Unconventional Leadoff Approach Working For The New York Yankees So Far

New York Yankees' Ben Rice is greeted in the dugout after scoring a run on a single hit by Cody ... More Bellinger in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants Saturday, April 12, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Pamela Smith)
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In this day and age, teams are often fond of talking about looking under the hood into some of the peripheral numbers such as the advanced statistics anyone can access and their own internal metrics. It is a way to say a low batting average is a product of bad luck and the player in question is still producing good at-bats and capable of turning the bad luck into results.
And in the case of Ben Rice, the exit velocity was amongst the things the Yankees were gushing about in spring training when he made and won his case to be the designated hitter on a virtually everyday basis until the day Giancarlo Stanton returns from injuries to both elbows.
In a disjointed start to a season defined by how the Yankees work around Gerrit Cole eventually rehabbing from Tommy John surgery on his elbow and how the some of their young players capitalize on opportunities, Rice’s production ranks among the highlights of the early going where the Yankees have played 10 times with game-time temperatures 50 times or under.
He also is part of unconventional leadoff arrangement for the Yankees, who are batting speed guys Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Anthony Volpe in the middle of the lineup behind Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger. Rice has gotten five turns in the leadoff spot, homered twice and been on base each time and is part of a trio of Austin Wells and Paul Goldschmidt hitting well over .300 so far and both of those players own leadoff homers.
The Yankees saw him homer again Saturday, an inning after a two-strike single set up a much-needed five-run inning against the red-hot San Francisco Giants. The Yankees looked like the team who hit 22 homers in their first six home games after a week of frigid bats and temperatures.