The Mets television broadcasters were hammering Gary Sanchez on air Friday night, and the Yankees catcher definitely deserved every bit of the first inning verbal abuse.
His decision to just stand there at the plate after catching left fielder Joey Gallo’s perfect throw and let baserunner Jonathan Villar, who was a dead duck by 30 feet, slide under him for a game-tying run was mind blowing.
This was the lowlight of the darkest chapter of a Yankees’ season that is dying before our eyes, seven losses in a row and 11 in 13 games counting this 10-3 shellacking delivered by the Mets at Citi Field on the 9/11 20th anniversary eve.
This wasn’t the No. 1 dumbest play in baseball this year. Pirates first baseman Will Craig locked up the blooper of the century on May 27 when he fielded a two-out dribbler hit by Cubs shortstop Javier Baez and decided to chase to hitter back to home plate after he stopped running only to throw wildly when a runner on third broke for the plate.
We’re giving Sanchez’s mistake the silver medal, which by the way came on a two-out base hit by … you guessed it, Javier Baez, who now plays second base for the Amazins.
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This mistake by Sanchez, the latest of many defensive headshakers in his career, was the start of a comedy of errors on a night in which the Yankees threw the ball around like it was a hot potato.
What was Sanchez thinking?
We can only guess because the three Yankees who were made available for post-game Zoom interviews did not include El Gary.
Here was the reaction of Yankees pitcher Jordan Montgomery, who also had a bad night:
“It’s unfortunate.”
Manager Aaron Boone, who goes out of his way to stick up for his players 100% of the time, sounded like he was teaching Little Leaguers Baseball 101 explaining what he thinks Sanchez was thinking.
“Obviously, he’s going to be out easy,” Boone said. “It’s a great throw by Joey and I think (Sanchez) felt like (Villar), because he was so out, would pull up. Well, he got out of his crouch and athletic position. In that spot where you’ve got a guy dead to rights, you’ve got to just lower your body, maybe initiate the contact, but remain athletic in your legs.
“It’s a little bit akin to fielding a groundball. You want to go low to high. Once you get high, it’s hard to get caught going down. So it’s just a play where he needs to stay in his legs a little bit better.”
It’s a play that has to be an inning-ending out.
“It’s a big play,” Boone said. “It’s an important play, but you’ve got to deal with that over the course of a season.”
The Yankees dealt with it very poorly. They regained the lead 2-1 in the second inning on a homer by Gallo, but a night full of mistakes picked up in the third when the Mets scored five times to build a 6-2 lead that turned into a rout.
First, Montgomery lost his command after allowing a leadoff hit, walking three in a row to force in the tying run, then third baseman Gio Urshela fielded a bases-loaded grounder and threw wildly to the plate, turning an out into a run that opened the flood gates.
Later in the game, shortstop Gleyber Torres made a bad relay throw to the plate to let a Mets run score and the result was the same when he whipped a wild throw to first base to kill what should have been an inning-ending double play.
Sanchez’ mistake didn’t do in the Yankees, but it might have impacted the rest of the game.
“That’s tough to say,” Boone said. “We came right back and grabbed the lead and the next half inning. The one thing it did was force Monty to throw extra pitches. He ends up getting the pitcher spot out of the way in (the second) inning instead of the pitcher leading off the (third) inning. Those are things that kind of factor into how a game unfold. So did a factor in? Possibly, but you got to be able to deal with it.”
Randy Miller may be reached at rmiller@njadvancemedia.com.
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