The Yankees have made more outs on the bases than any other team in baseball, and to manager Aaron Boone, that’s a curse and a blessing – the former, obviously, because they are outs, but the latter because, in part, you want your team to stay aggressive.
“In the backdrop of where that has been an issue for us, that’s frustrating,” Boone told Carton & Roberts during his weekly segment on Friday, “but you have to strike that balance where you don’t want guys to be not aggressive on the bases, because we’ve had that a couple times too. We’ve gotta strike that balance.”
Gary Sanchez has been the culprit of a few seemingly-egregious blunders over the last week and change, and Boone tried to explain how he has worked with Sanchez on some of those, including understanding a recent situation where he was thrown out at third on a ball in the shortstop hole.
“You try and talk through it and get to the bottom of what happened – what was your pre-pitch preparation, how was your secondary lead, things like that, and then the instincts have to take over there,” Boone said. “That ground ball – he’s had a couple of bad decisions on the bases and that was not the right one, but it’s a little tricky because it’s taking the shortstop to his left.”
That play in particular, though, is a tough one for every player, the skipper posited.
“It’s instinctual to want to take off – and that’s one of those plays that’s not specific to now, it goes back to when I played. You’ll see great baserunners run into outs on that ground ball to the pull side,” Boone said. “You’ll see the ball on the ground and want to score, but too often in that game, I feel guys run into that out. We’ve done it a couple times this year, and we just have to make sure our guys are educated and try to avoid it.”
And to the skipper, sometimes it looks like one mistake may cause a mental lapse – but in particular, when it came to Sanchez and that play, his struggles the rest of the game were simply magnified maybe because of that first gaffe.
“I think we exaggerate the story of what happens there,” Boone said. “The wild pitch was on a tough pitch to handle, the stolen base, he threw it into center field but he had no chance on the play, and striking out with runners on can happen. I’d like to think that sure, there’s discouragement now and then, and there’s frustration because guys care, but part of being a pro is you have to be able to handle success and failure, not only day-to-day but within the course of the game.”
And one thing that may have been magnified but really was a molehill to Boone? The play on Thursday where many thought Kevin Kiermaier ran out of the first base line to avoid a tag – but according to the skipper, he didn’t, and he dropped some rulebook knowledge to back that stance up.
“I do not think he went out of the baseline. I did not real time, and I confirmed it when I came back in after I got ejected. Why I waited to go out there was because I was checking to see if we had to challenge a tag, and then I went out there to get some clarification,” Boone said. “I asked what the umpire saw, and I thought Kiermaier was within his rights. The runner’s lane has nothing to do with it – the rule says that when the fielder catches the ball and makes his move, if the runner has established his line, the line starts there, and from there, he can’t avoid you by more than three feet.”
Listen to Boone’s entire segment with Carton & Roberts below.
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