It’s no secret that the Yankees are off to a great start at an AL-best 25-11 after winning their fifth straight game Tuesday night vs. the Rangers.
What might be a bit of a secret, however, is that they’ve had such a positive early showing despite a noteworthy suboptimal number: .160.
That’s the team’s batting average out of the leadoff spot so far, and it’s dead last in MLB. (Yes, really.) Yet in spite of that, the Bombers are scoring 5.53 runs per game, ranking second in the sport to the Braves and leading the AL by a wide margin.
Lowest Team Batting Average by Leadoff Spot (entering Wednesday)
Yankees: .160
Marlins: .199
Mets: .201
Padres: .204
Reds: .208
The main culprit? Trent Grisham, who has been atop the lineup in 25 of 36 games to date and has hit .148/.306/.284 (13-for-88) in those instances. The 29-year-old lefty hitter is batting .170 overall this year and owns a lifetime .216 average, even after a career campaign in 2025. Still, Grisham has maintained a reasonable (by comparison) .307 on-base percentage this year -- just shy of his .320 career mark -- thanks to 23 walks in 137 plate appearances. That’s the impetus behind sticking with him … for now.
Other than Grisham, the only Yankees who have been deployed out of the No. 1 spot more than twice are righty swingers Paul Goldschmidt (seven games, six starts) and Amed Rosario (four). Those have come when facing left-handed pitchers, with Goldschmidt slashing .100/.250/.200 (2-for-20) and Rosario putting up a .231/.375/.462 line (3-for-13).
While batting average is low on the list of important offensive metrics, it no doubt would be beneficial to have more production in that statistic atop the order. Especially when the next three names typically coming to bat for New York are: Ben Rice, Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger in some sequence.
Put another way, imagine how much room for improvement there is for an already hot-starting team with an already strong offense, if that batting average picks up at the top.
Will the Yankees continue to roll with Grisham like they did for most of last season, particularly against right-handed pitchers? Or is it possible Aaron Boone could tinker and insert, say, Rice -- who batted leadoff on occasion last year -- in place as a way to put opposing pitchers on notice from the first pitch of the game? After all, Rice, who hits lefty like Grisham, has batted out of the first lineup spot twice in 2026 -- once as the starting DH and once as a pinch-hitter -- and he’s homered in both games.
It’s something to at least keep an eye on as the season progresses, especially if the Yankees eventually do stumble into an offensive slump. Until then, though, the club should feel secure in the fact that it has started so hot -- even if that hasn’t been the case at the top of the lineup.