Yankee fans, are we happy today? Not really. After a scorching 7-1 start, the Yankees hit a small rough patch, going 1-3 over their past four games and capping the homestand with a 1-0 loss to the Athletics on Thursday in which they managed just one hit. Here are six thoughts from a less-than-riveting six-game homestand.

Anthony Volpe’s Job May Be Safer Than We Thought

José Caballero was handed a golden opportunity early this season to potentially take the shortstop position from Anthony Volpe, who is recovering from off-season shoulder surgery. He hasn’t made the most of it. In 40 plate appearances, Caballero is slashing .135/.200/.162 with a wRC+ of 10, going 5-for-37 over the past six games while also looking shakier on defense than expected. His struggles opened the door for Amed Rosario, who wasted no time making an impression, practically winning Tuesday night’s game against the Athletics single-handedly.

Nobody expected to be missing Anthony Volpe 12 games into the season. Here we are.

Ryan McMahon Can’t Be This Bad, Right?

If you thought Caballero was struggling, meet Ryan McMahon. The Yankees’ 2025 trade deadline acquisition has been equally dismal to start the year, finishing the homestand 2-for-29 and slashing .069/.250/.069 with a 17 wRC+. Defense alone can’t carry a third baseman, and while McMahon was never expected to be a lineup centerpiece, he’s been an absolute zero so far, much like most of the Yankees’ bottom-of-the-order. He’ll likely settle into his usual 85-90 wRC+ self by year’s end, but right now it’s rough.

Should We Be Worried About Bednar?

David Bednar’s velocity is down, and it’s worth watching. His average fastball sits at 95.6 mph this season, compared to 97.1 mph last year. Hitters are taking advantage, batting .375 against it with a .494 wOBA. Bednar attributes the dip to the cold weather the Yankees have been playing in, which is plausible, but it’s a check engine light worth monitoring as conditions warm up.

Jazz and Trent‘s Struggles are Halfway Concerning

The Yankee offense has been carried by Ben Rice, Cody Bellinger, Giancarlo Stanton, and Aaron Judge, and it’s easy to pin the team’s struggles on the bottom of the order: Wells, Caballero, McMahon. But the hitters sandwiching the lineup’s core have been quiet too.

Trent Grisham is less concerning than his surface stats suggest. He carries a .387 xwOBA and a 61% hard-hit rate with a 23% walk rate. The underlying numbers are genuinely good. Baseball is a cruel sport: without context, a .162 average and 95 wRC+ looks like proof the Qualifying Offer was a mistake.

Jazz Chisholm is a different story. His xwOBA sits at .233, and his batted-ball and plate discipline metrics are poor across the board. That said, the cold weather argument holds some water, the guy is from the Bahamas after all. Chisholm runs hot and cold by nature, and if the Yankees are going to sustain success, he’s the X-factor. The ceiling is real, it just needs to show up.

Yankee Stadium Needs to Figure It Out

This is an NYY Takes special because we love to complain about the stadium but my goodness the place is still a joke from a customer experience perspective. The concourses are jam-packed, the line for anything is laughably long, and it doesn’t seem like they have nearly enough staff to handle the amount of people who are at these games. For a stadium so expensive, the lackluster service is a slap in the face to fans, and the whole experience can skew towards feeling like a scam (maybe it is).

Also – I tried giving Uber Eats a test drive given the long lines, the order was cancelled after 10 minutes. Fun!

The ABS System is… Fine?

Got my first taste of the ABS system in person and I guess it’s fine. It provides some funny moments when the hitter is just dead wrong (ask Ben Rice), but it does disrupt the flow of the game at times. I don’t hate it, I don’t love it. Worth noting that a decent amount of fans at the game seemed genuinely confused by it, whether that was not knowing how many challenges each team gets or just being surprised it existed at all. We’re barreling closer and closer to check swings being reviewable at the major league level. That may be a bridge too far.