NEW YORK — The boos rolled down from the Yankee Stadium stands before the fourth inning was over. The home runs kept flying into the seats. And in the YES Network booth, a franchise icon put words to what everyone was watching.
The New York Yankees lost 11-4 to the Minnesota Twins on Saturday. It was their eighth defeat in nine games. The night belonged to Minnesota’s power and to a pitching staff that could not stop the bleeding.
Spot starter Brendan Beck, filling in for the injured Carlos Rodon, walked into a nightmare and could not walk out of it. By the time it was over, the frustration had a target. Fans wanted answers from manager Aaron Boone, and a Yankees legend in the broadcast booth had already framed the problem in real time.
A spot start that unraveled fast
The Yankees had reason to believe in Beck, who had gone 5-0 with a 1.24 ERA at Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre in June. None of that showed up on Saturday. He gave up three runs in the first, including a two-run homer to Kody Clemens. The second inning was worse. He served up back-to-back homers to Luke Keaschall and Alex Jackson, and the Yankees trailed 5-0 before the offense had a chance to breathe.
The crowd let Beck hear it. The boos grew louder with each ball that landed in the bleachers. Boone finally lifted him after 3 2/3 innings. Beck’s final line: five runs on five hits with two walks and three strikeouts.
O’Neill puts the decision on Boone
Paul O’Neill watched it unfold from the YES Network booth. The five-time All-Star and 1998 World Series hero has become one of the sharpest voices on Yankees broadcasts. As Beck kept surrendering hard contact, O’Neill turned the moment into a question about the manager’s next move.
“Another mistake, another one ends up in the bleachers and if you’re Aaron Boone, now you gotta make a decision,” O’Neill said on the YES Network. “Do I waste my bullpen or just try to stick with him. Obviously, not the start you wanted to see. Every mistake he’s making is ending up in the seats.”
The comment cut to the heart of the Yankees’ problem. A spot starter was getting hit hard. The bullpen was already stretched thin from a losing streak. Boone was trapped between two bad options, and O’Neill said so plainly.
The Yankees’ 11-5 loss to the Twins carried more than one ugly number. Their pitching staff surrendered six home runs, marking the first time New York gave up that many in a game since Aug. 15, 2019. That night, Cleveland tagged the Yankees for seven homers in a 19-5 rout.
The bullpen offered no relief
The pitching problems did not end when Beck left. Reliever Tim Hill entered and gave up a solo home run to Trevor Larnach in the fourth. The Yankees fell behind 6-0.
The home runs kept coming all night. The Twins hammered the Yankees staff for six home runs, the first time the Yankees allowed six in a game since Aug. 15, 2019, when they gave up seven in a 19-5 loss to Cleveland.
The offense has not helped. The Yankees have now gone 16 straight games without scoring more than five runs, their longest such stretch since a 20-game run in 1991.
Boone keeps trusting Doval despite the failures
No arm has tested Boone’s patience more than Camilo Doval. The former Giants closer, acquired at last year’s trade deadline, imploded again in the eighth inning. Jazz Chisholm Jr. booted a routine grounder to lead off the frame, and Doval handled the rest of the damage himself, giving up a Byron Buxton sacrifice fly, a Kody Clemens RBI single, and a two-run homer to Josh Bell. It was the second straight outing in which he allowed four runs.
The pattern is not new. Doval has now allowed a career-high six home runs, all in his last 27 2/3 innings. Left-handed hitters have tormented him all season. He entered Saturday having surrendered a .951 OPS to lefties, well above his .728 career mark. The late-inning meltdowns have become a recurring theme, not a one-night aberration.
Yet Boone has continued to hand him high-leverage innings. Rather than pull back on a reliever who keeps failing in the same spots, the manager has stuck with him, and Saturday was the latest cost of that trust. Asked about the struggles afterward, Boone acknowledged the recurring problem without signaling a change in how he plans to use him.
“His execution against lefties is critical,” Boone said. “That part’s been a struggle. He’s been unlucky at times, but he’s made his mistakes against lefties, sometimes it’s been for slug. Against righties, he continues to throw the ball well.”
Camilo Doval’s latest outing added another painful entry to the record book. He became the first Yankees pitcher ever to allow at least four runs in consecutive relief appearances while facing no more than seven batters in each game.
Boone’s sixth-inning call draws fire
The Yankees did not go quietly. After trailing 6-0, they rallied to make it 6-4 through five innings. Then they loaded the bases with one out in the sixth and had a chance to take the lead.
Boone made his move. He sent up back-to-back pinch-hitters with the bases loaded. Amed Rosario batted for Ali Sanchez and struck out. Then veteran slugger Paul Goldschmidt pinch-hit for Trent Grisham and flied out to end the inning. The threat died. The Yankees never got that close again.
Boone defended the decision to use Goldschmidt, who is on a $4 million contract this season, against the Twins left-hander in that spot.
“I mean, I’m going to take Goldy against the lefty there, two outs with them loaded,” Boone said. “Our shot to either grab the game or get down two. Yeah, just a two-out scenario, I’m taking Goldy there.”
The logic was defensible on paper. Goldschmidt has been the Yankees’ best hitter against left-handed pitching all season. The result, though, gave a frustrated fan base one more thing to argue about.
A fan base running out of patience
Suzyn Waldman captured the mood with a pointed Yankees reflection.
“Happy birthday, America. It would have been the 96th birthday of George Steinbrenner. And, of course, today is also the birthday of my partner John Sterling, who would have been 88. I like to think that John and George are here somewhere, and they’re sitting and watching from overhead, and that they all have plenty to say about this ballgame to each other.”
Fans on X openly called for the manager’s firing. The reaction to the Goldschmidt pinch-hit was especially brutal, with one account snapping, “Fire this arrogant loser!”
The pile-on did not stop there. One fan wrote that they were “not tweeting until the Yankees fire Aaron Boone.” The account WNY Yankees ripped the relief corps, writing that the “Yankees bullpen is terrible.” Others aimed at the leadership. “Where are this teams leaders?” one fan asked, calling it “an unacceptable brand of baseball.” Even a self-described non-fan wrote, “I can’t stand the Yankees but they deserve a better manager than Boone.”
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