ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – The Yankees’ latest summer slump has reached a familiar stage: Aaron Boone has begun to struggle.
And while much of the recent fan anger has been focused on Boone, who pitched a 5-3 loss to the Rays on Tuesday night, marking the team’s 17th loss in their last 23 games, general manager Brian Cashman gave him a vote of confidence ahead of the series opener against the Rays.
“Obviously he works extremely hard,” said Cashman, who was at Tropicana Field for the team’s struggles. “He has a very good relationship with his teammates. He’s being asked every day to make the most of what he has and push the right buttons, and I think he’s handling it as well as he can.”
“We had a wave of success the first two months, but then as June ended and we went into July, it got really tough for a long time. Ultimately, it all comes down to the record we have now, but as a team, we’ve got to play better than we are right now.”
The Yankees had the best record in the major leagues with a 50-22 record on June 14. Since then, they were 5-16 going into Wednesday’s game, their worst record in the majors over that span.
Meanwhile, the Yankees have fallen from a 3.5-game lead in the AL East to three games behind the Orioles. The Yankees entered Wednesday leading the AL Wild Card standings, but the Twins (1.5 games back), Red Sox (3.5 games back) and Royals (5.5 games back) are suddenly in hot pursuit.
Boone, who is in the final year of his contract, accepted responsibility Tuesday night when asked what he could do as manager to help the Yankees end their ongoing slump.
“It starts with me,” Boone said, “and I come in through the coaching staff and try to get the guys prepared the best we can and set the tone with how we present, but it’s up to us as coaches to make sure the players go out there at their best and are successful.”
“We’ve got to keep doing it with all our might and trust that the ball will bounce back to us a little bit and start rolling here. It starts with this bump, so we’ve got to keep doing it.”
The Yankees had a 55-38 record as of Wednesday morning, still the fifth-best record in the major leagues. FanGraphs gives the Yankees a 97.1 percent chance of making the playoffs, while Baseball Reference gives them a 96.6 percent chance of making the playoffs.
But their current nosedive is terrible.
The Yankees have been plagued by injuries to Giancarlo Stanton and Anthony Rizzo during this time, but their biggest problem is their starting pitching.
The starting pitchers had a major league-worst 2.77 ERA through June 14, but have posted a major league-best 7.04 since then, and it got even worse with Carlos Rodon’s latest run on Tuesday night.
