Boone Takes the Blame: Yankees Lose 2-1 After Manager Keeps Cole in Too Long

Aaron Boone walked out to the mound in the seventh inning Friday night at Yankee Stadium. Gerrit Cole had thrown 97 pitches. The bullpen was ready. Brent Headrick was warmed up.
Boone asked Cole if he had one more in him. Cole said yes. Boone walked back to the dugout.
Six pitches later, Max Muncy launched a two-run homer into the second deck in right field. Dodgers win 2-1.
After the game, Boone didn’t dodge it. “Sometimes you have to take the ball from them,” he said. “That’s on me. Looking back, I probably should have gone to the bullpen there.”

How It Happened

Cole was dealing. He had held the Dodgers to one hit through six innings, with the Yankees leading 1-0. He walked Mookie Betts to start the seventh — his 98th pitch of the night. Boone came out, looked at his ace, asked the question, and left him in.
Muncy had been 0-for-10 in his last stretch. He’d gone hitless in five previous at-bats against Cole this season. None of that mattered. He fouled off a changeup, fouled off a slider, then watched Cole hang a 91 mph slider right over the middle of the plate. Muncy hit it halfway up the second deck. He didn’t even run — he walked down the first base line watching it go.
Dodgers led 2-1. Cole’s night was over

Sasaki Was Sharp

The other half of the story was Roki Sasaki. The Dodgers’ young right-hander repeatedly hit triple digits on the radar gun and kept the Yankees off balance all night. He gave up an unearned run but never let the game get away from him. When he left in the sixth with two runners on, Jack Dreyer came in and struck out Jasson Dominguez to end the threat.
The Dodgers managed only five hits. One of them was all they needed

The Bigger Picture

This was the first time the Dodgers had played at Yankee Stadium since winning the 2024 World Series there. They came in having lost three straight. Cole came in having gone 3-5 on the season despite pitching well in several of those starts.
Boone has managed Cole long enough to know when to pull him and when to trust him. Friday night, he trusted him. It didn’t work. He said so himself.
Source: ESPN, Yahoo Sports, AP, Dodgers Nation