Joe: Sanchez still catching up

SEATTLE — Joe Girardi gave an honest assessment of Gary Sanchez’s season on Sunday. “I think he’s had a decent year,” Girardi said. “I think he’s capable of playing better. He went through the injury early on (missing 21 games due to a right biceps injury), which I think was pretty frustrating for all of us and him as well. I think there are things that he’s learning, as I think all young catchers do. They go through it. There are things that happen at this level that you’re not really exposed to at the lower level and you have to learn on the fly. I think offensively (opposing pitchers) have a better idea of what they’re dealing with and they pitch to them maybe a little bit different. He’s dealing with that. But his numbers are pretty good.”

Overall, Sanchez is slashing a respectable .265/.344/.470 with 14 homers, but in his last 20 games entering Sunday he’s slashed just .213/.281/.313 with one homer. He was 0-for-5 with two strikeouts in Sunday’s win over Seattle.

The 24-year-old catcher has also had some issues defensively. Girardi was seen speaking sternly to Sanchez in Chicago over his inability to block balls in the dirt. Sanchez has nine errors and has thrown out 36 percent of potential basestealers.

“He’s still a work in progress,” Girardi said. “I think he can get better. And we’ve had to make some adjustments. He came up last year and caught pretty well so we didn’t make a lot of adjustments. But he’s had some struggles this year, and we’ve went to work. Very seldom is a catcher in his first four months in the big leagues a finished product. It takes a lot of work.”

Asked about specifics, Girardi responded: “I think we’ve seen him improve blocking. It’s something that we’ve worked with him very hard on. I think he’s received better. I think there’s some balls that have gotten by him that probably shouldn’t get by him. That’s going to happen to every catcher, but maybe a few more than should. Those sorts of things. I think adjusting to pitchers the way they’re pitching you now is something he could work on too. He doesn’t get a chance to throw a lot because teams don’t’ run on him a lot. But you have to stay sharp, there’s ways to stay sharp, and we’re working on that with him too as well.”

GETTY Gary Sanchez has not quite lived up to sky-high expectations that came with torrid start to his Yank career, but Joe Girardi says his catcher is still learning to handle opposing pitchers changing their approaches when he’s at the plate.