The Yankees announced a series of camp cuts today, most notably optioning outfielder Jasson Domínguez to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. Relievers Kervin Castro and Yerry De los Santos were also optioned out.
Domínguez opening the season in the minors has been the expectation since camp began. The Yankees retained Cody Bellinger and Trent Grisham in free agency. Bellinger signed a five-year deal, while Grisham accepted a qualifying offer. They’re alongside Aaron Judge in what is probably the best outfield in the sport. Giancarlo Stanton is healthy and opening the season at designated hitter, while the Yanks will run a Ben Rice/Paul Goldschmidt platoon at first base.
There simply wasn’t a path to regular playing time for Domínguez. The Yankees are looking for a right-handed bench bat who can platoon with Grisham. Bellinger will primarily play the corners against righty pitching but can slide to center field in Grisham’s place against southpaws.
The switch-hitting Domínguez isn’t suited for that role. He’s much better from the left side, for one, and it’s hardly ideal for his development to work as a short-side platoon bat. Non-roster invitee Randal Grichuk seems the favorite for the last bench spot based on his track record against lefty pitching, even if he hasn’t hit in a minuscule spring sample.
The demotion certainly isn’t in response to Domínguez’s camp performance. He did all he could to try to win a job, batting .325 with three homers and two doubles in 45 plate appearances. He’ll get everyday playing time in Triple-A and will very likely be the first one up if Stanton or any of the regular outfielders suffers an injury.
Spencer Jones is the only other outfielder on the 40-man roster. He’s a good prospect with monster power but struck out at a 35% clip in the minors last season. Domínguez was a league average hitter in the big leagues (.257/.331/.388 over 429 plate appearances) and is a little more than two years younger.
It remains to be seen whether the move will have meaningful service time implications. Domínguez has one year and 130 days of MLB time. He only needs to be on the big league roster for 42 days this year to surpass the two-year threshold and remain on track for free agency after the 2030 season. It seems likely he’ll get there given Stanton’s injury history, in particular.
There may be a less impactful but more immediate service implication, however. If he logged a full service year this season, Domínguez would have been right on the border of the usual Super Two cutoff for early arbitration next winter. Unless he’s recalled by the middle of April, he’s unlikely to have enough time to qualify as a Super Two. That’d keep his 2027 salary close to the league minimum. This will be Domínguez’s second of three option seasons.
Outfield is full with Judge, Grisham, and Bellinger as the everyday guys. Dominguez has a shot to make himself a good 4th OF but he needs to work on stuff.
I think his ceiling higher than fourth outfielder but he definitely has things to work on.
He has 468 career MLB at-bats. Nothing has suggested that Jasson will ever become a star. But I think he can become an everyday player/starter somewhere in the next couple of years.
Offense isnt the issue, OPS+ of 101 last year suggests he was atleast average without even factoring the stolen bags.
@Samtman The problem is he was pretty exposed against LHP.
He’s 23 years old. I think it’s foolish to suggest he cant improve. A league average season at age 22 is actually impressive
@mlb
This is the silly stuff that gets me mad. The lair average bat avg and OBP are .250/.320. As a 22 yo in his first season, with less than 75 hands of AAA under his belt in NYC, how does a .257 bat avg and .331 obp w/ 11 homers and 23 SB say stay he CAN’T do? He obviously needs to improve his production and defense, but so do most rookies. There’s a reason why not every all star was rookie of the year. I dint get ppl who want their teams to embrace youth but then can’t be a little more patient with them. The demotion is all about getting him everyday playing time. The idea of trading him “just cause” is pure idiotic behavior. He’s not a guy in need of a change of scenery. Yanks had the most productive OF offensively, by WAR and it wasn’t even close. it made perfect sense to run it back with the threesome of Grisham, Beli and Judge. However, there could easily be a place for him if Grisham struggles this year or if they let him walk after this season. They could even trade him at the deadline and bring up Dominguez of he has a good season at AAA. But let’s not be stupid and Judge them off of 1 season where they eye league average at worst. His glove is a legit concern but it’s not a deal breaker if he can hit. keep a cool booty.
Meh… He can’t hit lefties and he’s comically bad at D. He needs to solve one of those issues to be a difference maker.
He could definitely become a star. Baseball history is littered with players like Schmidt and Trout who looked really bad during their early MLB plate appearances, but later become superstars. Not to push Dominguez into superstar territory, but he could become a pretty good player.
And with playtime + patience you would hope that to jalen. I can’t imagine the Astros fan base is sitting around calling Cam Smith a bust? I’m sure that the Senator fanbase didn’t give up on Woods and make him a future buddy because he stick out too much in the minor like Spencer Jones. Yankee fans are always clamoring for an infusions of youth, and Cash has done a great job of that, but with that comes inherent risk. So you mitigate that risk by having a bunch of proven players on the roster. but if you want youth then they come with inherent risk and of you can’t stomach that them stop asking for them to bring up the younh talent because they aren’t all going to preform immediately. And the Yanks were still successful with Dominguez in the lineup. This move back to AAA should be viewed more about giving him full time at bats until opportunity presents itself. no need to call him a bust or try to move him. I heard the same complaints about Robinson Cano
Mainly needs to fix his defense, he was pretty bad last year. Average hitting and good baserunning are useful skills. Still really young and can get on track, but in the meantime he’s not plan A.
Yeah like hitting right handed better, and playing better defense. I feel 3 or 4 months in AAA should help all of that.
He could work on his presentation for the talent competition some. Maybe some jazz flute since he’ll prolly ace the evening gown portion. That Gary Cooper i must be the luckiest man on the face of the earth speech he dished out at rehearsals was a bit long in the tooth IMHO.
They don’t want him to be a fourth outfielder hence the demotion.
What I’m saying is if he comes back at some point this season he’s the backup. 4th OFs do get plenty of playing time throughout the year too especially if they’re longside platoon hitters. 110-120 games and about 400+ PAs is far from wasting away on the bench. Someone will get injured, and then Dominguez is the next man up.
Barring injury, I don’t see where he would get that much playing time even with Stanton getting his requisite rest as DH. All of their other bench players will play too.
They have a pretty squishy left side of the infield though, have to think that 3B/SS is a revolving door again unless they actually wise up and let Caballero take over one spot full time like he should. The rest of the bench is pretty limited on both sides of the ball. Grichuk looked like toast last year, even vs. LHPs, and he’s pushing 35. Goldschmidt is ancient and can’t play anywhere but 1B. Stanton should never ever play defense ever again, he can’t even stay healthy as a full-time DH.
The Yankees are a good/borderline great team. Definitely the best in the AL if the pitching staff gets healthy, but their bench/DH situation is pretty bad.
YBC – if Grisham regressed closer to what he has been lately, and isnt repeating his heavy HR output, its not hard to imagine him shipped out of town around the deadline.
Even if Grisham is close to what he did last season, if Jasson shows growth in AAA its still not hard to envision a mid-season swap and bringing the kid back up. Enough time would pass to keep out of super 2.
Well we all know that Stanton will almost certainly miss some time. Jasson will be back up soon enough.
Definitely NOT better than the Mariners.
Fair to say the media might have overhyped this kid, and of course Cashman missed the trade window….again. Still a puppy, so he very well could still be successful in the bigs, but in won’t happen in the Bronx.
Just because the media hyped him doesn’t mean other teams agreed.
Ruben Rivera 2.0
Dominguez may be the first called up to a backup OF role, but the next young Yankee outfielder who will win a starting position is Spencer Jones.
The Martian returns to his home planet of Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
He didn’t appear in any minor league games last year so I’m guessing he spent entire year on the roster. This is probably his final option year unless they manipulate his time down there to also have 2027 be an option year.
Manipulating his time has nothing to do with his options. He had 2 options left, now one. Question is what do they do next year with Stanton still around?
Grisham won’t be around. Stanton will have 1 year left and they could just east his salary if they wanted to at that point. There’s room for both Jones and Dominguez in 2027
Jones can play CF. What does JD do except wait for a Stanton injury or release?
The Yankees aren’t going with either of those two, “as they are contenders”. That’s always the excuse. As players leave, they sign others. Seldom do they let rookies get full time roles.
Fangraphs shows him having 2 options left, presumably not accounting for this demotion yet, so he should still have another one left after this year. Not sure what you mean about manipulating his time; option years are based on when he was originally added to the Yankees’ 40-man roster originally.
I’ve heard reference in past where a team recalls a player before certain number of days in the minors in order to extend how many option years the player has remaining since a year in baseball can equal two seasons.
There is a way for teams to gain a 4th option year on players if they have fewer than 5 pro years and have already had their options expended, but Dominguez has 5 pro seasons under his belt already and still has some of his original 3 options remaining so he wouldn’t qualify.
Mostly stashing in the minors is done to extend the number of years of team control over a player and/or delay the player’s arbitration timeline.
I thought he was the next Mickey Mantle?
He’s 22. Might take him a minute.
DomingHoax was another over- hyped Cashman prospect.
No one overhyped him except haters like you.
I don’t recall anyone saying he was Mickey Mantle. Just you.
There goes his baseball card value to zero
A nice reminder: ALWAYS sell those Bowman’s immediately.
Connor griffin auto is $1500 now. Insane
Every franchise has prospect busts, but no one gets more overhyped quite like a Yankees prospect.
Dominguez isn’t even a top 3 bust among AL East prospects in recent years.
It’s funny how everyone is writing him off completely when he actually improved at the plate last year from his 2023-24 stats. He’s really just the odd man out when Bellinger, Grisham, and Judge are ahead of him on the depth chart. He wouldn’t be able to get adequate playing time in NY this year so better to have him work on his defense and power in AAA every day. Even if he doesn’t end up becoming a star he should be able to carve out a career as a solid regular if a couple things improve.
I think Dominguez will have a decent career but being a platoon hitter with poor defense after being viewed as a blue chip prospect should still be considered a bust
It’s way too early to call him a bust.
Oh there’s plenty of prospect hype to go around. A fair reading might suggest they’re far from leading the league here. Dodgers have had plenty of examples in last few years, BoSox as well. And likely plenty more of that to go around. But it’s a favorite screed of Yankees haters.
Trey ball
Who overhyped him? This overhype BS comes from hater fans who don’t want Yankees fans to be excited about anyone. I never EVER hear this about any other team.
I don’t recall him being overhyped any more than other teams’ prospects.
So what was the meaning behind the term “Martian” if not to indicate he was “out of this world” ?
Again is there no fun and joy to be had by Yankees fan? We can’t have fun and support our own?
And you know what for a kid that went through TJ and last season being a backup he wasn’t completely terrible. Definitely not as bad as is being made out.
Sorry guys but your playing revisionist history, I listen to the sports talk radio, read the post and talk to people in my town( near NYC). This kid was ridiculously overhyped. It was unfair to him, he had a fine season last year but people now want him gone and are labeling him a bust.
Have you heard how other teams and fans hype THEIR prospects?! This is nothing new, every team does it, even with worse ones. The Yankees get guff because they’re the Yankees.
I bet he hates the Yankees at this point.
He’s 22. Let’s cut him a break. Still, why Grisham is here when Jasson or Jones could have played left at a fraction of the cost while the New York Yankees don’t have a third baseman or shortstop that can hit is a joke.
First of all, I will not tolerate this Jose Caballero slander! He put up a 131 wRC+ after getting traded to NY last season coupled with elite defense and baserunning. They ought to plug him in at shortstop and make Volpe the utility guy now. Second of all, we all saw that Grisham finally put together a great season with the bat, and did it against MLB pitching. Take the proven guy when you have him. Jasson hasn’t really proved much of anything.
Grisham is horrible. He hit .235 with 137 strikeouts in 143 games. Yea he hit 34 home runs but only had 74 rbi. He took that QO because no one was knocking on the door for his services. Before last season he had to be one of the worst offensive players in the league. Cashman really messed up with that QO. I’d rather have both Jones and Dominguez in the OF, and I don’t want to hear about Jones striking out too much when we have a lineup of guys that all strike out too much. I’ll take the strikeouts in exchange for the power and much higher batting average and speed on the bases. They could have had Rice work to be a 3rd baseman, put belli at first then have Jones in CF and Dominguez in LF. Jones rates better in CF than Dominguez and I’ll gamble that both have better upside than a guy who couldn’t hit above .198 the previous 3 seasons before last year. BTW Grisham has 729Ks in 766 career games. He’s terrible.
Rice has no professional or college innings at 3b. Grisham batted leadoff for most of the year. You Yankee trolls are in piss poor shape this spring.
It’s somehow getting worse as the years go by. Using batting average and RBI’s as measuring sticks in 2026 and suggesting two good players play out of position to accommodate two guys who aren’t big league ready. The nonsense will hit an all time high if the Yankees get off to a slow start
You left out his .348 OBP and 82 walks! He went full TTO and it worked out really well for him.
Maybe the Yankees should bat Grisham and his .234 average cleanup. I’m a lifelong Yankees fan, not a troll, just sick and tired of seeing this franchise overpaying for absolute garbage. I don’t really like going after big free agents all the time, I love to see home grown guys, they have them and are wasting them to give a roster spot to a garbage player. It’s a shame that they are just wasting Judge’s career. With Ben Rice, all I’m saying is that I’d rather have him in the lineup somehow over Grisham. They were hell bent on being Bellinger back (holding my breath on that one too), but then they have two very talented prospects that should be getting everyday reps at the MLB level. Look, they’re trying McMahon at SS and he never has played there, another high priced guy that can’t hit.
Where in the hell are you getting your info from? Never heard or read anything about McMahon moving to short until just now.
By the way, you do sound a lot like the trolls who go all Chicken Little every time something happens.
McMahon is a backup to SS and probably a better option than Rosario. Grisham had a .348 obp that’s why he lead off. Who cares about $22 million for Grisham. If he comes close to repeating then great. If JD or Spencer force him out of the lineup than great too. Assuming Jones and his 30%+ k rate can provide better production than Grisham is just kind of silly. I’m hoping he can but he’ll have to push Grisham out of the way to do it and I’m alright we with that.
McMahon has played SS in spring training with the intention of playing him there if necessary during the season.
Nick Kurtz had one hell of a year last year and struck out at a 36% clip and I’d say he was a hell of a lot more productive than Grisham…that being said I’d roll the dice with Jones.
@SgM86
For all the grievances you have, the Yankees were first in MLB in runs scored last season. Isn’t the point of the game to collectively score more runs than the opponent?
Play Ben Rice at 3B? That’s like asking Stanton to play CF everyday.
Jones isn’t quite ready yet for the show. He would make Joey Gallo look like a perennial batting champ candidate.
Keep in mind that league as a whole last season averaged .245/.315/.404. The game has changed and it’s not 1996 anymore.
McMahon was given a look at SS because he might have to play there in case of emergency. Volpe is on the IL for the first month or so and there isn’t really another option to play SS if Caballero gets hurt. Rice is the starting 1B so I have no idea what you’re getting at there.
So you don’t want to hear about Jones striking out too much, but you keep citing Grisham’s high strikeout totals while trying to build a case against him. You really think that Jones, with his astronomical K-rate, will have a much higher batting average?
Pay attention, he has been playing shortstop in Spring Training.
Jarred gets it.
@dgxmii
Grisham plays CF. Bellinger shouldn’t be more than a backup CF. Dominguez can’t even play LF, so absolutely not a CF option. It can’t be only that a player hits. They need to field, too.
If he can hit he’ll play somewhere.
Got this one wrong before they signed Grichuk. I thought he was staying up.
Stanton will undoubtedly need an IL stint to rest the elbows so he’ll be brought up eventually. Plus Dominguez needs more reps to work on his swing from the right side and work on his defense in LF.
Grichuk fills the 4th OF need better for now. For as much as I like Jasson and Jones, playing everyday and together is the b3st thing for them.
This would be so much funnier if he didn’t rake during spring training. That QO to Grisham kind of forced their hand though.
They offered the QO to Grish because JDom wasn’t ready to play everyday evidently while the offseason plan was to send him to play winter ball.
The Yankees wouldn’t have offered him the QO if they didn’t have a contingency plan already in place when he accepted it. Just so happened they built the contingency midseason last year with the Caballero and McMahon trades. McMahon is a weak bat but his defense is elite. Cabby really went on a tear after the trade and imo he has finally earned a chance to play full time.
Agreeing with you everywhere in this thread, Jarred.
Best outfield in the sport? Are you kidding me? Wow, total homerism. Grisham and Belliache have both had years where they couldn’t hit .200, Error in Judgement literally blows chunks in the important games. Best outfield in the sport? Maybe you’re talking about the grounds crew?
Holy cow.
Well, my homerism knows no bounds as well! Tatis, Merrill, Laureano looks dang fine to me!
“Probably” the best outfield. Meaning it’s debatable. In terms of WAR I believe they were last year.
I actually burst out laughing when I read that.
The Yankees OF was the most productive offensively last year. This is easy to find info but that would require a little effort. Leaving your typical brain dead comments clearly requires no effort.
And every year automatically repeats!
Holy cow.
The point is they had the best offensive outfield last year and you’re acting like it’s insane to say they’re probably the best outfield in the league
Why oh why are you so brain dead, hayzee?
Not to be a party p00per, Hank, but it’s right there in his name.😶🌫️ Hazy af
I’m always reminded as a Reds fan how the Yankees couldn’t bear to give up Volpe, Peraza, or Dominguez in 2022 when they were in discussions involving Luis Castillo.
Now it’s 2026, Dominguez still doesn’t have a full time role with the Yankees, Peraza was dumped to the Angels for garbage, and Anthony Volpe is one slow start away from being jettisoned out of the everyday lineup.
Oops?
Hindsight is 20/20, no? No guarantee prospects can handle the MLB. Castillo has 6 bWAR with the M’s in 3.5 seasons since being traded. Not exactly great value with his high salary.
Albert Pujols was passed on 401 times before getting drafted.
Castillo is still good value even though he’s not the borderline #1/strong #2 he was 3-4 years ago. We’re in the era where #4 starters are making north of $20M AAV on the open market. Zac Gallen still got the QO after a rough 2025. I’d say Castillo pitches more like a low end #3 nowadays, he’s been extremely durable too.
If Grisham is the standard of being big league ready in the Yankees eyes, Aaron Judge is an absolute fool for not demanding a trade. Grisham’s .348 on base percentage looks all well and good on paper and so does the 82 walks but when you look at it closely, he also had 72 singles, 34 home runs, 9 doubles, 1 triple. So in 154 instances of this guy being on first base, he had 3 stolen bases. That’s a problem. That’s a major problem. I find it bizarre that a guy has 34 home runs and only 10 extra base hits.
His 44 extra-base hits (38.3%) ranked him for 65th in the league. Faulting a guy who hit homeruns but not enough doubles or stolen bases is wacky. This appears to be a “you” problem, not a baseball one.
My god, you’re annoying.
And dumb.
Why should he be stealing bases when Judge is batting or coming up next? Teams don’t do that stupid stuff anymore.
Castillo didn’t miss a start
They apparently wouldn’t trade Gil to the Astros for Tucker. Now Gil is throwing 2 MPH less than his rookie year while walking the same amount of guys…
I’m not a Castillo guy so I’m good.
Looks like service time manipulation on Dominguez. He had a good spring training.
LMAO or maybe because Djom is TRASH. Spring training stats are meaningless
Don’t fret. Hold onto your 2020 Bowman 1sts and 2024 Topps rookies and you can retire in a few years
He is cooked
How does he still have options left lol
His Future Hall of Fame career hits a bump in the road.
The Yankees should trade Dominguez right now while they can still get three future Hall of Fame players for him. Yankees prospects are never overrated and always pan out. Don’t wait to long Cashman.
True, Yankees prospects like Arron Judge are never overrated.
They just seldom have prospects like Aaron Judge. They have many more like Peraza.
Few ever have prospect like Aaron judge. Most has prospects like Peraza. This is reality.
You, stymedone and the rest of the Yankee haters are so full of it when it comes to Yankee prospects it isn’t funny….when you look around the majors, name a team that has more major league players on rosters than the Yankees….yes they might not be “stars” but teams seem to jump at the chance to get a former farm team player in the Yankees organization in theirs….for example the Red Sox just names Caleb Durham their starting 3rd baseman, in addition to their starting catcher, one of their main bullpens guys and the guy everyone th0ught wasn’t worth a bucket of Double Bubble Refsnyder who has become a left handed hitting star….yeh, the Yankees don’t develop anybody right Trolls?
Great point, rocky7. If the Yankees had such bad prospects, no one would trade for them.
Wasn’t he hyped as being the next Mickey mantle lol. Sill young and was league average hitter. So it would be foolish to give up on him. Could’ve sold high on him as another overhyped prospect a year or two ago
The media hyped him as such not the Yankees….the Yankees just went along with it…
After hearing this guy called the “next big thing”, and getting hyped to the moon for years: big wow
Cashman screwed up by bringing back Trent.
Jasson needed not to be jerked around like the yanks do with so many young players.
This is my opinion and I don’t care what anyone else thinks
The idiots are out in force here tonight.
They should’ve optioned Grisham.
Remember when Yankee fans and media anointed this guy the 2nd coming?
Cashman doesn’t have an eye for young position player talent. His focus is free agents with a track record.
Grisham has looked less than acceptable from the Spring games many of us saw….another tactical mistake by Cashman…how he keeps his job given the mistakes he continually makes is beyond me….by the way the Red Sox should send a thank you note to Cash for allowing them to get Durham as their starting 3rd baseman while the Yankees had to fish and cut bait on last years ‘closer” who we got in the trade and subsequently stunk….
Best outfield in the sport?? Judge may be MVP level, but Bellinger is decent and Grisham is not that great. I can think of 6-7 better outfields in the sport. Nice east coast bias!
Name those 6-7 better outfields