The top five leaders on the 2020 New York Yankees in wins above replacement (WAR) were DJ LeMahieu (2.9), Gerrit Cole (2.2), Gio Urshela (1.9), Clint Frazier (1.5) and Luke Voit (1.5). Each player entered the year with high expectations and finished with impressive performances during the pandemic-shortened season, and here now we’ll take a look at some of their standout 2020 accomplishments.

In today’s analytics-based day and age, baseball players like Gio Urshela don’t just spring up out of nowhere and transform into legitimate All-Star-caliber players, but sure enough that is exactly what the Yankees have witnessed over the last two seasons since his arrival.

Considered a talented defensive third baseman with a low offensive ceiling, Urshela’s move from the Blue Jays to the Yankees was relatively under-the-radar at the time when he was acquired for cash considerations on August 4, 2018.

In fact, the trade first became known when Scranton-Wilkes/Barre RailRiders beat writer Conor Foley tweeted that Urshela “just walked from the Buffalo clubhouse (visitor’s) at PNC Field to the RailRiders clubhouse.”

Now, just over two years after that fateful move, Urshela ascended to become the third-most valuable Yankee in terms of wins above replacement (1.9) this past season on a star-studded roster filled with All-Stars, perennial MVP candidates and highly touted prospects.

“Nobody thought Gio would be this guy,” Brian Cashman admitted in 2019. “What he is doing now was not anything we felt we were tapping into.”

The 29-year-old Colombian native missed some time recovering from elbow bone spurs in early September, but he shone once again on both offense and defense with a slash line of .298/.368/.490 and countless highlight-reel plays at the hot corner.

Urshela notched the longest hitting streak by any Yankee this season when he hit a remarkable .451 across 13 games from August 31 through September 24, also tying his own career-best mark.

Against his former Indians team in this year’s Wild Card Series match-up, Urshela was the undisputed most valuable player in the game that sent the Yankees onto the ALDS, calling Game 2 “one of the best games I ever played in my life.”

Urshela bashed a 432-foot go-ahead grand slam – the first slam ever hit in a postseason game by a Yankees third baseman – in an eventual 10-9 comeback victory for New York, but it was his defense that earned him the coveted ‘championship belt’ that night.

With the Yankees down 9-8 in the eighth inning, Urshela made one of his signature “**How did he do that?!**” plays in the infield, diving to his left to field a grounder and initiating an inning-ending double-play from his rear end to extinguish the Cleveland rally.

“It was one of the key plays of the game,” Aroldis Chapman told reporters after the game. “We all know what Gio is capable of. It was an amazing play.”

While the Yankees’ postseason march may have ended short of Urshela and his teammates’ expectations this year, the Bombers can rest assured they’ve got third base covered heading into next year and beyond.

Urshela won’t hit free agency until 2024, so the Yankees will have ample payroll flexibility to improve in other areas while Urshela remains on track to be another one of Cashman’s most valuable pickups for the foreseeable future.

Stay tuned to YES Network for all the latest news and developments on the Yankees offseason as the winter months approach.