Hal Steinbrenner admits the Yankees’ sluggish season has been “absolutely aggravating, maddening and tough to watch,” but he threw his support behind GM Brian Cashman, manager Aaron Boone and the coaching staff Thursday in a wide-ranging call with reporters.
“Am I mad at what I see? Absolutely,” Steinbrenner said via Zoom as the Yankees’ afternoon game against the Angels was postponed due to inclement weather. ”I’m aggravated. Frustrated. Angry. But that’s not going to push me to a knee-jerk reaction to get rid of somebody.”
Many of the fans that remained at Wednesday’s soggy ninth-inning giveaway loss to the Angels – with closer Aroldis Chapman giving up a game-tying grand slam in a seven-run inning – chanted for Boone to be fired. The $201 million Yanks are 41-39 and in fourth place in the American League East at essentially the season’s midway point, with five losses in their last six games, including being swept by the Red Sox over the weekend in Boston.
“We’re not going to get down. We’ve had tough losses before. We’re going to do everything we can to win, win, win,” Steinbrenner said when asked for his message to the team’s fan base.
Boone said Steinbrenner has been “very supportive,” yet “pretty pointed with some comments at times about what’s going on, and ‘Hey, this needs to be better.”
The owner added that he believes “no one works harder” than Boone and his coaching staff. But while he supports the organization’s increased reliance on analytics, Steinbrenner wants to see “a balance” between that department and the team’s scouting staff, featuring front-office executives Tim Naehring and Jim Hendry.
Asked about his relationship with Cashman, the team’s GM since 1998, Steinbrenner replied: “Look, Brian and I have been doing this a lot of years together. He’s extremely intelligent, and he understands the deal when it comes to relying on pro scouting and relying on analytics…We communicate very well. There’s not much that happens without him running it by me first. He knows that’s the way I want it. I think he’s done a good job. This team that we’ve put together, leaving spring training, was a very, very good team. They just haven’t played up to their potential that I believe we still have…That’s been the big problem. At least they haven’t done it consistently.”
Steinbrenner revealed that the players held a “fiery” team meeting earlier this week, “and that’s a good thing.” Still, he has been “most frustrated” by the team’s inconsistent offense, calling the lack of production “perplexing.”
“It has been tough to watch, and the players know that. They’re better than this. This is not the product that we expected and not the type of play that they expect themselves,” Steinbrenner said. “Myself, Cashman, Boone, the coaches, we’re responsible. We’re in charge…But make no mistake about it, in my opinion, the majority of the responsibility, whether it’s the inconsistent offense or bad base-running, that responsibility lies with the players. They’re the ones on the field.
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“They need to fix this problem…because everyone, including our fan base, rightfully so, has had enough, quite frankly. It’s enough. They know that, and you’re seeing them say that…We can all share the blame, but the majority of the blame lies with them.”
Steinbrenner stressed that he would “absolutely consider” going over the luxury tax with the team’s payroll if the front office believed such an addition would help the Yanks become a championship contender. Cashman made a smaller-scale move Thursday, acquiring speedy outfielder Tim Locastro from Arizona. Steinbrenner also said being a seller at the trade deadline is “not a direction I’m contemplating right now.”
The mild-mannered Steinbrenner also understands the inevitable comparisons to his father, longtime Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, who made countless in-season managerial and personnel changes, many to the detriment of the organization, during nearly four decades at the helm.
“Look, he certainly did that a lot. I think what people forget is that oftentimes it didn’t help, it didn’t work,” Hal Steinbrenner said. “And oftentimes, quite frankly he was criticized for it….Doing knee-jerk reactions to appease this person or that person in the middle of the year, when I really don’t think there’s a problem, that’s certainly something I’m not going to do.
“All I can do is do my best to be my own person, make the decisions the way I have always made decisions, which is putting in as much thought into a decision as possible. There’s no doubt I’m going to be a little less ‘spur of the moment’ than [George] was in a lot of ways, but all I’m going to assure everybody is I do my best. It’s a legitimate question to always ask. It never bothers me, I love the man and you know he was the greatest. It’s understandable, but how do I cope with it? I’m just used to it. It’s part of the job. And it really doesn’t bother me.”