Game Thread: New York Yankees @ Kansas City Royals 5/9

The New York Yankees welcome the defend World Series champions to the Bronx and the Yankee Stadium for the first time this season with the first of a four-game set. The Yankees have traditionally done well against the Royals during their recent string of success so that's encouraging for New York tonight. In the contest tonight the Yankees will send Ivan Nova to the mound replacing CC Sabathia while the Royals counter with Chris Young. The game will be played at 7:05 pm ET and can be seen on the YES Network and MLB TV.

To see any of these four games live between the Yankees and the Royals click the Yankees Tickets link at the top of the blog and head over to our friends over at Ticket Monster. There you can pick up a pair of tickets without those bulky fees or annoying shipping costs associated with your purchase price. If you can't make it live or if you're a Yankees fan from afar like myself then you can follow along on Twitter by giving @GreedyStripes a follow.

The Yankees are still in the cellar and still need every win they can get and who better to beat up on than the defending World Series champs. Go Yankees!

Game Preview: New York Yankees vs. Kansas City Royals 5/9

The New York Yankees welcome the defending American League and World Series champion Kansas City Royals to the Bronx tonight as they also welcome Aroldis Chapman to the team for the first time this season. It's going to be quite a night for Yankees fans but it won't be for CC Sabathia as he misses his first start of the season after straining his groin muscle. In his place Ivan Nova will make his first start of the season as Chris Young opposes him for the Royals.

Nova will be making his first start of the season after CC Sabathia was added to the 15 day DL late last week. Nova pitched out of the Yankees bullpen six times this season, going four innings of two of those appearances as the long man, and could go as long as 75 pitches tonight in the Bronx. 

Young has pitched about as well as you would have expected out of the veteran this season. He's not going to give you eight innings very often and he's going to pitch to contact but he still finds ways to win regardless. In his last outing Young gave up five hits and two runs to the Washington Nationals in just 4.2 innings pitched. 

The game will be played at 7:05 pm ET inside of Yankee Stadium and can be seen on the YES Network and MLB TV. The Yankees made a statement last week playing both the Baltimore Orioles and the Boston Red Sox extremely well and the team looks to keep that going this week against a tough Kansas City Royals team. Even the past two seasons where the Royals have made and won the World Series in successive years the Yankees have done well against Kansas City and I see no reason why that can't continue tonight.

Go Yankees!

Weekly Check In: Aaron Hicks

Continuing with our weekly check-ins with new Yankees faces and old Yankees faces in different places we check in with one Yankees player who doesn’t have an incredibly large sample size. Aaron Hicks was brought in to essentially replace Chris Young as the Yankees fourth outfielder and bench player and while over the course of the season Hicks should get in plenty of at bats right now the sample size just isn’t there. Injuries will happen and legs will need to be rested in the Yankees lineup so keep that in mind when checking out this weekly check in with a new face inside the Yankees clubhouse and dugout, Mr. Aaron Hicks. 

Year	G	PA	AB	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS	OPS+
2016	5	8	7	1	1	0	0	0	0	1	2	.143	.250	.143	.393	16

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Old Faces in New York Spring Training Places

The New York Yankees have seen a lot of turnover over the past few seasons and especially during the 2016 offseason so I thought now would be a good time to see how those former Yankees faces are doing in different spring places. Not that spring stats mean much of anything at all but it can still be fun to look at to see if the team “won” a specific transaction or not.

Adam Warren:

Tm	GS	W	L	ERA	G	GS	GF	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO	WHIP	H9	HR9	BB9	SO9
CHC	1	0	0	5.14	4	1	2	7.0	7	6	4	1	0	5	1.000	9.0	1.3	0.0	6.4

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Stephen Drew:

Tm	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
WSH	16	37	4	9	3	1	8	0	4	8	.273	.351	.455	.806

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Brendan Ryan:

Tm	Age	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
WSH	34	17	30	5	11	2	0	3	0	1	5	.379	.400	.517	.917

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Rookie Davis:

GS	ERA	G	GS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO	WHIP	H9	HR9	BB9	SO9
0	4.50	1	0	2.0	2	1	1	0	1	1	1.500	9.0	0.0	4.5	4.5

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Chris Capuano

Tm	GS	W	L	ERA	G	GS	GF	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO	WHIP	H9	HR9	BB9	SO9
MIL	0	0	0	1.69	7	0	1	10.2	9	2	2	0	3	8	1.125	7.6	0.0	2.5	6.8

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Chris Young:

Tm	Age	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
BOS	32	14	37	4	7	3	2	6	1	3	6	.206	.270	.471	.741

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Jake Cave: 

Tm	Age	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
CIN	23	22	54	5	11	1	1	3	1	5	11	.229	.302	.313	.614

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Jose Pirela:

Tm	Age	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
SD	26	21	52	5	18	5	1	4	0	1	8	.353	.365	.510	.875

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Checking In w/ the New Additions

The New York Yankees were the only team without a major league free agent signing this winter but that doesn’t mean that Yankees GM Brian Cashman didn’t make any additions to the club. Out the door is Stephen Drew, Justin Wilson, Adam Warren, Chris Young and others and in their places are Aaron Hicks, Starlin Castro, Aroldis Chapman and Luis Cessa most notably. How are these four new Yankees going with their new club? Let’s find out.

Aaron Hicks:

Year	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
2016	9	26	2	7	2	1	3	0	1	6	.280	.308	.480	.788

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Starlin Castro:

Year	G	PA	R	H	2B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
2016	8	22	3	9	2	1	7	0	1	3	.429	.455	.667	1.121

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Aroldis Chapman:  

Year	Age	ERA	G	SV	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO	WHIP	H9	HR9	BB9	SO9
2016	28	3.38	3	0	2.2	0	1	1	0	3	6	1.125	0.0	0.0	10.1	20.3

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Luis Cessa:

Year	Age	ERA	G	SV	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO	WHIP	H9	HR9	BB9	SO9
2016	24	0.00	2	0	4.0	1	0	0	0	0	3	0.250	2.3	0.0	0.0	6.8

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Spring stats mean little to nothing, closer to nothing, and it’s been said 100 times but why not 101? At the same time though, and this is especially true for Cessa, you want to make a good first impression and a good early impact. Some are doing that while others still have plenty of time to turn it around. I have to say that I’m impressed with the power shown by Castro and Hicks this spring and the pitching by Cessa so maybe Brian Cashman knows what he is doing after all. Not sure, stay tuned.