In the cement scrawl of history, the 2025 Yankees - a team of Judge, Fried and Bellinger - led the AL East into the July 4th weekend, when Toronto clipped their wings. They fell into second place and - well - there they remain.
This year's Yankees, a veritable carbon duplicate of their predecessors, lasted in first place until last night, when a bullpen meltdown spawned one of those too-common "Out-of-Body, Shoot Me, Worst Loss of the Year" disasters, which plague and define the modern franchise.
The Yankees lost to seemingly meager Milwaukee, one of the younger and hungrier prototypes that beat the Yankees every October, if not months earlier.
Listen: May 10 is too early to count out any team, even when they step from a time machine with nary a molecule of change. Today - game time, 2:10 p.m. - we shall glimpse the Yankees' new ballroom - featuring Carlos Rodon, in some degree of restoration, as yet unknown.
But Yank fans have seen this movie before. To watch last year's lineup, virtually recreated down to the doorknob fittings, brings deja-vu, or worse... Deja-Boone.
Last night, the bullpen killed us. Of course, it did. For 17 years now, it's been the bullpen. The truth is, we never replaced Mariano - or Mike Stanton, or Ramiro Mendoza, or Jeff Nelson - none of them. We tried Joba, Houdini, Scott Proctor, Aroldis, Luke Weaver, the cast of Glee, a progression of missteps that exists to this day in the form of Cam Doval and Jeff Bird. We still cringe when the late innings come into view. I suppose we always will.
Second place. Technically, we're tied for first. And there's a lot of baseball yet to play, a lot of chances to rectify this ship. But here we are, looking up at Tampa. It sure was nice, leading the AL East. Now, what? Hola, Mr. Carlos, can you go nine?
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16 comments:
Mr Maturity
Mr Mental Toughness
Mr Mistah Man
Carloss Rodent
Is Milwaukee-Mound-Bound
Woot Woot
Someone better make a decision that Elmer Rodriguez should be our closer to fix this mess...
Our generation was spoiled by Mariano. And by actual baseball people running the team. And by Hal being in diapers, accumulating the anger that would come to fruition in the early 21st Century.
Accurate summary.
Hal may still be in diapers
Also accurate
Who sends up a .170 hitter to pinch hit? Isn't the pinch hitter supposed to be better than the guy he's pinch hitting for? I don't give a rat's ass if Grisham was 2 for 2 against that pitcher. That was then; this is now. And 2 at-bats hardly qualifies as a "sample size". That was the wrong move. Better to give Spencer Jones the chance to get his first major league hit there.
The only way to develop new players is to give them the opportunity. Last year, when Grisham was hitting his cookies, the media and the experts said Grisham should play over Jasson Dominguez. I said then that that was the wrong move. Maybe you win a couple of more games, or maybe you don't. But it wasn't going to make a rat's ass of a difference. And it didn't, in the end. All it did was cost another half season of development time for Dominguez.
Hate to pull a Christopher Columbo and say "I told you so", but here it is: I TOLD YOU SO!
HOG - you're ignoring the metrics. I'll bet you don't trust AI, either. We are just mortals. Bow down to the machine! Oh yeah, and fuck Hal, Brian, and Boone...
In a perverse way, Cashman is actually less to blame than the media "experts". After all, Cashman is not really trying to win. He's doing the financial thing. The "experts", on the other hand, really should know better because they're doing armchair General Managing. They should know how to build a winner. Instead, they follow along with what Finance Guru Cashman is doing and always applaud his every financial move as if that's what will take the Yankees to the Promised Land. Bull shit!
I don't know, Ranger. He's not a lights-out kind of guy. I don't think.
Congratulations are in order for Genius Cashman. Congratulations, you little weasel. You built another 2nd place team whilst pretending to be "championship caliber".
I would like to excoriate, whip, flog, and flagellate the media "experts". They deserve it!
Boone is an idiot. Cashman sucks. Hal couldn't care less.
And we still don't have a bullpen. Cashman's big acquisitions at last year's trade deadline were 2outof3 shit. Bednar needs maybe too much rest?
Whatever.
The same thing is happening now with Spencer Jones. Grisham gets the at-bat. Jones sits on the bench. Hey, way to go! That's why we call him Aaron Ba-Boone!
This team doesn't have the horses to beat anybody. Without Dominguez in the lineup, it's even worse. J.D. hasn't really started to hit from the left side yet. But he was hitting from the right side (surprise, surprise). Amazing how one guy can make a pretty big difference. Yeah, that's why you have to develop prospects as fast as you can.
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