The Aaron Boone Show? Manager turning run-ins with umps into an ‘art form’
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Joon Lee, ESPN
New York Yankees manager Aaron Boone has turned getting ejected by umpires into such a regular occurrence that his players — and even his family — debate their favorite signature moments, like he’s a sitcom character.
“You see him out there yelling,” said Yankees captain Aaron Judge with a laugh. “He has passion. I love the gum throw. You’ve got him doing stuff with his hat.”
It’s not just that Boone is getting tossed at an historic rate, earning him a recent one-game suspension from MLB after two ejections in a four-game span. It’s not just that Boone has been tossed 30 times in his five-plus seasons as a manager. It’s that Boone has been ejected enough times his players have begun breaking down his style — like Judge’s favorite, the gum tosses, which recently got meme’d into a phony Statcast treatment.
Aaron Boone’s gum throw via statcast pic.twitter.com/rW4s7LBuel
— gabe (@PlayoffTanaka_) May 16, 2023
“There’s an art form to it,” said Yankees outfielder Harrison Bader on the gum toss. “He does it incredibly well. I respect it and I support it at all times.”
Boone has been ejected more times in his career than Dusty Baker, who has managed 20 more seasons. As it currently stands, Boone has the third-highest ejection rate in MLB history, behind only Paul Richards and Frankie Frisch and ahead of notorious grousers such as Earl Weaver, Bobby Cox and Ron Gardenhire. It’s a feat made more impressive because Boone manages in the instant replay era, which has reduced potential friction between skippers and umps. Those within the Yankees’ clubhouse — and even in the umpires’ room — say his willingness to stand up for his team in this way is a feature, not a bug.
“I just think it shows what kind of leader he is for this team,” Judge said. “I can be mad about this ball and strike, but Booney is going to have my back. He’s going to speak up and voice the opinion of the team and me.”
In 2019, Boone famously got tossed by umpire Brendan Miller after a now-iconic, expletive-laden “savages in the box” rant. While Boone has become a frequent antagonist on the field for umpires, his relationships with the crews behind the scenes remain extremely friendly and cordial, according to multiple umpires who spoke to ESPN.
“Not many Yankees get ejected — he’s always taking the fire,” said one veteran umpire, who spoke to ESPN on the condition of anonymity. “He’s just doing the job that he’s supposed to do.”
A manager’s relationship with umpires can be very different on the field and off of it. Cox, who was ejected an MLB record 162 times — a full season’s worth of games — over his 29 years as manager of the Atlanta Braves and Toronto Blue Jays, famously got into screaming matches with umps. But when the crews would visit his restaurant in Atlanta, he often picked up their checks — serving up an apology along with it. Umpires frequently cite Boone’s background in baseball — he comes from a line of major leaguers that includes his grandfather, Ray; his father, Bob (who managed for six seasons after a long playing career); and his brother, Bret — as the foundation for a common understanding that what happens on the diamond stays there.
“If he crosses a line and makes it personal, then he’s probably going to get ejected, but he comes from a great baseball family and he knows what his job is,” another umpire said. “The whole thing is funny.”
Regardless, his growing reputation for piling up ejections is one Boone hopes to change, especially upon hearing that he’s outpacing Weaver and Cox for career ejections.
“Going to slow down then,” Boone said. “But all of a sudden, you have three in a week. I don’t want to get tossed. I’m trying to back off a bit more right now. But at the same time, not wanting to lose the edge that I want our players to have and things that I want to fight for. I don’t want our players to get kicked out at all if possible.”
Boone says his wife, Laura Cover, and four children usually do not mention the ejections when he comes home after being thrown out of a game. But when the gum toss got the attention of his 14-year-old daughter, Bella, Boone used the moment to impart some wisdom.
“Do as I say,” Boone said to Bella. “Not as I do.”
While Boone hopes to tone it down, Yankees players find his moments of passion refreshing. Typically, Boone remains even-keeled, never getting too high or too low after a big win or loss. The contrast between his largely calm demeanor and the intense persona that emerges while jawing at umpires fires up the dugout.
“You want a manager that will go to war for his guys,” Yankees outfielder Willie Calhoun said. “Some managers don’t do that at all. So when you see that, it just makes you want to run through a wall [for him].”
That type of support helps spur on struggling players, too. Yankees utility man Isiah Kiner-Falefa has received significant criticism at times from the Yankees fan base after scuffling both at the plate and in the field. But, he said, Boone sticking up for him, whether it’s with an ump or while facing the media, helped give him the confidence he could turn things around.
“It gives you this peace of mind and it helps you show up to work in a good state,” Kiner-Falefa said. “He shows he really cares.”
Boone understands there might be some umpires who are rubbed the wrong way by his actions, but he says his intention is to never make it about more than one moment.
“I always try to have relationships, that part is really easy for me,” Boone said. “It’s very easy to move on, have what I think hopefully is the right kind of relationship with them. A respectful one.”
As for the gum? Before games, Boone stockpiles it to keep near him on the bench. The stack then shrinks across nine innings. Whenever Judge tries to steal a piece before heading to the on-deck circle, Boone gets extremely protective. So when Judge sees a piece of gum flying through the air during one of Boone’s arguments, he knows the skipper has taken extreme exception to a call.
“To see him waste one, and knowing how much he loves it,” Judge said, “it means a lot.”
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Alden Gonzalez, ESPN Staff Writer
Roki Sasaki, the prized Japanese pitching prospect who has had scouts drooling over his potential since high school, has chosen the Los Angeles Dodgers as his major league team, he announced on Instagram on Friday.
Sasaki called this “a very difficult decision, but I will do my best to make it the right decision when I look back after my baseball career.”
The Dodgers, long viewed as the favorites for Sasaki, had recently emerged as one of three finalists for the 23-year-old right-hander, along with the Toronto Blue Jays and San Diego Padres. On Friday morning, the Padres began agreeing to deals with their prospective international signees in the Dominican Republic, a clear sign throughout the industry that they were out on Sasaki. The Blue Jays thusly acquired $2 million in international-bonus-pool space — along with center fielder Myles Straw — from the Cleveland Guardians in hopes of enticing Sasaki further.
It ultimately did not matter. A Dodgers team coming off a World Series title with a roster headlined by Japanese countrymen Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto again landed one of the biggest prizes of the offseason.
In the Dodgers, Sasaki joins a team that has built a reputation as one of the best at developing talent and one that expects to field an incredibly deep rotation in 2025. Yamamoto and Tyler Glasnow return from last year’s group. Ohtani, who will resume his duties as a two-way player, will be added. Blake Snell signed a five-year, $182 million contract in November. Clayton Kershaw is expected to return at some point, as well. And younger arms such as Tony Gonsolin, Dustin May and Bobby Miller remain in the organization, making it easy for the Dodgers to field a six-man rotation that would lessen Sasaki’s acclimation process.
Because he is under 25 years old and spent less than six seasons in Nippon Professional Baseball, Sasaki essentially will sign a minor league contract and follow the path of a player selected in the amateur draft — able to be optioned to the minors, scheduled to earn close to the major league minimum during his first three major league seasons and unable to become a traditional free agent until attaining six years of service time.
Teams were limited to giving Sasaki only their international bonus pools, which ranged from about $5.1 million to $7.5 million at the start of the signing period.
Sasaki features a mesmerizing splitter that has been lauded as one of the world’s best secondary pitches and pairs it with a fastball that reaches 100 mph, adding a slider that has also been deemed a plus pitch. In four seasons with the Chiba Lotte Marines, Sasaki posted a 2.02 ERA, a 0.88 WHIP and 524 strikeouts against 91 walks in 414 2/3 innings.
In an April 10, 2022, start against the Orix Buffaloes, Sasaki pitched a perfect game while setting an NPB record with 13 consecutive strikeouts. Seven days later, he took the mound again and fired eight perfect innings before being removed from his outing. The following spring, Sasaki showcased his talents on a global stage, forming a star-studded rotation alongside Ohtani, Yu Darvish, Shota Imanaga and Yamamoto for a Japanese team that won the World Baseball Classic.
For years, major league scouts and executives descended upon Japan to catch a glimpse of Sasaki and salivated over the possibility of him someday being posted. When it finally occurred in early December, upwards of 20 teams made initial pitches, doing so with videos and letters and even books. Sasaki flew to the L.A. headquarters of his agency, Wasserman, later that month and conducted meetings with at least eight teams — the Dodgers, Padres, Blue Jays, New York Yankees, New York Mets, Chicago Cubs, Texas Rangers and San Francisco Giants.
Earlier this week, five of those teams were informed they were out of the running, prompting Sasaki to take follow-up meetings in Toronto, San Diego and L.A. before coming to his decision.
Sasaki needed to select his new team between Jan. 15, the start of this year’s international signing period, and Jan. 23, the expiration of his posting window. His presence in the international amateur market left prospective signees of the three finalists in limbo on deals that are verbally agreed to years in advance, causing particular consternation within the Dominican Republic. The Dodgers, Padres and Blue Jays needed to not only free up their international bonus pools for the potential of landing Sasaki, but entertain the possibility of trading for additional space in hopes of enticing him further.
Sasaki starred in Summer Koshien, the prominent Japanese high school tournament, and was taken No. 1 overall in the NPB draft in 2019. The Lotte Marines handled him carefully, restricting him to bullpen sessions and simulated games in 2020 and limiting his workload whenever possible thereafter. Sasaki’s numbers were down a bit last year, his ERA rising to 2.35. His four-seam fastball went from averaging roughly 98 mph to 96. At one point, shoulder fatigue cropped up. There are concerns about how Sasaki will handle a major league workload, and many will acknowledge that his command needs improvement.
But few doubt his ceiling.
Within these next handful of years, several prominent evaluators believe, Sasaki could be an annual Cy Young contender.
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