Sean Casey makes large impression on Yankees: ‘boys had been fairly fired up’

DENVER — When many of the Yankees left the Stadium on Sunday after their 91st sport of the season, they had been underneath the impression that Dillon Lawson was nonetheless their hitting coach.

By the tip of the night time, nonetheless, Lawson had been fired, taking the autumn for the Yankees’ first–half offensive woes.

And by the point the Yankees reconvened on Friday at Coors Area to play their 92nd sport of 2023, they sat in on a 30-minute advance assembly wherein their new hitting coach, Sean Casey, put his energetic and passionate persona on full show. The Yankees hope that power may also help jump-start their offense within the second half, though it had little impact in Friday’s 7-2 loss to the Rockies.

“My impression of him,” Aaron Decide, who took batting practice on the field for the first time since going to the IL with a sprained proper toe, mentioned with a chuckle, “[is] he’s an awesome character. He’s a man that brings the power. He’s going to encourage you, push you a bit bit. Once you acquired a man like that that’s going to be in our nook each single pitch, each single day, I’m wanting ahead to it. We simply had an excellent hitters’ assembly, a bit group assembly, and he spoke about what he desires to do right here.

“The boys had been fairly fired up.”

The Yankees entered the All-Star break with an offense that ranked nineteenth in runs per sport (4.40), twenty first in OPS (.710), thirteenth in slugging proportion (.410), twenty sixth in on-base proportion (.300) and twenty eighth in batting common (.231).

Nonetheless, Decide and DJ LeMahieu each mentioned Lawson’s firing got here as a shock.

“We weren’t clicking. We weren’t hitting,” LeMahieu mentioned. “I don’t actually assume it was [Lawson’s] fault. It wasn’t actually anybody’s fault. We simply weren’t clicking within the first half offensively. We’re able to get after it [in the second half].”

Brian Cashman mentioned he wished a brand new messenger, which is why he made his first in-season teaching change throughout his 26-year tenure as Yankees basic supervisor.

Requested if Lawson’s message wasn’t getting by, Decide mentioned he couldn’t converse for everyone.

“Me and Dillon acquired some high quality work in, particularly once I had a sense he’d be the hitting coach a pair years in the past,” Decide mentioned. “I attempted to spend as a lot time as I might with him to attempt to perceive the place he was coming from, what he likes to work on, what his philosophies are. He gave me some good nuggets I nonetheless use as we speak.”

That mentioned, the Yankees had been wanting ahead to working with Casey, who introduced in prompt gravitas owing to his 12-year MLB profession, throughout which he hit .302 with a .814 OPS.

“I feel all people has strengths,” Josh Donaldson mentioned. “A part of Sean Casey’s strengths is being within the batters’ field. I feel there’s some information for that. And in addition going by the ups and downs of a season. I positively assume he’s going to have recommendation and issues he feels are going to be helpful for us.”

It has been a whirlwind week for Casey, who was introduced as the brand new hitting coach on Monday. By Friday, Casey’s former employer, MLB Community, was on the televisions within the visiting clubhouse at Coors Area whereas Casey ran a hitters’ assembly.

“For as nice a man as he’s, and gregarious and charismatic and high-energy and pleasant, he’s dead-serious about hitting,” mentioned supervisor Aaron Boone, who was Casey’s teammate for 5 seasons on the Reds. “He’s acquired a number of information to impart, and I’m assured he’ll be capable of try this.”