Aaron Boone's Lack of Urgency Cost Yankees in Game 2, and Potentially Doomed Their Postseason Chances

The Yankees are running a platoon-heavy lineup and a deep bench in the postseason, but Boone curiously left those options on the bench late in Game 2.

New York Yankees manager Aaron Boone made some puzzling decisions in Game 2 that could've made a difference on Monday night. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

What was the feeling after the fifth inning of Game 2 on Monday night, after Cody Bellinger's go-ahead grand slam fell just a few feet short and the Rays scored four runs on multiple defensive miscues? Was it sadness? Anger? Dread? Indifference?

Vibes-wise, the game felt over after the Rays took a 5-1 lead and seemed destined to take a 2-0 series lead, but that feeling is reserved for baseball fans, not those in the dugout who can write their own story.

And yet, you couldn't shake the feeling of apathy from Yankees manager Aaron Boone in the dugout. There were moves to be made on the field to jump-start a slumbering offense. Yet those moves did not come.

Very little of the team's six-man bench, entirely comprised of right-handed hitters who are specifically on the roster to hit the few left-handed pitchers the Rays have, was used in what turned into a 5-2 loss.

The days are dwindling in the Yankees' 2026 season, and now they're staring down the barrel of elimination. Nonetheless, it was befuddling to see Boone not make every effort to come back in such an important game.

Aaron Boone missed several opportunities to fire off the bench in Game 2

After the Rays took a 5-1 lead into the sixth inning, Cam Booser gave way to usual starter-turned-long reliever Ian Seymour, a left-handed pitcher, to face 3-4-5 in the Yankees' order. Right off the bat, Luis García Jr., who's struggled in the series and especially against lefties, took his at-bat and flew out.

That's a spot you could've seen Paul Goldschmidt, a guy who does well as a table-setter against left-handed pitching. The next batter was the struggling Spencer Jones, and even despite his reverse splits, there might've been a reason to go to the designated lefty masher Heliot Ramos. That didn't happen, and Jones struck out.

Fast forward to the seventh inning, where Seymour stayed in and faced another trio of lefties in Jazz Chisholm Jr., Trent Grisham, and Austin Wells. Those first two are guys the team doesn't start against left-handed pitching, so where were Ramos, José Caballero, or Anthony Volpe? Seymour predictably retired the side in order.

We finally got a pinch hitter to lead off the eighth inning when Goldschmidt hit for Ryan McMahon against Seymour. That at-bat resulted in a pop-out, but the team closed the gap to three by the time García came back up with two outs in the inning. Despite Goldschmidt already in as an easy defensive swap, the Yankees made no move. Seymour faced a grand total of two righties and eight lefties across three innings.

Boone was asked about his extremely odd late-game bench usage after the game, in which he simply responded that he didn't see Seymour as a platoon-heavy pitcher:

“Seymour, I view as very neutral,” Boone said after the game (h/t Greg Joyce of the New York Post). “So there would’ve been a right-hander I would have used at some point had we gotten runners on base, but by the time he was in the game it was 5-1. So I was playing more of a get-on-base, see if we could create traffic and then possibly shoot [Giancarlo Stanton] or Goldie or [Heliot] Ramos in a spot there."

There is credence to this, as Seymour has actually been significantly better against right-handed hitters in an odd twist (.683 OPS by RHH vs. .789 OPS by LHH). However, in a comatose lineup with only two batters who hadn't done anything all series, it wouldn't have hurt to give them a different look.

Putting someone like Volpe, Caballero, or Goldschmidt in as a table-setter for a later pinch-hit decision like Stanton would be an ideal way to use the bullpen. But in all likelihood, none of this would have had a realistic opportunity to happen.

But when you're in a situation like the Yankees, sometimes you have to take chances and show you're trying to find solutions instead of sticking with something that's failing.

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