Yankees' Aaron Boone ejected despite not saying anything in loss to Oakland

Aaron Boone gave plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt the silent treatment — and got ejected anyway.

Boone, who has had his share of issues with umpires in his seven seasons as Yankees manager, was tossed for the 35th time in his managerial career Monday afternoon, seemingly for something a fan behind the home dugout yelled (though Wendelstedt disputed that).

Boone was thrown out by Wendelstedt five pitches into the Yankees’ 2-0 loss to the A’s. The Yankees managed only three hits, and Zack Gelof’s two-run homer in the ninth inning off lefthander Victor Gonzalez was the difference.

Television audio picked up Wendelstedt, a big-league umpire since 1999, warning Boone to keep quiet after he argued that A’s leadoff hitter Esteury Ruiz did not check his swing while being hit by Carlos Rodon’s pitch. Boone, Rodon and the Yankees’ bench felt Ruiz went around too far, which would have negated the hit by pitch. It was a point Boone and the dugout made loudly to first-base umpire John Tumpane.

Boone acquiesced to Wendelstedt’s instructions to pipe down, but although he didn’t say another word, he was thrown out seconds later as he glanced down at the back of his left hand. Wendelstedt was looking straight ahead at the field before he turned and tossed Boone.

YES Network cameras showed a fan in the first row behind the Yankees’ dugout yelling something a half-second before Boone’s ejection.

“I don’t care who said it, you’re gone!” one field mic picked up Wendlestedt replying to Boone’s it-wasn’t-me protest.

“It’s embarrassing,” a still irritated Boone said afterward. “Obviously, it was not right.”

Speaking to a pool reporter after the game, Wendelstedt said what he heard didn’t come from the stands but from a player or another member of the dugout.

“I know what Aaron was saying was that it was a fan above the dugout. That’s fine and dandy,” Wendelstedt said. “It wasn’t over him and it wasn’t over where [bench coach Brad] Ausmus was; it wasn’t where the coaching staff and where Aaron was.

“But Aaron Boone is the manager of the New York Yankees and he’s responsible for everything that happens in that dugout. In my opinion, the cheap shot came from the far end [of the dugout] . . . I don’t want to eject a ballplayer, we need to keep them in the game, that’s what the fans pay to see. Aaron Boone runs the Yankees, he got ejected . . . In the entirety of my career, I have never ejected a player or manager for something a fan said.”

Boone, who has led or tied for the lead in the American League in ejections the last two seasons, might have been a victim of some of that checkered past.

Mostly stemming from his first few seasons as manager, Boone developed a reputation among umpires for being particularly hard on young umpires, something veterans in the profession generally frown upon.

His viral “savages in the box” tirade in 2019, for instance, was directed at Brennan Miller, then a minor-league call-up umpire who was promoted to the full-time staff before the 2023 season.

Umpires are protective the same way, say, big league managers are protective of their rookies.

But regardless of that past, and regardless of Wendelstedt’s opinion of where the offending verbal shot originated, by all audio and visual evidence, Boone’s ejection Monday was unwarranted. It would not be surprising if Major League Baseball quietly chooses to forgo the typical fine that comes with any ejection.

No one seemed more surprised Monday than Boone, who wore a genuine look of shock as he looked up to discover he had been tossed. After appealing to Wendelstedt, Boone moved on to Marvin Hudson, the third-base umpire and crew chief, who eventually walked the irate manager back to the dugout — though Boone returned several times to shout some more.

Ausmus managed the rest of the way in an overall frustrating afternoon for the home team, which wasted Rodon’s best outing since he signed a six-year, $162 million free-agent contract before the 2023 season.

The lefthander allowed one hit and two walks with four strikeouts in seven innings in his first scoreless start as a Yankee.

Still, most of the postgame talk revolved around Boone’s early ejection.

“I think Hunter’s a great umpire. I think he’s got a good demeanor,” Rodon said diplomatically. Earlier, he said he appreciated Boone having his back and added: “I get it. No one likes being chirped at. It’s part of the game. Sometimes that happens.”