case closed
The focus on where Giancarlo Stanton puts his feet may change as long as he keeps sending the ball far away from them.
A night after going 4-for-5 against the Nationals, and denying the idea that he had slightly altered his closed stance, the outfielder crushed his 17th home run of the year to put the Yankees on the board in the first inning of a 7-2 win over the Mariners on Tuesday in The Bronx.
“It’s good to lead into [today],” Stanton said. “The confidence needs to be the same always.”
Coming back to Yankee Stadium two days after getting booed for not coming through in Sunday’s 3-1 loss to the Rays, Stanton’s solo shot tied the game at 1-1 and traveled an estimated 426 feet. It was his only hit of the night but jump-started a fourhomer game for the Bombers.
“We were down 1-0, so I like a first-pitch tie right there,” manager Aaron Boone said. “That’s a beautiful thing.”
Before the win, Boone had backed up Stanton’s claim that he had not changed his stance despite a YES Network split screen showing a slightly differ- ent version during Monday’s game. Boone said he saw the segment, but downplayed the discrepancy.
“I think sometimes different camera angles, different points of time can make it seem a little different than maybe it is,” Boone said. “I don’t think there’s much difference at all, if any, especially because Giancarlo I think actually measures himself off out there every time to make sure he’s in [the stance]. That said, going forward, guys tweak things all the time that are slightly visible to the eye, sometimes they’re not.”
Boone maintained his faith in the 28-year-old playing out a $325 million contract, closed stance or not.
“I know for Giancarlo, a lot of the storyline is always going to be around his stance,” Boone said. “I think the stance is fairly irrelevant. It’s about him getting up there and getting comfortable. The reality is when he switched to that closed off [stance], he had as good a run as we’ve seen in a long, long time. For me, it’s about him always just getting on time and in that hitting pitching consistently. When he does that, he’s Giancarlo Stanton.”