Yankees' Aaron Boone believes Giancarlo Stanton is being too hard on himself

Giancarlo Stanton unknowingly channeled Hideki Matsui.

In May 2006, Matsui, already a two-time All-Star with the Yankees, issued a statement after undergoing surgery  to repair  a broken wrist, an injury he suffered several days earlier while making a diving catch in leftfield in a loss to the Red Sox.

“Due to this injury, I feel very sorry and, at the same time, very disappointed to have let my teammates down,” Matsui, who was expected to miss about three months, said in the statement. “I will do my best to fully recover and return to the field to help my team once again.”

Stanton took a similar tack Thursday afternoon in discussing the Grade 2 hamstring strain that will keep him out at least six weeks and possibly more.

“It's unacceptable,” he said. “The team relies on me and I can't have this continue to happen and put us in a really tough spot, put us in a spot that we weren't prepared for. There's guys to fill the roles that’ll do just fine, but at the same time, it's my duty and responsibility to be out there.”

The two situations are not completely analogous in that Stanton has experienced a variety of injuries since 2018, his first season with the Yankees. Before his wrist injury, Matsui had played in 518 straight games with the Yankees, with whom he signed before the 2003 season, and 1,250 straight games overall when counting his time with the Yomiuri Giants in Japan, a streak that dated to August 1993.

While never an iron man to that degree, Stanton spent the vast majority of the first part of his career on the field. From 2011-18 — the first seven of those spent with the Marlins — he averaged 130 games per season. Stanton played in 158 games in 2018, his first year with the Yankees, hitting 38 homers and driving in 100 runs. In 2017,  his last season with the Marlins, he was named National League MVP after hitting 59 homers and driving in 132 runs in 159 games.

But after 2018, it’s been mostly a series of physical setbacks, many of them of the soft tissue variety.

He had two IL stints in 2019 — for right ankle inflammation and left Achilles tendinitis — that limited him to 110 games. On Feb. 28, 2020, he expressed some of his exasperation about not only 2019 but about yet another injury that occurred in spring training.

“I mean it [the injuries] makes it seem like I didn’t take care of myself, you know?” Stanton said quietly by his locker at Steinbrenner Field, shortly after an MRI showed a right calf strain (Stanton would play in only 23 games in the COVID-19-shortened 60-game 2020 regular season). “Which makes it more frustrating.”

Indeed, Stanton is the furthest thing from a training room warrior. The outfielder/DH is known behind the scenes as one of the hardest workers on the club and has been since his Yankees tenure began, with teammates often shaking their heads in admiration at his level of preparation — both game preparation and physical conditioning.

It was for that reason that Aaron Boone pushed back on Stanton’s “unacceptable” comment.

“The one thing I can say in Giancarlo’s case is I don’t question his professionalism and his commitment to doing all he needs to do to stay healthy and to be healthy,” Boone said. “So there’s clearly that frustration, and Giancarlo feels that responsibility. He feels a responsibility to this team and to this organization to be the great player that he is, but to be able to do it more and more often. He feels bad, for us. But I don’t say unacceptable because I know the person and what he goes through and how he prepares. Sports is hard and you get hurt sometimes. As long as you’re doing everything possible to put yourself in the best position to be healthy, then it is acceptable.”