The Yankees may be down a few sluggers entering the postseason, however, they certainly are equipped with a player capable of picking up some of the slack.
Ben Rice continued his special season in Wednesday night’s 9-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays. The 27-year-old clobbered his 40th homer of the season in the first inning and performed an encore with his 41st in the fourth.
“It’s a cool milestone,” said Rice about hitting his 40th. “It’s not something you go into the season really like aiming for. You don’t really know how it’s going to go. But as I was kind of approaching that number, so it was cool to do it tonight.”
Back in spring training, manager Aaron Boone projected that the slugger would hit 39 homers on the season, allowing for a playful moment between manager and player as he rounded the bases for the 40th time.
“I think I said like, ‘hey, there’s 40 for ya,’” Rice said. “I was joking with him after the 41st one, saying, ‘Hey, thanks for inspiring me this year.’ But it’s all good fun. I mean, back in spring when he told me that, I knew he was hoping I’d hit 40.”
Rice’s season slash line sits at .263/.362/.537 as the Yanks have needed every bit of production with Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Cody Bellinger all missing significant time this season.
The first baseman didn’t have any real expectations in mind, however, it’s safe to say his regular season was a huge success.
“I never really set out like certain numbers or anything like that,” Rice said when asked about his goals entering the year. “But just tried to focus day by day, just trying to do the best I can to stick with my approach and go out hit the ball hard and have good at bats, and then as the season gets closer to ending, see where you’re at and hopefully there’s something like what we did today.”
Rice will have an opportunity to continue his strong season into the playoffs and the Yanks have a lot riding on the power hitter.
In 2025, he didn’t have much success, slashing .222/.286/.273 in six games between the Wild Card series and ALDS.
With Judge’s status very much up in the air, they will need Rice’s postseason to look much more similar to his regular season if they want to make it a memorable run.
