Saturday, August 4, 2018

Time is running out on Aaron Boone

There was a point last season - right around now, in fact - when every move Joe Girardi made turned to donkey crap. He'd bring in Dellin Betances, who was blowing big leads. He'd keep playing the ice-cold Aaron Judge, who needed time off. Come October, of course, he'd make the decision that would eventually become his legacy as "Clueless Joe:" He failed to demand a video replay against Houston, setting the table for a season-killing home run. He'd once been a successful manager, but as everything headed south, all Joe could do was stare into the abyss. 

Today, Girardi is becoming a more pleasant memory every day, as his successor Aaron Boone wilts in the summer heat. 

Before our very eyes, like a Penn & Teller trick show, we are watching the most talent-laden Yankee team in this decade turn into a bag of flaming poo. Worse, we are watching a team sleepwalk through what had been billed as the most important series of the season. 

We are watching Yankees jog out grounders with games on the line. We are watching Yankees fail to cover bases in critical situations. We are watching Yankees make mistakes you'd expect at the Little League World Series. We've been reduced to watching Phil Nevin - our modern incarnation of Stump Merrill - shouting in the dugout. But there is no Paul O'Neill on this team, busting water coolers. There is no Billy Martin, calling out stars. 

We are being run not by a manager but by a head of Human Resources. 

Thursday night, as the esteemed Local Bargain Jerk noted, the Yankiverse was horrified, as Boone allowed Jonathan Holder to become a trivia question - seven batters, seven runs - and a critical game flew out the window. For weeks now, Boone has been leaving his pitchers in too long, removing them only after the damage is done. But the humiliation of Holder - who clearly had nothing that night - could linger for a long time.   

Under Boone, the Yankees have floundered against the most pitiable lineups in baseball. Now, facing a good team, they've been undressed and outclassed on the national stage. These are not losses. These are fucking embarrassments. 

Today, at 4:05 p.m., we likely will add to the malaise, sacrificing a rookie - (who this season has been a disappointment at Triple A) - to the gods. We had the deepest roster in baseball. We supposedly fortified our staff last week. How did we get to sending Chance Adams into the lion's den... in his first major league start? Wow. Are we screwed up, or what? 

When I think of Chance Adams, I can't help but remember Chase Wright. Remember him? In 2007, the Yankees called up Wright, a promising young starter, after Mike Mussina and Carl Pavano went on the disabled list. They sent him into Fenway to face the surging Redsocks. 

He made it into the third inning. On the second time around the batting order... he made history. Kaboom, kaboom, kaboom, kaboom... four straight bombs. Manny Ramirez, JD Drew, Mike Lowell, Jason Varitek. Joe Torre took him out. The Yankees sent him to Scranton. That September, he returned to pitch in one meaningless game... then never appeared again in the majors.

After tomorrow night, the Yankees might just be a punch line. And don't think for a minute that the Wild Card is a sure thing. Oakland won last night, their fourth in a row. They're now just 4-and-a-half behind, with Seattle to follow. It's the only race in the AL, and we are steadily tanking. 

Time is running out on Aaron Boone.  

16 comments:

  1. The Red Sox fired Francona for not keeping a tight ship, for guys drinking beer during a game and eating fried chicken, for the team lacking spirit.

    Boone will probably get a long-term contract. He's bland, he's not paying attention, he's got Rothschild as his Don Zimmer.

    Though to be honest, I'd think a bunch of guys who are getting paid a lot of money to play a game, and who were justthisclose to first place not long ago, might actually not need motivation from an outside source like their manager. But, I'm obviously wrong about that.

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  2. I’m sure Boone didn’t interview as a hard driving, no bullshit leader of men. I’m sure he showcased his compliant nature. Ownership just needed someone that believes in the new baseball and will execute the instructions given by the millennial in the basement. Regarding the past few weeks, I’m sure ownership is more upset with the millennial than with Ma Boone.

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  3. "Yes" on all counts, Duque.

    Amen, Exactamundo and Aloha, to boot. You are firing on 8 cylinders here, unlike our beleaguered boys of summer, they who make gazillions, yet cannot focus for three hours a day, when they are supposed to earn that money.

    I never liked Boone, but so what? Nobody wants to hear an "I told you so." I thought Joey Binders had earned the right to one more season after last September, but that's water under the bridge.

    Ma Boone did not interview as a manager. He went in, kept his mouth shut, held up his wrists and nodded, the message being clear: "attach the puppet strings here." As you said, we're being run by a Head of Human Resources.

    Before you can blink an eye and get that piece of stringy lettuce out of your teeth with some floss, it will be winter. The season will be over and the kabuki dance of the off-season will have begun. From the post-mortems to the self-flagellation to the speculation.

    None of it matters. Cash will be picking out the four pairs of socks he'll need for the winter meetings, thinking about his spiderman gig, and generally congratulating himself for being Brian Cashman, "Maker of Men."

    We schmoes will all be ranting and raving, frothing at the mouth, churning up the will to believe, yet again, in the team that has sustained us since we were tiny. And, in truth, there's enough of a kernel here to build a real team upon. The problem as has become eminently clear over the past month, is leadership. We need a Clorox bleaching, followed by a scrapedown and a hazmat removal, of the entire front office, coaching system, farm people (farmers?), bench coaches and yes, the GM, which is code for "Gigantic Motherfucker," or "Great Moron" or "Goopy Mulch." We need to rip out the entire apparatus and start from scratch.

    I know you are thinking "this is too drastic and it will set us back for two to three years," to which I reply "So what?" It may or may not be true, but it's the only way to ensure that the virus is dead.

    This will never happen, though, because Hal does not care. He is not a baseball man, not a fan, and he is most likely making an acceptable return on his investment, so there is no incentive to DO WHATEVER THE FUCK IT TAKES TO WIN. His father made some spectacularly awful moves, but he was always animated by the inchoate, hell-driven urge to win. Hal is not. Jennifer Swindal might have been a better choice. I always felt as though she had more of Daddy's genes than quiet Hal.

    Also, there is a question of Cashmoney's mind control, or maybe he has pee tapes on Hal, or maybe it's all just a big joke. So what if the bottom line goes up a bit, down a big, just so long as the cash keeps rolling in. Maybe the constant moves and personnel changes are due more to keeping up the flagging attention of morons like us than with a cohesive, long-term goal in mind.

    I don't know. I don't care. I'm not watching anymore. I'll check the box. I'll check in here. I'll drink my coffee, walk my puppy, plan my next road trip and try to make a buck. Times are tough these days. Unless you're a Yankee, in which case you only have to show up and stagger out to the plate three times a night, whether you're half-asleep or not.

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    Replies
    1. I think you’re right about the tape, 13 bit, although to allow this level of ineptitude to continue it must be something even more incriminating, like Squat Cobbler. Or maybe even Crybaby Squat Cobbler.

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  4. The Ghost of Yankees PastAugust 4, 2018 at 9:48 AM

    The fact is, Boston is a better team. Their best position players are bettter than ours . Betts and Martinez are both better than our best player. Their next level players are better than ours and their starting pitching is better. That is not to say,if the Yankees play well ,they can’t beat them in a short series.

    But right now with our best player out, the Yankees playing poorly, the pitching staff short handed and Boston playing very well, it is ugly. Now we need to win one of the next two, regroup and live to fight another day.

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  5. Just remember.....who hired this guy along with the pitching coach? Who put this team together? He also needs to go!!!!!

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  6. Spot on, Duque! And everyone else!

    Yes, if we were really grading performance, Boone would be gone already—but then, so would Coops.

    John M., 13bit, I agree. As I've written before, I'm amazed that so many of these guys—young guys, having the time of their lives, being paid a fortune—can't get it together for at least those vital 3 hours a day. I keep asking myself, 'What are they, six?'

    But of course the answer is, yes, they are about six, mentally and emotionally, which is why they need an understanding but firm first-grade teacher running herd over them all the time. Which is what they don't have.

    Ghost, the Sox are, yes, a better constructed team. They are much better balanced than we are—but overall, they should not be so invincible. Position by position, I think we should have been, at least on paper, a better team going into this season.

    The starting pitching is key—it always is—and they are out there being instructed by a real baseball man, who is his own boss.

    13bit, I love the hazmat solution, as I was writing in my own "Enough" rant a couple days ago. That's what SHOULD be done.

    But...it won't be. Because as 13bit also points out, Hal is fine as long as the money comes rolling in.

    KD, I'm sure management is not upset in the least. The Yankees are averaging over 43,000 bodies in the seats every game, first in the league, and I'm sure cable ratings and whatnot are through the roof. In less than three years, they have completely taken back the city—the largest market in the country—from the Mets, and since the Mets are really a real estate racket posing as a baseball club, that will go on for some time.

    This team will have to tank spectacularly badly, for awhile, before any of that changes.

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  7. What if we take away their blankies and tell them no more playtimes until they win? Maybe put some Adderall in their baby bottles? Why do I feel so powerless?

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    Replies
    1. TREASON: THOU SHALT NOT REMOVE YANKEE SAFE SPACE

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  8. Are we the worst second-best team there ever was?

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  9. Why This Is A Good Thing


    OK it's not a good thing. I lied. Everything written above is true. I was gone by the time the fourth (FOURTH!!!!) Steve Pearce HR landed. Unwatchable and yes, Boone is just a little too complacent. Complacent is the word of the day.And whoever wrote that thing about the Pirates pitching coach vs Rothschild the other day should get a Pulitzer for investigative reporting. Because, truer words have never been written.

    So now what? I wracked what remains of my brain to see if I could spin it differently and here's my take:

    1) The playoffs are two months away.
    2) Judge Returns
    3) Sanchez returns (ending the whole "everybody on the other team can steal at
    will" thing
    4) The will bring up Justus.
    5) Other stuff.

    But here's the key. Not only are we not going to win the East but we will be trailing in the division by more than four games going into that last series. As long as we are up on Oakland/Seattle by four games or more going into that series we can rest and set up our staff to win the one game. Is it Tanaka on the extra days rest? Will Sevi re-find himself? CC just one time through?

    So failing to take the East is ONLY OK if we don't make it close.

    And again, once you are in the playoffs who is to say? The above gives us our best chance (and I don't mean Adams.

    Doug K.

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  10. Severino's days of dominance are likely done. Everything that was good about this team has unraveled. Doomed! We are doomed!

    But it's barely August. The best team in baseball in July and August does not always win; wire-to-wire winners are rare. The Red Sox, and this pains me to say it, do appear to be a very good team. Greatest team ever? Maybe if they finish the season without a hiccup. But I'm a big believer in hiccups. And loud, long burping. A nice case of indigestion could bring Boston back to us, and we could get hot, too.

    We'll see.

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  11. The thing that has me most concerned is the lack of guts. No spark, no fire, no nothing.

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  12. Amen, Parson, indeed!

    They are NOT the best team in baseball history. There has got to be a come down from this level of play, something like what happened with Seattle in 2001...and wouldn't it be sweet if it occurred for them in October?

    But N. Damur—agreed! This is what is killing me: just how dead they have looked.

    At some point, as manager, even if you are feeling perfectly sanguine about everything in the world today, you have to ACT OUT. If you really think everything will be fine...you still have to break some things turn over some tables, foam at the mouth and howl at the moon, just to get these guys going.

    I dunno...there were at least signs of life today. Maybe that will continue.

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