At the beginning of June, the New York Yankees looked to be one of the best teams in the MLB. They had a 50-22 record, a team ERA of 2.94, and scored 371 runs. All of those stats were the best in the league at that point as well. Unfortunately, something hasn’t gone right lately, resulting in them falling into a deep slump.
Since June 14th, the Yankees have gone 0-6-1 in their last seven SERIES, not just games. Regarding their games, they’ve lost 15 of their last 20, the worst in the Majors in the same timeframe. To make matters worse, they’ve given up the second most runs in that time also, trailing only the Colorado Rockies who are just one ahead of them with 131. To round all of this disappointing information off, the Yankees haven’t been able to win consecutive games since June 9th-12th.
It seems enough is enough over there in New York, as general manager Brian Cashman opened up about the struggles they’ve faced as of late. He said, “It’s been a struggle obviously. Thankfully, we got out of the gates really strong. Hopefully, that cushion will allow us to work through this, hopefully sooner rather than later, because it’s gone on long enough. It’s been a tough stretch for us.” He continued by mentioning that it’s normal for teams to hit rough spots, though this particular rough spot has been concerning.
Of course, the Yankee’s problems aren’t just isolated to one thing. There have been many problems across their roster in this horrible stretch, both offensively and defensively. For starters, their pitching has been atrocious, with a 6.11 ERA since June 16th, the worst in the league. Then, on the other end, they have scored just 20 runs in their last eight losses. The scoring problem has been especially bad when the team has runners in position to score, as the team has hit just seven for 46 in those instances over the last eight losses. Besides the overall issues, certain players have underperformed.
Juan Soto has just four hits in 22 bats throughout the early month of July, Aaron Judge has had two hits in his last 20 at-bats, and Anthony Volpe was bumped off the leadoff spot in favor of rookie Ben Rice. Oh, and we can’t forget to mention that Gleyber Torres was benched for not running out a ground ball towards the end of June. This is extremely concerning considering that there have been other incidents like this with Torress, and he’s in a contract year at the moment. Cashman spoke on Torres and said, “Sometimes those free agent walk years can come back and haunt you. I’m not sure if that added pressure might be weighing him down or holding him back.” Whatever it is, there is something bothering this roster, as Torres certainly hasn’t been the only player to lack motivation during a game. Trent Grisham allowed an extra base for an overall poor effort in the field and Volpe was torn apart for jogging home on a grounder, ultimately giving up an out and costing the Yankees another run.
The MLB trade deadline is rapidly approaching as well, so that is absolutely something worth keeping an eye on for the Yankees. If they continue to slump and stack up losses, they could be keen on making a trade to spice things up again. Cashman mentioned in his statement that the team is going to be “open-minded to a lot of different things” as the deadline draws nearer. Although he didn’t mention anything in particular that he wanted to see moving forward besides just piling up wins again.
At the end of the day, the Yankee’s current roster on paper appears to be one of the best in the league. With the way that they were playing early on in the season, that certainly looked to be a true statement. This slide has been very disappointing, and concerning now that it hasn’t faded away at all. It’s even worse now that there are open incidents of players just not providing much effort on plays that should be routine. The Yankees have some time before the playoffs come around again, but this is a trend that they’ve fallen into multiple times in the past, and right now they are in danger once more.
In 2022, the Yankees started that season off with a blistering hot record of 61-23. All signs pointed at them being a World Series contender with how dominant they were straight away. Fast forward to the end of the season, and the Yankees snuck into the playoffs with a 38-40 record in the second half of the season. The following season in 2023, the Yankees were 36-25 and once more positioned to make a playoff run. From that game onwards, the Yankees compiled a record of 46-55 and missed the playoffs entirely. Cashman refuted any notion that the team could be falling into the same issue that they’ve faced the last two years, but the data is alarming. New York wants to prove that it can continue to win games and compete at a high level. The problem is that morale seems to be at a severe low, their players aren’t performing up to expectations, and they’ve overall just taken their foot off the gas pedal.
Cashman did end his interview with a statement that got straight to the point, and it is probably something that every single Yankees fan, player, and coach has said over the last month. He said, “We’ve got to be playing better than we currently are right now, as an entire unit.” It is very hard to disagree with that statement, and I’m almost certain that nobody will. Only time will tell if New York can right the ship and make a deep playoff run, or if they’ll fall into the same boat as the last two seasons, where strong starts were wasted due to poor second-half play.
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