Over the last few years — ever since the 2024 World Series, to be honest — the Yankees have had a reputation for defensive sloppiness. In truth, that is a tad overstated: as mentioned earlier this week, when we previewed the Yankees’ defensive highlights from the 2026 season, the team has finished in the middle third of the pack, according to most defensive metrics, in each of the past three seasons. Nonetheless, even the most optimistic of us (and I certainly count myself among that group) cannot
deny the fact that the Yankees have repeatedly stuck their foot in their mouth over and over. And so, in an exercise in catharsis, let’s look back at some of the worst of the worst errors, misplays, and miscues from the 2026 season. We won’t be ranking them, because they all frustrate me in all sorts of different ways, but don’t let that stop you: let us know what you think about our list in the comments section below!
Slow Jazz
You know a defensive miscue is bad when the broadcaster in the opposing dugout says, “What on Earth is he doing?” Well, that’s exactly what happened to Jazz Chisholm Jr. back in April, as the second baseman took forever to throw the ball, allowing the speedy Otto Lopez to reach on an infield single to start the frame. While, ultimately, it didn’t end up costing the Yankees anything other than some damage to David Bednar’s ERA, as the team still wound up winning 9-7, this type of mistake is, in my opinion, among the most frustrating — this should have been an easy out, and yet, it wasn’t.
Houston, We ARE a Problem
Following his strong start to his big league career, George Lombard Jr. did his very best to erase all goodwill toward him by making errors in six consecutive games — no easy feat. Of these, the final one, from August 27th, is the one that sticks with me the most. First of all, not only does Lombard boot the ball, but then José Caballero, who catches the ricochet, compounds the problem by airmailing first base instead of just eating it; the damage was already done, there was no need to make it worse.
Inside-the-Park
I was at this game — in fact, I was out on the terrace when the play occurred, so I have a fairly unique vantage point. To some extent, it feels a tad unfair to put this on the list. While it’s hard to see on the video, the fly ball was hard to track, as it was knuckling in the wind (if you recall, this was the CC Sabathia game, which was moved from Saturday night to Friday afternoon due to inclement weather — and even then, hours before the storm hit, the wind was beginning to blow). Spencer Jones then slams into the outfield wall hard, with a very loud thud that made me actually a tad concerned about a potential injury. Then, it bounces in the worst possible direction, i.e., towards center field, and thus, away from the player responsible for backing up Jones. Last, and certainly not least… honestly, it was kind of cool. I had never seen an inside-the-park home run in person before, and now, the only things left on my baseball bucket list are to see a no-hitter, perfect game, and a cycle.
Still, an inside-the-park homer is an inside-the-park homer. No matter my own personal feelings, it belongs here.
Disaster at the Trop
Tropicana Field is cursed — or at least, the New York Yankees think so (after all, Andrew McCutchen said last week that the Yankees have not believed they could beat the Rays at the Trop as far back as 2018). I’m not going to get into their psyche (I’m a Latin teacher, not a sports psychologist), but I can confirm that they made a lot of errors down in St. Petersburg this year. The worst occurred, of course, with Cam Schlittler on the mound during Game 2 of the ALDS, as the team tried (and failed) to erase a 1-0 series deficit with the 2026 Cy Young favorite on the mound. It is, perhaps, unsurprising that our own Andrés Chávez listed this game as one of the worst moments of the season.
He’s Here! He’s There! He’s Every-Bleepin-Where!
When we reviewed the team’s best highlights, we took a look at José Caballero, who as the team’s Swiss Army Knife played literally every position on the diamond outside of pitcher, catcher, and first base. And while he was never quite a liability at any position…well, spending so much time bouncing around the diamond does result in a fair number of errors scattered around the diamond. We already saw one of his misplays at the hot corner above, so let’s check out some of his miscues elsewhere.
While playing the keystone on September 25th — the same game as the above inside-the-park homer, in fact — Cabby botched a ground ball, then simply couldn’t find it, thus allowing the run to score.
Back in May, he allowed the speedy Chandler Simpson to reach on this error that, uh, I’m not quite sure exactly how he managed to send the ball scurrying in that direction.
In August, he made two errors on the same play, bobbling the ball on the transfer trying to turn two, then throwing the ball low so that it skips away from Luis García Jr. (to be fair, García probably should’ve had that, but still).
Playing some center field on June 21st, he fields a grounder that went under the glove of Chisholm, then proceeded to throw the ball over everyone’s head when Spencer Steer tried to stretch it into a double, allowing the leadoff batter to reach third on what should have been a routine groundout up the middle.
Dishonorable Mentions
Lombard’s Other Five Errors in the Streak
The Final Cut from the Bottom Five
Amed Rosario in Fenway
