First base wasn’t supposed to be a problem for the Yankees. Mark Teixeira held down the position for a long time, and his heir apparent, Greg Bird, emerged in 2015. Outside of Teixeira’s brief resurgence 2015, though, first base has been an absolute black hole for the Bombers. That’s mostly because this team banked on the talent and potential of Bird, which has backfired for various reasons.
Bird’s health woes have been discussed ad nauseam. This year, however, a new problem surfaced. It was the first time that Bird supposedly had a clean bill of health, but he couldn’t buy a hit.