Brian Cashman defended staying mostly put at the trade deadline
New York Yankees fans expressed their frustration with the team on Wednesday night in their game against the Tampa Bay Rays and specifically aimed their ire at general manager Brian Cashman.
Wander Franco started the game off right for the Rays with a two-run home run on a pitch from Yankees starter Gerrit Cole. The Yankees ace knew it was gone the moment it left the bat and touched the heavens as it landed in the right field seats.
“Fire Cashman” chants began to echo throughout Yankee Stadium immediately afterward.
However, Yankees fans would not be in the doldrums for too long in the evening. They at least got to go home with a smile as New York staved off a sweep and won the game 7-2.
Anthony Volpe and Giancarlo Stanton each had home runs in the game. Cole settled down from the home run to strike out eight batters and improve to 6-0 after a Yankees loss this season.
“I thought it was a really good performance against a good team when I think he was grinding a bit out there tonight,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said.
As for Cashman, the Yankees’ lack of trade deadline moves appeared to be the sore spot with New York last in the American League East. The most the team did was acquire pitchers Keynan Middleton and Spencer Howard.
Still, Cashman said Tuesday that New York is still in the hunt for the World Series.
“Obviously, we’re in it to win it,” he said, via the team’s website. “We stayed the course because of that. We’ve got Nestor [Cortes] coming back as well as [Jonathan] Loáisiga soon. We know that we have better baseball in us, although we haven’t shown that and proven that. We’ve got two more months to show that.”
New York is 56-52 after Wednesday’s win. They are 10 games behind the Baltimore Orioles for the AL East lead and 3.5 games behind the Toronto Blue Jays for the final wild-card spot.
