Yankees' Juan Soto has been everything he was supposed to be

CLEVELAND — Juan Soto has been as advertised in the postseason.

No surprise there.

The rightfielder has been as advertised from his first game in a Yankees uniform — Feb. 28, when he hit an opposite-field three-run homer off the scoreboard in left-center at Steinbrenner Field in Tampa — all the way to Game 5 of the American League Championship Series on Saturday night. That's when he hit a three-run homer in the top of the 10th inning to give the Yankees a 5-2 victory over the Cleveland Guardians and put them in the World Series for the first time since 2009.

That came a night after Game 4,  when he hit a two-run homer in the first inning in an  8-6 victory  that gave the Yankees a three-games-to-one lead in the series.

And nearly seven months ago, there was the season opener March 28 in Houston, a 5-4 victory over the Astros in which Soto went 1-for-3 with an RBI and had the first of what would be his team-high 10 outfield assists to prevent the tying run from scoring in the ninth inning.

During the season’s first two months, as Aaron Judge was struggling, Soto more or less carried the offense, hitting .311 with 15 homers, 49 RBIs, 40 walks and a .990 OPS in his first 59 games.

All en route to hitting .288 with 41 homers, 109 RBIs, 129 walks and a .989 OPS in 157 games.

And then there was Soto’s first playoff game with the Yankees, a 6-5 victory over the Royals in Game 1 of the Division Series. He had three hits and, as was the case in the season opener, threw out a runner.

Soto, whose hitting was characterized by Brian Cashman as “transformational” shortly after the general manager completed the trade for him last December, has more than matched the hype that accompanied his arrival from San Diego.

“I think he's completely focused on going out there and performing on a big stage in the playoffs,” Aaron Boone said on the eve of Game 1 against the Royals.

Soto has shown the same focus as he did as a 20-year-old when he helped lead the 2019 Nationals to a World Series title.

Going into Saturday night’s Game 5 — in which the Yankees had a chance to clinch the American League pennant for the first time since they won the World Series in 2009 — Soto was 8-for-28 (.286) with two homers, five RBIs, seven walks and a .953 OPS in the first eight playoff games.

He added a first-inning double to that total in Game 5, but Gleyber Torres was thrown out at the plate on the play for the first out of what ultimately was a scoreless inning. 

Pretty much from the time he joined the Yankees, Soto's impending free agency has caused much angst among the fan base.

Much was made earlier in the season when managing general partner Hal Steinbrenner said he was open to in-season negotiations with Soto’s agent, Scott Boras. But that was mostly smoke and mirrors; Boras almost always takes his players into free agency and there was never any expectation that he would do anything different with Soto.

While speaking with a handful of New York reporters earlier this season, Boras called Soto "a centurion,” meaning a once-in-a-century player. So when he hits the market — and he will — Soto is expected to get a package of at least $500 million. In fact,  the industry expectation is that the final number will approach $600 million or even surpass it.

Since the first day of spring training, hardly a week has gone by when Soto hasn’t been asked about becoming a free agent. He’s been as consistent answering that question as he has been on the field.

“I’ve been happy with the organization, how they’ve made me feel,” Soto said in September, discussing it for the umpteenth time. “I think what’s been most important is how I’ve felt with my teammates . . . [But] we still have to meet that one expectation: winning a championship. That’s No. 1.”

That, too, is priority one for the Yankees, but however the season ends, the top priority will be re-signing Soto, which would continue to give them the most devastating one-two punch (with Judge hitting after him) in the sport.

“I'm not thinking of the free agency part of it. I don't think he is. I think he's loving being here and being part of this team and knowing what's at stake and what he has an opportunity to do,” Boone said as the playoffs got underway. “He's been in playoff baseball before. He's won a championship before. He obviously knows what it takes. I think that's where his mind is.

"Talk about being present; I think he's very present with where he is, and obviously he's coming off an amazing regular season. Obviously, a guy we count on heavily in our lineup, but I think he's in a great place. I don't think he ever gets ahead of himself like that. I think that'll be for . . . when that time comes, they'll handle that.”