ESPN: Gold Glove Infielder Signed by the Yankees for $49 Million to Replace Torres.
After he was selected as an American League All-Star and finished third in the Rookie of the Year voting following his 2018 debut, the New York Yankees lost trust in the second baseman who had been their mainstay. Naturally, that second baseman was Gleyber Torres, a native of Caracas, Venezuela, who played with the Yankees for seven years before becoming a free agent without even receiving an offer from New York that would have kept him there.
Shortly after Christmas, Torres signed a one-year, $15 million contract with the Detroit Tigers. He is therefore ready. What about his old squad, though? The Yankees still don’t seem to have a strategy to replace Torres in the middle infield with 33 days left before the start of the live spring training competition.
Gavin Lux, a second baseman who played for the 2024 Los Angeles Dodgers, who in October denied the Bronx Bombers their 28th World Series championship, piqued the Yankees’ interest. However, Lux was transferred to the Cincinnati Reds by the defending champs.
According to reports, the reigning AL champions also had discussions with Brendan Rodgers, a former Colorado Rockies Gold Glove infielder who went free when Colorado refused to extend his contract and instead gave him a third year of arbitration eligibility. However, such discussions seem to have been fruitless.
Korean Imports Will Arrive in the Bronx, Per New Prediction
However, according to a recent Fox Sports projection, the Yankees might sign another free agent who would cost more than Lux or Rodgers but less than Torres. In contrast to the $15 million Torres demanded from Detrot, the estimated price tag in this instance, according to the sports business website Spotrac, would be almost $49 million over four seasons, or an average yearly compensation of nearly $12.3 million. Ha-Seong Kim, a former second baseman for the San Diego Padres, is the player.
Kim can use his astute baserunning to help the Bronx Bombers, who need more players who can get on base and score runs. Additionally, if he bats with Aaron Judge, his superb plate discipline (18.6 percent chase rate in the 98th percentile, per Baseball Savant) would be extremely beneficial, according to Fox Sports MLB analyst Deesha Thosar. “The Yankees need a dynamic multi-talented Gold Glover like Kim who can subtly improve their offensive output; they don’t need any more gaudy free-agent additions right now.”
In 2023, while playing second base for San Diego, Kim was awarded a Gold Glove. Before joining the Padres in 2021, the South Korean import spent seven seasons with the Kiwoon Heroes, a Seoul-based Korean Baseball Organization team best known during Kim’s first five seasons as the Nexen Heroes. Having spent four seasons with the Padres and 94 games with the Heroes at third base, he can also fill in there.
Last year, Kim outperformed Torres as a player.
For the most of the offseason, the writers of Bleeding Yankee Blue, the top Yankees fan site, have been on the Korean infielder’s bandwagon and have also projected that Kim will join the Yankees.
On Friday, they wrote, “What are we waiting for?” “We at Bleeding Yankee Blue have been raising our ‘Ha-Seong Kim’ flags since early December, while everyone else is still scratching their heads over which free agent infielder the Yankees might sign.”
Kim also has a positive comparison to Torres. His 2024 Wins Above Replacement of 2.6 was higher than Torres’, who played 33 more games than Kim but only managed to accumulate 1.8. Kim outperformed Torres last season by a margin of 3.5 to 1.9 per 162 games, which means that Kim would be a substantial upgrade at a cheaper cost.
