Just before reaching Beltran’s spot, you’ll find the locker belonging to Aaron Judge, perhaps the Yankees’ best position player prospect. Beltran asked to have Judge nearby because he wants to guide the player who most believe will succeed him in a year as the Yanks’ right fielder.
“He’s a guy, the future of this organization, and I feel like I’ll help him,” Beltran said Monday after a pre-camp workout at the Yankees’ minor-league complex. “When I was growing up and in the big leagues the first year, I had some veteran guys who took care of me, helped me, along the way.
I never really figured Carlos Beltran for the mentoring type so this is nice to hear. I remember that drill he invented with the Mets where he'd stand in front of a pitching machine and have tennis balls shot at him at like 130mph with numbers written on them and then he'd have to call them out. Hopefully Judge will master that by April and cutdown on his 32% K rate in Scranton last year. Overall it's nice to hear that in what may be Beltran's last major league season he's taking the time out to mentor a budding star and isn't just mailing it in.
As for Judge, I don't know what his prospects are for this season. I feel like there's like a 50-50 shot he makes the club at some point. The first thing that's going to need to happen is he's going to have to adjust to AAA pitching. If he can get his slash-line up to the level it was at in Trenton there's a chance that when he spot opens up (most likely due to injury to either Ellsbury, Beltran or Gardner) he could get the call but I don't think they'd bring him up just for depth. If Aaron Hicks or Dustin Ackley prove that they can handle a more consistent role then Judge may be out of luck. If not he may be up sooner than we thought but ultimately it's going to fall on his shoulders. He's going to have to get better.
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