Yankees players defend Aaron Boone as questions swirl: ‘Hardest coaching job’ in MLB

NEW YORK — It was Aug. 14, and inside the New York Yankees’ clubhouse, the mood was glum. The night before, the Yankees suffered what could end up as their worst loss of the season when reliever Clay Holmes blew a four-run ninth-inning lead to the Marlins in Miami. Their playoff hopes were rapidly dimming, and when their hitters’ meeting began to kick off the series against the powerhouse Braves in Atlanta, manager Aaron Boone called everyone’s attention toward him.

Boone acknowledged how tough it was to swallow the previous loss, and how losing two of three to Miami had put the Yankees in a difficult position. But the 50-year-old former big-leaguer made it a point to turn toward the positives. The Yankees had been collecting more hits and he liked how the team had continued to fight. Seated near the front, Aaron Judge nodded his head. Judge knew his teammates had felt like they were letting each other down and disappointing the coaching staff. He appreciated Boone’s perspective — even if the Yankees still wound up getting swept by the club with MLB’s best record.

“Let’s focus on the positives,” Judge said, “because if we sit here and dwell on the negatives, those negatives are going to turn into a lot more negatives.”

Far more negatives are swirling around the Yankees than positives right now. Especially considering Thursday’s 6-5 loss to the Nationals at Yankee Stadium, in which they wasted Judge’s fourth home run in two days, twice blew the lead and had a ninth-inning rally fall short. At 61-66, the Yankees have lost 10 of their past 11 games and have fallen to 10 games back of the third and final wild-card spot. They haven’t won any of their past nine series. Just 35 games remain in their regular season.

“We’re all disappointed with how the season’s gone and just how we played,” infielder DJ LeMahieu said.

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On Wednesday, their general manager, Brian Cashman, fielded question after question about what has gone wrong in what he called a “disaster” season. Many had expected the Yankees to be contending for a playoff spot, not calling up top prospects with an eye toward 2024.

When asked to assess Boone’s job performance this season, Cashman trod lightly around the topic. He didn’t say Boone had done well or poorly. Rather, Cashman said that Boone was “doing everything he possibly can do, just like all of us,” and that Boone was “pulling all his levers.” And when he was asked if Boone’s job security was something he would have to look at in the offseason, Cashman dodged again, saying, “I think we’re all going to be evaluated, and I’m including myself.”

Ultimately, the decision whether Boone stays or goes will be up to owner Hal Steinbrenner. Boone has one year remaining on his three-year contract, and like Cashman, he’s received lots of heat from a fan base disappointed with the state of the team. In July, the Yankees fired hitting coach Dillon Lawson, and Cashman said it was because he wasn’t connecting well enough with the team’s hitters. Cashman hoped the new hitting coach, former player Sean Casey, who had no coaching experience, would generate better results. Yet many of the Yankees’ offensive numbers have actually regressed under Casey.

On Wednesday, Boone said that in his most recent meeting with Steinbrenner and Cashman, which happened last weekend, the owner was “certainly frustrated, as we all are” with the Yankees’ performance. Boone added that he was on the same page as Steinbrenner.

“But I think we’re all in this together and share that same kind of feeling,” Boone said. “So, I don’t think he’s necessarily pointedly angry with me in these meetings.”

But with fans yearning for accountability from the Yankees as they trend toward their 14th straight year without a World Series appearance, and with Cashman facing questions about Boone’s future, Yankees players say they love playing for the man who took over his post after Cashman fired former manager Joe Girardi following the 2017 season.

“It’s not an easy job,” LeMahieu said. “I think he handles it great. The players respect him. They enjoy playing for him, but they also respect him.”

“He’s a good friend of mine,” Judge said. “He’s been with me here since 2018. We’ve built a strong relationship.”

“I think he has his players’ backs all the time,” utility man Isiah Kiner-Falefa said. “He wants to win, and he’s willing to do anything he can for his players. It’s all you can ask for as a manager.”

A recurring theme among players asked about Boone was that they appreciate his positivity and how he tries to connect personally with just about every player on the roster. Reliever Tommy Kahnle grew up a diehard fan of the Philadelphia Eagles, just like Boone. But Kahnle abandoned the team in 2020, disagreeing with its decision to fire head coach Doug Pederson. After Kahnle signed with the Yankees in the offseason, Boone called Kahnle and told him he would help him restore his Eagles fandom. It hasn’t worked yet, but Kahnle has appreciated Boone’s repeated efforts throughout the regular season. He added that he liked the closed-door meeting Boone called following the Yankees’ 8-3 loss to the Red Sox at home on Aug. 18.

“He gave us a talk,” Kahnle said. “I like that stuff. I’ve been on teams where guys don’t do anything. They just kind of keep on going and you’re just struggling. He truly has the belief that we’re going to turn this around and get things going. I’ve always admired that from him and he’s always been almost kind of like a player-coach, essentially, which has been my preference always for a long time. I certainly love everything that he does. He keeps everybody in line.”

Kiner-Falefa described Boone’s demeanor as “fiery” in the meeting.

LeMahieu said before playing under Boone, he thought that most big-league managers “didn’t have a lot on (their) plate.” Now, he said he believes being the manager of the Yankees is “the hardest coaching job in the big leagues,” noting how Boone juggles various departments within the Yankees, his own coaching staff and media obligations.

“I just like that he checks in during the offseason,” LeMahieu said. “Just in general. He genuinely cares about his players. I think he cares more about his players than he does his job.”

Judge said “it meant a lot to me” and that it was “pretty special” that Boone stayed in contact with him during his chaotic offseason as a free agent.

Still, despite the love, there’s the matter of Boone’s track record. While 2023 will almost certainly be the first season one of his teams misses the playoffs, he hasn’t afforded himself the kind of breathing room a World Series victory would have provided. If the Yankees wanted to sell their fans on change for the upcoming season, they could decide to move on from Boone, whose roster they also didn’t believe in enough to fortify with any meaningful trades at the Aug. 1 deadline.

Though Boone benched Kiner-Falefa in the playoffs last year, IKF said he always felt like Boone was in his corner. He added that he didn’t feel as if blame for the Yankees’ disappointing season should be placed on the shoulders of Boone or anybody on the coaching staff.

“It’s more on the players,” Kiner-Falefa said. “I feel like there’s nothing different they can do. We go out there and get two or three hits — they don’t have the bat. At the end of the day, we just haven’t been able to frickin’ score more runs than the other team.”

(Photo: Gregory Fisher / USA Today)