It’s always tough to evaluate a player after a career year. Before coming to New York, DJ LeMahieu was a barely league-average hitter, worth 1.95 fWAR/650 PAs. Last year, in the Bronx, he had a 5.4-win season and was the best player on a 103-win team.
He had one season like that before, in 2016, following it up with two campaigns that were the definition of mediocre. One of the big questions around the Yankees in 2020 was whether the LeMahieu we saw in pinstripes was going to be the one that stuck around, or if he was due for another disappointing followup.