Around the Empire: Yankees news - 8/9/19

New York Daily News | Kristie Ackert: In true 2019 Yankees spirit, I’ve decided to kick off this link collection with - what else - updates on the hurting Bombers. Though Gleyber Torres seems to have avoided serious injury, he was still left out of Thursday’s lineup due to precautionary reasons. As for some recovering Yankees, Gary Sanchez caught seven innings of a minor league game on Wednesday, and Aaron Boone hopes to slot him in the lineup on Saturday. Meanwhile, Luke Voit’s status is still unclear following his sports hernia, but apparently he’s feeling good. On the pitching side, David Hale could return to soak up some innings this weekend, while Luis Severino seeks to throw off a mound today.

FanGraphs.com | Jay Jaffe: Never mind all the other injuries; if I just handed myself the link above in March, I would have thought the season was a goner. Instead, the Yankees have overcome all of their injuries to post the best record in MLB so far. Jaffe does a nice job here of highlighting both the quantity and the magnitude of all the injury hits that the Yankees have weathered this season, as well as the stellar performances from fill-ins like Mike Tauchman and Cameron Maybin that have led the Yankees to thrive. One minor nitpick; couldn’t he have been more careful not to jinx anyone with that title? Here’s hoping that Gleyber avoids any karmic punishment and returns as expected.

NJ.com | Mike Rosenstein: DJ LeMahieu, the Yankees’ MVP of 2019, currently leads the American League with a .335 batting average. Meanwhile in Queens, up-and-comer Jeff McNeil is hitting a league-leading .339, and has been a key cog for the recently surging Metropolitans. If current trends hold, New York may be home to two batting title winners in the same year, a prestigious occasion that only two other cities have experienced since the birth of the American League in 1901 (George Sisler and Rogers Hornsby did the trick for St. Louis in 1920 and 1922, while Jimmie Foxx and Chuck Klein accomplished the feat in 1933). Here’s hoping that the LeMahieu-McNeil duo can bring the honor to New York - preferably with LeMahieu ending up with the higher average.

MLB.com: Finally, who’s excited for the “Field of Dreams” game between the Yankees and the White Sox that was recently announced for August 2020? MLB’s official press release covers the basic details of the event, and also includes a video showing the 3D rendering of the anticipated construction of the ballpark. My humble suggestion to MLB would be to do away with the outfield fences, so Aaron Judge can launch one into the cornfields and have a chuckle as the White Sox outfielders search frantically for the ball among the corn stalks.