Together with his membership stumbling via the final two months of the season, Aaron Boone has insisted that he’s main the most effective groups he’s managed over his eight seasons with the Yankees.
“I do feel like, since I’ve been here, we have a chance to be as good as any team as we’ve had,” the skipper mentioned final weekend after the Bombers have been swept by the middling Marlins. “I really feel like that.”
Two collection losses later, the Yankees have but to point out any form of proof that helps Boone’s declare.
On Sunday, they dropped a rubber match in opposition to the Astros as their ace, Max Fried, struggled once more. In the meantime, Houston’s Jason Alexander, who awoke with a 5.97 ERA, permitted only one hit over six scoreless innings. The Yankees did find yourself scoring within the 7-1 loss, however a number of sloppy errors and a few poor bullpen work let the sport get out of hand, persevering with developments which have plagued this group for some time.
The Yankees led the American League East by seven video games on Could 28, however they’re now in third place. With the group six video games behind the Blue Jays and three behind the Crimson Sox on the conclusion of Sunday’s contest, the Wild Card race is the first focus proper now.
Even that’s in jeopardy, because the Yankees management the third and last Wild Card spot by simply half a sport. Had it not been for the abysmal White Sox beating the Guardians on Sunday, Cleveland would have the Yankees on the skin wanting in.
“We’re not doing our job,” Aaron Decide mentioned Sunday. “We’re not doing the little things that put ourselves in a good position to go out there and win baseball games.”
The Yankees have nobody however themselves guilty for that, as they’re 2-7 since what was imagined to be a reinvigorating commerce deadline and 20-31 since June 13. Solely the Nationals, Rockies and Mets – New York’s different disaster – have been worse over that latter stretch.
And but, the Yankees publicly contemplate themselves amongst baseball’s greatest.
“We’ve got a great team in this room,” Decide insisted, making the declare greater than as soon as regardless of inadequate proof. “A lot of great players, guys that have had their backs up against the wall before and in tough situations. Just like every year you play here, you’re gonna have your back up against the wall. So guys have been there and done that, and we just gotta step up and do it on the field. We can sit here and talk about it. You can ask me how everything is going, but it’s about what we do on the field.”
Decide, a bit annoyed with some questions over the Yankees’ struggles and his well being – he’s rehabbing a proper flexor pressure – is correct about one factor: the group has gamers who’ve been on this place earlier than.
That’s partly as a result of extended summer season swoons have turn out to be an annual prevalence beneath Boone.
There have been years when the phenomenon has sunk the group, resembling 2023, when the Yankees didn’t make the playoffs. Then there was final yr, when the Yankees performed a really related model of baseball, solely to beat it and attain the World Sequence.
In fact, that model of baseball contributed to a loss within the Fall Basic. However it’s too quickly for the 2025 Yankees to be interested by how their poor fundamentals might harm them in October.
“The game is littered with dead and buried teams,” Boone mentioned Sunday. “We’re in a playoff position right now, and we’ve been through a bad two months where we haven’t performed at a level we need to. But look at last year. Go back the year before, the year before. You can pick out a number of teams that are sitting in a worse position than we are right now that go on that run. We have the people to do that, no doubt in my mind, but it’s just sitting here as talk right now.”
Boone higher hope that he’s proper about his personnel, or the Yankees may very well be taking a look at an early finish to their season.
A primary-round exit within the playoffs wouldn’t shock anybody at this level. Heck, the Yankees need to make the postseason.
They nonetheless can — and will — however the on-field product wants to start out matching the descriptions the Yankees have peddled.
“We haven’t been good enough for the last few months,” Boone acknowledged. “However that is totally different than say even 2023, the place I didn’t assume we have been essentially able to that run that we wanted to actually get sizzling. And we have been out of place at that time. That is totally different. We’re able proper now the place we’re answerable for issues. We’re in a playoff spot technically proper now, and I consider we now have the folks to get it accomplished.
“We’ve gotta play consistent baseball, period.”
Initially Revealed: August 10, 2025 at 6:57 PM EDT
