SWISHER'S WORLD

In April, Yankees made a lot of fans happy by signing Nick Swisher to a minor league deal. It was cheap, and would give us a little extra coverage at first, and a solid bat. It's a move that made sense for the team. But it's inching closer to June, and there has been no sign of Swisher in the Bronx yet.

There are a few things we know about the Swisher deal. He was signed to the minor leagues, with an opt-out date of June 15th, if he was still in Triple-A. Swish had a less that appealing last two seasons. After having arthroscopic surgery on both knees in 2014, 2015 also seemed to plague him with injuries. He finished the season only playing 76 games, and the Braves released him in March, despite owing him $15 million for the season. 

Swish started strong in the minors. In April, YESNetwork.com reported that after 10 games with the RailRiders, Swish held the second highest batting average on the team at .368. That has since changed, however. It seems his hot streak has cooled off a bit. Swish is now batting .260, with 32 hits, 13 RBI's and 4 homers.

So what does this mean? Well, not much really. Remember the purpose of the signing was to have a backup at first base. Mark Teixeira is now in a slump, batting .195 with just 2 RBI's and no homers in May, and it's likely due to an injury. Or at least that is what I suspect. He now has to have an MRI for a neck injury and meet with team doctors.

This seems like the perfect opening to call up Swish, but Joe Girardi's options aren't limited and I see Dustin Ackley who is hitting .212 in May, manning the position instead. Of course, we'll have to wait on the findings from the MRI to be able to know for certain if the Yankees will have to call someone up or not.

(Photo Credit: Stephen D. Cannerelli)

With the Opt-out date only three weeks away, and Swish's bat fizzling out after a strong first few at-bats, I don't really see a scenario where the Yankees will call him up. It seems much more likely that Ackley would take over in in case of an absent Teixeira. They still have Ronald Torreyes at their disposal as well, although that would probably be a last ditch effort on their parts.

Because I am a biased Swisher fan, I'd like to say that he'd get the call-up, but realistically it's highly unlikely. The deal made sense for us, and for Swish at the time. We'd get insurance at first, and Swish could get one more shot at the majors, but the pieces just don't seem to be coming together like that for us. 

--Erica Morales BYB Senior Writer 
Twitter: @e_morales1804





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