NEW YORK — Yankees shortstop Anthony Volpe was removed from the starting lineup Sunday night for the finale of a critical four-game series against the rival Boston Red Sox.
Volpe is mired in a 1-for-28 slump and leads the majors with 17 errors. New York started recently acquired utility man Jose Caballero at shortstop as it prevented a four-game sweep with a 7-2 win.
Volpe is hitting .208 with 18 homers and 65 RBIs in 129 games this season. He has started 125 at shortstop, but he was not in the starting lineup for only the fifth time this season.
“Just scuffling a little bit offensively here over the last 10 days, [and] having Caballero,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone explained pregame. “Cabby gives you that real utility presence that can go play anywhere.”
Volpe entered on defense with the Yankees leading 5-2 in the eighth inning and converted his only chance in the field. Caballero moved to right field.
Volpe said after the win that he is not in Monday’s lineup against the Washington Nationals but expects to be back in it Tuesday.
“As a competitor and as someone that takes pride and wants to be out there every day, you just take it on the chin and you look for the positives,” Volpe said. “If I do what I got to do, it’ll be what it is. So, it’s all on me.”
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Sunday was the second time in eight days that Volpe did not start. After going 0-for-9 in the first two games at the St. Louis Cardinals, he sat out the series finale last Sunday.
He went hitless in 10 at-bats over the first three games against the Red Sox. During Saturday’s 12-1 loss, he had a sacrifice bunt and committed a throwing error on a grounder by David Hamilton during Boston’s seventh-run ninth inning.
Volpe, 24, batted .249 through his first 69 games. But since June 14, he is hitting .153 — and some Yankees fans have been clamoring for the team to sit him down.
Volpe won a Gold Glove as a rookie in 2023 and hit .209 with 21 homers and 60 RBIs.
He batted .243 with 12 homers last season when New York won its first American League pennant since 2009. In the postseason, Volpe batted .286, including a grand slam in Game 4 of the World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
“I think he handles it quite well,” Boone said about Volpe’s struggles. “I don’t think he’s overly affected by those things. Just a young player that works his tail off and is super competitive and is trying to find that next level in his game offensively. I think he’s mentally very tough and totally wired to handle all of the things that go with being a big leaguer in this city and being a young big leaguer that’s got a lot of expectations on him.”
Acquired from the Tampa Bay Rays at the July 31 trade deadline, the speedy Caballero was hitting .320 in 14 games with the Yankees and .235 overall entering Sunday’s game. He went 0-for-3 against the Red Sox but drove in Giancarlo Stanton with a sacrifice fly in the fourth. Besides shortstop, Caballero has started at second base, third base and right field.
New York is 5½ games behind the first-place Toronto Blue Jays in the AL East and half a game back of second-place Boston. The Yankees, Red Sox and Seattle Mariners are tightly bunched in a race for the three AL wild cards.
The Associated Press and ESPN’s Jorge Castillo contributed to this report.
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