The New York Yankees put on a fantastic show of offense on Saturday against the Milwaukee Brewers with 20 runs and a franchise record nine home runs. However, their defense was dreadful, and they were lucky that the offense decided to show up.
The Yankees defense was dreadful on Saturday
New York committed five errors on Saturday against the Brewers, including two in the second inning that nearly caused them to squander what was a 4-0 lead entering the inning. Overall on the day, Anthony Volpe, Max Fried, Jazz Chisholm, and Pablo Reyes all committed an error, with Reyes logging two.
Defense was a huge problem for the Yankees last season, and they tried diligently to upgrade it by adding in Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt while moving Jazz Chisholm back to second base. However, it is clear that their defense is still a problem and needs to be addressed early.
The lackluster defense was critical yesterday, as the Brewers knocked off nine runs despite them. Fried, who made his Yankees debut Saturday, had only two of his six allowed runs charged to him as a result of the poor defense, and he was unable to get the win since he was pulled during the fifth inning.
The Yankees defense has to be better
While the offense can provide the run support to make up for the poor defense, there will be games where the bats go quiet and the gloves need to be on point. It didn’t have much of an impact on Saturday, but it will make a big difference in close games.
Yankees fans are all too familiar with poor defense costing games, as the fifth inning of Game 5 of the 2024 World Series featured two critical errors that allowed the Dodgers to erase a 5-0 deficit and eventually win the game and the series.
Going forward, the defense will need to play better to prevent closer games from slipping away. They will hope to shore up the defense on Sunday when they go for the series sweep over the Brewers.
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