Where Does Austin Slater Fit Into The Yankees' Outfield Plans?
The Yankees have acquired outfield Austin Slater in a trade with the Chicago White Sox, which appears to be the right-handed hitting outfielder trade that they were expected to make. Yankees' No. 18 prospect Gage Ziehl, a right-handed pitcher, was the return.
Prior to this trade, names like Twins' outfielder Harrison Bader had been thrown around in the midst of Aaron Judge's flexor strain injury. The Yankees were likely unable to match the kind of price the Twins wanted for Bader, who has a solid .772 OPS this season and has a mutual option for 2026.
Slater's numbers at face value appear fairly middle-of-the-pack, with his .236/.299/.423 slash line appearing fairly pedestrian. However, like rookie phenom Ben Rice, Slater's underlying metrics suggest he is getting fairly unlucky.
According to Baseball Savant, Slater's expected batting average is .289, and his expected slugging percentage is .570, both markedly higher than his actual numbers.
The main reason the Yankees acquired Slater was because of his .859 OPS against lefties, per MLB Network insider Jon Heyman.
The Yankees' outfield core has struggled against lefty pitching - Trent Grisham has a .189/.308/.295 slash line against southpaws, and Jasson Dominguez's .207/.286/.299 line isn't much better. The addition of Slater gives them another option against lefties that manager Aaron Boone could get creative with.
The addition of Slater should be the last trade the Yankees make for a hitter, having already acquired Rockies' third baseman Ryan McMahon and Nationals' utilityman Amed Rosario. They could explore a creative trade for a player like Willi Castro, but that appears unlikely.
Now, the Yankees will likely turn their attention to the rapidly evolving starting and relief pitching market, with names like David Bednar, Dennis Santana, Mitch Keller, Jhoan Duran, Griffin Jax and Edward Cabrera hot off the presses.
This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jul 30, 2025, where it first appeared.
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