#Yankees’ Aroldis Chapman used shutdown to get shredded
“#Yankees’ Aroldis Chapman used shutdown to get shredded”
When MLB shut down spring training on March 12 and the coronavirus erased regular-season action in April, May, June and most of July, Aroldis Chapman went to work on a chiseled body that pumps fastballs into triple digits from the left side.
Six days a week in his Davie, Fla., home the Yankees’ closer worked out, looking to shed weight from the 6-foot-4, 218-pound frame he reported to spring training in Tampa with in February.
“I definitely wanted to take advantage of that, actually wanted to cut some pounds during quarantine and being at home and training at home,’’ Chapman said during a Zoom call prior to Tuesday night’s intrasquad game at Yankee Stadium. “I was able to do that, I was able to cut some pounds, 10 pounds, and I feel really good right now. I find myself at a great weight for an athlete.’’
Ten pounds gone would put Chapman at 208 and go along with the belief that the older an athlete gets the lighter he should be. Chapman turned 32 in February and this is his 10th year in the big leagues, the fifth with the Yankee for whom he has saved 111 games.
When last seen pitching in a game that counted, Chapman gave up a two-run homer to Houston’s Jose Altuve in the ninth inning of Game 6 of last year’s ALCS that ended the Yankees’ season and propelled the Astros to the World Series where they lost to the Nationals.
A lot has changed since then due to COVID-19. If MLB can finish spring training and begin a 60-game regular-season schedule, it will do so with a lot of new on-field regulations and a huge one in the stadiums: no fans.
For a pitcher who thrives on emotion to fuel him, what that means for Chapman is something he doesn’t know.
“That is a good question. I am going to have to get back to you on that one. I’ll have to see how that feels. I will be better suited to give you a better answer then,’’ Chapman said. “Once I get into a game and see the reality of it.’’
Aaron Hicks honored Negro League Baseball during pregame workouts Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium. His black T-shirt had Negro League Baseball around an interlocking NL on the front and “They Played For Us So We Can’’ on the back.
One night after sitting behind home plate with GM Brian Cashman and evaluating players, a decidedly slimmed down CC Sabathia shagged balls in right-center field during batting practice on Tuesday at the Stadium.
Sabathia, who joined Cashman in the seats again Tuesday evening, works in the Yankees’ front office with the title of special adviser and donned the same T-shirt Hicks wore.
Kyle Higashioka was originally in the Bombers’ lineup for Tuesday night’s intrasquad game but was scratched because of a stiff neck.
Clint Frazier replaced Higashioka as the DH, the second straight night he wasn’t in the field.
“He is doing well. He had a little foot issue he was dealing with over the last couple of months,’’ Aaron Boone said of Frazier. “He has been able to do everything from running and playing the outfield so we are kind of slow-playing him here in the first couple of days.’’
While not everybody on the field wore a mask during pregame activities, Frazier wore one the entire time he was on the field.
Aaron Judge went 0-for-3 with two fly balls to the right-field warning track.
Because Miguel Andujar took ground balls at third base before Monday night’s intrasquad game, Boone was asked on Tuesday if the idea of Andujar playing the outfield had been altered a little bit.
“Not really, he will play the outfield [Tuesday night],’’ Boone said of Andujar, who was in left field for the Bombers and hit second against Gerrit Cole. “We will move him back and forth. He has been getting defensive work in the outfield as well.’’
Andujar homered to right field off Cole in the first inning.
Boone understands throwing the baseball around the diamond after outs is discouraged but isn’t sure it is an exact rule.
“We have to get to the bottom of that,’’ Boone said.
The Yankees are waiting on DJ LeMahieu and Luis Cessa to each take a COVID-19 test that comes back negative so they can move closer to joining spring training 2.0.
“Waiting for both of those guys where they test negative a couple of times and get to the point where they can enter into the intake portion of it,’’ Boone said of the second baseman and right-handed pitcher who tested positive and are quarantining away from the team.
When it was apparent that COVID-19 was going to shut down MLB games for more than the two weeks at the beginning of the season, some people said the longer the shutdown went the more it would benefit the Yankees who had Giancarlo Stanton, Judge and Hicks ready to land on the injured list for Opening Day on March 26.
It worked out that way for all of them but especially for Judge, whose fractured top right rib didn’t allow him to start swinging until two weeks or so ago.
“I think in a lot of ways it timed up perfectly and it worked out really well,’’ said Boone, who started Judge in right field for the second straight night. “They started the progression which started with him swinging in the pool, dry swings and stuff and at a point where they deemed it was safe for him to start doing that. It has coincided with working out perfectly to this point as far as where we are in camp and when Opening Day is going to be.’’
That would be July 23 against the Nationals in Washington if MLB doesn’t have to shut the game down again due to COVID-19.
Jonathan Loaisiga arrived from Nicaragua on Monday and underwent intake testing.
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