Soto relieved as Yankees get ‘good news’ on star
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Jorge Castillo, ESPN Staff Writer
NEW YORK — The Yankees avoided a season-changing setback Friday when testing on superstar Juan Soto‘s left forearm and elbow revealed just inflammation and no structural damage.
Manager Aaron Boone said Soto will avoid the injured list and is “day-to-day.” He did not play in Friday night’s series opener against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Boone called the test results “good news.” Soto called them a “relief.”
“It was what I was looking for,” Soto said after New York’s 2-1, 11-inning loss to the Dodgers. “Just trying to see what was really going on in my elbow, and we were having a little bit of thinking of what it was going to be like and how it was going to come out. And thank God it came out our way.”
Before Friday’s game, Boone said Soto could be available off the bench. And, as the game remained scoreless in the late innings, it appeared as though Soto was a pinch-hit option. Soto took to the dugout’s top step wearing batting gloves, with a bat in hand. He was seemingly prepared for an opportunity.
But he never entered the game. He didn’t even take a swing to prepare. It turned out that Soto, according to Boone, wasn’t available to play in any situation.
Boone smiled when asked if Soto was a decoy.
“He was just, I think, feeling the moment there a little bit,” Boone said.
It was the first game Soto missed this season after starting in right field in each of the Yankees’ first 64 contests.
“I’m trying to do my best,” Soto, 25, said. “It’s tough to see the game from the bench, and I don’t like that. So I try my best to be out there. I try to help the team.”
Soto left Thursday’s win over the Minnesota Twins during a 56-minute rain delay with what the Yankees termed “forearm tightness.” Soto later said he had been dealing with the discomfort for over a week, but it didn’t affect him when he threw a baseball or swung a bat.
Boone said Soto won’t need an injection, just medicine to treat the inflammation. The manager said he didn’t know if Soto would wait until he is symptom-free before returning to the lineup or would play through discomfort. Soto said he hopes identifying the issue will lead to erasing the discomfort.
“I don’t think I have to be grinding through it the whole year if we do the right thing and we do it the right way,” Soto said. “Definitely if we didn’t know what was going on in my elbow and we didn’t know, then maybe we’d definitely be grinding through the whole year. But now that we know what it is, we can treat it and we can do the right thing to get it going. I think I’ll be fine.”
Boone said having Soto play as designated hitter — something he hasn’t done yet this season — is possible when he returns. When, exactly, is unclear. Soto said his return to the lineup depends on how he feels when he reports to the ballpark.
Soto’s durability and production have led an MVP-caliber season in his first year as a Yankee and final campaign before free agency. The four-time All-Star is slashing .318/.424/603 with 17 home runs and 46 walks to 48 strikeouts. He began Friday tied with teammate Aaron Judge in fWAR (4.1) while leading the American League in batting average and on-base percentage.
Losing Soto for a prolonged period would have been debilitating for an offense that has helped fuel MLB’s best record behind him and Judge, another top AL MVP candidate. For the Yankees, Soto exiting Thursday brought back memories of Jasson Dominguez‘s situation last September when he reported right elbow pain before an MRI revealed a torn ulnar collateral ligament that required season-ending Tommy John surgery.
The team avoided the worst with Soto on Friday.
“There was a little unknown, but all you can do is say a prayer and hope for the best and we got the best news we could today,” Judge said. “He’s a big part of this team. We’ve been saying it all year.”
Also on Friday, Boone said right-hander Gerrit Cole will make his second rehab start Sunday for Double-A Somerset. Cole, sidelined since mid-March because of nerve irritation and edema in his right elbow, made his first rehab start Tuesday for Somerset, allowing two singles and no runs across 3⅓ innings.
Boone said earlier this week that Cole would likely make at least two more minor league rehab starts, which would include Sunday, putting him on track for a possible return to New York’s rotation in mid-to-late June.
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Jorge Castillo
NEW YORK — The Yankees are acquiring third baseman Ryan McMahon from the Rockies in exchange for minor league pitchers Griffin Herring and Josh Grosz, sources confirmed to ESPN on Friday.
The Yankees will assume the remainder of 30-year-old McMahon’s contract, which includes approximately $4.5 million for the remainder of 2025 and $32 million over the next two seasons.
An All-Star last season, McMahon was batting .217 with 16 home runs and a .717 OPS in 100 games for Colorado in 2025. He hit home runs in the first two games after the All-Star break and another on Tuesday and is on pace to keep his four-year 20-homer streak alive.
While the production has resulted in a 92 OPS+, which suggests McMahon has been 8% worse than the average major league hitter this season, he still represents a significant offensive upgrade at third base for New York.
The Yankees have had Oswald Peraza, one of the worst hitters in the majors, manning third base nearly every day since the club decided to release DJ LeMahieu, another former Rockies player, earlier this month and move Jazz Chisholm Jr. to second base. Peraza, while a strong defender, is slashing .147/.208/.237 in 69 games this season. His 24 wRC+ ranks last among the 310 hitters with at least 160 plate appearances this season.
Defensively, McMahon is a Gold Glove-caliber third baseman whose four Outs Above Average is third in the majors this season. He joins a Yankees club that has been marred by sloppy defense, most recently on Wednesday when it committed four errors in a defensive meltdown against the first-place Toronto Blue Jays.
Herring, 22, has recorded a 1.71 ERA in 89⅓ innings across 16 starts between Low- and High-A this season. He was a sixth-round pick out of LSU in the 2024 draft.
Grosz, an 11th-round pick in 2023, had a 4.14 ERA in 87 innings over 16 games (15 starts) for High-A Hudson Valley this season.
With third base addressed, the Yankees will continue to seek to acquire pitchers to bolster both their rotation and bullpen.
MLB.com first reported on the Yankees trading for McMahon.
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Jorge Castillo
The Mets acquired left-handed reliever Gregory Soto from the Orioles on Friday in exchange for two minor leaguers in what could be the first of multiple moves by New York to bolster its bullpen before the trade deadline Thursday.
The trade, which sent Class A right-hander Wellington Aracena and Double-A right-hander Cameron Foster to Baltimore, gives the Mets a hard-throwing left-hander to complement the club’s only lefty on the roster, Brooks Raley, who returned from Tommy John surgery last week.
Soto, who is 30 and was an All-Star with the Detroit Tigers in 2021 and 2022, has posted a 3.96 ERA with a 27.5% strikeout rate in 45 appearances this season. The Mets will be his fourth team since the 2022 season.
On Monday, Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns plainly signaled that upgrading the bullpen for the stretch run is his top priority.
The need is clear. Injuries and overuse have depleted a relief corps that led the majors in bullpen ERA through May 31. Since June 1, the group has posted 4.52 ERA, good for 23rd in the majors.
Aracena, 20, is 1-1 with a 2.38 ERA in 17 games for St. Lucie. The Orioles said he is one of two pitchers in the minors this season to have thrown at least 60 innings without surrendering a home run.
Foster, 26, is 5-2 with two saves and a 2.97 ERA while pitching at the Double-A and Triple-A levels.
BOSTON — Hundreds of Aramark workers at Fenway Park are on strike and planning to stay out for all of a homestand between the Boston Red Sox and the Los Angeles Dodgers starting Friday night.
Concession workers had set a deadline of noon Friday for Aramark and Fenway Park to reach an agreement with the Local 26 chapter of the Massachusetts and Rhode Island hotel, casino, airport and food services workers union.
The union went on strike at noon asking for “living wages, guardrails on technology and R-E-S-P-E-C-T!”
With the Red Sox and Dodgers scheduled to start at 7:10 p.m. EDT, union officials had a request for fans attending this homestand with food and beer workers on strike.
“We’re asking you to NOT buy concessions inside the ballpark,” Local 26 wrote on social media. “Tailgate before the games!”
Union workers walked the picket line wearing green T-shirts declaring “FENWAY WORKERS ON STRIKE.” They carried signs in the shape of a baseball proclaiming Local 26.
The Red Sox go out of town Monday with a game that night at Minnesota.
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