But but BUT... At last, We beat Boston in something.
This victory came - coincidentally? - as the football Giants eeked out a win over the second-worst team in the NFL, representing the tech capital of the world, which allows Eli Manning to saddle and ride the rest of the 2018 season like Slim Pickens on the bomb in the finale of Dr. Strangelove. And if that isn't a jumble of metaphors, then I'm Elvira, Mistress of the Yankee Dark.
It's rare to see a sports franchise achieve such exquisite mediocrity from top to bottom. That is, unless you live in New York.
Here, sports teams represent the gold standard for incompetence. Consider the Knicks, where every year is 1929. The Nets and Rangers aren't far behind, the Mets have perfected the art of rotting from the head down, the Jets still marvel about Joe Namath, and then there are the Jersey Giants, a team that cannot even tank properly.
Two nights ago, Eli and his teammates beat the lowly 49ers, giving the owners - (fun fact: the Tisch/Mara families boast of being the only people in the world to have both an Oscar and a Super Bowl ring!) - an excuse to continue their piddling limp along the road to nowhere. The victory guarantees Eli will start another game, and then another, and then another... because twice in his career the Giants were good, and as this miserable season dwindles down, they will increasingly face franchises who want to lose, because that's how NFL teams improve. (But not the Giants.)
The Giants have arguably two great players - Odell Beckham and Saquan Barkley - squandering their salad days on a zombified team. More likely, both will die, lunging for a buddy pass. The Giants seem bent on having Barkley run the ball 100 times, as long as he can recite the alphabet. But it will save Eli at all costs - keeping Eli at QB, protecting Eli in the pocket, allowing Eli to remain the comforting, white-bread, suburban kindergarten teacher face of the team - and never replacing him. (They actually have another year on his contract.) As a result, we'll watch him play out the back nine in a meaningless season, when we'd be better off losing.
Well, that's business as usual, eh?
But something could change. Could Amazon save New York sports? That's the question. By 2025, the massive infusion of tech money should make large contracts - like the one the Yankees have with Giancarlo Stanton - a Starbucks tip jar. In fact, one of the biggest winners this week should be Hal Steinbrenner. New York will be welcoming tens of thousands of well-heeled residents, and many will become diehard Yankee fans... if the team is decent. There has never been a more important time to develop a Yankee dynasty. They could rule NYC for generations to come.
There is no reason in this world, other than sheer negligence of brains, for the Yankees to adhere to an austerity spending plan.
Listen: I'm not sold on giving a Bryce or a Manny a 10-year deal. Inevitably they will be a millstone around our necks. But more than ever, Hand-Me-Down Hal had better use the one advantage the Yankees have - their market-based wealth. If he doesn't, the rest of NYC sports just might pull out its checkbook, and the Yankees won't be the lone oasis in a sad sports desert. If I owned the Mets, the moment Amazon confirmed its plans, I would have been on the phone to Scott Boras. It's going to be a whole new sports landscape. And the Yankees won't necessarily dominate it. In fact, if Hal starts clinging to pennies, his time at the top of the sports food chain might be coming to an end.
ReplyDeleteI'm not so sure about the benefits of Amazon's move in regards to NY Sports.
Chances are the new New Yorkers will carry their sports allegiances with them from wherever they came from and, because they are "tech savy" they can stream (legally or not) their home teams.
Plus, given how few of them get laid and how often they change jobs the odds of them settling in NY and raising little Yankee or Met fans isn't great.
Add a relative indifference to watching sports (as opposed to playing on line) and it may end up being a blip on the NY sports landscape.
What would have been better for us all would have been if Bezos bought the Yankees given his ability to crush the life out of the competition and his constant undercutting of prices to achieve that end. For example:
1) Cheaper beer delivered to our seats by drones.
2) Amazon Prime would provide free access to the entire Bernie Williams CD collection.
3) He could potentially buy the Red Sox as well and dismantle them to improve the
Yankees market share.
4) A season of "All or Nothing" devoted to the Yankees.
5) 50% off all Yankee books except "O Holy Cow" which deserves to be full price. OK I'm sucking up with that one.
6) and last... No Hal.
I'm sure there are other benefits of Bezos buying the team that I can't think of right now. Perhaps someone else has ideas.
Doug K.
Duque, I just don't think you're getting how Hal thinks.
ReplyDeleteAmazon coming to New York is good for Hal...because that means more foreign-born techies who might support his NYCFC Pigeons project.
The Mets a potential rival? Don't make laugh. The Mets are a real estate racket, posing as a baseball team. THEY like this Amazon move because it mean there may be more rich people helping them restart their Willetts Point development.
Other rivals for New Yorkers' sports dollars? As long as there's a single Dolan living, Hal has the market wrapped. Sure, the Maras may revive, which they do from time to time, rather like those 17-year cicadas. But until then...
And spend money to compete? Please!
That would mean taking a risk, and whattaya think the Steinbrenners are, capitalists?? Even Old George specialized mostly in bribing, bullying, and cajoling government agencies of one sort or another into subsidizing his enterprises.
A high-payroll Yankees team will mean more money out of Hal's capacious pockets...and it might not win!
Much easier and safer to just NOT pay out the money in the first place. That's a guarantee!
And here's the beauty part: he and Coops can just claim that they are only doing what people like us begged him to do from the beginning, which was build with youth, from the ground up.
I have to admit, there's a certain evil genius at work here.
Oh, and speaking of the Giants, Duque, did you see that Ron Johnson died the other day?
ReplyDeleteBack in 1970, Johnson had one of the greatest seasons I ever saw for the Boys in Blue. I looked it up: the Giants ran him 263 times, and he caught 48 passes and even ran back kickoffs. When the defense was on the field, I think he was selling those "We're Number One!" signs in the stands.
Comes 1971, and lo and behold, Ron Johnson is hurt.
They Scotch-tape him back together by 1972, though, and he has an even BETTER season: 298 rushes, 45 passes caught.
By 1974, he's done.
They'll do the same to Barkley.
this was a sad, sad post from our hero, Mr. Duque. just goes to show how despondent we traditional Yankees fans have become. When duque, the Sage of Syracuse, honestly expects our fortunes to turn because of an new Amazon sweat shop, well... we are screwed.
ReplyDeleteThe Curse of Andujar is already coloring our collective expectations and judgements. It can only get worse.
The giveaway to Amazon is just plain disgusting. Cuomo and DeBlasio proved they understand nothing about the state of the tech industry or the uniqueness of NYC. A pox on both their houses. Amazon shoulda paid US to come here, not the other way around. Seriously.
ReplyDeleteHoss, I noted Johnson's passing with sadness. 1970 was the first year I was at all interested in football. No, check that, I did watch Joe Namath win the Super Bowl, or at least I have a false memory of doing it. Johnson was great, a short career that made me think the Giants might be a decent winter pastime until the Yankees came back. And that was right around the time Danny Cater hit .300 and Munson came along. Exciting times.
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