Jazz Chisholm Jr. is about to find out how his “70 percent” mentality plays in the Home Run Derby.
The Yankees are just hoping he gets through it 100 percent healthy.
After Chisholm was named as the eighth and final participant for Monday’s Derby at Truist Park in Atlanta, Aaron Boone was asked if he had any concerns about the All-Star second baseman doing it given the injuries he has already dealt with this season.
“I hope not,” Boone said Friday with a slight chuckle. “Obviously he’s playing at a really high level and in a really good place physically. But he has had some things that have slowed him at different times this year.
“But at the same time, you don’t want to stand in the way of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that every individual player, ultimately, should make that decision.”
Chisholm missed the month of May with an oblique strain, left a June game early with groin tightness and then revealed last weekend that he has been playing through shoulder soreness in recent weeks, though he reiterated on Friday that it has never bothered him swinging.
Instead, Chisholm made multiple references to the “70 percent” mindset he has played with since returning from the injured list — meaning not overswinging or playing out of control and just letting his natural talent take over — which has led to big dividends.
“I’m just going out there to have fun,” said Chisholm, who entered Friday batting .314 with a 1.011 OPS and 10 home runs in 32 games since returning from the IL. “I ain’t trying to think that hard about it. I’m not even gonna really practice for it. … For me, I’m just gonna go out there, have fun, 70 percent, don’t do too much, just hit a couple homers. Hopefully I win it by doing that. I’m just going to enjoy the time out there.”
Chisholm said the only person that needs to practice for the event is his stepdad, Geron Sands, who will be pitching to him.
The 27-year-old said when he was growing up, he always told Sands that when he got to the big leagues and hit in the Home Run Derby, he would throw to him.
So after Chisholm got the news on Thursday that he would be participating in the event, Sands had already arrived in New York by Friday.
The two have plenty of experience together, as Sands has been throwing to Chisholm since he was a kid in the Bahamas, which has continued each offseason now that he is a big leaguer.
“He throws to me every year in the Bahamas Derby,” Chisholm said. “So it ain’t nothing new to us.”
Chisholm pointed to that derby back home — officially called the Don’t Blink Home Run Derby in Paradise — as good practice for Monday.
Because it happens annually in the middle of the offseason, when Chisholm usually hasn’t even started swinging yet, he is conscious of not overdoing it and risking injury.
“I haven’t been swinging before those times, so I wouldn’t go out there to try to hurt myself,” he said. “So just out there having fun. Hit a couple, might catch a couple that go further than the others. But just try to be accurate and consistent more than trying to hit the ball further than Oneil Cruz.”
Chisholm, who will be the first Yankee to participate in the event since Aaron Judge (who won it) and Gary Sánchez did it in 2017, cited Cruz and Ronald Acuña Jr. — before he was replaced by Braves teammate Matt Olson on Friday night — as the biggest threats in the eight-man field.
This one might not be as picturesque as the derby back home, in which hitters crush baseballs into the ocean.
But Chisholm, who has a flair for the dramatic as an entertainer, is just looking to have fun.
“Just not even thinking about it, that’s what I’m going to go out there and do,” Chisholm said. “Because I normally do well in the Bahamian ones.”
