Yankees general manager Brian Cashman has reacted to sharply critical comments made by Dodgers reliever Joe Kelly in the wake of the World Series.
At MLB GM meetings in San Antonio, Texas, on Tuesday, Cashman was asked about remarks Kelly made on the “Baseball Isn’t Boring” podcast in which he compared and contrasted the Dodgers’ attention to detail versus the Yankees’.
“Look at the team, look at the talent. We go through numerous scouting reports. We pay attention to every single detail. We have a lot of big superstars in our clubhouse, but our superstars also care and aren’t lazy and play hard. That’s the difference, and the biggest separator,” Kelly said of the two teams.
Cashman disagreed with Kelly’s premise.
“They’re the world champs and they get all the credit, but I don’t think it’s a fair representation at the same time,” he said, as covered by SNY.
“I think it’s more fair to say that we just played poorly in that series and underperformed. I think we underperformed in that series more so than somehow [the Yankees] were lucky to get to the World Series and how did we even get there.”
The Dodgers won the World Series in five games after the Yankees blew leads in Games 1 and 5.
Cashman’s contention was that the Yankees were a “good team” that just “didn’t play our best when it counted the most.”
Kelly was not on the Dodgers’ NLCS or World Series rosters due to injury.
On the podcast, he ripped the Yankees for being “sloppy” during the World Series and said he would’ve ranked the Padres, Phillies, Braves and Mets ahead of them in his hierarchy of quality baseball teams this season.
“They got bad ball. Yeah, sloppy. Everyone knows that,” Kelly said. “We were saying every single game. ‘Just let them throw the ball into the infield, they can’t make a play.’ You saw Shohei [Ohtani] get an extra base going to third off a sloppy Gleyber [Torres] play. It’s well known. We all knew.”
At the GM meetings, Cashman continued to brush off the reliever’s comments.
“I also know people with the Dodges so I’ve got some internal conversations that I’ve certainly got feedback on, I think it’s more representative of some specific players rather than the overall group,” he said. “And in Joe’s case, it feels like it’s some reason it’s a little personal, you know, the way he’s out talking like he has. So it feels like that’s more personal than anything else.
“So, I can’t make much more of it than that. I know he’s certainly talking a lot right now. And, hey he won, or they won, so, I can just say what I just said.”
