Is it possible that Yankees fans expressed too much caution in the case of Giancarlo Stanton this offseason? SNY’s Andy Martino seems to think so, deeming any 2025 season obituaries premature in a Thursday mailbag before the opener.
Stanton arrived at spring training nursing “severe” issues in both elbows, stemming from tendinitis that he reportedly dealt with throughout the 2024 season. He heroically capped that campaign with a flourish, slamming a game-winning homer in the ALDS, four more blasts in the team’s ALCS victory over Cleveland, and a pair in the World Series (including a Game 1 shot that could’ve set the tone, if not for some defensive malfeasance).
The Yankees need Stanton’s one-of-a-kind slug back in order to approximate the best version of themselves, but if we’ve learned anything from harboring Stanton on the roster since 2018, it’s not to push it. Aaron Judge himself noted earlier in camp that having Stanton at his best by midseason would be a tremendous boost. Yankee fans, conditioned to expect the worst, thought even that assessment was too optimistic.
Stanton missed the first Opening Day of his career on Thursday, but he’s been placed on the 10-Day Injured List, rather than the more severe 60-Day version. According to SNY’s Andy Martino, Stanton’s use of “severe” may have scared fans off the scent, but in reality, he’s not in danger of missing the season or anything close to it (knock on all the wood in the world).
In Yankee mailbag, Giancarlo Stanton optimism. And a weird internet bully has a tiresome comment about Juan Soto. https://t.co/CANEXysEKw
— Andy Martino (@martinonyc) March 27, 2025
Yankees slugger Giancarlo Stanton could return before too long, according to SNY’s Andy Martino
Martino’s take on Stanton’s absence, guided by Yankees sources, might be the most optimistic we’ve heard yet: “The organization has long known Stanton as a player who does not sugarcoat injuries or provide overly optimistic prognoses. He’ll be out a while, don’t get me wrong. But the expectation is that he’ll be back with more than enough time to provide his typical late-season and October heroics.”
Even more incredible? The Yankees confirmed ahead of Thursday’s game that, while no timeline exists for Stanton’s return, he’s at least begun swinging a bat.
Ben Rice will step in to begin the season, and ideally step up as the campaign builds, putting his 10 additional pounds of heft and muscle to good use. Stanton’s October renaissance masked the reality of his decline (and Yankee fans are forever thankful for that). Maybe the best we can hope for, moving forward, is for all his talent to be distilled into shorter stretches, making his dominance more valuable? There certainly are worse fates than that.
