Brian Cashman's Biggest Challenge Is Fixing The Yankee Offense
Bill Madden, Daily News, October 11, 2025
Bill Madden, Daily News, October 11, 2025
Now that another Yankee season has concluded prematurely without a championship trophy, the usual finger-pointing begins and fans in every corner of Yankeeland are looking for culprits. But I'm here to say in this latest playoff elimination at the hands of the Blue Jays the blame should fall squarely on the players themselves.In short, the Blue Jays proved themselves to be a better team — and that was not the fault of Yankees GM Brian Cashman. He did everything he could . . .You could certainly make the case — as I have — that no GM in baseball had a better year than Cashman . . .What the AL Division Series — and actually their regular season matchups in which the Yankees were 5-8 against the Blue Jays — came down to was a matter of Toronto being the best team in baseball in terms of making contact and putting the ball in play and the Yankees one of the worst. During the season the Jays' batters had the most hits and second lowest strikeouts in the majors.By contrast, the Yankees had the third most strikeouts behind only the Rockies and Angels, and the 12th most hits. In addition, the Yankees hit 83 more homers than the Jays during the season but scored only 43 more runs. When it came to clutch hitting, the Jays led the majors hitting .292 with runners in scoring position as opposed to the Yankees who ranked 12th at .255.Although on paper it could be argued the Yankees had a quality player at every position . . . the fact remained they were still the same home run-or-bust offense they've been for the last few years. And it was much the same in the ALDS as the Jays out-hit the Yankees 37-24 in the four games and struck out only 34 times to the Yankees' 50 — 12 of them by Anthony Volpe.Which brings us to what comes now for Cashman in his effort to rectify the one over-riding Yankee flaw that seemingly shows up way too many times in the regular season and especially against good pitching in the postseason – too many damn strikeouts and two few multi-hit rallies. If Cashman could be blamed for anything this year it was his blind loyalty to Volpe, who hit .212 with 150 strikeouts and just 43 walks in one of the historically worst seasons ever by a major league shortstop. And his 73.3 strikeout percentage in the ALDS was the worst mark ever in a divisional series (minimum 15 plate appearances).This cannot continue. . . .What the Yankees need more than anything else is a leadoff hitter, who makes consistent contact and doesn't strike out. They're . . . looking at turning over left and center field to the kids (Jasson Dominguez and Spencer Jones). But again we're talking more strikeouts — Dominguez had 115 as opposed to 41 walks as a part-timer this year and Jones . . . had a disturbing 179 strikeouts [in AA and AAA]. . . .It's what Cashman does about the hitting that will once again determine how far they go in October.
So . . . the Yankees getting humiliated in the ALDS "was not the fault" of the team's General Manager, who "did everything he could". In fact, "no GM in baseball had a better year", so presumably none of the other 29 GMs could have constructed the Yankees' 2025 roster any better than Cashman.
AND YET . . . the MFY's lineup was "still the same home run-or-bust offense" that their fans have loudly complained about for years. Indeed, Cashman has let "the last few years" go by without addressing the team's "over-riding" "flaw" of "too many damn strikeouts and two few multi-hit rallies". (That's "too few multi-hit rallies", Bill and Bill's editor.)
So "once again", Yankee fans have to wait and see if Cashman at last will turn his attention to something he has been either ignoring for years or consistently failing to fix, despite that "flaw" being blindingly obvious to everyone who watches the team. I don't know, Bill, it sounds to me like Cashman's culpability in the Yankees' chronic postseason failures (16 consecutive YEDs (and 24 of the last 25 seasons) at this point) is not nothing.
Madden's thesis is that Cashman is all but blameless for his team's poor showing – the blame rests "squarely on the players" – but he spends almost all of his piece outlining how Cashman – with access to seemingly endless amounts of money – brought these blame-worthy players together and put them on the field.
You can't blame players for not doing what they are incapable of. If the Yankees need to abandon their masterplan of "too many damn strikeouts and two few multi-hit rallies", someone in charge of the roster should sign players who don't strikeout too damn much and can hit for a higher average.
It seems as though Cashman and Boone will keep on doing the thing that fails everytime and hope that blind luck brings them a different result. That's fine with me, because I take great pleasure in the Yankees' chronic misfortune.
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