Flaw Ball

BY KEVIN KERNAN

Let’s not forget, long before this latest debacle, the Yankees were roasted by some World Champion Dodgers after Aaron Boone’s club lost the World Series in five games, including one of the worst meltdowns in World Series history in the fifth inning of Game 5.

On Saturday, former Yankee captain Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez both criticized their old team, pointing out the obvious, something Yankee fans have been saying all year that the Yankees make way too many mistakes and suffer from a lack of accountability.

On the former Pinstripes scale, it does not get much worse than that.

The Yankees are playing Flaw Ball.

All this came about because Jazz Chisholm made one of the dumbest plays imaginable, getting doubled off first base on a popup to second base on Saturday. And don’t forget Jazz recently made a similar play on defense, trying to double up the runner at first even though the runner was standing on the bag. Jazz threw the ball away for an error.

Somehow, Jazz produced a daily double of mind-bending plays on one of the most simple plays in the game, a popup to second.

Even T-ballers, most of them, know to get back.

Through it all Aaron Boone defended Chisholm, saying Jazz was trying to make a play, and instead was angry with the first base coach.

Having been around major league players since 1977, I can only imagine what Jeter and A-Rod were saying about these Yankees behind closed doors.

The Yankees have become a $300 million broken record of baseball mistakes, especially on the base paths. Catcher Austin Wells walked off second base while representing the potential game-winning run the other day because he thought there were three outs instead of two, even though he moved to second on a bunt by Trent Grisham.

Earlier this year, Jasson Dominguez was caught in La-La-Land off second base, having trouble focusing on the outs in the inning. There are only three. Then there was Jorbit Vivas not sliding at third and slowing down as Ronald Acuna Jr. doubled him up from right field. The Yankees take too much for granted, and now this Jazz mistake makes four incredible base-running blunders.

And Boone repeats his standard line: “It can’t happen.’’

It keeps happening.

Having been around major league players since 1977, I can only imagine what Jeter and A-Rod were saying about these Yankees behind closed doors.

Boone, a third-generation major leaguer, has allowed the Yankees to become a baseball punchline. How many times can Michael Kay say, “What’s going on here?’’

Boone doesn’t fix what’s broken; he just repeats the same platitudes that he spewed again on Sunday after the Yankees lackluster 7-3 loss to the Marlins, giving the Mighty Marlins a three-game sweep of the Yankees for the first time in their history.

And yes, the Yankees once did manage to lose four games in a series to the Marlins – the World Series in 2003 and I was there for that. Jack McKeon, a South Amboy, NJ native, was the manager of that Marlins team that won four of six to win the franchise’s second World Series. And wouldn’t you know it, McKeon, who turns 95 in November, was in Miami on Sunday for the game as he was inducted into the Marlins Hall of Fame.

I spoke with Jack earlier this week to congratulate him and he is still sharp as ever – and pointed out that too often in today’s game the players need to be led. “Believe me,’’ he said, “players want and need discipline.’’

That, right there, says it all. Boone continues to do a disservice to the Yankees because he allows the players to walk all over him. Yes, he called Chisholm into the tunnel for a meeting but after the game he endorsed Chisholm’s bizarre line of thinking, saying Chisholm was trying to make something happen.

You can’t possibly say that to the fans, the media and to the rest of your team and fix a fixable problem. Chisholm was acting as a mind-reader, thinking that Marlins second baseman Xavier Edwards was going to miss the popup on purpose and let it bounce on the turf – a most risky play – and then “swap out’’ baserunners by throwing to second base to erase Chisholm and put Paul Goldschmidt at first base.

Talk about overthinking.

Edwards kept stealing glances at Chisholm as if to say, “That dude is really off first base that far. He is going to let me double him up on a play where he should be standing on the bag.’’

It was a preposterous thought process by Chisholm. In any other generation on Major League Baseball, the manager would say, “I don’t know what the heck Jazz was thinking but he needs to get his butt back to first base.’’

With at least five bleeps in there.

But this is not just any generation of baseball. This is a generation of players who basically have never been told no. This is a generation of players that work on their on-field celebrations more than they work on fundamentals, in this case baserunning.

And again, this is Not Just Jazz being dumb, this was the fourth strike of dumb base-running by the Yankees this season. If a manager doesn’t lose his mind over the third and fourth strikes, when will he ever criticize his players?

Milwaukee’s Pat Murphy has his Brewers playing great baseball, partly because he holds them accountable.

The problem with Boone is that he is so engrossed in what the media will say or write about his players, he always has their back even when they make dumb plays that hurt the team.

A-Rod is right, where is the accountability?

Jeter is right, the Yankees make way too many mistakes.

The Dodgers were right; they knew the Yankees would collapse fundamentally because they play shoddy fundamental baseball.

Instead of vowing to fix the mistakes, Boone makes excuses for his players. After a while, those excuses wear thin even in the team’s own clubhouse.

I have said, time and again, the Yankees are so lucky Aaron Judge did not flee to San Francisco and the Yankees are so lucky that the Giants management at the time, a bunch of Nerds, did not know how to close the deal on Judge.

With Judge out injured though, the leadership of the team is non-existent. Boone is a broken record of excuses. Chisholm bounced back with a strong game on Sunday, in another losing effort, but only because he was embarrassed by the hard to imagine play of being doubled off on a popup right in front of you.

Imagine if earlier this year, Boone had gone after his players for continuing to make fundamental mistakes, maybe some feelings would have been hurt, but that’s life in the big leagues. That’s life in New York. Better to demand more of your players than allow them to continue to play poor fundamental baseball. With the loss Sunday the Yankees are 25-32 since May 28. If losing a series to the Marlins, who were once 16 games under .500 this season – but are now playing fundamentally sound, together baseball – is not a wake-up call for the Yankees, they never will wake up.

In a terribly weak AL East and AL – remember the Dodgers told us how weak the American League was as soon as they dispatched the Yankees – somehow the Yankees have dropped to third place behind the Blue Jays and Red Sox. If the AL was as competitive as the NL, the Yankees would be out of the running for a watered-down Wild Card spot.

Against the AL East, not the AL East of past years, the Yankees are 14-19. Against teams leading their divisions, or tied for the lead, the Yankees are 12-16.

Even after Sunday’s loss, Kumbaya Boone was saying, “I think we’ve got a really good team.’’

What gives Boone the right to think they are a really good team?

A shallow sense of urgency was the message of the day for the Yankees with Boone finally coming around to the fact, it’s getting late in the season and the Yankees have not shown they are a team that is an October threat.

“We gotta go,’’ is how Boone put it.

A few trades made the Yankees think they had it made heading into this series, yet in Game 1 against the Marlins, the new-look Yankees blew 6-0, 9-4 and 12-10 leads before blowing the game. None of the new additions have started well. Yes, Ryan McMahon can play third base, but he struck out four times Sunday as the Yankees struck out 14 times – and that was coming off a 2-0 shutout loss with Chisholm’s base-running gaffe. Only two MLB players have struck out more than McMahon this year.

And just to be clear, Chisholm wasn’t trying to make something happen as Boone said. I checked with seven baseball people on Sunday, a variety of scouts, former managers and coaches and all said it was one of the most ridiculous plays they have ever seen in their life.

I asked all of them if they had seen anything like that before and only one did, texting me back: “Yes. Double-A. Runner on first thought there was 2 outs in 9th (only 1, down 8 runs). Guy was a prospect. Didn’t make it, wonder why?! But the key here is MINOR LEAGUES. … the Yankees are in trouble; they seem to find ways to lose.’’

Yes, they do.

Just as they did in the World Series in that fifth inning of Game 5 with their ace Gerrit Cole on the mound and a 5-0 lead. The Yankees and their fans were upset by some of the Dodgers’ lesser players taking a shot at them, but they were only saying what the Dodgers knew going into the Series.

Boone, as is his nature, put himself on his high horse and said early in spring training that he hoped “to handle things with a little more class,’’ if the Yankees could win their first championship since 2009. “A few people sounding off isn’t necessarily how I would want to draw it up.’’

And there lies the problem. From a managerial standpoint Boone was given a gift by those Dodgers, they were rubbing it in the Yankees face, but Boone wanted to take a “classier’’ road. At that moment he should have had a team meeting, a fire and brimstone meeting, saying, “I’m tired of these bleeping Dodgers laughing at us. We are going to be so buttoned up this year on fundamentals and the work begins now. No excuses.’’

Instead, he criticized the criticizers, much like he criticizes the media for pointing out his team’s shortcomings. He is so soft he didn’t know how to make that gift for him work and instead it has been another year of platitudes.

He also pointed out that the Dodgers superstars didn’t call the Yankees out.

Well, on Saturday his team and his managerial style was called out by Yankees captain Derek Jeter and by Alex Rodriguez on FOX, former Yankee superstars.

Aaron Boone continues to be the ostrich manager who buries his head in the sand and right next to him are GM Brian Cashman and Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner, all with their heads in the sand.

Instead of challenging the people who criticize the Yankees poor play, how about challenging the players to play better and not just say, “We’re a really good team.’’

You’re not, and if it is going to change, Aaron Boone has to be the first to recognize that, not the last.