Brian Cashman Has a Simple Response to the Yankees’ Ugly 5-15 Slide

The New York Yankees are in the middle of a bad stretch. Really bad. They just dropped back-to-back games to the Tampa Bay Rays, and the schedule isn’t getting any kinder. Over the last 20 games, they’ve gone 5-15. They’ve lost eight of their last ten. The vibes? Not great.

When a team hits a skid like this, the manager usually takes the heat. Aaron Boone knows that better than most. But general manager Brian Cashman isn’t pointing fingers. He went to bat for his skipper this week, telling Bryan Hoch of MLB.com that Boone is doing everything he can.

“Nothing different than I’ve always seen,” Cashman said. “I think he’s a very hard worker, very well connected. I think he’s prepared. I think he’s pulling every lever he possibly can pull.”

Cashman isn’t wrong that Boone is working hard. But the results aren’t matching the effort. The Yankees sit at 50-42, five games back of the Rays in the AL East. And that’s with a lot of things going wrong at once.

What’s Actually Going Wrong

Start with Aaron Judge being out. The Yankees’ best hitter has been sidelined with a rib injury, and there’s no timetable for his return. Without him, the lineup looks thin. Other star players haven’t stepped up consistently. The pitching staff has been all over the place — some good starts, some disastrous ones. And the defense? It’s cost them games. The shortstop situation is a mess, with Anthony Volpe and Jose Caballero splitting time and neither locking it down.

Boone has been the Yankees’ manager since December 2017. That’s nine seasons. He’s got more than 745 wins and a .582 winning percentage. Six of his first seven years ended in the postseason. The Yankees won 100 games in 2018 and 2019. Boone was a finalist for AL Manager of the Year in 2019. Last season, the team made it to the World Series and lost to the Dodgers in five games. He signed a two-year extension in February 2025.

None of that past success protects him from the current noise. The Yankees are in a division where the Rays are playing well, the Orioles are lurking, and every loss feels heavier when your lineup is missing its anchor. Cashman may be backing Boone publicly, but in this market, public support doesn’t always last.

The schedule isn’t letting up either. The Yankees have a series against the Red Sox coming up, and then the Orioles. If the slide keeps going, the conversation around Boone could shift very quickly.