Gary Sanchez Refused To Hustle On Ninth-Inning Grounder, Costs Yankees A Game

Gary Sanchez is currently hitting just .188 on the season, so you’d expect the New York Yankees backstop to try and help the team in other ways. Like, say, hustling on balls in play. Unfortunately, that’s not what the 25-year-old catcher did Monday night and it cost his team the game.

Sanchez was up with two outs in the top of the 9th, as the Yankees trailed the Tampa Bay Rays 7-6. With the bases loaded, Sanchez hit a grounder sharply to Rays second baseman Daniel Robertson. Robertson flipped the ball to Willy Adames, who rushed to tag second base. Yankees outfielder Aaron Hicks beat Adames to the bag and was safe, but Sanchez was jogging up the line. Adames saw he had a play on Sanchez, so he threw on to first to get the out.

Had Sanchez just run to first he would have easily beaten the throw from Adames and the Yankees would have tied the game.

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Sanchez is going to get killed for not hustling in that situation. Instead of a tie game after a great comeback, the Yankees lost and dropped six games behind the Boston Red Sox for first place in the AL East.

If you’re an MVP candidate, maybe you get a little leeway for not hustling there. When you’re not hitting your weight, you don’t. Sanchez deserves to get crushed for this.