In the battle for NY sports legitimacy, the Yankees are still the Yankees, and the Giants are still the Giants

This week, as winter arrived in the Northeast, I made a ridiculous, rookie fan blunder. 

Yep, I drank the Kool-Aid, licked the toad, followed the piper, swallowed the crapola... 

I bought into the idea that a "winning culture" would transform the New York Football Giants into a normal NFL franchise. Yep, I bit into the apple. It took just one Thursday night to jolt me out. 

Last night, the Jersey Giants birthed one of those soul-crushing losses that epitomize NYC sports. 

If they were a Broadway play, they'd be closing today. 

Ten tidbits from the eternal New York doomscroll... 

1. Few events ruin your psyche like Thursday Night Football - the Giants' personal wheelhouse for nationally televised mediocrity. As a fan, you stay up until midnight, expecting to win, then everything collapses, and you go to bed wanting to choke the Posturepedic. 

2. Let's take a moment to recognize how lucky we are that practically all other NY home sporting events begin much earlier in the night. When the Yankees blow one in the ninth, you're still a few shots of Jack from beddy-bye. 

3. Long ago, the Giants made late collapses an art form. There is always something - a fumble or interception - guaranteed to replay in your skull until dawn. Last night, they missed a routine 33-yard FG. Nobody in the NFL misses 33-yard FGs. When it happened, everybody knew what was coming. The Giants lost by three.

4. Oh, but that's just beginning to replay the horrors.  The Giants squandered two late interceptions, either of which would have salted a win. All they needed was a first-down. So, what did they do? They ran balls into the middle of the line, got nowhere, and barely killed a minute off the clock. Twice. 

5. That, my friends, is Giants football! 

6. Of course, the Giants have been decimated by injuries. That's a given. They are always decimated by injuries. Their billionaire owner makes them play on a concrete slab beneath a throw-rug. Year after year, their bones break and their brains are shaken. Last night, the TV cameras caught Cam Skattebo vomiting onto the turf. A sign of concussion? The way the jolly announcers joked about it, nobody in the stadium could care to ask. Boys will be boys... eh?  

7. I doff my cap to every Giant fan who attended last night's game. They endured lightning strikes, near-freezing rain and the hair-pulling malaise of early morning traffic that would take hours to navigate. As you read this, some are probably still trying to get home. After a loss like last night, it's all I can do just to drag my sorry ass to bed. How do season-ticket holders stay hopeful? My God, they are toddlers, clapping to save Tinkerbell.  

8. Baseball is now three weeks from the Abyss, the owner lockout, which will turn following the Yankees into a malevolent, insulting waste of our time. Three weeks. Yet here's the kicker: The Giants will probably be out of the NFC race before MLB can reach its shutdown. That's performance art.

9. In Yank news - after all, this is a Yankee blog - the Death Barge this week sent a four-man delegation - which included a Japanese billionaire - to meet with 18-year-old pitching phenom Shoki Oda. News was leaked to various Gammonites - surely to make us feel - gulp - hope? Sorry, Hal, but being outbid on Japanese talent is the modern Yankee way. In bidding wars, we finish second. Sending the cast of Glee as a delegation merely gives Hal an excuse to pull out his pockets and say, "Look at how hard I tried."

10. There is one difference this November. The Knicks. God bless them. But remember when we hoped their victory would launch a golden year for NY sports? Well, that's over. The Mets are still the Mets, the Jets are still the Jets, and Giants are still... oh, you know... 

It's getting cold. Winter is upon us. It started last night. 

Ten reasons to believe in Giancarlo Stanton, while staring into the Abyss

Brian Cashman can't believe his luck: He'll get one more year out of Giancarlo Stanton. 

We're in the doomsday grasp of Stanton's 13-year contract from Hell, signed with Miami two winters before Trump boarded the escalator, before the Russians annexed Crimea and Philip Seymore Hoffman OD'ed. Time flies, eh? 

Yesterday, asked about Stanton by a gathering of Gammonites, Cashman said:

He’s not going anywhere. He’ll be in spring training with us without a doubt, and hopefully healthy and ready to go. And that’s his intention. He finished the season healthy. And the fact that Aaron Boone was calling his name in big moments, I think, answers the question of what we think he’s capable of when he is healthy.

When you see such words, it's hard not to imagine a barker on the State Fair Midway, selling tickets to Big Alfie, the world's largest hog. Basically, we're screwed. Once again, we'll push that boulder up the hill and, at the summit, let it roll us over - an eternity of tweaks, tears and slow marches back to the dugout.  

Ah, but let's not go there. It's mid-November, and the first snow has yet to glaze Syracuse, perennial winner of the Golden Snowball. 

Here are 10 reasons to drink the tea. Ten reasons for absurd hope. Ten reasons to believe in Gio...  

1. He's only 37 - younger than Steph Curry, Kirk Cousins, Lindsay Lohan and the red-haired kid who played Ron Weasily in the Harry Potter movies. He's younger than the Olson twins, Lady Gaga and Daenerys Targaryen.  

2. This is his walk year, so he'll be playing for a long-term deal.

3. With Stanton as DH, Aaron Judge gets to play more RF.

4. With Stanton as DH and Judge in RF, Ben Rice gets more time at 1B.

5. With Stanton as DH, Judge in RF, and Rice at 1B, Jose Garcia can play 2B - creating the worst right-side defense in baseball. Way to follow the Milwaukee model, eh?

6. Don't sweat the logjam; he'll tweak something and disappear.

7. Stanton is a great "clubhouse presence."

8. The Marlins will pay $10 million of his $25 million contact.

9. He can avenge his two Ks in the AL Division series.

10. There won't be a 2027 season anyway. 

Rejoice, Yankee fans. Feel free to stare into the Abyss. The Mets can sign Skubal. The Dodgers can grab the rest. Boston can do whatever. None of this matters. Long live Giancarlo! One more year.

The 18-year-old Japanese kid who won't solve our problems, coaches say sayonara, and what about Bob...er, Alec?

Busy day in Yankeesland, what with Cam and all the behind the scenes stuff.

Two things: we'll hire coaches who won't be able to do anything about Yankee issues because Cashman and Boone will still be in charge. The other thing is (Ben Grimm? James Arness?), if we sign a third baseman, it will be the wrong third baseman and we'll be right back where we started.

Life stinks, as Pere Ubu said. (He died awhile ago, but RIP David Thomas, a strange and amazing man.)

 

CONGRATULATIONS CAM ! (YOU BROUGHT THE SCHLITT !)

What did he know and when did he know it?

 

Now that the Democrats have scored their biggest electoral sweep since the Watergate year of 1974, I think it's appropriate to raise the above question once again:  What did he know and when did he know it?

By "he," of course, I mean Brian Cashman. Or Aaron Boone. Or Matt Blake, or Max Fried himself.

The "what,"  of course, comes from "WTF? Max Fried needed a bone spur operation a few weeks after the season was over???"

How was he feeling, say, the day he went out there and, you know, ended our season against Tampa Bay?

Particularly when we had Carlos Rodon, hot as that fiery asteroid entering the atmosphere to end the reign of the dinosaurs.

Don't get me wrong. Carlos Rodon is capable of spitting the bit on any given day, no matter how hot he is. And plenty of other things went wrong in that absurd, three-game set (Looking at you, Ryan McMahon. When I'm not swiveling my head to look at Jazz Chisholm. Or Austin Wells. Or Aaron Boone.)

But still. Did Max Fried go out there knowing the ol' soupbone was...just so much soup? Did he tell anyone?

What did (somebody) know and when did (he/they) know it?

Yanks promote Aaron Gershenfeld, international man of mystery. Ten nuggets of tidbittery

To soothe their fan base after they don't sign Tarik Skubal, the Yankees have announced the promotion of Aaron Gershenfeld - the team's current Run Prevention & Catching Coordinator - to a new, unnamed slot within their soul-crushing corporate machine. 

What will Gershenfeld do? What will his job be called? Who is he? Wait... who are you?  What's going on here? 

Stop with the questions! They steal your soul. The Gersh will replace Tanner Swanson - last season's Director of Catching/Major League Field Coordinator - who was recently poached by Seattle. We've replaced the Director of Catching with a Run Prevention Coordinator, which is overseen by the Rector of Titles, which answers to the Provost of Pitter-Patter.  

But who is "the Gersh," and what will he be scrawling into that clipboard of fate?

At considerable expense - and physical danger - IT IS HIGH has compiled 10 tidbits of intrigue on this man of mystery.

1. Why is there a shadow over his basic information?

2. Why is this on his Baseball Reference record?

3. Does he have a thing for looking like Colin Jost? 

4. At age 34, he could be younger than many MLB catchers. (Note: Austin Wells is 27, Ali Sanchez 29.) Will that help or hurt?

5. In 2013 and 2014, playing for University of Louisville - (across the river from New Albany) - Gershenfeld helped his team reach the NCAA World Series.

6. He graduated from Louisville with honors in sports administration and was named to the All-Academic team. 

7. In 2016, as hitting coach for East Tennessee State, he was credited with helping four players to be selected in the MLB draft. 

8. In 2017, as an assistant at Vanderbilt, he helped the team reach the NCAA Super Regionals. 

9. He moved to The Citadel and became a third base coach, specializing with catchers. He was said to be instrumental in recruiting top high schoolers.

10. But questions persist. Is that him, circled, behind headliner Hal Steinbrenner, in the 2013 New Year's Day performance of Kinky Boots? If so, what is he doing?

The Yankiverse demands answers. And a better season from Austin Wells.

Well, it is Veterans Day...

Cashman also made noises about trying Garcia at second (idiot) due to the logjam a healthy Stanton would cause.

Yeah, well, if history serves, that won't be a problem.

Brian Cashman's itinerary for Day One of the General Managers meetings

Looks to be a long, fruitful day for the Yankee GM. Here's the schedule... 

7:30 a.m. Lear jet lands outside Vegas.  

8:10 a.m. Arrive at Ritz-Carlton. Unpack. Check messages. Last-minute preparations. 

8:13 a.m. Call NAME REDACTED .

10:00 a.m. GM meeting gaveled to order. 

10:02 a.m. Recess declared. 

10:15 a.m. Open bar in the Nautical Room.

2:00 p.m. Check for calls from Hal, wife, NAME REDACTED. 

2:10 p.m. Convene to the Captain's Lounge.

4:00 p.m. After multiple missed calls, finally connect with NAME REDACTED.

4:15 p.m. Uber ride to outskirts of city.

5:00 p.m. Unspecified medications from NAME REDACTED.

5:30 p.m. Concern over efficacy of medications.

6:00 p.m. Naked karaoke in barnyard.

7:00 p.m. Hobo boxing. 

7:30 p.m. Fire dance welcoming Satan.

8:00 p.m. Cock fights.

8:15 p.m. Keynote address by Beastmaster.

8:30 p.m. Human sacrifice.  

9:00 p.m. Pose for photos with Mr. Hegseth, Mr. Patel and Mr. Miller.

9:15 p.m. Trade Ben Rice for right-fielder.

9:30 p.m. Trade Cam Schlittler for DH.

10:00 p.m. Re-sign Trent Grisham to 10-year deal.

11:00 p.m. Vow eternal allegiance to Beastmaster. 

11:05 p.m. Set fire to party farmhouse. 

11:20 p.m. March through desert, shooting iguanas, pets, bystanders.

Dawn: Back to hotel for day two.

Save The Steinbrenners

The lockout is just weeks away. There may not be any baseball next year. 

It has to be done.

The goal of the lockout is to finally create cost controls by placing a cap on spending ensuring a path to profitability that goes beyond having the franchise value increase exponentially. Short term pain for long term gain.

No one knows how long it will take to force the player's union into capitulation. An athlete's career and earning window is limited so it would appear that the owners have the upper hand but…

There will be a period of time when no money is coming in and, for a family business like the Yankees, this will create hardship.

I’m worried about Hal and the rest of the Steinbrenners

The children will feel it the most. 

Especially around Christmas.

The lockout is slated for Dec 1^st.  

Consequently, there won’t be any Christmas presents this year. Not good ones anyway. Just a few of the remaining Edwin Encarnacion Home Run Walk Parrots.

Perhaps, a quilt or two to keep them warm this winter, stitched from the no longer salable jerseys of Josh Donaldson, DJ LeMahieu, and Ryan McMahon.

A peasant’s Christmas dinner consisting of rat meat and pigeon wings that, in happier times, would have found their way into the hot dogs.

The Stadium will produce no revenue save for the meager returns of the 2026  “Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl” on December 28^th. 

Too late to save the holiday.

“Bad Boy Mowers”  BTW. That’s actually the sponsor this year.

--

Knowing this was coming Hal has taken steps to cushion the financial shock of this tragic, self-inflicted wound .

In recent months he has:

1. Moved YES streaming from Gotham over to DAZN. Reducing costs.

Well, his costs anyway.

Yankee and Net fans now have to pay more.

Even better for Hal, fans will keep DAZN year round.

Previously a lot of Yankee fans dump YES in the off season because the Venn Diagram showing the overlap of fans who follow both the Yankees and the Nets is laughably small.  Now they can watch the Knicks and Hal gets a slice of that pie.

2. Saved money on the coaching staff by failing to offer raises or expensive promotions to  key bench personnel in order to retain them and prevent them from being poached by rivals.

Hey, why should he pay for coaches if there’s no season?

Oh yeah and...

3. Sold a piece of the team for 2.6 Billion Dollars. Cash.

--

Apparently these money moves are insufficient.  

Hal still needs the lockout. Otherwise the greedy players union will take incrementally more!!

Think of the children!

Here are some new potential revenue streams to help the Steinbrenners get through the next few months...

License the training rooms to 24 Hour Fitness (Premium  Pinstripe Pass! )

Who wouldn’t want to lift weights on the very machines used by Yankee Superstars like Giancarlo Stanton? 

State of the art vending machines can sell bags of Yankee themed “Commemorative Potato Chip Bags” to help you track your progress.

Merch!

Then relax and take a schvitz in the steam room.

You know Hal sacked the cleaning staff the second the Yankees failed to get past the ALDS again so you might be able to see a pool of sweat left by Helios Ramos.

 

Take some home in a commemorative bottle.

Turn the Luxury Suites into Hotel Rooms. 

They have couches. Or, even better, I’m pretty sure they have a warehouse full of Castro Convertibles left over from their “Starling Castro Convertible Collection”, a lesser part of their ill-conceived furniture marketing efforts that included the Juan Sofa, and the borderline insane… Otto Velez “Otto-Man”.   

Plant Cannabis  

Yankee Outfield Grass®!

That’s some primo farming space right there. The stadium is a perfect place to grow pot. It is enclosed, gated, and already has grow lights.

The ticket windows are reminiscent of the ones used at the Cop and Stops of pre-legalization fame. Just put your money in the little bowl and slide it under the bulletproof one way glass.  

The team could charge as much as $100 for a nickel bag of “Bronx Bonger”  or  "Judgement Day"  Sorry… Commemorative Nickel Bag of "Bronx Bonger”  or  "Judgement Day” .

Should the season restart before harvest I know one left fielder that wouldn’t mind

If Hal takes these suggestions I'm sure they will get through this difficult period. 

As far as the rest of us go...  two words.  Yankee Classics. (Actually, it's two other words. I'll leave it up to you to fill in the blank.)

Cody Bellinger is the AL Platinum Glove. Is he playing out of position?

Congrats to Cody Bellinger, who last week won the 15th annual AL Platinum Glove, an award that somehow weighs catchers with shortstops, right fielders with second basemen, spark plugs with lug nuts, peanut butter with jelly...

It's another fukkin logarithm, obviously. Speaking for all who cannot explain what a logarithm is, let me assure you that Belly deserves his trophy, at least as much as Rex Harrison deserved his 1965 Oscar for My Fair Lady, brambling through his Broadway role, while Peter Sellers was being criminally overlooked for Dr. Strangelove. It needs to be said, people: Awards are bullshit, and that's not even mentioning the 2026 FIFA Peace Prize.

(Note: I have since learned that the award comes from fan voting, which only makes it less impressive. It's the People's Choice Award for defense.) 

Listen: There is an eloquent argument to be made that the Yankees should leave Belly in left field for at least the next two years, if only so he can win more awards. He is our goalie, our sentry, our Lawrence Taylor (or, let's say it, our Arvell Reese?), and let's not disturb a genius at work, especially in our most iconic position. 

That said... (clears throat)... 10 thoughts.

1. It's time to accept the Milwaukee Model - you win with speed, plate discipline, pitching and defense, defense, defense. Moving Bellinger to CF would follow that plan. 

2. Belly in CF would instantly improve our defense, involving our best glove into more plays.  

3. The Yankees have no other great-glove CF on their roster.

4. Trent Grisholm is gone; last year, he ran out of gas anyway.

5. Spencer Jones might someday be a solid CF, but for now, he takes bad routes and watches catchable balls drop. They assured us he was ready, but he doesn't look comfortable.

6. I cannot escape the cataclysmic terror of Jones colliding with Aaron Judge in right-center. Dear God. Such a seismic event would end Yankee civilization, as it did the dinosaurs. Belly is far less likely to run headlong into Doomsday. 

7. For all his speed, The Martian, Jasson Dominguez, will never be a CF. It's not certain if he can play OF.

8. To sign or trade for a defensive CF would add to an OF logjam.

9. Moving Judge to CF would abuse him. 

10. WTF? We have nobody else.

My guess is that the Yankees will go with Jones, who remains the most tantalizing prospect in the system. 

So much for the Milwaukee Model, eh? It's not the Yankee way.

Yankees stun world with jaw-dropping, eye-popping Scranton/Wilkes Barre announcement

Okay, siddown for this. Deep breath. Clutch the grab-bar. Blink, if you see this. Okay...  

Now, I'm gonna type something that will look like a transcribed Sonoran toad-lick hallucination, as if the gods of chaos are using my keyboard to spread the tomato seeds of insanity across this planet.

Let's do it - in 10 small bites.  

1. The Scranton/Wilkes Barre Railriders - home to the Martian, Ryan McBroom, Zolio Almonte and 13 seasons of former future Yankee stars - are no more!

2. They are now the "Scranton/Wilkes Barre Highlanders," a throwback to the original Yankee teams of ol' New Yawk, married to the fact that there are - indeed - "high lands" in the geographical outskirst of Scranton, Wilkes Barre and Moosic, Pa.

3. Full disclosure: I have lived almost all my life an 80-minute drive from Scranton/ Wilkes Barre and - until today - have never heard the countryside described as "Highlands" or their inhabitants called "Highlanders." That just might be me. Maybe I missed it. Known to happen. 

4. Also, I should note that, before they became the "Railriders," I'd never before heard that word, either. So - grain of salt, eh?

5. Also, let's be clear: There are high lands in and around Scranton and Wilkes Barre. Generally, I've heard them as "hills." But the name "Scranton/Wilkes Barre Hill People" would not have worked. 

6. The "Scranton/Wilkes Barre Hilltoppers?" Or "Hill Folk?"

7. From 1989 to 2006, they were the "Scranton Red Barons," harkening back to the heyday of Snoopy, which inspired the most underrated Christmas song of all time. In it, Charles Schultz' intrepid cartoon beagle - as a WWI pilot - is forced down behind enemy lines, seemingly doomed, only to learn that yuletide joy overcomes everything. Suddenly, without warning, the Baron cries out, "Merry Christmas, my friend!" leading to a holiday toast. Christ, I'm crying, just typing it. 

9. In 2007, they became the Scranton/Wilkes Barre Yankees, after luring the mother ship's Triple A affiliation from Columbus. This happened after the Phillies fled to Allentown, where Billy Joel lamented that they're "tearing all the factories down." Hey, there should be a playlist. That moved created the aptly named Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs.

10. In 2012, they became the Empire State Yankees, because the stadium in Moosic had become a mud pit and needed millions of dollars in taxpayer-funded renovations. For the entire year, the team bussed around upstate New York, playing home games in Rochester and Syracuse. I believe this was a low point in team history. For our playlist, I would submit Skeeter Davis singing "The End of the World."

In 2013 they became the "Scranton/Wilkes Barre Railriders." Honestly, I've never figured out why. Now, it's the Highlanders. Clearly, there's a three-syllable cadence thing going on. Let's hope it inspires a new generation of merch. 

So, let's go, Homelanders. Wait. I mean Highlanders! Highlanders. HIGHLANDERS! From the high lands of Central Pennsylvania. Which, hopefully, Anthony Volpe will never have to visit again...

For Hal Steinbrenner, the time to do something is at hand

In just four weeks, Hal "Food Stamps" Steinbrenner - the most swaddled nepo baby since Jesus - will lug an iron chain to the front gate of George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa. He'll be joined by family consigliere Brian Cashman, holding one of those oversized padlocks that belongs in a Road Runner cartoon. 

Then, together, they will kill Major League Baseball.

If any Gammonites are watching, they will be a solemn bunch, like witnesses to an execution. The padlock will click, and whatever Hal has to say - lamenting that this happened - it will be too late. His craven words will be a fart. 

If Hal has anything to say, now is the time to stand and deliver. 

Once the locks snap, MLB will birth another endless war, the kind everybody originally thought would last a week. 

These days, every war is an endless war. 

And in any lockout, Hal will be one of the biggest losers.

If the owners "win," they will impose the salary cap they've coveted for decades, and the Yankees will lose their fiscal advantage. They will become a coastal version of the KC Royals, forced into austerity payrolls that effectively kill the franchise for years.

If the players' union wins, Hal will have to do what he hates - spend his inheritance. No billionaire wants to be told how to spend his money. How do think they became billionaires? The last thing Hal wants is wide-open bidding on players. If the union wins, that's what he'll get. 

And once the padlock clicks, it will be too late to speak out. 

So... a suggestion... 

Whatever Hal has to say - if anything - he better say it soon. He should rage against the gods, the owners, the players, you, me, our moms, I don't care, everybody - whatever!

The storied New York Yankees - his dad's pride and joy - will soon be on the chopping block. Is it really going to happen? It's up to you, New York, New York.

The world is in chaos, yet the Yankee fates still hinge on one entity

Hey, Juju gods!

Yeah, you! 

Cut the shit. You're weirding us out. Look at the world. Everything's gone nuts. You want 10 signs? Okay, here goes... 

1. Mississippi. Iowa. South Carolina... fukking Texas? Are you serious? TEXAS?

2. You know who has the No. 1 selling album in America? My Chemical Romance. (I'm not making this up.) "Welcome to the Black Parade?" Really? Again? Welcome to 2006. 

3. Parts of Florida just took a year's worth of rain in two days. It's also rained like hell in Arizona. Arid-fukkin-zona. Meanwhile, yesterday, in Syracuse - rhymes with "sheer-abuse" - temps hovered near 80.

4. The President is working on the war the economy affordability  chandeliers. 

5. The stock market is a yoyo. 

6. They're making John Wick into a cartoon series. (Reminder: I'm not making this up.)

7. Bob Dylan is pals with the Pope.

8. George Stephanopolis just got his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. 

9. Melania wants the Nobel Peace Prize.

10. And, um, this...

But but BUT... wanna know what hasn't changed? Are you yearning for that one restroom grab bar, that lone boulder of reality, unto which we can still perilously cling?  

Anthony Volpe. 

Yep, we're still waiting on him. It's been 100 years. As we sit here, with Jazz Chisholm halfway out the door and Jose Caballero still penciled in for utility IF, Volpe is still in the mix. He's our ballroom light fixture, our gold-plated arch. 

In these ridiculous times, when chaos runs rampant like a biker gang in a mall, Yank fans still have something to clutch and stay afloat. Unfortunately, it has a career batting average of .225. 

But hey, you never know. Volpe came within six inches of hitting the most important HR of this decade. So close, so fukkin close... Who knows? Maybe this will be his year. At least he's stayin' alive. 

Caleb Durbin. Now Shelley Duncan.

 

Basically, the Yankees in November have one job, just one: Sign Teruaki Sato

MLB teams have until Dec. 1 - (that's when the owners pull up the rug) - to decide the fate of Japanese slugger Teruaki Sato. 

The Yanks claim to be interested. 

Well... they fukkin oughta be. Guy plays 3B, a Yankee sinkhole. Last year, Ryan McMahon batted .213, Anthony Volpe moved to 2B, Cabby ran out of gas, and nobody bubbled up from Scranton.  

So, who is Teruaki Sato? Ten observations...

1. He bats left, throws right, plays 3B/1B/OF and turns 28 in March. 

2. He's no Goliath - -just 6'1", 207 - (by comparison, Ben Rice is 6'2", 228) - but won the Triple Crown last year in Japan. 

3. Defensively, he's said to be an average 3B who might eventually move to 1B.

4. His dad was a Japanese national champion in judo.

5. His nickname is "Teru." Rhymes with "Hey, you!" (His Yankee nickname could be "Apollo Investment.")

6. He opened his career in the Japanese major leagues with two back-to-back HRs, then added a game-winning three-run shot.

7. In Japan, he's been an all-star in four of the last five years.

8. Last year, in the World Baseball Classic, he went 3-10 with three doubles. In the regular season, he hit .309 with 39 HRs and 106 RBIs.

9. Supposedly, to maximize his value, Sato's agent wants to market him as a 3B, his favorite position. That would seemingly undermine interest from the Mets and Dodgers.

10. But not the Redsocks, Angels and/or Phillies, who are letting free agent 3B Alec Bohm walk. Their GM, Preston Mattingly - (ah, shoot me) - scouted him last year in Japan. 

In Japan, he wore jersey number 8, replacing Kosuke Fukudome. That's Yogi's number. (How about 88?)

A blue wave, but not necessarily midnight blue...

Long night, staying up to watch the scores. Scattered thoughts...

1. Elon Musk is the Stevie Cohen of politics. 

2. Hal Steinbrenner is the Darlene Graham of owners.

3. Ken Paxton is the Gene Mauch of politicians.

4. If last night were a game, the GOP would have used a position player to pitch the 9th.

5. If Ryan McMahon is not traded, he might be impeached.

6. Holy crap! Rep. Mark Teixiera (R-Tx) is a thing.

Playing Taps for Jazz and Other Thoughts

Jazz Chisholm

Not sorry to see Jazz go. 

This picture says it all. Not just about Jazz but about a clubhouse culture where he thought it would be ok.  

Billy Martin would have slapped it out of his mouth. Jorge Posada would have slapped it out of his mouth. Hell, Suzyn Waldman would have slapped it out of his mouth had she not been up in the booth.

See Ya. 

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"I grew up as a Yankee fan, being from the Bahamas, watching Derek Jeter and those guys every day. It was a great time being a Yankee. I loved my time as a Yankee."

So bursts another childhood fantasy.

I'm not referring to Jazz Chisholm, author of the above sad revelation, whose contractual qualifying offer yesterday was stuffed in a bottle and set out with the Japanese tide.

What died - and keeps succumbing, year upon year - is our collectively naive belief that to simply don the Pinstripes will transform a stat-sheet star into a great and hustling teammate. 

Jazz is gone. As is another Yankee pipe dream. 

Top Ten thoughts...

1. Over two straight winters, we've now cut ties to star second basemen with iconic first names - Gleyber and Jazz.

2. Upon their arrivals, both anticipated long and rewarding Yankee careers. 

3. At the end, both were bluntly shown the door.

4. Gleyber went to Detroit in 2025 and became an all-star (16 HR, 74 RBIs, .256). Clearly, he had something to prove.

5. Wherever Jazz goes, he'll be bent upon showing up the Yankees. They have given him the wake-up wedgie that he needed. 

6. Right now, the Yankee 2B position looks like Anthony Volpe or Jose Caballero. 

7. One top free agent, 2B Brandon Lowe (35 HR, 96 RBI, .260) might be their guy. (He'll be 32.) 

8.  Increasingly, there is talk about 3B Teruaki Sato, the 2026 Triple Crown winner in Japan. 

9. To get Sato, the Yankees must do what they haven't done in recent years: Outbid the Dodgers, Mets and/or Phillies.

10. This looks to be the last balls-to-the-wall free agency period before the Dec. 1 lockout. The Yankees - fortified by all that Apollo Investment cash - need to make a huge splash.

But but BUT... Hal is still Hal. And whomever we sign, get ready to watch Jazz outperform them in another city. When dreams die, they piss people off.

Guess HE didn't "QUALIFY" . . . .

The Caleb Durbin trade just gets worser and worser. Ten takes on Cashman's latest folly

Once again, this we know: 

Ghosts exist, flying saucers are real, money is piss, and Brian Cashman is the Yankee anti-Christ. 

Every winter, every summer - every stinking year - the unstoppable force of Cashman's hubris erodes what - once upon a time, long, long ago - could have been a successful career as Yankee GM. 

He rode high in the '90s, survived the 2004 disaster, won a ring in 2009, and now faces his 18th year of bad deals, every one of them worsened by the YES channel's cheerleading, which instantly proclaims every Cashman move as a work of genius. 

From Alex Verdugo to Michael King, from Scott Effross to Joey Gallo, from Harrison Bader to Jordan Montgomer, from - gulp - Caleb Durbin to Devin Williams... the Mulligans just keep coming. (Heliot Ramos and Henry Lalane have entered the chat.) And Durbin - a gritty, balls-to-the-wall fireplug - might turn out to be one of the worst.

Ten sighs... 

1. Three years ago, Durbin - a 5'6" Yank farmhand - tore up the Arizona Instructional League with the most stolen bases in its history.

2. Enamored with Josh Donaldson at 3B, Cashman dealt Durbin to Milwaukee for closer Devin Williams. 

3. In Milwaukee, Durbin became a finalist for NL Rookie of the Year. 

4. In NYC, Williams and Donaldson crapped their beds.

5. Last winter, the Brewers sent Durbin to Boston in a six-player deal. 

6. Sunday, Durbin won the AL Gold Glove at 3B. 

7. For Boston, Durbin - age 25 - batted .248. That's 35 points higher than Yankee 3B Ryan McMahon. He topped McMahon in every key metric.

8. Durbin's numbers are deceptive, because he endured a terrible start - (.228 in the first half, .274 in the second.) 

9. Durbin cost the Redsocks $796,000. McMahon, in the final season of a six-year contract, will cost the Yankees $16 million. 

10. This winter, Cashman will desperately seek to trade McMahon, while finding a 3B.

And the bonus kicker...  

In mid-September, Cashman waived Oswaldo Cabrera. He was quickly snapped up by the Reds.

Cody wins Gold Glove

Discuss amongst yourselves.

Also a winner: that "too small for the majors", "get rid of the little squirt" Caleb Durbin. In fact, the Red Sox had three Gold Glove winners.

Yeah, well. Whatever.

RIP Jerry Koosman.

As for Randy Levine...some people walk down the street and get called "asshole." This never happened to Pablo Picasso.

"I walk down the street, people tell me I'm stupid. OK, I get it."

The headline above is a Randy Levine quote from an article published today by Forbes.

This leads me to ask:

Q: Should we dare hope that Randy L. admitting it is the first step in fixing it?

A: No, because you can't fix stupid.

There are a few fascinating tidbits in this article:

• Levine has been the Yankees' president since 2000, making him one of the longest-serving members of the franchise's leadership. => Man, aren't we lucky?
  
  
• Levine was linked to a potential appointment as Donald Trump's chief of staff. => But, instead, we still have him.  Again, aren't we lucky?

"Levine's comments came as the Yankees continue to face questions about whether their leadership can get the franchise back to a championship."

It's certainly good to see that the Yankees' senior management is tuned in to these things.  Nothing's gonna stop us in 2027.

Oh.  Wait.

The lockout! War! Coastal flooding! Robot uprising! With everything going to Hell, should the '27 Yanks consider tanking?

Ten reasons why the '27 Yankees and their fans should phone it in. 

1. The owner's been phoning it in for years.

2. The ownership lockout will ruin 2027 anyway.

3. Under Aaron Boone, the Yankees already tank each June.

4. Tampa regularly tanks; it works for them.

5. The Brewers, Rangers, Astros, Nats, Redsocks, Royals and Cubs all have recent world championships; at various points, they tanked. 

6. Tanking would be easy; not even Cashman could mess it up.

7. Keep Rice, Schlittler, Jones and Lombard- trade everybody else - and poof! Soon, it's 2028.

8. One of these days, as impossible as it seems, the Mets will rise from constant tanking.

9. With our new draft picks and international spending money, we can load up with Dax Kilbys and Martians.

10. The 2027 winter is already lost, as NYC follows the Giants' march to the Super Bowl. 

Top (and bottom) ten Yankee organizational achievements in 2026

TOP TEN 2026 SOURCES OF YANKEE PRIDE

1. Won 93 games!

2. Runner Up in AL East!

3. Cam Schlittler!

4. Ben Rice!

5. Attendance of 3.2 million, 2nd in MLB. 

6. Escaped Jeffrey Epstein files scandal. (Thus far.)

7. Hooked Apollo Investments and banked billions. 

8. Burned full year of Giancarlo Stanton contract.

9. Beat the Redsocks.

10. Leaves fan base okay with impending lockout.

AND THE BOTTOM TEN (OUT OF 100)

91. Scored 13 runs in one inning against A's.

92. Max Schuemann!

93. Mets!

94. Never figured out Boone's post-game gestures to fans.

95. Dua Lipa attended game and ate hotdog!

96. Postponed CC Sabathia Jersey ceremonies.

97. Austin Wells broke up Rays playoff no-hitter.

98. Austin Wells showed hustle, going for three in Rays playoff game.

99. Anthony Volpe's playoff game-tying HR against Rays. (For two minutes.)

100. John Sterling spared from latest collapse.

“You’re going to be a rich f*cker. Just remember when you’re on that horses**s Yankees team, and you guys are all playing for yourself — just remember, say, ‘This is the way we used to do it.’"

Printed above in a Jumbotron font is the terrifying warning from Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy - bellowed in the champagne-soaked aftermath of the world series - to Brewers' hero Jake Bauers.

Someday, when you're unfathomably wealthy and playing for a big market team where everyone chases personal stats, you must remember this, a kiss is still a kiss, a smile is still a smile...

Sorry. Got carried away.

In this millennium, no words have more frighteningly indicted the Yankees.

Ten ugly thoughts...

1. Every Yank fan on this planet agrees with Murphy.

2.  Though the owner, the management, and the YES propaganda mill would deny it, modern Yankee teams are compilations of individual players chasing stats.

3. What else explains the fixation with home runs at the expense of fundamentals? Regardless of the situation, batters take full, ridiculous swings - because that's where the money is.

4. In recent years, the Yankees have lacked one key component: A catcher. A 3B. A soul.

5. This vacuum begins at the top, where Hal Steinbrenner perpetually settles for a contending team. That lack of urgency percolates throughout the organization.

6. Even though the Yankee s are no longer baseball's biggest money pit, to small market teams and fans, they still epitomize excessive, runaway spending.  

7. When players become indescribably rich, they're never the same.

8. In professional sports, you cannot buy hunger.

9. The Yankee culture will not change under this management, and the owner will not make changes, because he is comfortable with second place. 

10. Yankee fans, and their opinions, simply do not matter.

That's China Town, Jake.

The World Series exposed...the Yankees.

Congratulations to the Milwaukee Brewers— 

(Even if their longtime owner did manage to wreck the 1994 season, turn a blind eye to a generation of juicing, and stand there hopelessly unable to determine how to break a tie in the All-Star Game, in his wholly compromised role as commissioner. This Bud IS you, Mr. Selig.)—

—though reportedly, the Brewers' fine manager, Pat Murphy, asked Jake Bauers, the surprise hero of the postseason, if he wasn't glad he was no longer with that "selfish" Yankees team that played the game the wrong way.

This quote sounds so bizarre that I question its veracity. Among other things, Mr. Bauers stunk up the joint as a Yankee, a Mariner, an Indian, and a Ray, before turning in a .199 first year in Milwaukee.  

The shock is not that Brian Cashman let him go, but that he didn't throw $22 million at him. 

Well, good for Jake Bauers. And good for Pat Murphy. The both deserve their rings. But here are 10(?) observations on how it was the Yankees who were really exposed by this World Series.

—After an ALDS in which they kept the Yanks from so much as taking a lead for one inning, much less winning a game, the TB Rays had to grind out an ALCS against the Cleveland Guardians of Traffic, then were steamrolled by the Brewers. 

—In the Series, the Rays hit .182 with 1 home run and only 5 stolen bases in 9 attempts, and committed 3 errors. They played poorly in every aspect of the game. Their starting pitchers lasted a combined 21 1/3 innings, or fewer than 5 per start, and surrendered 13 earned runs in that time.

—There was no reason to think they would do much better. While the Rays had the best record in the American League, they were only third in total WAR, at 7.9, behind both the Red Sox (14.6) and your New York Yankees (13.8).  

—At no position, save for José Caminero at third, did the Rays field the best player at that position. In fact, save for RF, where they were second, no Ray ranked no higher than fifth in the league at any position.

—The greatest disparity between the Rays and the Yankees came in pitching, which is almost always the difference in baseball. The Yanks, boasting their best starting pitching in 25 years, and what rounded into a highly effective bullpen, were at 13.4 in pitching WAR. The Rays were merely 7th in the AL, at 1.9.

—In other words, with pitching ranked almost TEN TIMES better than Tampa Bay's, the Yankees could not get closer than within 4 1/2 games of the Rays over the regular season, or snag so much as a lead during their playoff series. I don't know if this has ever happened before in the history of baseball, but I would bet that it has not. 

—For all the talk about "selfishness" in the Yankees' clubhouse, or Cashman's magical ability to deflect the fault to Aaron Judge—"He said nice things about Verdugo!"...Tampa Bay did not display any great advantage over the Yanks in almost any statistical category, throughout the season.

—In team fielding, the Rays fielded .984, the Yanks, .983. Tampa Bay made 4 fewer errors—the Yankees pulled off 23 more double-plays. 

—In team batting the Rays led with an OPS of .728 to .720, and an OPS+ of 103-101—hardly huge differences. The Yankees actually scored more runs, 739-736, and outhomered TB, 223-169. Tampa Bay had all of 11 more steals, 164-153.

—The one big statistical difference came in clutch hitting. TB outhit the Yanks, .258-.235. Also, the Yankees were second in the AL in most strikeouts, at 1,480 and last in total hits, with 1,250. Tampa Bay, by contrast, had the fewest strikeouts in the league, at 1,145, and led all American League teams with 1,405 hits.

—In other words, here is where Cashman's disastrous insistence on playing "Three True Outcomes" baseball came clearly into play. The Rays struck out 335 fewer times, and out of those 355 at-bats, slashed 155 more hits, for an average of .463 "non-strikeout hits." (Stat patent pending.)

—Throughout the World Series, the broadcasters (and everyone else) heaped praise upon the Brewers and Rays for playing baseball "like it should be played," and rightly so. 

But it's worth pointing out that the two teams in the Series just last fall—and what were obviously the two best teams in their respective leagues in 2025, the Blue Jays and the Dodgers—hit home runs by the bushelful, belting 191 and 244, respectively, during the regular season, and combining for another 19 during their seven-game set.

—In other words, there are many ways to play winning baseball. Brian Cashman is bad at all of them. 

—It's not just that the Yankees stick rigidly with "Three True Outcomes" ball. It's that they don't know how to play that, either.  

—The key to the Yanks' failure this postseason was that they had at least five players in their starting lineups—Austin Wells, Ryan McMahon, Jazz Chisholm, Anthony Volpe, and Trent Grisham—who had no business being there, after their repeated and abject failures all season, and in the recent past.

—Remarkably, three of those players—Jazz, Volpe, and Wells—had also made critical mistakes in the infamous, Fifth Inning Fiasco of the 2024 World Series. Two of them, along with McMahon and Grisham, were on the field to make equally disastrous flubs in the first inning of the critical, Game Two of the 2026 ALDS. 

—Even more incredibly, the Yanks managed to exhaust their pinch-runners by the end of the final game in that series, put a chronically injured player who had not batted since the end of April up in the two most crucial at-bats of the season, and ended it with Trent Grisham—a player not only injured but awful—up there for the last out, in a one-run game.

The only conclusion possible from all this is that the Yankees—despite one of the greatest advantages in pitching ever seen in their league playoffs—did not even get to the ALCS not because their players were "selfish," or their clubhouse atmosphere was bad, or Aaron Judge said nice things about his teammates, or even because of the general incompetence of Aaron Boone (incompetent managers having won plenty of World Series).

It was because their general manager, Brian Cashman, made once again the same mistakes that he makes year after year, and failed to put the right players on the field—.even after their proven failures in the recent past.