By DANIEL BARBARISI
Brett Gardner didn’t think it was anything to worry about, really. He had tweaked his elbow sliding to make a catch in left field in late April, and figured the pain would go away in a couple days.
Fast forward through five months and one elbow surgery, and Gardner is finally making his Yankee return, trying to salvage something in what has become a lost season for the 28-year-old speedster. Gardner will be activated in the next few days to be a pinch runner and defensive replacement, but the Yankees won’t allow him to swing a bat or think about hitting in a game.
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The Yankees—who were rained out Tuesday—will use outfielder Brett Gardner as a pinch runner and defensive replacement down the stretch.
At this point, that’s a victory for Gardner, who didn’t know if he would see the field again at all this year.
“I know what my role is,” Gardner said. “I’m obviously excited to do that. I realize with that sort of thing, I might not play for a week. It just depends on how the games go and what kind of situations pop up, but I’m ready if they need me.”
Gardner led the American League in stolen bases last season and played a spectacular defensive left field. But in his ninth game this year, he dove for a ball against the Minnesota Twins and banged the elbow of his right (non-throwing) arm on the Yankee Stadium grass. It never felt quite right after that. Each time he would come close to returning, the pain would come back, and Gardner would be shut down again.
“Every time I would think I was good, I would come back and play in a game and realize that I wasn’t,” Gardner said.
The trickle-down effects were significant. The Yankees were forced to play backups Andruw Jones and Raul Ibanez far more than either veteran player expected, and both have flagged down the stretch. Needing an element of speed and defense, the Yankees made a shocking deal for Ichiro Suzuki at the trade deadline.
Finally, in late July, Gardner underwent surgery to remove inflamed tissue and cut down bone spurs in the elbow. It has been eight weeks since the surgery, and Gardner says he feels normal. But he only swung a bat for the first time Tuesday, and is nowhere near being ready to hit, which the .265 career hitter said isn’t such a big deal.
“Obviously I have to be able to swing a bat,” Gardner said. “Somebody joked with me, I think it was one of my buddies down in Tampa. They said, ‘What can you not do?’ I said I can’t hit. They said ‘What’s changed?'”
So for now, he’ll try to salvage his season with his best tools: his legs, and his glove, filling a September role usually reserved for minor leaguers with great legs and weak bats. Instead, manager Joe Girardi will have a veteran to deploy.
“He can play defense if we needed him to play some defense,” Girardi said. “He’s not going to be able to hit, but you have enough guys on your bench that if his spot came up in a crazy game, you could do something.”
The Yankees have been one-dimensional without Gardner, and Girardi has said many times that they didn’t realize how much of an impact Gardner had until he was gone. Beyond his elite defense, Gardner is one of the few players who hits singles, creates runs on his own and puts pressure on opposing pitchers. Without him, the Yankees became even more of a slow, lumbering team that takes walks and waits on the big home run.
Despite his inability to hit right now, Girardi didn’t rule out the chance that Gardner could make the postseason roster–though it’s likely Gardner would need to demonstrate at least some hitting acumen before the Yankees made that kind of move.
“I look forward to being able to swing a bat again,” Gardner said, “whether it be in a week and a half, 2 1/2 weeks or next February.”
Write to Daniel Barbarisi at [email protected]