Giancarlo

Stanton

Rice steps into the heart of New York’s loaded lineup behind Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger following last year’s 26-homer breakthrough campaign. The 27-year-old slugger’s realistic 30-homer ceiling makes him an upper-echelon fantasy catcher heading into the regular season. Here’s the full lineup set to face Giants ace Logan Webb at Oracle Park in primetime: Trent Grisham (CF), Judge (RF), Bellinger (LF), Rice (1B), Giancarlo Stanton (DH), Jazz Chisholm Jr. (2B), José Caballero (SS), Ryan McMahon (3B) and Austin Wells (C).

Stanton’s homer off Yennier Cano was hit 340 feet to right and would have left just two MLB ballparks, but that was just making things even. In his prior at-bat, Stanton crushed a ball 416 feet to center off Dean Kremer. Statcast said it would have been a homer in 23 ballparks, but it was a flyout today.

The hit, a fourth-inning single, didn’t actually factor into the run scoring. Neither did Stanton’s 383-foot lineout in the sixth, that would have been a homer in five MLB ballparks, or his 392-foot flyout in the eighth, which was a homer in eight parks. The lone run actually came earlier in the eighth after two walks and a double steal that resulted in a throwing error, allowing the go-ahead run to score. Stanton is now 5-for-20 with three homers this spring.

Stanton’s two homers traveled a combined 826 feet, according to Statcast. The 36-year-old veteran slugger’s fantasy appeal is strictly limited to deeper mixed leagues given his well-documented injury history and power plus counting stats profile. He’s still capable of unleashing the occasional gargantuan homer but he hasn’t topped 115 games in a half-decade, which limits his realistic full-season projection to somewhere in the 25-30 range.

Stanton did his damage off of Jose Urquidy leading off the second inning, clobbering an 0-1 cutter for a 424-foot (109.5 mph EV) solo shot to open the scoring in the ballgame. The 36-year-old slugger also singled in the contest, finishing the night 2-for-3. For the spring, he’s hitting .250 (2-for-8) through his first three games.

Stanton is still working through his tennis elbow injury — something that is going to likely be an issue for the rest of his career — but it’s encouraging to see him in the lineup relatively early in the Grapefruit League. When healthy, Stanton still offers significant power production potential, but he’s essentially a lock to miss significant time on the injured list at this stage.

“I can’t open a bottle,” Stanton said. “I can’t open a bag of chips … a bag of anything. That’s the way it is.” He plans to continue to play through the pain. Obviously, as he’s played just 582 of 1,032 Yankees regular season games since 2019, fantasy managers know what they are getting into at this point. Stanton will almost certainly continue to miss plenty of time this year, even though he has said he wants to play a full season.

Yankees manager Aaron Boone will not make any changes with New York facing Blue Jays rookie sensation Trey Yesavage following a lopsided series-opening defeat earlier this weekend. Here’s the full lineup: Trent Grisham (CF), Judge (RF), Cody Bellinger (LF), Ben Rice (1B), Giancarlo Stanton (DH), Jazz Chisholm Jr. (3B), Ryan McMahon (3B), Anthony Volpe (SS) and Austin Wells (C).

Like clockwork, Stanton is red-hot just in time for the postseason. He smacked his first home run to put his Yankees on top in the first inning and then demolished a 451 foot no-doubter two frames later. On a per at-bat basis, he’s been one of the best hitters in baseball season with a .926 OPS and 23 long balls in just 242 AB. That’s better than a 50-homer pace for the 35-year-old slugger who still clearly has a lot left in the tank.

Stanton came up with the bases loaded in the fifth inning and hit a ground ball past the third baseman. The 35-year-old DH has 10 RBI over his last seven games. Stanton is hitting .264 with a .901 OPS and 59 RBI this year.