The calendar may have just changed to May, but the New York Yankees are already getting behind. The team has lost 13 of their last 17 games and they are now 8-15 on the season. The Yankees need to do something fast in order to jumpstart the offense and team. One thing they must do is bench third baseman Chase Headley.

Headley is off to a historically bad start this season. He has yet to hit an extra base hit and owns a .156/.267/.156 slash line through 64 at-bats and 75 plate appearances. He was only the 13th player in MLB history to start the month of May with a slugging percentage under .150 with at least 70 plate appearances. That isn’t the kind of production anyone can tolerate out of their third baseman.

To be fair, Headley has been solid on defense, a huge improvement over last season when he had trouble throwing to first. That can’t be an excuse for his putrid offense. The Yankees are sticking with him, talking about stat corrections and quality at-bats and exit velocity. The fact is that isn’t translating and those excuses have to be shelved along with Headley for the time being.

Ronald Torreyes has been much better at the plate than Headley. He owns a .375/.375/.500 slash line with a double and a triple in 24 at-bats. He isn’t going to keep those numbers, but right now he is playing a solid third base and is hitting far better than Headley. Joe Girardi has to deal with the reality that with Headley in the lineup, he isn’t putting his best group on the field.

At the moment, Torreyes is the Yankees’ best answer at third base. Rob Refsnyder is the next best option, but he isn’t ready as a third baseman yet.  He might be better than Headley at the plate and he can always be pulled late in games for defense, if the team needs to go that route. Torreyes, though, is the best short-term option.

The season is slipping away for the Yankees. To be fair, the entire team is underperforming and coming up short in almost every facet of the game. To pin it all on Headley isn’t fair and it doesn’t rest only on his shoulders. He just happens to be the start. He may bounce out of it. He may not. He has earned the demotion for the time being. Girardi should start with Headley and begin to make other moves in an effort to jumpstart this team.