Yesterday, as the Yankees were getting drubbed by Boston, David Cone made the above remark about Michael Kay.
Actually, what he said was, "You're a glass is half full kind of guy today." Not always, just for the day.
The reason Coney said that was because Kay, watching the Yanks get pasted--OK, to be fair, watching Cole get pasted but with the Yanks playing haplessly behind him (not meaning "without Happ")--pointed out that in 2009, the to-be-World-Series-Champions Yankees lost their first eight games against the Red Sox, but then rebounded to win 9 out of 10 against them the rest of the season.
Kay did this while acknowledging that, yes, it sounded a little cheery given the buckets of horror movie blood being spilled on the field by our hapless (and Happless) Boonies. Which, come to think of it, may be a better name than "Yankees" given the way we played like clueless yahoos from Palookaville. Still, Kay felt compelled to note this historical fact as a whisper of hope for all of us drinking ourselves into oblivion so early in the day.
So let's get in the Wayback Machine and look at our mid-2009 situation. Lenny Moretti on AllNY.com put it this way at the time:
In American League Team statistical categories, the Yankees are ranked 1st in Runs, On Base Percentage, Slugging Percentage, and OPS Rating, which combines Slugging and On Base numbers. New York is also tied with Texas for the most Home Runs so far with 132. Their .276 team Batting Average ranks them 2nd in the Major Leagues, just percentage points behind the LA Angels.
Then he broke down the team, lauding Jeter, Tex, Godzilla, and Co., before finishing with this:
The ability to beat the league's top teams also needs to improve as the Yankees are a combined 4-13 vs. division leaders Boston, Detroit, and the LA Angels.
Unless something changes there, even if New York gets into the playoffs, they probably won't last very long if they can not beat the better clubs.
The second quote is just as true today as it was all those years ago. But the first bears not even a whiff of resemblance to our gallery of GIDP- and whiff-happy goofballs.
Like Mulder, I want to believe. I want to take Fat Mikey at face value and say, "Yeah! See? We can just do that again this year!" But no matter how many carloads of Life cereal Mikey eats, I'm not at all convinced. Not with this team. Not unless the Boonies somehow become the Yankees again. Not unless Princess Hal waves her magic wand and makes it all better with power-in-the-clutch pixie dust.
Sure, it's possible. This is nothing if not the streakiest team in recent memory, able to go from zero to pixie in no time and rattle off a string of exciting victories.
It's the braking time that's got me down. We go to zero just as fast and stay there just as long. Maybe longer. If Kay really thinks we can pull off this year what we did in 2009, I want whatever he's drinking in that half-full glass.
Michael Kay is just saying that because there is nothing else to say. He knows that this team can't hold a candle to the 2009 team. There is not the slightest resemblance b/w 2021 and 2009.
ReplyDeleteThe Hammer of God
Amen!
ReplyDeleteAfter the games of June 27th, 2009, your New York Yankees were 42-32, in second place, 4 games out. A.J. Burnett had just one-hit the Mets in 7 innings of shutout ball, as Brian Bruney and Houdini Robertson brought home a 5-0 win.
The Yanks were about to take off, going 61-27 the rest of the way, including 15-2 against those three division leaders named here.
Anyone here want to put a Hickory stick on the same thing happening? That is, these New York Yankees playing .693 ball the rest of the regular season, then going 11-4 in the playoffs and World Series? I'll take that action.
One of the worst players in baseball--middle-aged to boot--is starting in centerfield again tonight. At least Odor, another of the worst players, seems to have been demoted to the bench while nonetheless still uselessly occupying a roster spot--all while Hoy Jun park, who could play second base or center, languishes in SWB. This management team is beyond dumb--it's a study in masochism. It's hopeless.
ReplyDeleteQuite an at-bat by Voit there. Greenlighted on 3-0, he swings at a ball nearly in the dirt, misses. Next pitch, flies out to mid-center left.
ReplyDeleteMen on second and third, nobody out, Sanchez-Stanton-Voit score one of them. Oh, hooray.
I was pleasantly surprised they got that run in. Wasn't expecting any
ReplyDeleteWell, we call all relax now. The World Series is now within our grasp.
ReplyDeleteDarren O'Day is almost ready to return.
Bern,
ReplyDeleteDoes that mean he's starting to look at box scores again?
I can only hope.
Hey, Sevvy is throwing on flat ground. We're really moving now.
ReplyDeleteWilson and O'Day coming back and Britton said he's only gone for the 10 days. We'll see about that.
We're only down 3-2. The fluke HR and we're right back in it.
Cough.
One thing I like about Luetge. He looks like an old-time ballplayer.
ReplyDeleteUnlike the rest of the roster that just looks old
ReplyDeleteBig fucking deal
ReplyDeleteImpressive home runs don’t win ballgames
ReplyDeleteSolo shots. We're second to worst on that one, just the Orioles are worse.
ReplyDeleteI've never understood what "honoring America" means when applied to playing a song written to gin up support for our getting into WWI.
Guess I'm not with it, patriotic-wise.
What an awful at-bat by The Gleyber. Enough, already. Two years of this? I cannot bear to see this guy on my team anymore.
ReplyDeleteWhen was the last time we threw somebody out at home?
ReplyDeleteFrazier suddenly can't ever throw accurately.
ReplyDeleteTrade.
And of course, Clint with an even worse at-bat for the coup de grace. Sorry, that was unfair. Grace would have done a much better job.
ReplyDeleteReally, I'm done for at least a while. I'm switching to the Mets' broadcast. I don't care if these guys even do come back. This is like the first month of the season again, and I just can't stand to watch so many awful at-bats in every game.
I await, though, some enterprising young sportswriter doing a deep dive into how many of these young Yankees could possibly fall apart so completely, in such a short time.
ReplyDeleteThis has GOT to be some kind of truly fucked-up coaching strategy. Sure, sure, there's the usual, "maximum velocity and lift angle" nonsense. But no other team in baseball has been hitting this bad, for this long.
There's an idiot at large—besides myself, of course—and we have to find him.
Frazier's throw was fine. It was a relay. LeMahieu botched the relay throw to home--airmailed it.
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, by my count this now makes 77 consecutive plate appearances for Torres without hitting a home run. This guy is the key to the Yankees' future?
ReplyDeleteNo, he is not.
https://www.espn.com/wnba/game/_/gameId/401320656
ReplyDeleteThanks for correcting me on Frazier, Anon.
ReplyDeleteTrade 'im anyway.
Well, that was the opposite of fun.
ReplyDeleteWe're looking at early tee times in October, aren't we?
ReplyDeleteFuck! We’re looking at early tee times in July.
DeleteLol, time for a fire sale before the deadline, that's if anybody wants any of these bums. Thank goodness July's schedule looks pretty insurmountable.
ReplyDeleteBundy puking on our mound? That wasn't sickness. That wasn't the heat. That was a show of dominance.
ReplyDeleteSome contenders might want Judge.
ReplyDeleteJM--I agree that they should trade Frazier. Through a combination of poor coaching and manipulative mind games, they have ruined him as a Yankee. The only way he'll have a chance to fulfill the potential he showed in 2020 is to make a fresh start with another team.
ReplyDeleteFrazier, and this isn't an excuse for LaMahieu's throw, made a pretty bad play on the ball. He misjudged the angle of the ball off the wall, then took 5-6 seconds to make a nice throw to LaMahieu. But hey, he's got a quick .186 bat. And he quickly K'd on four consecutive changeups. He's just a little too editable for New York. Maybe he'd do something in Baltimore.
ReplyDelete*^ excitable Damned autocorrect.
ReplyDeleteNah this is a direct reflection of the coach/gm.... This team fuckin sucks. No heart, no excitement, no development everyone has taken a step back since Boone and his brain trust. Fuck this team
ReplyDeleteSomething here is not right.
ReplyDeleteAs everyone on this site know, I loathe and despise the two men running the New York Yankees, and I think Boone should go, too.
But in all fairness, the team did improve at first under Ma. Over 100 wins in 2018 and 2019, and while we all saw the cracks in the plaster and all the mistakes, had the Boston Red Sox and the Houston Astros not been bald-faced cheaters, we might well have seen two Yankees World Series.
So what gives? I really want to know now. Granted everything we've all said about this team being badly assembled, without heart, not understanding analytics and/or understanding them all too well...it still doesn't account for so many guys just falling off the edge of the earth, and such lethargic, dispirited performances.
To quote the late, great Fred Willard: "Wha happened?"
It's not a very athletic team. Too top-heavy--literally, as in too many guys like Judge, Stanton, Voit, and Sanchez with overdeveloped upper bodies that puts their bodies out of whack and renders them vulnerable to all manner of recurring injuries. Plus, no team athleticism, speed, and hence no dynamism--too many guys who seem like they're wearing ankle weights while running the bases (Urshela, Voit, Sanchez, LeMahieu, etc.). Poor coaching. Poor team construction--just pile up guys and figure out later where you're going to play them. A manager who doesn't understand the basics of strategy. A total mess.
ReplyDeleteThis might be the slowest Yankee team that I can remember. Whatever happened to the "faster, more athletic" mantra that The Brain kept spewing about? Interestingly, I recently read an article that opined that the Yankee hitters' swings were getting "too grooved" rendering them unable to adjust to anything outside their wheelhouse. I'm certainly no hitting coach, but it lines up perfectly with what I've been seeing. Often it looks as though they are swinging at a tee ball. Another thing, the hitters seem to be trained to "guess hit", and to lean on that idea too much. IMHO, they need to get back to "see the ball, hit the ball". This guess hitting makes it too easy to scout the Yankees, and smother them.
ReplyDeleteAnd gawds, how long since a Yankee team has zero sense of anticipation. Everyone of these players have been playing the game for at least twenty years. How then can they look and act so surprised so often? Or is it that for whatever reason they aren't getting enough sleep, explaining their zombie-like play? That would be on Boone and the coaching staff, and Cashman. I can accept that some years player all suck at the same time. What I can't accept are a bunch of highly payed pros who don't seem to be into the game. Pop psychology aside, these guys would really benefit from a Billy Martin ass-kicking.
To the question, "what happened?" Hitting's a lot harder when you don't know what's coming. Whatever the Sox and Astors were up to, 2017-2019, the Yankees likely were too. Unlike the Sox and Astros, the Yankees have not adjusted to life without sign stealing. Do we know this to a certainty? No. Can the possibilty be dismissed? No again. These are not the same hitters.
ReplyDeleteIn all reality, we were sign stealing too during that time period. We had not carried to the next level with "clanging" and such. After all, Beltran exported it!
ReplyDeleteBut, look at the Stros now.
They are loads better than us.
They tanked for several years and developed good young talent.
we digressed.
We are doomed with this management and ownership
They are headed back to playoffs and probably a deep run.
This is so obvious
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