Okay, enough. UNCLE! I quit. You win, juju gods. It's over. Uncle! UNCLE!
Just make this stop. I don't care what you have to do, launch the hockey season early, whatever: Just make the 2022 Yankees go away.
When we fail in October - (spoiler alert: we will fail in October) - I won't whine. I'll be stoic, philosophical, phlegmatic. I'll lean into it. Come Christmas, when instead of Aaron Judge under the tree, I see that pile of steaming horseshit, I'll yell, "HOORAY! A PONY!" In fact, I'll yell, "HA! CASHMAN IS LEAVING!" even though we know he'll return. Because nothing will change. Year after year, the Yankees spend just enough to come close. In free agent offerings, in trade packages, in everything - we are great runners-up. Hal has his priorities, and they involve a different pile of zeros than the ones in our subject header.
Last night, if there was hope to find, it was in how the Yankees united to spare Aaron Hicks from desperate humiliation. By converging to embarrass themselves as a team, they took Hicksy off the hook. In the end, with the crowd gone, we got to watch Josh Donaldson - our new incarnation of the 2013 Yankee Vernon Wells - argue a play at second, as if it mattered. He looked like the Black Knight in Monty Python's "Holy Grail "Life of Brian," (thanks, editor) with arms and legs chopped off, shouting defiance from the ground. Sad and funny. And that's how we should view this team. Sadness and laughter.
This has become the cruelest August since 2013 - the horror shows of Wells and Pronk, Lyle Overbey and Chris Bootcheck. Two months ago, the juju gods tricked us into believing. That won't happen again, not in my lifetime. Even now, with the BJs spitting the bit, we still sit queasily atop the AL East, trying to ignore the distant thunder. We'll soon get a taste of Toronto - four games at home. Expect the worst. Right now, it's our only way to survive.
Another year, and nobody coming from Scranton. It's truly amazing, how YES can tout all these prospects who then disappear. Remember the accolades for Estevan Florial? You have to laugh, otherwise it will consume you.
We can't even find a spot for Clarke Schmidt, because - get this - our current pitchers are simply too valuable to lose via waivers. Meanwhile, other teams rejected our trade offers, because they studied our top prospects and weren't impressed. We cleared out our best young arms, and now - we await the returns of Setback Sevy, The Big G, Bader the Boot, and DJ - our versions of Godot. As if they're going to come back, flip a switch, and everything will be like it was in June.
Nope, it will be like what it's been every October for the last 12 years.
Uncle.
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26 comments:
Boone doesn't seem to be capable of rallying the troops. And he's such a nice guy.
Didn't I say that this team is capable of playing .270 ball in the second half? After the .730 start, and then it all started coming apart like a cheap suit, we all said that this is the WORST "best record in baseball" team that we've ever seen. We here at IIH IIF IIG know better than any of those morons in the press. I said it first. We said it first here.
The only silver lining is that support for Brain Cashman seems to be slipping. His poll numbers are way down. If you listen to WFAN radio, people are calling up and complaining, disgusted with this face flopping that has been "going on ten years now". We know that HAL does value public opinion, so perhaps, maybe, hopefully Brain will be moved to a sinecure position and someone else who is more competent will be the new GM.
All available Huggers . . .
Get those Hugs on High Alert!
Its Nasty's Night.
Its Nasty's Night, tonight.
Remember when this team was the Evil Empire? Outside of having Darth Bader, this team is the end of the Roman Empire. Also remember when this team had "Savages" at the plate, now they have 9 - Fred Savages flailing away. Maybe they can get 86 yo Ted Savage to play RF. He can't be worse that Hicks.
They had a fucking harry potter night. Far from the evil empire.
58-23 (.716) in the first half
14-21 (.400) in the second half
Truly remarkable to watch a team flip on a dime like this.
Another Brian Cashman "unsinkable ship" that struck an iceberg.
@ZacharyA…
But they’ll make the playoffs so it’s been a successful season. 🤦
Next year Hal won’t have to pay Judge. So that’s another successful season.
So…if the team continues its current awful 2nd half pace, they will go 15-31 over the last 46 games, yielding a win total of 87 games, which is exactly what I predicted in our preseason prognostications. Of course I hope I’m wrong and proven to be a cynical bastard who can’t predict the sunrise, but 87 wins should be a low bar for an organization like this to clear. If it comes to pass it really does underline and highlight in bright fluorescent yellow the failures of the team’s management.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: the great record in the first "half" is comparable to the win streaks of last year, which were followed by losing streaks of equal or near-equal magnitude. So our great April-May-June-half of July rightly is being followed by a shitty rest of July-August...but, will it continue in September-October?
And that's the crux of the season, right there. How long do we have to pay for the great first half in order to reemerge with another win skein? Can we purge our sins (Miggy, Florial, Monty, Schmidt, Maraschino, always Cashman and his terrible machinations in general) with a terrible late July and August? Or will September, like the Tuesday after stormy Monday, be just as bad?
In other words, can we pull out of this in time to "get hot" again just as the playoffs roll around, earning the name "New York Streakees" for yet another year?
That's the question I wonder about. I figure this whole month will be a disaster. It's what comes after it that has me curious.
Josh Donaldson is hitting .167/.266/.267 (.533 OPS) at home this year.
And he's not getting any better. Since July 1, he's 6-42 (.143) with 15 K at Yankee Stadium.
He's Joey Gallo 2.0 at home, yet Boone bats him 4th instead of 8th or 9th.
So tired of it.
Well, weirdly, JM, much of the pitching seems to be stabilizing—at least when it comes to the starters. So, maybe that's hope. But the lineup has flatlined, and there's no saying when anybody will be back to help.
Agreed Horace - and Zach's complaint about Donaldson is valid - however there aren't currently many other bats to plug into the 4th hole that would be productive - other than Mr 2 hole who may finally drop to 3 or 4 tonight.
Boone will likely do a little bit of judgeling - I mean juggling tonight.
Bill Parcells once said "There is winning and there is misery."
I go away for an extended weekend and I come back to a shit show...
As for the player moves at the deadline, ARod looks like an MVP Monday Morning GM...
Torres looked good at leadoff....and that's about it...his swinging tendencies make him a better fit up there... What about a lineup of
Torres
Benin-Bendi
Lemahiue(When he's back)
Judge
Rizzo
Stanton (when he's back)
Trevino
IKF
Bader (when he's back)
El Duque, excellent and well written article. Thanks for bringing up the bums like Vernon Wells. Excellent comparison to Donaladson.
Bader's not playing this year. They don't even bother to update his status or give progress reports on him.
Bader's a no Judge 2023 hedge. That's it.
Bring up Peraza. Put DJ at 3rd, Let Peraza float between 2B ,SS and OF like he has been in Scranton.
I don't know if he can play 3rd. He is batting over .300 since 6/3 with 11 HRs. He has 16 HR on the season.
Or Cabrera to play 2B, SS, 3B. He has batted .337. since he returned on 7/4 from injury.
At this point, give them a chance with a 10 game cushion and the need to goose the lineup. they can always say that it is until Stanton gets healthy .
Anything is better than Donaldson and Hicks. [Florial for Hicks?]
Oh look at that, Josh Donaldson batting cleanup again.
Boone's solution to the ongoing Hicks fiasco: start Marwin Gonzalez in right--the 33-year-old Marwin Gonzales who has been struggling to keep his head above the Medoza line for the past two years--and move the faltering Judge to center, just to be sure that his best player gets even more worn down as the long season advances. Anything--even the abysmal Marwin Gonzalez--other than giving Florial a shot. This is a diseased organization--the disease is brain rot.
Judge's OPS has been declining steadily for the past month--for the past week it's .762. He's had one hit in the last three games. Just the right time to wear him out by putting him in centerfield. Do every possible stupid thing--Marwin Gonzalez starts in right, Judge goes to centerfield while he's slumping, etc.--to avoid giving Florial a shot.
@Archangel...Someone help me here with my memory...if we bring up Peraza isn't there something about his eligibility clock that starts when that happens? Doesn't Ca$h want another year of control or something like that? We should start asking ourselves who will be player 27 and 28 after Sept. 1? And it's 29 for doubleheaders of course...
@Barney...read an article about Gonzalez today...the guy has hardly played...he's just a fill in for infield position for the most part...and he's hardly had a hit for that matter...head scratcher...
Ranger:
From MLB.COM
Players receive Major League service time for each day spent on the 26-man roster or the Major League injured list.
Each Major League regular season consists of 187 days and each day spent on the active roster or injured list earns a player one day of service time.
A player is deemed to have reached "one year" of Major League service upon accruing 172 days in a given year. Upon reaching six years of Major League service, a player becomes eligible for free agency at the end of that season (unless he has already signed a contract extension that covers one or more of his free-agent seasons).
SO: calling up a player from SWB at this point in the season would not affect their service time. Again my belief is that the team would rather roll out one of their overpaid “stars” than give a minor league player a chance. This flies in the face of reason, but helps pad the pocketbook.
Cue Dr. Smith.
The pain, the pain......
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