Ma Must Go

To blame Ma Boone for the inevitable collapse of the Yankees' pitching staff is akin to blaming a hammer for a badly built house.

Unlike what we traditionally think of as a baseball "manager," Ma is merely an extension of The Genius Known As Cooperstown Cashman, a tool in the hands of that beady-eyed egomaniac.

But there are tools and then there are tools.

Leaving Masahiro "Tiger" Tanaka out there to die last night was the most obscene misuse of an honored Yankee veteran since Billy Martin left an injured Catfish Hunter to take a beating in the 1977  Beantown Meltdown—then did it again in the World Series.

That enraged the Yankees' veterans at the time, as well it should have.  But this is actually worse.

Martin's callous sacrifice of the Catfish (the second time, anyway) was at least in the service of resetting his worn staff and winning a World Series, which he did.

Tanaka was thrown to the wolves in a July game in which the Yanks had a 10-game lead.  And Tanaka is hardly someone who can handle things with the same, ironic perspective of a good ol' boy like Hunter, who could take a lot.

This was a baseball soul-killing, which our lump of a field manager didn't even understand.

It was a backhanded insult, rendered with little care or thought, by a skipper who is too often out to lunch.

You can't even blame Coops or the algorithms for this one.  Tanaka should have been in the showers with the score 5-0, and the Yanks should have found a way to get through that game even if it meant that its Golden Horde of relievers pitched 1 inning each for the rest of the night.

I never thought Boone was a good manager, alas.  But this leads me to conclude that he is a bona fide,  factory-certified fool.

We will never win a ring with the Unholy Trio of HAL, Coops, and Ma in charge.  But this was an insult, not only to a gutty pitcher but to everyone who knows and follows the game.  Ma must go.