Maybe this explains why, in those absent moments during the winter when Aaron Boone thought about who might lead off for a team without a natural leadoff hitter, he started to think about Austin Wells. After all, you don’t rise from rookie league to first-string catcher in four skinny years by spending life overwhelmed by moments.
Wells, from the moment he first arrived here in 2023, walked like he belonged here. So it was when Boone approached Wells at the start of spring training and told him he was thinking about making him a leadoff hitter, this was Wells’ reaction:
“Cool.”
And so it was that, seven weeks later, when he gave the Yankees their first lead of the season with a leadoff homer Thursday, first time in baseball history — as in ever — when a catcher hit a leadoff home run on Opening Day, this was his reaction to that.
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