DJ LeMahieu

DJ LeMahieu signed with the New York Yankees in January 2019 on a modest two-year, $24 million deal, and most of the fan base shrugged (he'd just posted a down year in Colorado, and nobody in the Bronx was picturing a batting champion). The very next year he hit a freakin' .364 and became the first Yankee since Bernie Williams to win a batting title. Five years after that, he was designated for assignment with $22 million still on the books. Both things are true. That's DJ LeMahieu's whole Yankees career in one sentence.

The Bargain Nobody Wanted

David John LeMahieu came up through LSU (a 2009 College World Series champion) and the Cubs system before Chicago shipped him to Colorado in December 2011. He spent seven years as a Rockies second baseman, won three Gold Gloves, made two All-Star teams, and took home the 2016 NL batting title at .348. Then 2018 happened -- a quieter season -- and the Rockies let him walk.

The Yankees signed him in January 2019 as infield depth, a solid glove who could plug holes. What they actually got was the best value contract of the Cashman era. In his very first season, with the 2019 roster setting an MLB record for players used on the injured list (30, breaking the previous record of 28), LeMahieu became the first Yankee ever to make 25-plus starts at three different infield positions in one year -- 28 at first, 66 at second, 47 at third. He also hit .327 with 26 home runs and 102 RBI, made his first All-Star team, and won a Silver Slugger. The utility signing was suddenly the best hitter on the team.

The Batting Title Nobody Saw Coming

Then came 2020, and it got weirder. In a 60-game, COVID-shortened season, LeMahieu hit .364 -- the ninth Yankee ever to win an AL batting title and the first since Williams in 1998. He led the league in OBP (.421) and OPS (1.011), finished third in MVP voting, and became just the second player in modern history (after Ed Delahanty) to win a batting title in each league. Gary Sanchez started calling him "LeMachine." Somebody else started calling his bat the "Boat Oar." Both stuck.

The Yankees locked him up that January with a six-year, $90 million extension, spread thin on purpose to soften the luxury-tax hit. It looked smart immediately. It looked less smart by the end.

The Long Middle

From 2021 to 2023, LeMahieu was solid and hurt, mostly in that order. A quieter 2021 (.268, 10 HR) gave way to a fractured big toe that wrecked the end of 2022 -- he still won a Gold Glove that year anyway, the first-ever American League utility Gold Glove, after splitting time at third, second, and first (never shortstop in pinstripes, whatever you may have heard). 2023 was rough in the first half and better in the second, right around the time the Yankees fired their hitting coach. Coincidence, probably. Nobody in the Bronx believed that at the time.

Then 2024 arrived and things got worse. A foot fracture in spring training. A hip injury in September. He never got back for the World Series run, which stung more than it should have for a guy hitting .204. By 2025, Jazz Chisholm Jr. had the second base job, LeMahieu had a bench role and a .674 OPS, and on July 9 the Yankees designated him for assignment. He was released days later, owed money on a contract that had long since stopped making sense on either side.

None of it erases 2019 and 2020, which is the case a lot of Yankees careers make for themselves. LeMahieu was never a star in the traditional sense -- no monster power seasons, no highlight-reel defense at short. He was a professional hitter who happened to run into two of the best years anybody in pinstripes has had this century, got paid on the strength of them, and then had to live up to a contract his body wouldn't let him finish. The batting title's still real. So is the DFA. Baseball doesn't care which one you'd rather remember.