As usual, Yanks won the tabloid back pages of 2022. But a change might be coming...

In case you're scoring at home, here are the final IT IS HIGH 2022 Tabloids Covers Leaderboard. 

Once again, the Yankees easily topped all other NYC-area franchises, taking 210 Daily News and Post front and back pages. 

Since 2017, when we began charting tab covers, the Yankees have never been challenged. 

Here are the annual top five:

2022: 
Yankees 210, Mets 148, Giants 75, Knicks 60, Nets 54.

2021:
Yankees 207, Mets 156, Knicks 124, Nets 63, Giants 59.

2020: (Pandemic)
Yankees 152, Mets 132, Giants 124, Jets 55, NFL 52. 

2019:
Yankees 211, Mets 191, Giants 87, Jets 68, Knicks 68

2018:
Yankees 242, Mets 155, Giants 140, Jets 70, Knicks 51.

2017:
Yankees 287, Knicks 129, Giants 111,  Mets 109, Jets 35.

Takeaways:

1. NYC remains a Yankee town. Last year, the Mets won more games, created more controversies and spent more money, but they still couldn't topple the Death Barge's claim on newsprint. 

That said, much of the difference resulted from the Yankees lasting two weeks longer in the playoffs than the sad, quickly castrated Amazin's.

2. The Knicks/Giants/Jets/Nets continuum remains supremely awful - thereby gifting much of the available ink to the Old Guard Yankees. If any of those franchises ever figures out how to win - hah! I'm just fantasizing, ridiculously, floating on a cloud, what an insane thought! - the city's two baseball teams could be rather quickly replaced.  

And here's a wild thought: Today's Giants game against the lowly Colts might set the tone for 2023. It's the biggest game of the year, thus far! If the Giants win, they will reach the playoffs, making 2022 a season of progress. If they lose, well, it's like the groundhog seeing its shadow - it means they'll surely lose next week in Phily, miss the postseason, and spend the next six months in their usual stench. Weird, eh?

3. In case you're wondering, yes, NYC still has a hockey team. The Rangers actually scored 44 back pages in 2022, by far the most in our brief history. Until then, they only broke double digits once (2017), and twice were shutout entirely. It's clear, for them to get noticed, they must win the Stanley Cup. 

4. In that regard, NYC is wide open to any team that warrants a parade down the Canyon of Heroes. The last big four NYC championship came in 2009. It's getting sad. According to Wikipedia, New York still leads all cities in championships. But that's only because the Yankees have such a vast historical lead over all others. Maybe the era of the Mets is upon us. Happy New Year.