aaron hicks yankees
Wendell Cruz-USA TODAY Sports

The New York Yankees have designated outfielder Aaron Hicks for assignment, according to Greg Joyce of the Post. This proved to be the corresponding move after outfielder Greg Allen was acquired from the Red Sox Friday.

#YankeesTwitter can finally rejoice as Yankees finally pulled the plug. Hicks’ trade market must have been absolutely non-existent for Brian Cashman and Hal Steinbrenner to eat over $20 million through 2025. Keep in mind that Cashman and manager Aaron Boone just didn’t play Gallo for two months before shipping him to the Dodgers.

But in the case of Hicks, he was simply that bad. He hit .188 with one home run and a .524 OPS in 28 games. His maximum exit velocity on the year is in the 19th percentile and his line drive rate (LD%) is an awful 10.4%. He doesn’t even have the saving grace of making regular hard contact.

Add in years of injuries, including Tommy John surgery, and one amazing juiced-ball season. Put it all together, and Hicks has been an overall bust in New York.

And the Yankees’ next step with him? They have ten days to trade, waive, or assign Hicks to the minors. Smart money says another team picks up him up off of waivers.

But at the end of the day, moving on from Aaron Hicks does nothing but help the Yankees. Allen is very much the same player, but nowhere near as expensive. He hit .270 in a cup of coffee with the Yankees in 2021 and was hitting .250 with a .795 OPS at Boston’s Triple-A Worcester affiliate. Allen also stole 21 stolen bases in 37 games, giving the Yankees another reliable set of legs off the bench.

It’s almost shocking, even unprecedented, but Cashman finally did it. The Aaron Hicks experiment is over and, for once, New York’s front office seems to be owning their mistake.

Josh Benjamin has been a staff writer at ESNY since 2018. He has had opinions about everything, especially the Yankees and Knicks. He co-hosts the “Bleacher Creatures” podcast and is always looking for new pieces of sports history to uncover, usually with a Yankee Tavern chicken parm sub in hand.