Yankeetorial: Let us heed the words of Donald Rumsfeld

Across the Yankiverse, bloggers and sportscourtiers today are presenting a dangerous party line: That we must soon, as John Harper put it Sunday, "make a trade for a proven starter."

God help us. They say we should gird our loins to hear the Tampagon just dealt good prospects for some yipping, gin-bloated washtub, who'll give us 10 Daryl Rasner-ish starts, and if we're lucky, we'll win six. They'll get an Austin Romine or a David Phelps, or - worse - somebody flying way below blogger radar - and the Yankeeganda machine will quickly churn stories on why that prospect was never going to make it as a Yankee. He had ringworm or something,

Next winter, as we're licking our loss wounds, we won't tender a contract to the old fart, because he'd take it in a heartbeat. Thus, we get no draft pick. And next summer, right about now, we'll watch a Mark Melancon excel for the other team, and we'll pretend it never happened or - better - we'll say -- and this Ian Kennedy line is pure genius -- "Aww, he wasn't an AL East pitcher!"

It's time to face to the words of Donald Rumsfeld:

You go to war with the army you have.

This is the phukking team we have. We spent $200 million on it. That's enough. Not another bloated contract! Not another geezer animal rescue! Play the kids. Show faith in what we've built, and give the farm clubs and impetus to build more. Stay young.

(Yes, I know the debate line: "But the 2009 team had Eric Hinske and Jerry Hairston Jr.!" Listen were they that much better than what we had in the minors? Last year, look what happened when we gave Greg Golson a chance.)

Listen... It's tough to be a mainstream sports beat writer. They gotta go with the flow. Plus, let's be real: Cashman knows more than I do. He has pro scouts. I do not sit here and claim to know more than he does.

But fukitall, I do know this:

The time to deal prospects is winter, when you're the team taking the bids, when you're dealing from the strength. (As the Redsocks did last December.) When we deal young players in June out of desperation, we get our pockets picked.

This year, Boston looks unstoppable. Does anyone really think Carlos Beltran is going to make a difference? If we don't watch out, the Redsocks could win two or three championships. If we don't look down range, we might be getting swept by them for a long, long time.

We are one hummungous bad deal from returning to the 1980s. Don't think it can't happen.

Rummy thought we'd roll through Iraq and be home by the All-Star break.

It's hubris, folks. We have to change our ways. No surrender. No deals. Play the army we have.