The New York Yankees have begun the 2019 season with a very disappointing start. So, who could be blamed for this disaster?
The Yankees started off the 2019 season as World Series favorites, but now 16 games into the season, they have a 6-9 record while looking like a little league team with their lack of energy and urgency. They currently sit 5.5 games out of first place and with 11 players currently on the IL it doesn’t look like things are going to change anytime soon.
So, this leads us to the question, who should be blamed for the Yankees disappointing start? To answer the question simply, it’s difficult to blame anyone for just bad luck and poor production, but if there is one direction to put the blame in it would be towards the coaching staff. Particularly, Aaron Boone and Larry Rothschild.
Since taking over as Yankees manager Aaron Boone has gotten on the bad side of many Yankees fans due to his lackadaisical mindset and how he never provides this team with any sense of urgency. Sometimes when teams are struggling they need to have a fire lit underneath them in order to get back on track, but Boone will never be that guy to do it. Third base coach Phil Nevin was forced to take this role last season when the team was struggling in Detroit and he really let them know that they needed to step their game up. At times it seems like Boone is too worried about being ‘one of the guys’ in the clubhouse rather than taking a leadership role.
We all know that Boone will not be around for much longer, but for the time he is the Yankees manager we would at least like him to act like he cares whether or not this team actually does good.
Another member of the coaching staff that should be taking some blame is long-time pitching coach Larry Rothschild. This is mainly because of newly acquiree James Paxton tipping pitches against the Houston Astros and Carlos Beltran needing to be the guy to point this out to him (aka the man who should have been named manager). It should be the pitching coach who spots these things and brings them to the pitcher’s attention, but maybe Rothschild was too busy conversing with the analytics team as to what was going wrong.
On Sunday afternoon’s game against the Chicago White Sox, we all saw a prime example as to how important a strong pitching coach is to a ballclub. Starting pitcher Carlos Rodón was struggling so their pitching coach came out and lit a fire underneath him, following the visit Rodón was simply untouchable. Meanwhile, Masahiro Tanaka began struggling and all Larry Rothschild did was sit on the bench and converse with Boone.
Nonetheless, the Yankees need leadership that will squeeze the most talent out of this team despite all of the brutal injuries. It’s time for everyone to stop blaming the disappointing start on injuries and start blaming it on poor coaching and lack of leadership.
Clueless article. The level of incompetence of a writer is usually in direct correlation to the amount of whining they do.
Thank you for calling out Rothschild. Boone – meh, he has issues, but willing to give him time to figure this out. Rothschild though??? Lord almighty this man has been underperforming for years. The fact that he was brought back last year after pitching was so clearly and undeniably the downfall, can’t comprehend what Yankees ownership is thinking at this point. Have wanted this man gone for years.