(NOTE made later: OK, I blew some numbers in this; should blog drunk, but I was preparing to see the Yankees in Bradenton. Comments section takes me to task, but I stand by the point anyway: The new system will mask the collapse that's already underway.)
Today, between updates on the Elisabeth Hasselbeck situation on "The View," both the Gray Lady and Murdoch Mush opine that the Retrieval
Empire ™ is about to slide back in time, to the dark era known as 1965, when
the great war wagon of Mickey, Roger and Elston lost its wheels and went into
repose... Roger Repoz, that is. And clearly, when you study the '13 Yankee roster,
you see players mulling the Early Bird at Denny’s, or broken in bone, if not
spirit. When Brennan Boesch is the hope,
you’re the Walking Dead, whether you know it or not.
But to everybody who thinks the Yanks will goosh like a
water balloon and miss the next 11 years - nope, can’t happen. It’s not that we won’t be mismanaged – or mis-owned - by heirs who count pennies while
nickels flee the exits. It’s the Selig Parity Safety Net, the new reality of NFL Baseball.
In 1965, the Yankees collapsed under Johnny Keane and
finished second in the AL. Today, that would have generated a playoff birth. Who
knows? They might have won. Nobody would even remember a failure.
In 1966 and 1967, they finished fifth out of 10. Again, in
the modern AL, fifth-place gets a one-game wild card. Collapse? What collapse? And in 1968, they came in third. Good grief, they’ve done worse than
that in recent years, while the streak of post-season appearances has been
maintained.
In 1969, they fell below .500. Realistically, that’s
the only year they were absolutely destined to finish in Urinetown. That
was our 2008. In 1970, they won 93 games. They didn’t make the playoffs, only because
baseball hadn’t yet become the NBA.
So let’s ponder a few thumbtacks of unconventional wisdom: The Yankees collapse is already underway. We
haven’t been the dominant team in baseball for years. The Red Sox were
for awhile in the 2000s, and now it’s the Giants. It soon will be the
Dodgers and Angels (or maybe not; I’m not buying into their ascension, just yet.)
Our collapse has been masked by the expanded playoff structure. And though this year certainly looms
like doomsday, we’ll still be in the chase through August, because everybody is. Nobody get eliminated in June and July. (Well, maybe San Diego, but that's it.) That is parity, folks. Everybody
spends the same, everybody wins the same, and nobody gets eliminated. There is no New York Yankees... just 26 Kansas City Royals.
It’s not 1965, folks. Oh, no. It’s something much-much
worse.
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5 comments:
They finished 6th in a 10 team league in 1965 with 77 wins.
... and last in 1966.
Oops.
And 9th in 1967. 83-79 in '68, 80-81 in '69. I think you've racked up a few demerits with this one, Duque.
On the other hand, the Yanks were much better in the '80s than most fans give them credit for. Between 87 and 97 wins every year from '83 to '87, which would have been good for at least one playoff spot (I can't figure out the cockamamie third-place deal, but they would have won the AL Wild Card in '85).
Now chew on THIS for a minute: If the Dynasty Yanks of 1921-64 had to get through 47 rounds of playoffs every year to get to the World Serious, how many would they have won? Just sayin'.
This interesting though factually incorrect commentary by Mr. Duque led me to do a little research, and get this - the First Lousy Era Yankees would have won the AL Wild Card in both 1970 and '74. In the George Gone Wild years, also known as the Second Lousy Era, they would have nabbed the wild card in '85, '86 and '93.
Given what a crapshoot multi-round playoffs are, who knows? We could have another five titles to crow about. The pair of decade-plus title droughts could have been whittled down to a mere 5-6 years apiece ('65-'69 and '87-'92 would still have been disasters).
That said, I still hate the "everyone gets a medal" playoff approach of the Selig Era. Heaven forbid the Yankees ever win a WS as a wild card. It's just not right! We won our 27 titles fair and square, by finishing first in something -- league, division, payroll, whatever.
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