It's time to ponder your legacy as owner of the once great New York Yankees.
You've won one world series since 2001. That's behind the Astros, Cardinals, Giants and Redsocks.
You've conceded baseball's marquee spotlight to the Dodgers.
You've watched the Orioles come to dominate the AL East.
And you've assembled a team of "Ifs."
I won't list them all. Frankly, I can't. There simply are too many. But almost every one requires the Yankees to suddenly receive great production from past disappointments.
At best, maybe half will pan out. That's why they're called "Ifs."
Listen: Yank fans love to believe in their team. They still see the Yankees as something special, more than merely the Padres or Royals. They accept the injuries, the slumps, the trials and the tribulations that come each season, shortly after February 20th arrives, and - for better or worse - our hopes converge.
But you've invested $225 million in a team that resembles a Boeing jet with a hole in its side. We simply don't have enough pitching.
Will you really enter this season with such a glaring weakness?
Because this is your legacy.
I read an article on mlb.com (another one) that summarized the reasons FanGraphs has us posting a .549 winning percentage this year. It's interesting, in that the projection doesn't expect big comebacks for Rizzo or Stanton, just positive WAR years.
ReplyDeleteThis sentence about last season really caught my eye:
"Aside from Gerrit Cole’s Cy Young season, the year went about as bad as it could have, and still they ended up with only two fewer wins than the D-backs, who represented the NL in the World Series."
My God. My brain had overlooked that testament to Manfred Mediocrity that is now the postseason. We've known for a long time that the WS no longer presents us with the best two teams in baseball, duking it out. But that...that...Jesus H. Schmuckendoodle. It's embarrassing.
A team with 84 wins shouldn't be given a chance to be in the playoffs, much less the Series. Man, has this become fucked up.
By the way, FanGraphs says our outfield--which was 25th in the majors last year--is now fourth best. And that we now have two of the best four hitters in baseball.
Boy, just wait until the Martian comes back.
So Girardi is coming back as a YES "analyst." Great. I still can't stand the guy and will never forget how he treated Posada at the end of Jorge's career.
ReplyDeleteLegacy? Steinscummer don’t give a tin shit about legacy, only jis bank accounts.
ReplyDeletePitching? Ain’t got no pitching. If it mattered to him, he’d fix the issue, infuse the entire org with the very best people.
Yankee fans have been consigned to a living hell of eternal mediocrity, but hey - buy your tickets NOW!
A Boeing jet with a hole in it's side indeed...
ReplyDeletehttps://filmarchiv.chamberofunderstanding.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/if_poster.jpg
ReplyDeleteRiddle me this, True Believers . . .
ReplyDeleteBesides being multisyllabic words that end in "lence", what does Fraudulence, Purulence, and Flatulence have in common?
Nice one, Doug!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070464/mediaviewer/rm1172780289/?ref_=tt_ov_i
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083694/mediaviewer/rm2171415040/?ref_=tt_ov_i
Yeah, I was going to say! From Malcolm McDowell's anarchist period. My goodness, I used to think those films were so bold and transgressive when I was a teenager. Now...they're all but unwatchable.
ReplyDeleteMuch like the Yankees will be this year.
AA,
ReplyDeleteI own both the O Lucky Man movie and the soundtrack. Still listen to it.
I'm currently working my way through the film with my twenty five year old son (because it is over three hours, slow, and we both have ADD). It's such a strange and dated film. The soundtrack however is timeless and outstanding.
"Besides being multisyllabic words that end in "lence", what does Fraudulence, Purulence, and Flatulence have in common?"
ReplyDeleteNicknames for the back end of the Yankee rotation?
Sometimes yah just gotta watch some of these films from the past through a filter of the time in which they were created.
ReplyDeleteLindsay Anderson's work is a prime example of this.
A couple of more:
https://youtu.be/WoaxXtcxN2c?si=Yb-aLyDzb5AZ75pE
https://youtu.be/lWEcLPjLDpo?si=pGxPBVEVpk56lLOb
I watch some old movies and TV shows and my wife says, "Really?" But you had to be there.
ReplyDeleteFraudulence, Purulence, and Flatulence are actually the Three Horsemen of the Halpocalype. Or the Andrews sisters. Not sure which.
JM - I'm going to go climb the nearest mountain and meditate on that.
ReplyDeleteOh Tico Tico Tick, Oh Tico Tico Tock, Oh Tico Tico you're the cuckoo in my clock.
Let's face it - Hal has no heart or soul and Brian has no Brain. We are doomed.
JM
ReplyDelete"Fraudulence, Purulence, and Flatulence are actually the Three Horsemen of the Halpocalype. Or the Andrews sisters. Not sure which."
Why not both?
That's "now" thinking, Doug.
ReplyDelete