Yankees’ left field competition includes under-the-radar slugger

BRADENTON, Fla. — Each of the Yankees’ top candidates to start in left field this season made their presence known in the visitors’ clubhouse at LECOM Park, spring training home to the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Aaron Hicks smiled and laughed as he caught up with reporters, showing that he’s in a better frame of mind this spring while chatting about the new rules banning defensive shifts.

Oswaldo Cabrera was as spunky as ever, bouncing around in his bright yellow hightop sneakers.

Even Estevan Florial was a source of attention, returning to his locker after smoking a 110.7-mph RBI double up the middle in his second at-bat.

And then there’s Rafael Ortega, the non-roster invitee who started in left on Friday. The Venezuelan sat on the far side of the clubhouse, his eyes glued to a monitor with a live feed of the final few innings in what turned out to be a 9-1 blowout win and near no-hitter that was broken up in the ninth.

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Ortega, 31, was quiet in the clubhouse, but he made some noise between the lines earlier in the afternoon. After swatting a two-run home run to right-center field off right-hander Mitch Keller in the second inning, Ortega added an RBI triple in the fifth, a sharp grounder that bounced high over Pirates first baseman Carlos Santana, rolling into the right-field corner.

As much as he’s a long shot to secure a spot on the Yankees’ Opening Day roster, Ortega — a veteran with a knack for overcoming adversity — already has made quite an impression at camp.

“He’s one of those guys that we want to get a lot of looks at,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said.

Ortega’s first taste of big-league action came back in 2012. The Rockies triple-jumped him from High-A to the big leagues for two games at the end of the regular season. After two hits in his debut and an uneventful encore the next night, Ortega had to wait until April 16, 2016 for his next big-league opportunity.

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Those 1,294 days were the darkest of times, an odyssey that tested Ortega’s will to keep going. Until a breakout season with the Cubs in 2021, Ortega had only appeared in 143 MLB games over a nine-year span. That journey, featuring countless fruitless invitations to spring training, injuries and hundreds of games in Triple-A, molded him into the player he is today: a southpaw that feasts on right-handed pitching.

“I feel good right now with where I’m at because I learned a lot from those ups and downs, especially the downs,” Ortega said. “When you go down, you get better at something that you need to get better at. That’s been helping me a lot to be here with this new opportunity with the Yankees.”

Ortega hit .291 with 11 home runs, 33 RBI and 12 steals with Chicago over 103 games in 2021. He was a machine against righties, batting .321 with a .900 OPS in 271 plate appearances against them. Three of his home runs came in one game against the Nationals in August, a hat trick that tied a franchise record.

Ortega’s splits against lefties are a red flag and he knows it. The spacious left field at Yankee Stadium would be a tall order for him defensively. Still, left-handed hitters with an ability to put the ball in play and hit for average have been hard to come by for the Yankees of late.

If a Yankees outfielder gets hurt, Ortega could quickly become a legitimate option at any point in the season.

“It means everything to be here,” Ortega said. “To play for the Yankees is every kid’s dream. Being here, I know the opportunity is right there. You never know what’s going to happen, I don’t make the decisions, but I’m going to do the best I can to be there and help this team win.”