Yankees have two Anthony Volpe options with clock ticking & José Caballero clicking
Instead of joining the Yankees in the Bronx on Friday, Anthony Volpe found himself batting second for Double-A Somerset. The Bombers had left the door open for Volpe, working his way back from offseason labrum surgery , to be activated before their series-opener against the Orioles. Instead, Aaron Boone said the shortstop will play in Somerset through the end of the weekend.
“Then we’ll kind of reevaluate where we are after Sunday,” the manager said. At that point, Volpe’s 20-day rehab clock will expire, leaving the Yankees with two choices on Monday. They can either activate him, or they can option him and keep him in the minors.
The latter would represent a drastic departure from the way the club has handled Volpe in the past, as Boone and Brian Cashman have always stood by him throughout three seasons of below league-average offensive production and a poor 2025 defensive showing, which coincided with him playing through a tear in his labrum for most of the season. It was only a few weeks ago that Cashman said the plan was “always” for Volpe to reclaim the starting shortstop job — which he’s had a near-stranglehold on since debuting in 2023 — though the general manager mentioned that the decision would ultimately be Boone’s. But that was before José Caballero began capitalizing on his opportunity to start at short.
“Where we are right now in time, I don’t think it hurts to have some more runway for [Volpe],” Boone said. “Cabby is obviously playing very well for us. So I just want it to be a situation where we’re giving Anthony every chance to come in and be successful, but also taking note of what’s going on with our club as well.
” While Volpe, 25, entered Friday with a . 303 average and a . 717 OPS over 10 rehab games and 34 plate appearances split between Double-A and Triple-A, Caballero was hitting .
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