Yankees Hot Corner – Giancarlo Stanton is consistently inconsistent

It’s about a quarter of the way through the 2018 season and Giancarlo Stanton is off to an okay start.  He hasn’t been great, striking out at an alarming pace and popping up in clutch moments, but he’s also carried the Yankees in a few games.

Stanton was 4-for-4 on Sunday with a home run and three RBI.  He was the catalyst in the Yankees’ 6-2 win over the Oakland Athletics and seems to be coming out of what feels like a season long slump.  Stanton looks to be much more comfortable in pinstripes than he was at the beginning of the season.  He looked to have put immense pressure on himself at the beginning of the season, and subsequently was absolutely terrible.

So far this season Stanton is batting .252 with 10 home runs and 26 RBI.  His average could be higher, but he’s never been Rod Carew so it’s not too surprising.  In comparison, according to Katie Sharp, he was batting .253 with 11 home runs and 27 RBI at this time last season.  Last season, he won NL MVP with a final stat line of .281, 59 HRs and 132 RBI.  He was on a terrible team and still manage to drive in 132 runs.  That’s amazing.

Stanton is one of four Yankees to have 10 home runs in 40 games, a feat that hasn’t been accomplished since the 2003 Texas Rangers.  He is probably the fourth best hitter in the Yankees’ lineup right now and just having him in the middle of the lineup helps the rest of the team.  He takes plenty of pitches from opposing pitchers, still draws plenty of walks, and hits moonshot home runs.  He may not be perfect but he’s still a dynamic player.

Stanton is consistently inconsistent for a few reasons;  He seems to carry the Yankees team for games at a time and then have an 0-for-4 night with three strikeouts.  He seems to be a gazelle in the field some nights and looks like a little leaguer in left field other nights.  Some games he’s locked in and some games he’s falling over himself swinging at balls in the dirt.  You know what you’re going to get from Giancarlo Stanton, but it’s always an adventure.

To all Yankee fans, the only thing I can say is that Stanton will be more consistent by the end of the season.  Expectations were sky high because he was the NL MVP, but he was also on an island in Miami where he was the man and there was essentially no pressure to perform.  Playing in front of 5,000 fans and being 15 games out of first place is a far cry from playing meaningful games in the Bronx.

Stanton has learned to embrace the boos and does not take it personal.  He even stated so in a recent interview, where he was shocked to see that Yankees fans are so involved in every pitch.  I’m sure he’s happy that he plays in front of a full house almost every game and is here for one reason;  To bring home a 28th World Series championship for the Yankees.

Will Stanton have a repeat MVP season?  Probably not, but he doesn’t need to.  The beauty of the Yankees is that they’re so deep that every night it seems like there’s a different hero.  He was the hero in Houston where he went 3-for-4 with two HRs and accounted for every run scored.  He was the hero on Sunday where he scored three of the six runs.  However, as stated before he doesn’t need to be the guy every night.  He just has to go out, take pitches, and play the kind of team game the Yankees like to play.  The rest will fall into place, and so will the consistency of Giancarlo Stanton.