Aaron Boone can only be fired by the Yankees in one way, and that way has never been done before.
For the first time in decades, the Yankees are playing with integrity, but it’s not safe to say that this will result in manager Aaron Boone losing his job.
According to four people with firsthand knowledge of the Yankees’ internal procedures, there is actually only one way Boone will be let go:
managing general partner Hal Steinbrenner would have to defy general manager Brian Cashman and his baseball operations staff. And no managerial choice has ever caused that to occur before.
For now, Steinbrenner is not answering questions from the media, including this one. He will wait until the end of the season to make an official announcement regarding Boone.
If Steinbrenner does decide to make a change, it will be in contrast to his past practice of adopting Cashman’s managerial suggestions. There hasn’t been any discussion about that happening within Cashman’s baseball department thus far.
Boone is a benefit, not a contributing factor, according to a senior Yankees official.
From ownership to Cashman to scouting to analytics to the manager and coaching staff, the Yankees are a highly collaborative team. Boone continues to play a crucial role in the daily tasks that this group completes together.
Therefore, it would be questionable for the Yankees to fire Boone and bring in someone like Don Mattingly in his place.
If you aren’t completely restructuring the organization, you can’t just put someone else in that important position.
Many Yankees supporters are advocating for precisely this kind of reconsideration in the wake of this season, which Cashman has called a “disaster.” That is a subject for a different column.
In terms of specifics, Cashman is in the first season of a four-year contract and has been general manager or assistant general manager for thirty consecutive winning seasons.
Put another way, until Cashman offers to step down in order to protect Steinbrenner from more “Fire Cashman” banners and tweets, neither he nor his program will disappear. And even in that case, one may assume Steinbrenner would attempt to dissuade him.
Steinbrenner and Cashman have a long history of trust, which is demonstrated by the former’s willingness to listen to the latter when making coaching and managerial decisions.
In November 2008, following Joe Girardi’s first season as captain, Hal took up his father’s role as the Yankees’ manager. When Cashman suggested Girardi extensions, he granted them.
Later, after the 2017 season, when the general manager and manager did not collaborate as effectively as they had in the past, he accepted Cashman’s suggestion to part ways with Girardi.
Team insiders claim that during the 2021 season, Steinbrenner heard voices in his ear urging him to fire Boone and bring in Buck Showalter, who was then employed by the YES Network. The conversation was never taken seriously because Cashman wanted to remain with Boone.
This July’s events strengthened the Yankee power structure. At least in 2022, Steinbrenner had been a supporter of hitting coach Dillon Lawson. But Steinbrenner agreed when Cashman suggested firing Lawson.
It also doesn’t seem inconsequential that Boone’s pal Sean Casey was chosen by the Yankees to replace him.
