The New York Yankees’ poor form in the 2025 MLB season is no secret. Despite the return of stars such as Aaron Judge, the team has lost five consecutive games and is barely alive in the fight for the wild card.
While fans and the media blame manager Aaron Boone, a well-known MLB insider has focused on a more uncomfortable truth: the Yankees’ problem is structural, and it starts with their minor leagues.
It’s not just Aaron Boone: Yankees face organizational crisis
The poor form of the New York Yankees in the 2025 Major League Baseball season is no secret. Despite the return of stars such as Aaron Judge, the team has lost five consecutive games and is barely alive in the fight for the wild card.
While the fans and media blame manager Aaron Boone, a renowned MLB insider has focused on a more uncomfortable truth: the Yankees’ problem is structural, and it starts with their minor leagues.
Didi Gregorius’ explosive words about the minor leagues
- During a recent appearance on the show Foul Territory, sports journalist Erik Boland recalled a revealing testimony from former player Didi Gregorius, who wore the Yankees jersey for several seasons.
- The consequence: players who know how to hit hard or throw fast, but lack vision, do not understand when to take risks, how to handle complex defensive situations or how to play as a team.
- According to the insider, Gregorius was pointing to the overemphasis on advanced statistics such as exit velocity, spin rate and other modern metrics. While this data is useful, the problem is that the teaching of basic baseball fundamentals, such as baserunning, defense, or smart play in pressure situations, has been neglected.
- What Boland describes is not just an isolated episode, but a widespread criticism of how the Yankees are developing their young players. According to the expert, the team has lost its identity by focusing almost exclusively on numbers, leaving aside the integral development of the player.
Yankees on the brink of collapse in second half of season
Beyond the internal problems, the current results reflect this crisis. After starting the year as the best team in the American League, the Yankees have plummeted. Their offense has become predictable and relies almost entirely on figures such as Judge, Paul Goldschmidt and Cody Bellinger. Outside of them, the bats are off.
In addition, the bullpen has been unable to close out games and the starting rotation lacks depth. As a result, the Yankees are just half a game ahead of the Texas Rangers, who are threatening to take away their last playoff spot.
The Yankees’ case is an example of how an obsession with advanced statistics can hinder the full development of players if not balanced with solid fundamentals of the sport. The New York organization, one of the most historic in baseball, is at a crossroads: radically change its training model or continue in free fall.
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