Wednesday, October 4, 2023

Audit This!

 

So now that we know that your New York Yankees' promised organizational "audit" is a farce, surprise, surprise—instead of bringing in some impartial agency to actually audit the Yankees, the team will take a look at some other, unnamed organization and, I'm sure, learn oodles—it is time that we here at IIHIIFIIC initiate our OWN audit.

Item Number 1: 

Giancarlo Stanton is DONE.

It gives me no pleasure to write this. Stanton seems like a good enough sort, and surely it can't be pleasant for him to know that he is washed up at 33.

But he is.

Sorry, but for all the hopes he raised, Big G has never lived up to anything like the promise he showed when he came to the Yanks in 2018 at just 28.

Going by OPS, Stanton has never reached the heights of his four best seasons in Miami; never managed to reach an OPS of .900. The closest he came was .894 in 2019—when he played all of 18 games.

The injuries, we all know about. Stanton has missed 321 games—or nearly 38 percent of all Yankees contests—since coming over. Figures that would have been even worse without the Covid season.

When he can play, his career has been on almost a straight decline in New York, his OPS averages going from .852 to .894 (18 games) to .887 (23 games) to .870 to .759 to .695.

One might have thought that Giancarlo hit rock bottom last year, when his game completely fell apart after May, and he wound up batting all of .211.

Nope. Turned out it was just a ledge—from which he tumbled down to .191 this year.  Has there ever been a Yankees power hitter—I mean a guy counted on to be one of the one or two big boppers in the middle of the lineup—who has hit .191 in over 100 games?

Don't bother looking it up. The answer is no.

Since coming up from Florida, every aspect of Giancarlo's game has crumbled. A credible outfielder in Miami, now he can barely move in right field. An occasional base stealer—he swiped 36 in 50 attempts in the Sunshine State—he has only 6 since coming to the Bronx, none since 2020.

Once Stanton was able to carry the team with occasional binges, and most notably in the playoffs. But that was always overrated. His postseasons in New York have mostly been distinguished by his failures: that .222 ALDS against the Red Sox, with no homers, no ribbies, and his awful Craig Kimbrel at-bat in 2018; the 2019 ALCS against Houston where he begged out of the lineup even though he'd been able to homer AFTER sustaining said injury; his 2020 game in Boston, where he stood and watched his single plunk off the Green Monster.

The man is done, and he ain't coming back. Hey, it happens. What the New York Yankees need to do is figure out what to do about this hideous mistake.

Stanton still has 4 years and $118 million to be paid by the Yankees (though $20 million of that will be picked up by Miami). Even worse, he is taking up valuable roster space.

Pay him some discount to leave? Why should he take it? Pay someone else to take him? Maybe—but it's doubtful HAL would ever do that. Play him in the outfield until he breaks, and the Yanks can get the insurance money?

I dunno.  But the results of the first IIHIIFIIC Audit are clear:  Hey hey, ho ho, Big G Stanton's got to go.






17 comments:

  1. When a player is done, they're done. They don't come with clearly marked expiration dates. There's no way of predicting when. But it will happen to them all. Try not to give huge never-ending contracts to those that are clearly in decline. And for fuck sake DO NOT TRADE FOR OTHER FRANCHISES CONTRACT BLUNDERS.

    May Giancarlo bench press models and starlets until his pecs are even more over developed than they are now.



    And yes, you know it, FUCK HAL.

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  2. No Hoss everything is going to be fine...

    https://nypost.com/2023/10/03/yankees-giancarlo-stanton-says-he-will-hit-lab-in-offseason/

    “There’ll be a lot of changes,” Stanton said on the final day of the regular season. “I’ve talked about how bad the year has been, so not much more to touch on that. But there will be a lot in the lab in the offseason.”

    Asked about particulars, Stanton said, “Everything will be taken a look at.” He didn’t think it would take a major overhaul, just “minor [tweaks], but the right ones.”

    HE DIDN'T THINK IT WOULD TAKE A MAJOR OVERHAUL, JUST MINOR (tweaks)... BUT THE RIGHT ONES"!!!!!!!!!!!

    So we're good then.

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  3. First Montgomery, now Eovaldi.

    Two of our guys taking Texas ahead.

    Some analytics team we have. Fucking fuckers. Fuck them all.

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  4. Thanks for that article, Doug.

    Yeah, amazing. He's going to make a really thorough investigation, look into everything...and then make minor tweaks. He's going to really concentrate on watching film and making adjustments...if it doesn't get i the way of his travel plans. He contradicts himself almost as he speaks—which is no small feat.

    And the writer lauds his "8th highest exit velocity" in the majors. Whoop-dee-do.

    Look for Stanton to show up next spring doing the exact same thing. Look for the same, level swing sweeping through the exact same spot of the strike zone on every pitch. Look for him to be slower than ever—and yet still pull something in the first two months of the season that will take him out of the lineup for at least another two months.


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  5. ANOTHER ex-Yankee throwing another five innings-plus of shutout ball.

    Still, Vladdie, Jr., getting picked off second—and then lying there like a beached porpoise, signaling for a replay—was special. And TB out already!

    Go Twins!

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  6. So Mike Stanton is going to hit the lab...what is he going to do...the Monster Mash?

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  7. Michael Kay, incidentally, criticizing some move or another as having been made "late last night, in front of his computer."

    Yeah, where have we seen that before?

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  8. Spending all my working years in a lab made neither me nor any of my coworkers younger or better at baseball.

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  9. I fully agree that Arch Stanton is done

    However I fear no other GM in baseball is stupid enough to take his contract on other than the clownboot that is Cashman so we are stuck with him

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  10. Stanton needs to hit the Cream and the Clear.

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  11. But Mildred, did you make the tweaks?

    Warbler, I agree. Stanton is the first player I've ever wanted to see juice.

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  12. It may not be "pleasant" to know he's done at the age of 33, Hoss - and that was a kind formulation, a nice way to put it - but it's probably not as painful with the 100 million cushion. That buys plenty of therapy, time in the tropics, and other consolatory gifts with which to weather the pain. Not to mention hookers.

    Either way, he's saying the right things - not really - and making noises, just like Hal is making noises about the fake audit. You know what my elders would tell me? They'd say "ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THEN WORDS." And they'd also tell me to do my homework. I didn't listen and look at me now. 100 million bucks would sure help. Shit, I'd settle for less.

    Weep not for Giancarlo.

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  13. He's gonna hit Arod's lab and hope to not get caught.

    The irony is, he'll still suck.

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  14. What an agonizing post season Already.... watching ex Yankees RAKE out there down their new teams...the Audit should simply read "Fuck you "

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  15. Absolutemente, Arch Stanton has got to got to got to GO!

    No one will be crazy enough to take him. They've just got to eat his contract, release him, say good-bye, good luck, God be with you, farewell, your checks will be in the mail or, if you prefer, electronically deposited.

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  16. @ Doug K., If he hits the lab in the off season, that'll be the only hitting he's done this year.

    @ ranger_lp, He'll do the Mash, the Monster Mash, we'll do the Mash, the Monster Mash!

    @ 13bit, don't cry for me, gi-an-car-lo! Four years a-go, you were done-zo!

    ReplyDelete

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