ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — For three-plus seasons, Anthony Volpe has answered almost everything the same way. Short sentences. Flat tone. Nothing to feed the New York noise machine.
That version of the Yankees shortstop did not show up at Tropicana Field on Wednesday. Standing at his locker, Volpe spoke for close to seven minutes. He was not defending a slump, an error or a strikeout. He was defending his character.
The 25-year-old had woken up to a claim that he told the Yankees no. That the club asked him to take reps at second base during his minor league stint, and that he refused, insisting he was a shortstop. Inside a clubhouse already strained by a lost week, the accusation cut in a way box scores never do.
A rumor built on secondhand accounts
The claim surfaced Tuesday on ESPN New York, where Michael Kay hosts his radio show. Kay, also the YES Network play-by-play voice, said he had heard from multiple people that the Yankees approached Volpe about second base while he was in the minors, and that Volpe declined. Kay hedged, noting he could not confirm it happened. The hedge did not travel. The accusation did.
Within hours the story had metastasized. A New York Post columnist said separately that he did not think Volpe wanted to play other positions at Triple-A when given the choice, which lent the rumor a second set of fingerprints.
The timeline never fit. Volpe was optioned to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre in early May after Jose Caballero seized the shortstop job. He spent roughly a week there and played only shortstop. Then Caballero fractured a finger, and Volpe was recalled. There was no runway for a position experiment, and no evidence one was attempted.
Volpe’s sharp rebuke to Kay
Anthony Volpe rarely offers long, emotional answers in public. This time, the Yankees shortstop made sure there was no room for confusion.
Volpe spent close to seven minutes pushing back against a since-retracted claim that he had refused to move to second base. He defended his reputation, rejected the idea several times and made clear that the report did not match what he says had been communicated inside the organization.
“It’s not true,” Volpe hit back.
Asked about the report, Volpe said the accusation surprised him because it contradicted his position.
“It definitely caught me off guard. It’s confusing, just because it’s not true. It couldn’t be further from the truth. From my end, from our perspective, that’s been very clearly communicated to Boonie and the team, and I think it’s just kind of B.S.”
The correction, and the apology that followed
By Wednesday morning, Kay had reversed himself. He wrote on social media that the rumor sounded unlike Volpe, that he checked further, and that there was no truth to it. He stated plainly that Volpe never refused to work at second base.
Retractions rarely travel as far as the claims they correct. Kay went further than a post, repeating the correction to reporters at Tropicana Field and saying he intended to tell Volpe himself. He explained how the error happened.
“I had had two people tell me, and I was wrong,” Kay said. He added that he planned to apologize to Volpe within a day, that he felt badly about it, and that he would not have wanted to put the shortstop in the crosshairs.
Volpe says he offered to catch
Asked whether shortstop was central to his identity, the Yankees infielder said it was not, then offered the detail that undercut the entire rumor.
“When I was getting optioned, I told Boonie I’d play catcher,” Volpe said. He said he would do whatever the team needed, and that this was the truth.
He described a rehab in which he repeatedly asked the Yankees what they wanted from him. He was recovering from surgery to repair a torn labrum. For months he could do little more than take ground balls. The answer, every time, was to be ready to play short.
His frustration was less about the position than what the story implied. He said he hoped the teammates he has played alongside for three-plus years know his character, and that he would do anything to help the Yankees win. He called it kind of B.S.
“I feel like I’m defending myself over something that literally didn’t happen.”
Boone and Cashman close ranks
Aaron Boone treated the question not as a media problem but as an attack on a player he has managed since Volpe’s rookie year.
Asked directly about Kay’s comments, the Yankees manager left no room for interpretation.
“I don’t know where that’s come from,” Boone said. Anthony would always do whatever the team asked, the manager continued, calling Volpe’s character and team-first mindset beyond reproach.
General manager Brian Cashman was asked whether Volpe resisted trying second base at Triple-A. His response, sent by text message, was a single word: no.
Boone also supplied the practical reason Volpe has not appeared elsewhere. He began taking occasional ground balls at second after Caballero returned from the injured list in late May, but that work slowed as injuries hit Aaron Judge, Jasson Dominguez, Trent Grisham and Ryan McMahon.
The numbers behind the noise
Volpe’s production explains why the rumor found an audience. Through 41 games, he was hitting .240 with a .663 OPS, one home run, three errors and five Outs Above Average. His .338 on-base percentage was a career high.
Caballero has been more dynamic. He was hitting .245 with a .701 OPS and 10 home runs, and had graded out better in Defensive Runs Saved, six to one.
Volpe won a Gold Glove as a rookie in 2023, then endured a brutal defensive stretch last summer while playing through the shoulder injury. Boone insists the player has not disappeared.
“And by the way, he’s been a damn good shortstop,” Boone said. He acknowledged the struggles, then argued Volpe has also played well through long defensive stretches.
The larger question outlasts the rumor. Jazz Chisholm Jr. is headed toward free agency, and top prospect George Lombard Jr. is waiting. Second base may yet be part of Volpe’s Yankees future. It was not part of his refusal, because there was no refusal.
Volpe started at shortstop Wednesday night and went 1-for-3 with a strikeout in a 3-0 loss to the Rays, with Caballero at second. As of Wednesday evening the apology had not been delivered in person. Kay said it would come.
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