WFAN radio personality Mike Francesa has accused Brian Cashman of terminating hitting coach Dillon Lawson to hide his failure and protect his job. He strongly criticized the Yankees general manager blaming him for unfairly sacking Lawson and using him as a scapegoat for the team’s problems.
On Sunday, hitting coach Dillon Lawson was let go from his position, and former player Sean Casey was appointed as his replacement. This decision came after the Yankees suffered a 7-4 defeat to the Chicago Cubs in The Bronx, marking the end of the team’s first half of the season.
However, Mike Francesa placed the responsibility for the team’s offensive struggles squarely on Cashman’s shoulders.
“Really scapegoating the batting coach making an in-season change, which is extremely rare for the Yankees and their coaching staff,” he said on BetRivers podcast.
Mike Francesa flays Brian Cashman’s decision to sack Lawson
Mike Francesa began the latest episode of his self-titled BetRivers podcast by expressing his view that the Yankees were truly singling out Lawson, their batting coach, and resorting to an in-season change, which he considered to be highly uncommon for the team and its coaching staff.
Francesa pointed out that the Yankees were essentially assigning blame to someone. He mentioned that their offensive performance in the first half of the season, particularly after Aaron Judge’s absence, had been extremely poor. This led the team to feel compelled to take action and find someone to hold responsible for their struggles.
“Basically laying the blame somewhere,” he claimed. “Their first-half performance, especially since Judge went out, has been so abysmal offensively that they had to do something, they had to blame somebody.”
As the All-Star break approached, the Yankees had a combined OPS of.710, which ranked them 20th among all teams in Major League Baseball.
Mike Francesa emphasized the importance of being honest and placing the blame on the individuals responsible for constructing the roster, with Brian Cashman being the primary figure. The well-known sports host wasted no time criticizing the lineup that Brian Cashman and the front office put together for this season, highlighting how it has failed to meet the expectations set for it.
During his extensive commentary on the Bronx Bombers, which lasted for nearly 15 minutes, Mike Francesa expressed his belief that he has always considered batting instructors in the major leagues to be ineffective and lacking credibility.
Mike Francesa ridiculed the team’s offense, stating that if removing the batting instructor was considered a drastic measure, it was laughable. According to him, this move by Brian Cashman was simply a way for the Yankees to appear proactive and demonstrate that they took action by dismissing the batting instructor.
He questioned the batting coach’s performance in crucial moments, asserting that there were no instances of failure since he was not at bat. According to him, Dillon Lawson’s role was primarily to provide support rather than be the reason behind the Yankees’ offensive struggles.
The onus is on bats, not on the coach, says Mike Francesa
The Yankees’ offensive statistics have been average or positioned toward the lower end of the league rankings during the first half of the year. After Sunday’s defeat, the offense of the Yankees ranked 28th in batting average (.231), 26th in on-base percentage (.300), and 19th in runs (400).
Mike Francesa pointed out that during the period when the team required significant offensive contributions from their key hitters, namely Stanton and Rizzo, who possess the potential for 30 home runs and strong RBI performances as middle-of-the-order players, both of them failed to meet expectations.
Additionally, he expressed frustration with the Yankees‘ reluctance to embrace any potential advancements or changes, perceiving it as a disregard for progress. Mike Francesca emphasized that the Yankees were facing a challenge due to their limited left-handed hitting, which was particularly problematic considering their struggles against right-handed pitchers throughout the season.
In the 75 games played against right-handed starters, the Yankees have recorded a slash line of .229/.292/.403.
Mike Francesca explained that opposing teams have the advantage of repeatedly using right-handed pitchers against the Yankees, which makes sense given the circumstances. He highlighted the effectiveness of right-handed pitchers who possess a strong curveball, as they can easily dominate the Yankees since they lack impactful left-handed hitters.
He further mentioned that in the past, the Yankees had a lineup consisting of five players capable of hitting powerful home runs at any moment. However, with Rizzo’s current performance, the team no longer possesses such a threat.
Mike Francesca found it amusing that batting coach Dillon Lawson was fired, considering the situation. Additionally, he remarked that if the Yankees wanted to hire a new batting instructor, they were free to do so, but in his opinion, it would not make a significant difference. He emphasized that the real solution to their issues was to acquire proficient hitters. This is where Brian Cashman has failed.
What do you think? Leave your comment below.
Francesca is correct IMO in laying much of the blame on Cashman IMO but let’s not forget Fredo Steinbrenner who could have prevented this by not resigning Boone and Cashman.
The hitting coach can make a difference especially with younger hitters. Look at Volpe after his Chicken Parm dinner with his former teamate. This highlights what a hitting coach can do as well as what a lousy hitting coach got fired. Don’t forget the hitting coach was strongly endorsed by Cashman and analytics staff which he is married to.
Time to move on from Cashman… Bring in Jeter and give him the reigns. Always was and always will be a winner!!! Make him a smaller percentage owner and get back to winning baseball !!!
Mike Francessa is, and always was a BS artist as well as a liar
Blaming the current roster’s lack of hitting on roster construction is ridiculous. Rizzo and LeMahieu have established track records and are underperforming. Stanton is continuing his usual pattern (inconsistent, streaky, injury-prone) but just more so. Donaldson is all or nothing, continuing his slide from last year. Hicks has been declining, except for a few weeks when he went to Baltimore (now back to his doldrums. So, what is the problem? If a hitting coach could figure out how to get any of those players back to their long-established forms, it would be fine. Apparently, Lawson had no solutions to multiple players’ problems so he deserved to go. Apparently, Casey was always their first choice anyway, but declined due to his wife’s illness so they went with a purely analytics guy, which forgets that these guys are human beings , not robots!
John Smoltz pointed out how Volpe’s stance was too open on national tv, then his friend told him over chicken parm. The hitting coach never played MLB.
He sucked. Mike is a 🤡