He’s stood there and faced it every single day. “He’s been working his tail off behind the scenes, whether it’s extra hitting, extra work. “We’re talking about a guy who hasn’t run from any of this,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. The Yankees hope a few mechanical tweaks can be the difference for a hitter they need to start producing better results. Both numbers are considerably worse than the average hitter this season. Before Monday, Cabrera had a 50.6 percent ground ball rate and a 38 percent fly ball rate. Lawson said the team has been trying to improve his load and launch position before his swing in an effort to make sure he’s in a better place at the point of contact so he’s able to stay through the ball and get better ball flight than he has this season. Yankees hitting coach Dillon Lawson said before Monday’s game that Cabrera has an individual meeting with the hitting coaches Tuesday to discuss where he stands at the plate. 489 and a wRC+ of 38, meaning he’s 62 percent worse than the average major league hitter. He came into Monday’s game with an OPS of. Overall, this season has been a struggle for Cabrera. Before the game, Cabrera smiled as wide as he could when asked what it would mean if he hit one off of him and said, “Oh, that would be very fun.” “Real conversations I had with my teammates was how I learned English, and he helped me.”Īs a thank you to Sears, Cabrera hit a two-run home run off his friend. That means he’s a good teammate and a very good person. He was there just teaching me and he didn’t expect nothing. He wasn’t expecting to get anything back in return for helping me. “It told me a lot about who he was as a person that he wanted to help me get better. “I just remember the moments he helped me,” Cabrera said. To this day, Cabrera credits Sears with getting himself comfortable speaking his second language. He always listened.įive years later, Cabrera does all of his interviews in English. He never criticized Cabrera for using the wrong word. But Cabrera knew that he could always turn to Sears to help guide him when he didn’t know something. Learning about his teammates was challenging because his mastery of the language was so limited and mainly focused on things he needed to manage off the field. Cabrera said the classes were meant to help the players learn how to speak in situations off the field, like what they should say when they’re at a bank, how they can make hotel reservations for themselves or family members and how they can order food at restaurants.īowden: The 10 biggest surprises of the MLB season. But what those classes offered in terms of having conversations with English-speaking teammates was limited. While in Charleston, Cabrera said he was taking English classes the organization offered when he wasn’t training. I know I can get better than where I’m at right now.” There are still words I am working on and I still have to use better words in other moments. When I was there, I was probably at a 3 out of 10 in knowing English. “I didn’t know much English at that time. This is the word to say instead.’ That was a really good thing. “I was always talking with him and he was always telling me things like, ‘This is not the thing you say here. “He was one of the first ones who was around me a lot in Charleston,” Cabrera said.
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