Brian Cashman defends Yankees as ‘pretty f–king good’ in wild rant against critics
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — In his first time speaking to reporters since the Yankees finished what he described in August as a “disaster” of a season, Brian Cashman came out firing.
An animated Cashman held court for over an hour on Tuesday, much of it defending the Yankees’ baseball operations group that put together the roster of an 82-win team — the club’s fewest victories since 1992 — while pointing to the franchise’s track record of success overall.
Cashman repeatedly referred to separating fact from “bulls–t,” indicating that critics were largely piling on during a down year for the team, but made it clear how he feels about the Yankees’ brain trust in general.
“I’m proud of our people and proud of our process,” Cashman said at the general managers’ meetings. “It doesn’t mean we’re firing on all cylinders. It doesn’t mean we’re the best in class.
“But I think we’re pretty f–king good, personally. I’m proud of our people and I’m also looking forward to ’24 being a better year than ’23.”
Cashman, like Hal Steinbrenner had earlier in the day, pushed back on criticisms of the Yankees’ analytics department or that the team has leaned too heavily on analytics.
He cited the Yankees having the smallest analytics staff in the American League East and the largest pro scouting department in the majors.
“Is that a shocker to everybody?” Cashman said. “Shouldn’t be, but no one’s doing their deep dives. They’re just throwing ammunition and bulls–t and accusing us of being run analytically. Analytics is an important spoke in our wheel but it should be in everybody’s wheel and it really is. It’s an important spoke in every operation that’s having success. There’s not one team that’s not using it. We’re no different.
“But to say we are guided by analytics as a driver, it’s a lie.”
In explaining the Yankees’ brutal season in 2023, Cashman pointed to injuries (another one of the things that was “not bulls–t,” he said, while also later defending the strength and conditioning staff) and underperformance as two of the biggest factors.
He insisted that the 2023 roster, on paper, was better than the 2022 roster that won 99 games and the AL East.
“I’m telling you that injuries and underperformance are part of it, without a doubt,” Cashman said. “Are there areas for us to get better at and improve at? Yes. Are there people that jumped off the bandwagon because we started to s–t down our leg and losing games and it caused them to make mountains out of mole hills?”
The Yankees’ season was derailed in part by fluke injuries to Aaron Judge (a torn ligament in his toe after running into the wall at Dodger Stadium) and Anthony Rizzo (post-concussion syndrome stemming from a collision at first base).
But they were also hurt by injuries to players that have injury histories, including Giancarlo Stanton, Carlos Rodon and Luis Severino, among others.
While speaking about some of their recent trades, many of which have backfired, Cashman said the Yankees had been “victimized … [for] trying to go for it.”
He also staunchly defended their player development group, fighting back against the idea that many of their young players of late have struggled to translate minor league success into major league success.
“The same people that were responsible for us having a lot of success are somehow being focused as the blame game for the reason the 2023 season went south,” Cashman said. “I think you can start unpacking all of a sudden there’s a lot of discussion about player development and how we develop our players and analytics, and then it’s like, you got to come back to why did we lose and why do we have such trouble with many of the same players coming back that won 99 games last year with bringing certain guys into that roster mix.
“Obviously got a lot of injuries that took guys offline, and then we had underperformance in certain areas, too. That’s what added up to our 82-win season, and more so than anything else, but there’s a lot of narratives that got carried away in my opinion, and a lot of people that have been unfairly portrayed in my opinion.”