The New York Yankees organization holds itself to such a high standard, owing to their stature as the most successful franchise in the history of the MLB. Their huge spending ways have always given them a leg up on their opposition, spoiling fans with one playoff berth after another; in fact, since 1994, the Yankees have only missed the postseason four times, and their most recent finish below .500 came 31 years ago — an impressive display of consistency that has spanned three decades.
However, 2023 has been an overall difficult year for Aaron Judge and the Yankees. The postseason is now nothing more than a pipe dream for them, given that they're 6.5 games behind the Seattle Mariners, a team that's currently on the outside looking in on the playoff picture despite having an 84-69 record, with eight games left in the season. Thus, fans are looking for someone to direct their ire towards, and that someone just so happened to be general manager Brian Cashman, who received jeers from the Yankees faithful even during their 7-1 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday night.
Nevertheless, Judge urged Yankees fans to channel the majority of their boos towards those who can control the team's output on the diamond, and that responsibility falls on the players' shoulders.
“I think, as an organization top to bottom, we all take responsibility. But as a player, I feel like we take the most. We're the ones out there doing it. We're the ones out there playing every single night, so I hear their frustration, that's for sure,” Judge said, per Gary Phillips of NY Daily News Sports.
The mindset of winning as a team and losing as a team is a hallmark of an esteemed organization, so it'll be reassuring for fans, even for just a little bit, to see Aaron Judge be accountable for the Yankees' disappointing 2023 season. Even then, it's clear that the Yankees weather adversity better than most franchises in the MLB, so it'll be interesting to see how they bounce back come 2024. To Judge's credit, he guarantees that they'll be back stronger than ever.
“We'll get it right,” he added.
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