Aaron Boone didn’t consider walking Cal Raleigh ahead of walk-off hit in Yankees’ first loss

The Yankees ’ bullpen had been flawless up until the ninth inning of Monday’s ballgame. With the group a bit shorthanded on the night, Aaron Boone decided to keep the ball in the hands of Paul Blackburn in a tie ballgame heading into the bottom of the ninth. Blackburn had just put together a scoreless eighth making his first appearance of the season, but the Mariners quickly created some traffic against him leading off the final frame.

Boone was forced to make another decision after a pair of singles put the winning run 90 feet away with just one out. The skipper decided to have Blackburn pitch to switch-hitting AL MVP runner-up Cal Raleigh rather than walking him to load the bases for the righty Julio Rodriguez . Rodriguez was 0-for-4 with a pair of strikeouts on the night, and Raleigh had struck out in his lone at-bat off the bench, as both fight through some early season struggles.

Still, the decision came back to cost the Yanks as the slumping backstop laced a walk-off single on the fourth pitch he saw to give the Mariners the series opener. Asked about it postgame, Boone said via YES Network that he never considered issuing the intentional walk. “Then you’re just bringing up no margin for error and a walk in play,” he said.

“You got both guys that are struggling out of the gates, and Julio would be almost impossible to double-up so we’d have to bring the infield in in that situation -- we view [Blackburn] as very neutral, and even reverse, so no, there’s was no thought to that. ” In the end, the Yankees' three-game winning streak and the bullpen's 14+ inning scoreless streak were snapped.