It didn’t take long for the Yankees to start manufacturing runs after the All-Star break — and recently hired hitting coach Sean Casey appeared quite excited from the Coors Field dugout.
As Giancarlo Stanton rounded the bases following his first-inning homer, the YES Network camera panned to Casey in the dugout, celebrating with other members of the Yankees and pumping his right arm in the air — with a surprised look on his face — and Stanton crushed a ball 445 feet over the left-centerfield fence.
Casey dished out high-fives.
He clapped his hands.
It was the energizing presence that the Yankees brought into their clubhouse when they hired Casey on Monday, replacing fired hitting coach Dillon Lawson and attempting to fix a struggling offense that sat outside of the playoff picture.
But the Bombers faded after that quick start and suffered a 7-2 loss to the Rockies on Friday night.
In the first inning, Gleyber Torres singled on the third pitch from Austin Gomber.
Then, Stanton took a four-seam fastball and redirected it into the outfield for his 10th homer of the season.
Stanton had been one of the Yankees’ veteran sluggers struggling the most, too, alongside DJ LeMahieu and Josh Donaldson, among others.
He missed time starting in April with a left hamstring strain, and after returning in early June and hitting a homer in his first game back June 2, Stanton hit just .083 over the next 14 games.
Stanton compiled just two extra-base hits over that time.
The Yankees’ offense had already struggled with Aaron Judge out of the lineup with torn ligament in his big right toe, and they lacked Stanton’s impact within the lineup even though he had, on paper, returned.
But Stanton hit three homers in the 13 games heading into the All-Star break, including two in a July 8 victory against the Cubs.
Though it’s unclear if an adjustment from Casey contributed to Stanton’s first-inning blast, it certainly served as a fitting first chapter in the former MLB Network analyst’s Yankees tenure, which will run through the end of the 2023 campaign and then be reevaluated.
The Yankees, though, couldn’t generate enough offense throughout the rest of the game against the Rockies, managing just six hits the rest of the game.
