Aaron Boone was smiling late Monday afternoon while thinking back on some old days in Buffalo when he was here more than 20 years ago. It was a respite from all that ails the New York Yankees manager.
By late in the evening, Boone was like all of his players. Shellshocked.
"First of all, we have a lot of really good players. Guys that have had a lot of success in this league," Boone insisted after the Yankees were punished in a 10-run sixth inning en route to getting humbled by the Toronto Blue Jays, 12-7, at Sahlen Field.
"You've got to trust in that ability in that it's going to turn. ... You've got to have that belief right now and that's the biggest thing when you're going through a tough time."
You got the impression Boone was saying the right things but knows his team is in trouble. The Yankees are 21-20. They're 1-5 on this road trip and 5-14 in the last 19 games. Forget that World Series bid everyone thought was coming in the spring.
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At this point, they'll be lucky to hold off the Tigers and Orioles -- the Tigers and Orioles! -- and just make the playoffs.
"It's part of being a pro. Part of being in this game," Boone said. "I don't care how good you are. That adversity is coming for you. You've got to be able to handle it."
The joke around the Yankees is always about what would George Steinbrenner do. If the Boss were alive, a 5-14 stretch and a drop to the No. 8 seed in the playoffs standings would have people's jobs in jeopardy.
If those days, maybe Boone gets sent packing Billy Martin-style. Maybe hitting coach Marcus Thames gets sacrificed.
It's not that way around the Yankees anymore. The Boss has been gone for a decade and there's stability when you're talking 23 years and counting for General Manager Brian Cashman. But antennas were certainly raised here Monday when Cashman, in a white hoodie, suddenly appeared on the field during batting practice to chat with Boone and give an eye to his hitters. The GM is not a regular on road trips.
"I think he's here just to be with the team and keep his eyes on what's going on," said Boone. "And obviously support us as we go through a tough time."
The Yankees have so many problems. They've gone 16 consecutive games without reaching double digits in hits, tied for the fourth-longest streak in team history. Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton are still back in the Bronx trying to get healthy. Gary Sanchez is hitting an MLB-low .130. The starting pitching has been spotty. The bullpen, an alleged strength, was shockingly poor Monday.
Chad Green, Adam Ottavino and Luis Cessa needed 67 pitches to get through the sixth, an outburst capped by Danny Jansen's grand slam to left-center field. In 44 excruciating minutes, a 6-2 lead turned into a 12-6 deficit.
Said Boone: "It's hard to foresee an inning like that with the guys that we got."
Ottavino faced six hitters and retired no one, walking two and allowing four hits.
"I had zero swings and misses. That's kind of the red flag," he said. ".. When I threw it over the middle, they hit it really hard. That's obviously a recipe for disaster. I've never had an inning quite like that."
The Yankees hit just .184 over the weekend in going 1-3 against the Baltimore Orioles, a team that had been their personal pinatas over the last three seasons.
Getting six runs was a relief. Things started so well against Toronto ace Hyun-Jin Ryu. No. 2 hitter Luke Voit pounded the first pitch he saw into the left-field screen and Aaron Hicks followed with a no-doubt bomb. It was "back to back and belly to belly" as iconic radio announcer John Sterling likes to note.
Boone had to be smiling in the dugout. Prior to the game, he was doing likewise as he reminiscing about his 1997 trips here with the Indianapolis Indians to meet the Bisons.
"Those were some good times. Two really good teams," Boone said. "I remember having some real battles here. One of my memories is playing here in an April series and the first two games got colded out. And the third game was equally as cold but we had to play. I remember it being 28, 30 degrees with the wind blowing like crazy and Bartolo Colon on the mound throwing 100 (mph) where the wind was moving you in the batter's box."
Most Yankees fans around here probably don't realize it, but their manager had a pretty big role in a key time in Bisons history. The '97 season was the final one of the American Association and the Bisons and Indy met 24 times. And they hated each other. Boone had 22 homers and 75 RBIs that year. The Bisons were star-studded, with Colon, Jeff Manto, Torey Lovullo, Richie Sexson and Sean Casey.
One night in late August, the teams nearly brawled in the hallway at Indy's Victory Field because of a mutual carping session over the volume of clubhouse stereos. Boone hit a big home run here in an 11-7 Indy win in Game 3 of the semifinal playoff series before the Bisons rallied to win the final two games.
"Hey, those were big games. It was a really, really intense rivalry we had with Buffalo," Boone said. "Those were fun times. And I do remember the hallway back and forth going on between the two teams."
Boone, of course, went on to have a nice career in the big leagues. Hit another postseason home run six years later that had a tad greater significance in the baseball world. Got a cushy gig on ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball, but traded it in for a much tougher one as the ringmaster of the circus in the Bronx.
The TV booth must look mighty fine to him now.
