While Toronto Blue Jays‘ first baseman Vladimir Guerrero Jr. isn’t set for free agency until at least the 2026 season, he’s already seemingly crossed one prominent team off his list. The 23-year-old Guerrero Jr. was recently asked for his thoughts on the New York Yankees, and he revealed in strong terms he has no desire to suit up for them. Héctor Gómez of Z101 Digital relayed that Saturday:
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.: "I like to play in New York, I like to kill the Yankees. I would never sign with the Yankees, not even dead."
(via @ElDotolNastra)
— Héctor Gómez (@hgomez27) November 5, 2022
Those comments are from the video interview embedded in that tweet, which apparently comes with a “potentially sensitive content” warning for “kill the Yankees.” But Guerrero has done a pretty good job of that, at least in a baseball sense, over his 2019-present MLB career. In 65 career games against the AL East rival Yankees to date, he’s hit .289/.346/.518 across 249 at-bats, with 72 hits, 27 runs, and 13 home runs. (One of those is the two-run shot on April 13, 2022 seen at the top of this post.)
That’s similar to Guerrero’s overall career slash line (.284/.358/.504), with a slightly higher batting average and slugging percentage, but a lower on-base percentage. And perhaps that speaks to his eagerness to “kill the Yankees.” To date at least, he’s walked less against them, but hit slightly more, and hit for more power. So he definitely enjoys putting up big hits against the Yankees.
This past season, Guerrero hit .274/.339/.480 across 160 MLB games, down from the .311/.401/.601 2021 season that had him finish second to Shohei Ohtani in AL MVP voting. But his numbers were still impressive, and there’s still a lot of talk about the Jays trying to sign him to a long-term extension (which he’s said he’s open to) rather than letting him hit free agency in 2026. And if he wants to keep playing in New York regularly and keep killing the Yankees, sticking with an AL East club may be the way to do that.
[Héctor Gómez on Twitter; photo from Wendell Cruz/USA Today Sports]
