Requested to present Aaron Boone’s efficiency a grade, Hal Steinbrenner countered with a plea.
“Please don’t make me repeat myself,” the Yankees proprietor replied with a sigh and a smile over Zoom on Monday. “I’ve been asked this question so many times.”
Steinbrenner, chatting with a gaggle of reporters for the primary time since repealing his crew’s facial hair ban in February, went on to say that Boone is “a good manager at many of the things he has to do.”
“He’s not perfect,” Steinbrenner continued earlier than later applauding Boone’s capacity to soak up analytical knowledge. “I’m not perfect. You’re not perfect. But he is great at dealing with the players, with his staff, with [Brian Cashman’s] people and with [the media], and he makes overall good decisions on the field.”
Steinbrenner, whose Yankees misplaced the American League East after which the ALDS to the pennant-winning Blue Jays, went on to say, “You can’t pin this on Aaron Boone, that’s for sure.”
As an alternative, Steinbrenner blamed gamers for the membership’s shortcomings.
“This Toronto series was on the players,” he mentioned. “It’s on the players’ shoulders. They didn’t hit. We got a couple bad starts, obviously, against the Blue Jays. You can’t do any of that when they’re playing as good as they’re playing entering the playoffs.”
Steinbrenner repeatedly famous that the Yankees didn’t “play up to their potential,” whereas the Jays and Dodgers, who beat Toronto within the World Collection for his or her second straight championship, did. He additionally talked about the Yankees’ months-long summer season swoon a number of occasions.
With the Yankees tying the Blue Jays for the American League’s greatest document however dropping the head-to-head tiebreaker in the course of the common season, Steinbrenner acknowledged that the skid “cost us the division.”
Such stretches have develop into an annual prevalence beneath Boone and throughout ever-changing rosters, however Steinbrenner faulted gamers for that as effectively.
“There’s nothing coaching-wise that I feel we could have done differently,” Steinbrenner mentioned when requested cease the yearly ruts. “Gamers begin to push once they battle, and then you definately begin chasing dangerous pitches, after which only a myriad of issues occurs when a crew actually struggles like that.
“I don’t expect to see that every year. We’re too good for that.”
Steinbrenner did appear to attach teaching with the Yankees’ “mental mistakes” and woes on the basepaths, as he alluded to the departure of Travis Chapman. The primary base and infield coach was not invited again after his contract expired on the finish of the season, and he’s since joined the Tigers’ group.
“We’re going to expect better results this year,” Steinbrenner mentioned of the Yankees’ baserunning.
Steinbrenner’s expectations apply to total outcomes, too, because the Bombers are within the midst of a 16-year championship drought. That’s the second-longest in Yankees historical past.
The hiatus has left followers impatient, particularly with Steinbrenner not taking the identical care-free method to spending that his father, George, as soon as did.
Nonetheless, Steinbrenner nonetheless funds one in all baseball’s priciest payrolls on a yearly foundation, and he insists the Yankees’ mantra continues to be “World Series or bust” after one other yr with no title.
“I certainly thought it was last year,” he mentioned. “Now we start the work of subsequent yr. That’s our one and solely focus. I completely went into the playoffs believing we may win a championship, in fact, and the crew was ok to win a championship.
“But they’ve got to play up to their potential.”
