The Yankees’ five worst defensive plays of 2024

Borrowing a well-worn phrase from a different sport, they say defense wins championships. Does that mean bad defense can lose them as well? The Yankees ' defensive shortcomings became painfully apparent pretty early on, but outside of a one-game benching for Gleyber Torres that was more eyewash than anything, there was never any accountability for the breakdowns in fundamentals. The Dodgers knew this was a flaw they could exploit and did so to win the World Series .

Earlier today, John went over the five best defensive plays from the season. On the flip side of that coin are the errors and mental lapses that have too often characterized this iteration of the Yankees. Dismayingly, there was a robust sample to choose from, but we did manage to whittle it down to a selection of five.

World Series Game 5

Ah yes, that infamous fifth inning. It is a frame that I fear many of us will not forget for quite some time. Just when the Yankees finally seemed to be finding their footing in the series, offering a glimmer of hope that there was still a chance, they snatched that hope away like a lollipop from a child, losing the game and World Series in the most demoralizing fashion possible.

Everything was going so well, the Yankees scoring five unanswered and ace Gerrit Cole pitching a no-hitter through four, and perhaps it is this that made the immediate collapse in the fifth so shocking.

It all started with this routine Tommy Edman fly ball to center after Kiké Hernández led off with a single.

Aaron Judge picked the worst possible time to commit his first error of the season and his first muffed fly since 2017. While certainly not a Gold Glover, Judge makes all the plays you would expect him to make and is the last person you would expect to lose concentration in a spot like this. Thus, the greatest season by a right-handed hitter will wind up as a footnote to this single play in the minds of many fans.

All this being said, the game was still firmly within the Yankees' grasp, the Dodgers yet to get on the scoreboard. However, the defensive blunders continued to pile up. Next, it was Anthony Volpe's turn to bungle a routine play, spiking a 15-foot throw to third into the dirt to load the bases with no outs.

While he certainly has improved his defense from last year, Volpe's footwork continues to get him in trouble. He is seemingly allergic to coming in on a ball, instead waiting back for it to arrive in his glove. This speeds up his internal clock, and he ends up making flat-footed throws with his weight back on his heels like this.

Again, it's an unenviable situation that Cole faces here, but certainly still one he can get out of. Unfortunately, even he fell victim to a lapse in focus, forgetting to cover first on this Mookie Betts infield single to plate the Dodgers' first run and keep the bases loaded.

Although Cole would strike out the next two batters, things unraveled quickly from there, and by the time the dust had settled on the inning, the Dodgers had completely erased the Yankees' five-run lead. From that point you just felt this would be the final game of the Yankees season, and though they would grab another temporary lead, the Dodgers sealed the deal in the eighth. To lose a World Series on defensive plays is bad enough, but for it to happen on three completely avoidable situations, two of which came from the team leaders, leaves a bitter taste in the mouth that will take months to wash out.

World Series Game 1

Juan Soto was everything and more the Yankees could have asked for. Unfortunately, a pair of misplays in right field in Game 1 of the World Series set the ball rolling on the Dodgers ' eventual comeback, and the rest is history.

The first mistake occurred in the fifth inning. Kiké sliced a fly ball down the right field foul line, well out of the reach of Soto's glove. However, instead of turn to play the bounce off the wall, Soto stretched for the uncatchable ball, overreached and had to gather himself at the wall, and by the time he was firing back to the infield Hernández had a stand-up triple.

Will Smith drove him home with a sac fly to open the scoring. Though Giancarlo Stanton would respond with a go-ahead two-run blast in the sixth, this wouldn't be the last time in the game that a defensive lapse would hurt the team.

Fast forward three innings and the Yankees are still clinging to their one-run lead. Despite struggling in the NLCS, Shohei Ohtani is a threat whenever he steps into the box, and he rocketed this Tommy Kahnle changeup off the wall in right for what seems like your basic double. However, Torres was struck by another episode of insouciance, letting the throw from Soto clang off his glove to allow Ohtani to advance to third.

There is just no defense for this play in any game let alone the World Series.

Betts would hit a sac fly to tie the game and send it to extras, where Freddie Freeman would walk it off with a grand slam. Who knows how the game and indeed the series would have panned out if Soto had properly fielded that ball in the corner or if Torres had held his concentration for just a second longer? Maybe the Dodgers don't rattle off wins in Games 2 and 3 riding high on the wave of the Freeman slam; we'll never know.

3. Jasson Domínguez Forgets How to Play Outfield Mid-September

Many Yankees fans were excited to see what Jasson Domínguez could do in his second taste of the big leagues, but his return was delayed for months by Tommy John rehab followed by an oblique injury. The more he worked off the rust in the minors, the louder the cries became for his call-up to replace Alex Verdugo, whose bat disappeared after a hot first month. However, what the Yankees couldn't anticipate was Domínguez forgetting how to field a fly ball in the most important games of the regular season.

The first instance came in the second inning of the September 19th game against the Mariners. Justin Turner hits a deep fly to left center, but Domínguez has plenty of time to center himself under the ball.

I still cannot understand what happened here. He doesn't appear to lose it in the lights as his gaze is fixed on the ball the whole time. Maybe he thought the ball would clear the wall for a home run? The way he just casually watches the ball land next to him on the warning track certainly makes the play look worse, but there's no excuse to not catch this ball.

We only had to wait 24 hours for the next blunder. While the previous one was bailed out by an extra-innings victory, this one ended up costing the Yankees the game. In an eerily similar situation, JT hits a fly to almost the same spot. Domínguez gets to it with plenty of time but clunks it right off the heel of his glove.

This is a classic case of taking your eye off the ball, not watching it all the way into the glove. Three runs wound up scoring in the frame, a deficit the Yankees could not overturn.

The most damaging error to Domínguez and the Yankees' position at the time came during the climactic three-game series against the Orioles for the division crown. All the Yankees had to do was win one of the three games to wrap up the AL East, but nothing came easy with this team, dropping the series opener to keep the Orioles' hopes alive.

The game has barely started and Marcus Stroman has already worked himself into a jam, issuing three straight singles to open the contest. That brings Colton Cowser to the plate with the bases loaded and no outs the left fielder slicing a flyball down the left field foul line. Once again, Domínguez gets to his spot with time to spare, but ends up overshooting the ball, allowing two runs to score.

This is the hardest play of the lot, but still one a major-league left fielder should make — even a new one. The Yankees never could make up the early deficit despite some ninth inning heroics. And while they would clinch the division with a win the next night, this was Domínguez's third and final strike with the glove. You simply have to make all the routine plays as a playoff contender, particularly against the sole remaining opposition to a division title.

The basic inability to track a fly ball effectively cost Domínguez a chance to be a playoff starter, something which Aaron Boone all but confirmed when naming the postseason roster. And while Verdugo acquitted himself with sturdy defense in the playoffs and even hit better than a few of his teammates higher up in the batting order, you wonder what impact Domínguez's higher-ceiling bat could have done in October.

May 26th

No player over the last few years has incurred more of the fanbase's wrath when it comes to defense than Gleyber Torres. He plays with a carefree attitude at second not dissimilar to Robinson Canó, but often the line between smooth and lackadaisical became blurred. Indeed, while Canó was an elite defender in his prime, Torres led all second basemen in 2024 with 18 errors on the campaign, and none illustrated the perceived nonchalance more than this whiff on a routine Jake Cronenworth grounder.

As you can see from the rest of the clip, the error set off a domino effect of further defensive lapses that ended with the Padres scoring four in the frame. Victor González walked the first two batters he faced and then failed to cover first on a double play ball. Anthony Rizzo then misplayed a poor sacrifice bunt to allow another run to score and to top it all off, Dennis Santana couldn't get a handle on a swinging bunt in front of home plate, and what could have been a clean inning turned into a game-jeopardizing farce.

June 16th

It was two weeks into June and the Yankees were rolling. They sat 2.5 games up in the division thanks to recent sweeps of the Giants and Twins. Despite dropping the final game of the just-completed series in Kansas City in heartbreaking fashion thanks to a Clay Holmes blown save, the Bombers still had momentum in their favor as they rolled into Boston for a three-game series, evidenced by their 8-1 blowout in the series opener.

There is no doubting that Jose Trevino is a fabulous defender behind the plate, winning the 2022 AL Platinum Glove Award. However, his control of the run game leaves a lot to be desired, and Alex Cora seemed determined to test his weak arm from the very start. The first sign that this would be no ordinary night was when the lead-footed Dominic Smith stole second in the second, leading to two runs scoring. From that point forward it felt like a track meet, Boston baserunners stealing second and third unopposed at the first opportunity. There was a brief reprieve in the middle innings, but after Boston jumped out to an insurmountable lead with a three-run seventh, the carousel started up again, Cora appearing dead-set on rubbing salt in the wound and achieving the franchise record for stolen bases in a game. They got there eventually, recording nine on the night.