As the writers trowel out drivel, the Yankee season already feels lost inside an overwhelming sense of gloom

I feel like a spotter on the Titanic. The band is playing, people are dancing, the captain is drunk, and we're headed straight for the iceberg. Nobody hears the siren. And that water looks cold.

Yesterday, the Gammonites churned out reams of solid gold drivel, pumping it out by the paragraph. By the end of the day, their inch counts had to approach 40. That's a week's worth of drivel in smaller markets. They wrote drivel about their anticipation over CC Sabathia's weight gain, as if they didn't recall last year's weight loss. They produced drivel over Mark Teixeira's new protein diet, without noting that if he loses a few more pounds, he'll reach his batting average from last year: .216. 

And they rewrote the same A-Rod drivel over and over. How many times can they rerun the same empty paragraphs, the same overcooked outrage, the same tiresome snark, as if it's new? 

I'm sorry, folks. I cannot read it.  

None of it matters.

It's not even March 1, but the air has already been sucked out of the 2015 Yankee season. When I see another happy blather about the big year in store for some 36 year old pitcher, I want to scream, "YOU'RE MISSING THE ICEBERG!" And the iceberg is the Prince of Pennies, Yankee owner Hal Steinbrenner - a child who came naked into this world with more money than only a handful of people will ever know - who just allowed the best free agent prospect in baseball to sign with Boston... BOSTON. He did this over the advice of his most knowledgeable experts. He did this over the interests of his own organization. Prince Hal did it to save a few dollars, which - in the overall balance sheet - he will never notice. It's just a number on a piece of paper.

The last time I felt this sick about the Yankees, Hal's father had just traded Al Leiter to Toronto for a handful of magic beans in the form of Jesse Barfield. From the moment Barfield's name was announced, I wanted to barf. We had given up a great young prospect for a guy the Blue Jays - at the time, the smartest front office in baseball - realized was over the hill. Barfield was a bust, and the Blue Jays ate our lunch for the next four years. 

Folks, the iceberg is this: The Yankees are owned by a self-deluding fool who takes advice only when it conforms to his opinion. Consider the bad decisions the Yankees have made in recent years - each one smeared with Prince Hal's greasy fingerprints.

1. Sign A-Rod to a 10-year deal. (The Yankees now scream about it, as if they were forced at gunpoint. But they happily did the deal.)

2. Announce austerity plan to shrink payroll to $187 million and, thus, avoid luxury taxes.

3. Let Russell Martin walk to Pittsburgh, because we wouldn't give him a measly 2-year contract.

4. Trash the plan to reach the $187 million payroll, by absorbing bloated salaries of over-the-hill veterans. The austerity was all for nothing.

5. Give AJ Burnett to Pittsburgh. (Consider this: Of the big three signees of 2009 - Burnett, CC and Tex - we gave away the only one who had productive seasons left.)

6. Sign Ichiro to a two-year deal, with no room in the outfield for him.

7. Beltran for three years.

8. Ellsbury for seven years.

9. McCann for five years... all after we supposedly were going to nix long-term bloated deals.

10. Starting a season with four DHs and nobody to play 3B and 2B. (We ended up with Yangervis Solarte and Brian Roberts; neither made it to Aug. 1.) 

11. Constantly thinking old-timers (Vernon Wells, Travis Halfner, Andruw Jones, Alfonso Soriano) will suddenly return to form; letting them kill the season from the center of the batting order.

12. Letting a talent like Moncada go to Boston... BOSTON!  

I want to barf. For the next 15 years, this guy could be killing us. Not only that, but we've given him an impetus to always play harder against New York. It was Prince Hal himself who lorded over Moncada's third Yankee workout, and then ruled against spending the extra money - piddling coins, as far as the Prince of Pennies was concerned. But he couldn't be bothered to dig deeper.

Now, we're supposed to get excited about Teixeira's diet?

I'm sorry. I'm not buying it. The Prince of Pennies just traded Al Leiter for Jesse Barfield. Iceberg dead ahead. Somebody, please... stop the music. It's time to man the lifeboats.