Can This Recently Acquired Reliever Be the Closer the Yankees Need?

While the New York Yankees continue to fall further down in the standings, most of the blame is being placed on manager Aaron Boone. While Boone is certainly to blame for these struggles, the combination of the offense’s inability to score runs and a bullpen struggling to make outs is a recipe for disaster. When the Yankees traded for closer Devin Williams in the offseason, the team was trading for a dominant closer. A closer that only allowed three runs the entirety of the 2024 regular season. Williams has now allowed 26 runs on the year, which equals the amount he allowed from 2022 to 2024. While Williams was originally acquired to create fear in the ninth inning for the opposing team, he’s creating a different kind of fear: one for the fans who watch him walk out. 

While it has now been more than a decade since legendary closer Mariano Rivera hung up the cleats, the Yankees have yet to find their consistent closer. While Aroldis Chapman had a few years of dominance before and after his World Series win with the Chicago Cubs in 2016, his Yankee career is understandably tainted by poor postseason performances and his 2022 meltdown season involving a tattoo infection. After the team moved on to Clay Holmes, all seemed to be calm, but the honeymoon period abruptly ended in 2024. While Luke Weaver was great during the 2024 postseason run, the Yankees chose to move on to Williams this season, which has been a mess from the beginning. Weaver has been struggling since coming back from a hamstring injury, so turning to him is also something the team can’t exactly do. 

David Bednar, one of the Yankees’ most recent acquisitions before the trade deadline, showed a gutsy performance against the Texas Rangers during his first attempt as a closer for the team. While he allowed two runners on in the bottom of the ninth and was almost pulled from the game by Boone, Bednar won the battle to get Adolis García swinging to end the game. As of right now, it looks like Bednar will get the opportunity to close games for the Yankees, pushing Williams out to lower-leverage situations. While the closing situation for the Yankees has been rocky over the past several years, Bednar has the chance to rewrite the script for at least the next few years. Closing in the Bronx is no small task, and it was something that Williams was unable to handle despite stellar numbers in Milwaukee. Hopefully, the bright lights of closing time are something that Bednar can get used to.