe. But Hicks is too close for comfort now, within striking distance of his former team, capable of doing real damage to the Yankees. On their dime, too.
David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.
