Yankees hitting coach Dillon Lawson relieved of duty

NEW YORK — In more than two decades as Yankees general manager, Brian Cashman had never fired a coach during the season, believing that all performances should be evaluated in a sample of 162 games. This time, he had seen enough.

With the Yankees continuing to rank near the bottom of the league in numerous offensive categories, hitting coach Dillon Lawson was relieved of duty following Sunday’s incident. 7-4 loss the Cubs at Yankee Stadium.

“I grew up in an organization that was constantly making changes during the season. It’s not something I’ve gravitated toward in my tenure as general manager,” Cashman said. “But at the same time, when you feel like you have to do that, then you do it and face it, with all your might.”

Cashman said Lawson’s replacement will come from outside the organization, with assistant hitting coaches Casey Dykes and Brad Wilkerson remaining on staff in their current roles.

The lead hitting coach job has yet to be offered to anyone, according to Cashman, who said he has been assembling an internal list of candidates. Cashman intends to announce a signing before the Yankees open the second half of the regular season on Friday in Colorado.

“Here’s an opportunity,” Cashman said. “I think we have players more than capable of finding higher ground than we found in the first half. I’m looking for a unique personality that will mix and connect with that group of players, as well as some of the players I currently have on the disabled list.”

Cashman, who is in Tampa, Florida, to oversee the MLB Draft, said he spoke with general managing partner Hal Steinbrenner on Saturday by phone. During that conversation, Cashman suggested making a change, to which Steinbrenner gave his blessing.

The timeline suggests that the Yankees loss 3-0 to the Cubs on Friday night may have been the last straw. New York was limited to one hit in eight innings that night by right-hander Jameson Taillon, who entered the game with a 6.93 ERA, the highest in the majors among pitchers with 60 or more innings this year.

Scoring has been an issue all season for the Yankees, who entered the All-Star break with a 49-42 record, good for fourth place in the AL East. eight games behind the division-leading Rays. Overall, the Yankees are near the bottom of the league in batting average (.231 — tied for 28th), hits (690 — 29) and on-base percentage (.300 — 26).

“Since I’ve been here, we’ve had pretty high levels of offensive production,” Cashman said. “This year has been a completely different story. Ultimately, the end results are not the Yankees DNA we’re used to seeing.”

His numbers have taken an even more significant hit since Aaron Judge missed out on a sprained right big toe. They are 14-17 since Judge slammed into the right-field wall at Dodger Stadium on June 3, with the lowest batting average (.218), lowest on-base percentage (.288) and lowest third fewest runs (117) in the Majors in that span.

“I wanted to give things a chance to move forward, but I honestly feel like it’s not going to get better right now, at least as it is,” Cashman said. “It doesn’t mean the offense couldn’t have improved organically, but I feel like we’ll be better served with a new messenger.”

Lawson, 38, was the Yankees’ fifth hitting coach in the past 10 years, following tenures under Kevin Long (2007-14), Jeff Pentland (2015), Alan Cockrell (2016-17) and Marcus Thames. (2018-21) .

He spent his first three seasons in the organization (2019-21) as the Yankees’ minor league hitting coordinator, where he popularized the mantra of “Hit, hit hard.” Before joining the Yankees, Lawson spent two seasons with the Astros organization, serving as the hitting coach for Single-A Quad Cities in 2018 and short-season Single-A Tri-City in 2016.

“I don’t think Dillon can’t be a consistently successful major league manager,” Cashman said. “I think this is part of the growth process and the learning curve. We still think a lot about him and we know what his capabilities are, but I think at this time and place, we better move forward with a change.”