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In the middle of the New York Yankees‘ lineup, you can find two aging hitters who seemed to be past their primes but are now hitting as if they’ve found the fountain of youth.

The one who’s gotten the most press is Alex Rodriguez, and deservedly so. But we’re going to give some overdue credit to the other guy: Mark Teixeira.

Teixeira came into Friday’s contest against the Los Angeles Angels at Yankee Stadium with two home runs in his last three games. And he made it three out of four with a two-run shot off Jered Weaver in the third inning. That doubled the Yankees’ lead to 4-0, and it proved to be pretty important when the Angels mounted a six-run ninth-inning rally that fell just short as the Yankees won by an 8-7 final.

At any rate, Teixeira now has 17 homers. That ranks second in the majors behind only Nelson Cruz, Bryce Harper and Giancarlo Stanton. Also, Teixeira’s 17 dingers put him on pace to shatter the mark of 22 homers he hit in his age-34 season in 2014.

To boot, it’s not all about the home runs.

The 35-year-old switch-hitting first baseman is also getting on base at a .353 clip. Add that to a .581 slugging percentage, and you get a .934 OPS. For all the attention A-Rod has gotten, his own .904 OPS falls 30 points shy of matching Teixeira’s.

To be sure, A-Rod deserves props for the role he’s played in getting the Yankees to their AL East-leading 30-25 record. So do Brett Gardner, Jacoby Ellsbury, Michael Pineda, Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller. But of all the reasons the Yankees are where they are, Teixeira’s resurgence belongs near the top of the list.

By all rights, this shouldn’t be the case. Teixeira is old by baseball standards, and he certainly looked it in playing through three injury-marred, modestly productive seasons from 2012 to 2014. Why should he be back now?

Short version? He’s worked hard for this.

If older hitters could push a button and make themselves younger, all of them would do so. It’s a real shame they can’t. Really, the best they can do is get healthy and live healthy.

To these ends, Teixeira might as well be the new poster boy for getting and living healthy.

Among the changes Teixeira made over the offseason was a new diet that, as he outlined to Daniel Barbarisi of the Wall Street Journal, was meant to curb inflammation in his body. He also hired a new trainer and was able to pursue a full workout regimen rather than rehab the wrist injury that sidelined him for much of 2013 and lingered into the winter.

“We really attacked all of the issues I’ve been having,” he told Erik Boland of Newsday. “I got myself really strong. I was weaker than I’ve probably ever been in my entire career last year because of the [wrist] injury the year before, not being able to work out like I usually do…I feel like a kid again.”

Granted, because all of this came out during spring training, it sounded like standard “Best Shape of His Life” stuff. But two months into the season, it sure looks like Teixeira’s efforts have paid off. 

But there’s also more to Teixeira’s revival than his benefiting from changes he’s made outside the lines. He’s also benefiting from some changes he’s made inside the lines.

One is actually a carryover from 2014. Mike Axisa of River Ave Blues broke down how Teixeira had changed things up in the batter’s box by closing his stance and lowering the position of his hands. This allowed his swing to be more compact, and it’s working even better for him this year than it did last season.

One way you can tell is by looking at how Teixeira has been able to catch up to fastballs. Per Brooks Baseball, Teixeira has gone from hitting .218 against the heat to .278 against it.

Aside from that, another apparent benefit of Teixeira’s more compact swing is a lower whiff rate. He’s swinging and missing at only 7.7 percent of the pitches he sees, a full tick below the 8.7 whiff rate he had last year.

Of course, it also helps that Teixeira is being more selective about the pitches he swings at. He’s gone from chasing pitches outside the zone at a 28.1 percent rate in 2014 to just a 22.0 percent rate this year. While his discipline has always been good, this year it’s worthy of Joey Votto.

Last but not least, we have Teixeira’s batted-ball profile. With a 40.5 fly-ball percentage, he’s hitting the ball in the air at a higher rate than he’s done in a full season since 2013. He’s also pulling the ball a career-high 57.4 percent of the time.

This would be the stats-geek way of saying that Teixeira is doing everything he can to maximize his power potential, as strong guys who hit the ball in the air to their pull sides are indeed putting themselves in a position to hit dingers. That’s what Teixeira has been doing, so we shouldn’t be surprised that he’s been so successful hitting the ball over the fence.

Is it all too good to be true? More than likely, yes. Teixeira is on pace to hit 50 home runs and finish with his best OPS since his first season with the Yankees back in 2009. FanGraphs‘ projections see regressions across the board, and those are bound to come true eventually.

No amount of regression, however, is likely to keep the 2015 season from being Teixeira’s best in years. 

It’s a stretch to say that Teixeira has completely remade himself. In many aspects, he’s the same hitter he’s always been. Strength, discipline and lots of fly balls to his pull side have been Teixeira’s defining characteristics since he first set foot in the big leagues back in 2003.

But though he may not be doing anything new, Teixeira is simply doing his usual thing better than he was able to in the last three seasons. He’s had to make some changes to pull it off, but it’s all been worth it.

For him, it’s meant a return to status as one of the game’s elite hitters that he enjoyed for many years. And for the Yankees, well, it’s never bad to have a player like that in the middle of your lineup.

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs unless otherwise noted/linked.

If you want to talk baseball, hit me up on Twitter.

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Fact: When the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox game started, Mark Teixeira was 34. When it ended, he was 35.

Bleacher Report will be bringing sports fans the most interesting and engaging Cold Hard Fact of the day, presented by Coors Light.

Source: Mark Feinsand

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New York Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira hit his 361st career home run Sunday, tying Joe DiMaggio for 80th place on the all-time home runs list, per ESPN Stats & Info.

Teixeira slugged No. 361 off Tampa Bay Rays reliever Joel Peralta in the eighth inning of Sunday’s game. The shot, which sailed over the right-field fence for his 20th home run of 2014, gave Teixeira a 20-homer season for the 11th time in his 12-year career. The only season in which Teixeira has failed to reach the 20-homer plateau was last year when a wrist injury limited him to just 15 games.

The 11 seasons of 20 or more home runs tie Teixeira for fourth most among switch-hitters, alongside teammate Carlos Beltran and the recently retired Lance Berkman, per Complete Baseball Encyclopedia (via GammonsDaily.com).

Beltran has 14 home runs this year and thus needs just six more to move into sole possession of fourth place on said list. Tied for second with 14 20-homer seasons are Yankee legend Mickey Mantle and former Atlanta Brave Chipper Jones.

Hall of Fame inductee Eddie Murray leads the way at 16 seasons with at least 20 long balls, and his 504 career home runs have him 26th on the all-time list. Teixeira, who turned 34 in April, would likely have to play at least four more seasons to have any shot at joining Murray in the 500-homer club.

Mantle’s 536 home runs mark the all-time record for a switch-hitter, with Teixeira the only viable threat (and even that’s a stretch) among active players to make a run at the record.

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The New York Yankees aren’t sitting back and waiting for the results of Mark Teixeira’s latest tests on his surgically repaired wrist. According to Jon Heyman of CBS, the Yankees have approached Kendrys Morales, who could sign as soon as Thursday evening.

Morales has been held hostage by the rules of baseball. As one of few free agents that was given a qualifying offer of $13.3 million by his former team, signing Morales would have cost his new team their first-round pick.  Since the Yankees have already signed one of these players in Brian McCann, the Yankees would have to surrender their second-round pick, their highest, which would push them back from selecting 55th. Signing Morales before the draft would mean that the Yankees would not pick until 91. 

However, initial reports on Teixeira’s chronic wrist problem are positive. Daniel Barbarisi of the Wall Street Journal reports that Teixeira got good news from the doctor and could be back as soon as Tuesday. Reports have varied on which doctors Teixeira was seeing, but sources tell me that the answer was “all of the above.”

Teixeira saw not only Yankees team doctors and his surgeon, but he also called in at least one consulting surgeon for an opinion, thought to be Dr. Thomas Graham, the hand surgeon that worked on Bryce Harper’s thumb among others. Wrist problems like this normally do not recur after surgery, but the structures of the wrist are very fine. Even a small problem like scar tissue or inflammation can upset the entire anatomic structure, creating pain and weakness as Teixeira has dealt with.

The worry now is that Teixeira’s wrist is a chronic problem. Even with the positive reports and a possible quick return, there’s no guarantee that the wrist won’t act up again. Even with ace rehabber Mark Littlefield focused on Teixeira’s maintenance, this episode has Girardi and his staff worried about how much Teixeira will play, let alone hit.

Manager Joe Girardi told the press Monday that he was tired of playing a man down, intimating that he would like to see Teixeira on the DL. If Teixeira is able to play quickly, I’m sure Girardi would welcome him back, especially if he gets a good look at the Scranton roster that offers little in the way of quick fixes.

Morales would not be available until Thursday at the earliest, though it is much more likely that he will need a quick trip through the minor leagues. That is what Stephen Drew did after signing late and returning to the Boston Red Sox after being trapped by the same situation.

Signing Morales would lock up the DH slot and not offer much in the way of help for first base. Morales’ chronic ankle problems have limited his mobility greatly. It would also hurt the flexibility of a roster that is already inflexible and further tax a medical staff that is dealing with several players that require extensive maintenance and pregame routines.

There’s also the worry that Derek Jeter, now in his final season, will need the DH slot more if his ankle becomes problematic. Jeter has already been benched more than expected in order to keep him available during his victory lap, but that taxes the roster even more. 

While the Yankees aren’t out of the AL East race by any means—they currently carry a 41 percent chance of making the postseason according to Clay Davenport—the addition of another solid bat has to be tempting for a team like the Yankees. 

There’s one other piece of timing that needs to be mentioned, and that is the 90-day elimination period that is in place on Mark Teixeira’s insurance. The Yankees would have to wait that 90 days before they would be able to collect any money to alleviate the cost of Teixeira’s absence. The clock restarts if Teixeira plays even one game, so they will need to have some comfort level with his wrist before putting him in the lineup.

With the return of Teixeira and Carlos Beltran, who is currently trying to avoid surgery to remove bone spurs in his elbow, the Yankees wouldn’t need Morales. That would leave several other teams, including the Kansas City Royals, Texas Rangers and the inevitable “mystery team” that comes with a Scott Boras signing. A decision will likely be made shortly and the wait over for Morales just after the Houston Astros make their pick Thursday evening.

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Teams that feel they are close to being championship-caliber will occasionally take the risk of trading away young talent in exchange for one year, and sometimes only two to three months, of an impact player.

While sacrificing the “future”—players with impact potential who will be under team control for several years at a team-friendly rate once they reach the majors, if they’re not there already—to give the big league team a better chance to advance to the playoffs and beyond for the current season has been known to backfire, it can also be great for business. 

And because the business is heavily based on selling tickets—mainly to baseball fans who are focused on how good the team is right now and not three to five years down the road—it’s important for a front office to be aggressive and “go all in” when they feel the time is right.

If all the pieces fall into place, the excitement surrounding the team during a heated pennant race and the capturing of a division title, as well as the anticipation of a playoff series—not to mention ticket sales for games that aren’t on the regular-season schedule—and the actual playoff run is what can win over a fan for life. 

For most of us who have loved a particular team since our youth, it’s very likely that we didn’t become passionate about a team that was losing year after year. Even if it was just one magical season, like in 1984 when the San Diego Padres won the heart of this then-nine-year-old, the excitement of that winning season is what made you want to cheer for that team from that point on. 

Regardless of the outcome, you can’t blame an organization for acting on a golden opportunity to win over thousands of new customers for life. Many have worked out great. Others, not so much. 

Here are eight of the most notable trade rentals over the past decade with an updated grade for each team involved in the deal. 

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Finally healthy and swinging a hot bat, New York Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira is closing in on 350 career home runs heading into a weekend series against the Tampa Bay Rays.

The 6’3″ slugger hit No. 343 in Sunday’s win over the Los Angeles Angels, with a go-ahead blast in the seventh inning propelling him past Ron Santo on the all-time home run list, placing Teixeira in sole possession of the No. 92 spot, per ESPN Stats & Info.

The homer proved to be a milestone in and of itself, as it was his 80th home run at the new Yankee Stadium, the most by any hitter since the ballpark opened in 2009. Second baseman Robinson Cano, now of the Seattle Mariners, previously held the record with 79 home runs at The House that Jeter Built.

Teixeira added another long ball in the second inning of Tuesday’s game against the Mariners, giving him three on the season and 344 for his career. As he continues to rise up the all-time ranks, the switch-hitter is just six home runs shy of becoming the 91st member of the 350-homer club. 

The 34-year-old Teixeira remains under contract with the Yankees through the 2016 season, which should give him plenty of opportunities to pad his totals in the new, hitter-friendly Yankee Stadium. For his career, Teixeira has averaged 37 home runs per 162 games, and he was known for his durability until 2012.

500 homers might be pushing it, but Big Tex should at least make a run at 450, assuming he can put the injury woes of the past two years behind him.

All stats courtesy of Baseball Reference unless otherwise noted.

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Updates from Saturday, April 5

Bryan Hoch of MLB.com reported the latest on New York Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira:

ESPN’s Wallace Matthews has Teixeira’s thoughts on the injury:

Original Text

Unfortunate news struck the Yankees on Friday evening.

The club’s official Twitter account announced that first baseman Mark Teixeira suffered a strained right hamstring during the team’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays:

The Yankees’ Twitter account also reported that Teixeira was looked at by head coach Joe Girardi and trainer Steve Donohue. He attempted to stretch his leg but later exited the game:

Hoch provided a postgame update from Teixeira:

This injury doesn’t seem to be major at first glance; however, Teixeira has had ongoing struggles with injuries, and each must be looked at with caution.

Looking forward, the Yankees may take a cautious approach considering the 33-year-old will make $23,125,000 in yearly salary for the next three years before hitting free agency in 2017. He only played 15 games in 2013 and 123 in 2012, and he underwent wrist surgery last July. 

This is another unfortunate setback for the Yankees slugger, who is looking for a bounce-back season.

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Entering the official start of spring training 2014, one thing is clear: the New York Yankees are Major League Baseball’s most talked about team.

The newest edition of spring training in Tampa Bay for the Yankees took on an entirely different feel when Derek Jeter announced his upcoming retirement back on February 12th. The face of the sport (no offense, Eric Sogard) will arguably be the story of the season as the most recent era in team history comes to a close. Let’s just hope the Jeter Farewell Tour comes with better gifts than the Mariano Rivera one did (really, Texas Rangers? Cowboy boots for a guy from Panama?)

However, the truly most important story lines for the Bombers in spring training are to see what they can expect to yield from their off-season spending spree and how a roster with a surprisingly high number of question marks despite the payroll comes together.  

Can the trio of Jeter/Mark Teixeira/CC Sabathia bounce back from rough 2013? Can Jacoby Ellsbury stay healthy? What exactly can we expect from Masahiro Tanaka? Does David Robertson really have what it takes to replace Mariano Rivera? There’s only one place that has all these answers: Twitter. 

To make the playoffs this year, the Yankees will most likely need to build on last year’s 85-win campaign. That total might sound easy to build off considering the winter’s price tag, but as Ken Davidoff of the New York Post tweets, maybe the Yankees weren’t actually that good. 

A 79-win caliber team minus that team’s best player, one Robinson Cano? Sounds like a tough task to overcome for Joe Girardi. That’s why the quartet of Carlos Beltran, Ellsbury, Brian McCann and Tanaka could make or break the year for New York.

However, all four of those signees come with question marks (at this point, the question mark might as well be the team’s logo this year). We don’t know how Tanaka‘s stuff will translate. Ellsbury‘s games played per year have as been inconsistent as anyone in the league over the course of his career. Beltran is not exactly a spring chicken. McCann is probably the surest bet of the bunch, but even he is beginning 2014 on the wrong side of 30.

One of Ellsbury‘s former managers thinks that success will follow, as long as he stays on the field.

McCann is expected to be a staple in a Yankee lineup that could very well be formidable. Even if McCann has a “down year,” it would be almost impossible for his season to qualify as a positional downgrade from 2013, as MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch points out.

When Tanaka signed, there were two numbers that stood out: a 24-0 record last year in Japan, and a $155 million contract. Critics of the deal have theorized that Tanaka‘s performance won’t match the payday, but Sports on Earth’s Jonathan Bernhardt says even if he’s not great, it’ll be okay for New York.

“If it turns out that New York paid superstar money for a pitcher who is merely very good, fine; the Yankees are a license to print money, and young pitchers who are “merely very good” don’t grow on trees.”

One player who is no lock to make the Opening Day roster, but could make a difference is the enigma known as Michael Pineda. It’s been two full years since we last saw the right-hander in a Major League game, but ESPN’s Buster Olney says there is reason to be optimistic. 

There’s been much talk about Jeter’s last year and what it means for the franchise in the long-term, but in the short-run, no one really knows what to expect from the captain. 

Before his spring training debut on February 27th, Brian Cashman made it clear that on his list of concerns, Jeter is no where near the top, according to Newsday’s David Lennon.

In case you hadn’t heard, Rivera is no longer active. In his place is Robertson, a very good reliever in his own right, but someone who has little experience ending games in big spots. That won’t stop Robertson from thinking he can pitch at an elite level, according to ESPN’s Ian O’Connor.

There’s no doubt the Yankees have upgraded since the end of last season. However, they have some ground to make up in the division. The Red Sox are the reigning World Champions, the Rays have one of the best rotations in all of the league, and the Orioles made some moves late in the off-season to bolster their roster.

The most important Yankee might very well be Teixeira. The Yankees’ infield could potentially be a trainwreck, but if Teixeira can somehow re-create his first three years in the Bronx this year, that could theoretically change the entire lineup. 

Jeter’s last year will be a season-long parade of honors and accolades, but a 39-year-old who might as well not have played in 2013 with a severe ankle injury is as big of a question mark as it comes. It would be very Jeter of Jeter to hit .320 this year, but somewhere in the .280 range is more realistic, if not maybe a best-case scenario for New York. 

Sabathia made news in the off-season for his weight loss, but his season will ultimately come down to another type of loss: velocity. 2013 was arguably the worst season of Sabathia’s career, but he’ll still take the mound April 1st when the Yankees open their season in Houston. His development in spring training could be the most important thing for Girardi & Co. as the team tries to avoid a second straight postseason-less year. 

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Last season is one that Mark Teixeira and Yankees‘ fans would just as soon forget.  When “Tex” hurt his wrist while preparing for the World Baseball Classic 2013, it became a lost cause.

The Yankees never really adequately made up for the injury, and it was the first in a series of key setbacks the team experienced in recording its lowest win total (85) since the strike-shortened 1995 season.

Just how much Teixeira’s injury directly affected the club’s mediocre performance can be up for debate, but a look at the numbers suggests it was a major factor in the Yankees missing the postseason for just the second time in 19 years.

In his first three seasons in pinstripes, Teixeira played in 97 percent of the team’s total regular season games.  It’s no coincidence that the Yankees averaged 98 wins and won a World Series title over that time.

Source: MLB.COM

The table above shows the percentage of the Yankees’ runs that Teixeira participated in either by scoring a run or driving one in.  When healthy, the first baseman is clearly a vital component to the team’s lineup. 

By contrast, Lyle Overbay (the primary first baseman last season) took part in just 102 team runs over 142 games in 2013.  That equates to 15.7 percent of the total runs the Bombers put up—a drop from what Teixeira contributes when he’s full-time.

Further proof can be seen in looking a little deeper at the statistics, namely hitting with runners in scoring position (RISP) and oWAR (offensive wins above replacement).

Source: MLB.COM and baseball-reference.com

As with the first table, Teixeira has proven to be a significant contributor when he’s able to play in the majority of a season, and how successful the team is can be tied directly to his productivity.

It is no secret that one of the Yankees’ Achilles’ heels in recent years has been the club’s ability to hit with RISP.  The statistics bear out the fact that they are more successful in that scenario when Teixeira is healthy and in the heart of the lineup.  Even when playing a few more than 120 games as he did in 2012, “Tex” still managed to be part of nearly 20 percent of the team’s runs.

In addition to what he contributes at the plate, what Teixeira gives the Yankees in the field may even be of more significance. 

He is a five-time winner of the Gold Glove at first base (including 2012 when he played in just 123 games) and carries a .997 career fielding percentage.

He is a dependable anchor on the field.

To get back to the playoffs, the Yankees are going to need Teixeira back in their lineup. 

Will he be 100 percent recovered on Opening Day?

In response to a question about the first baseman’s status, Yankees beat reporter Bryan Hoch of MLB.com wrote:

Teixeira said recently that he feels close to 100 percent, though he wishes his surgically repaired right wrist felt a little less stiff. Teixeira has started hitting off a tee, and his game plan is to continue strengthening exercises while swinging a bat throughout the month of January.

It remains up in the air whether “Tex” will be back to full strength when the team begins the 2014 campaign. 

For the Yankees and their fans, playing games in October may depend on it.

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Robinson Cano‘s ten-year, $240 million deal with the Seattle Mariners, which was first reported by Enrique Rojas of ESPNDeportes (spanish link) earlier in the day, ties him with Albert Pujols for the third-highest contract ever handed out to a major league player—Alex Rodriguez holds the record for the first two spots. 

While there are plenty of examples of players putting up elite numbers into their late-30’s, it’s still a significant risk for the M’s because of the likelihood that they’ll be paying Cano top dollar for at least a few seasons when he’ll no longer be in his prime.

For every David Ortiz, who had a .959 OPS with 30 homers at the age of 37, there are several formerly great players who were out of the game by their early-to-mid 30’s because their skills had diminished to a point where they could no longer produce league average numbers. 

Contracts of this magnitude, years and dollars-wise, are still relatively new with the contract of Derek Jeter the only one amongst the top ten highest of all time that has expired. Therefore, it’s hard to point at any and declare Cano’s deal as a huge mistake by the Mariners.

But for what the players on this “10 Richest Contracts In MLB History” list have done on the field thus far and where they appear headed over the course of their deals, it’s not too early to pass judgment and place a grade on their impact. 

Each of the 10 slides contains contract details, average WAR per season over the course of the deal, a summary on the player’s impact and/or potential impact in the future and a letter grade.

The player’s contract, according to Baseball Prospectus, is listed. The player’s average WAR (wins above replacement) per season, according to Baseball-Reference, is also listed. 

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