Why We Stink: How Nepo Babies and Wealthfare Cheats Wrecked New York Sports, Part VIII.

It’s incredible how many stadiums and arenas were built around New York during that “first generation” of 1964-1984—and how quickly they were demolished. 

Yankee Stadium II, Shea Stadium, Giants Stadium, the Brendan Byrne Arena, the Nassau Coliseum—nearly all gone and forgotten now, despite the roughly $384 million dollars in public money (over $2.1 billion in today’s money), expended on them.

(All have been demolished, save for the Nassau Coliseum, the home of minor-league basketball, and the Byrne Arena, now the Izod Center, home of television rehearsal stages. But we’re still paying them off!)

But it didn't end there. We kept going, of course—on to the second generation of publicly subsidized sports stadiums. Wealthfare for all!

Charlie Dolan never did get a (wholly new) Madison Square Garden. But George Steinbrenner got a third Yankee Stadium, the Mets got Citi Field, the Nets got Barclays Center, the Islanders, the UBS Arena. 

It didn’t matter how many other needs there might be in places where these teams played. The city of Newark even paid out nearly $275 million to build the Prudential Center and bring in the Devils. Just what Newark needed—a hockey team! 

Despite this immense “second round” of subsidies—now well into the billions—public authorities neither requested nor received any concessions over how local teams would run their businesses. Prices went up—and up—and ballparks started shrinking. 

 

In 2008, the New York Yankees and the Mets drew a combined 8,340,700 fans—over 2.7 more than all three New York baseball teams had drawn at the height of their popularity, in the “Golden Age” year of 1947. 

 

Barring some completely unforeseen change in, well, everything, their attendance will never reach approach these heights again.

 

Both the Mets and the Yankees made a deliberate decision to sacrifice affordable seats available to the general public, for more luxury boxes and other restricted, elite sections. Today, Yankee Stadium’s capacity has been reduced to just 46,537 for baseball, from its all-time high of 82,000 in 1927.

In other words, almost an entire Fenway Park’s equivalent of fans had been shut out of New York’s most popular ballpark. 

What’s more, at all local, major-league sports facilities in the New York area, legal tender…is no longer legal tender. In a policy of dubious legality, the nine New York teams all insist on “cashless” transactions, which they depict as some sort of consumer-friendly service, instead of the exploitive effort to harvest fans’ data that it is.

 

For that matter, New York and New Jersey have made absolutely no effort to keep prices down on your screens away from the ballpark. Nor have our public officials ever challenged, in any way, pro sports’ new, noncompetitive arrangements, which have systematically erased the city’s market advantages.

 

While New York fans are charged prices higher than almost anywhere else on the continent, much of the money they provide is siphoned off to other cities and other teams, to ensure “competitive balance.”

Revenue sharing, luxury taxes, and salary caps leveled the playing field in all the big leagues—while individual teams were still allowed to move to new cities if they got a better offer. That is, teams were allowed to freely compete with each other…only in extorting cities for enormous payouts. 

 

With pro sports cartels sharing and sharing alike, it is possible for teams to skip back and forth around the country, bidding up the publicly subsidies for their luxury-first stadiums. (Looking at you, Oakland-Los Angeles-Oakland-Las Vegas Raiders.

 

And yet because no league has built in spending “floors” to accompany its spending “ceilings,” owners are allowed the option of not really competing at all, but simply pocketing handouts from taxpayers in other cities—whether those taxpayers ever wish to see a game or not.

Over the last few decades, New York and many other big-city markets have allowed all their sports leverage to be wiped away—in exchange for nothing, and long after their economic vitality and wealth had been fully restored, making them more desirable than ever. 

 

Even the expansion of local teams here in New York by over 100 percent from 1960 to-2007—from 4 to 9—has led to no decrease in prices, and no increased competition between teams. 

Where once the city had marvelous, cutthroat rivalries between its ballclubs, now New York is a peaceable kingdom, with no owners or players much bestirred to beat even the other team(s) in town—much less win a championship.

Runk Blog continues... Somebody's fooling himself

 Gary Sanchez... the famous Number 99.

Don't he wish? 

Runk blog continues: A split against the Angels is not a split

 

When you play a crapola team, like the Angels, without their stud best player, like the Angels, and you don't sweep a doubleheader, like what we did with the Angels yesterday, you didn't split. You splattered. 

And the Yankees spatted. I turned it on in the late innings, when we were down 8-2, no hope, crowd thinning, YES team promoting tomorrow - against the frickin Angels - a laugher, a blowout, a big ugly loogy spit splat.

The Redsock fan was snickering. He says they just handled KC, and they'll make the postseason and that, "I like our chances." That's how Redsock fans talk. He thinks they're going to splatter us in October. And why wouldn't he? 

We're one game away from being beaten in a series at home by the Angels, the frickin Angels, without their best player. If that happens, we're right back into the June freefall. I need a drink.  

Notes from the old country

I hear it is possible to win both games of a double header. Obviously, not yesterday.

It's actually amazing over here in Germland. Nobody seems to care about the Yankees. Nobody. It's astounding. I've seen a couple of guys wearing Yankees caps, but it's some kind of fashion statement. Considering the rest of their outfits, it's not a statement worth repeating.

Question: how can we not have enough starters to play a double header with a reasonable chance of winning both games? I like Warren, but he's not exactly ready for the big time. And where the hell is Ron Marinara or Maraschino or however the heck it's spelled? Is he really that bad? He started out great and now...pfft. Ghosted.

Ray Milland was a gamer. Must have had a great sense of humor to do The Man with Two Heads. He was also the bad guy on a Columbo episode. My first exposure to Milland was The Man with the X-Ray Eyes, the flick that Stang mentioned. Which was a decidedly weird movie with a really nasty ending.

His old films are almost uniformly good. He did comedy, drama, sinister bastards, romance--there wasn't much he couldn't do. Kind of like the opposite of Gleyber.

Anyway, since I'm sleeping while most of the games are being played (and missing the unfolding comments until everyone else is sleeping), I just wanted to poke my head up and say Guten Tag to y'all. As others have said, IIH is a balm and a joy in a world that generally sucks, and I miss the real-time game commentary.

Here's a photo of Ray in younger days. Bryan Ferry, eat your heart out.

LOOK! Its a Double Header !!!

 

Runk blog continues... The A's just did us a huge favor...

 They lost to the White Sox, ending Chicago's losing streak at 21.

You knew the White Sox would somehow wake up and sweep the Yankees. You know why we knew this? Because we're Yankee fans, and we were put on this earth to suffer. Oh, the pain!

Runk Blog begins... All-Time Top Ten Yankees Named After a Musical Genre

As stated above...

All time Top Ten Yankees Who Were Named after a Musical Genre

1. Jazz Chisholm.
2. Tim "Rock" Raines.
3. Enos "Country" Slaughter.
4. Umm.
5. Don't tell me, I'll think of someone.
6. Disco Danny Cater?
7. Ron Gospel Guidry?
8. take it away, readers...
9. ......
10.  ....

Two today. This sucks, because we're playing the Angles, without Yacht Rock Trout, and it's hard to sweep a daily double. 

Cracking open some Labatt's Blues, the true beer of upstate NY. In bed by 4 p.m. (Sorry, Genny, but your Cream Ale still haunts. And Utica Club never made the team photo.) 

Why We Stink: How Nepo Babies and Wealthfare Cheats Wrecked New York Sports, Part VII.

 New York, it would soon be clear, had learned all the wrong lessons from the departure of the Giants and the Dodgers. 

From the start, New York should have responded to their extortionate demands by making clear that it would challenge major-league baseball’s tenuous anti-trust exemption—baseball’s Achilles heel. The city should have openly threatened to fight baseball in the courts and in the Congress. 

New York should have threatened, too, that if the Dodgers and Giants left, the city would immediately seek to lure in two other teams to replace them—say, the promising young ballclubs in Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. 

It is hard to believe that an all-out counterattack on both these fronts would not have stopped the departure of the Giants and the Dodgers in their tracks. 

But what if, in the future, city teams threatened just to move to the suburbs, thereby hanging on to their huge, broadcast markets—something the Dodgers had briefly threatened to do?

 

City leaders should have also worked out agreements with surrounding areas in New York State, Connecticut, and New Jersey, to prevent them all from being baited into a bidding war by local teams.  Perhaps the football teams could have gone to the ’burbs—more parking lot barbecue space!—while the baseball and arena teams stayed in the city proper.

 

But they didn’t. 

 

Instead, once the Giants and Dodgers had shown that they would actually pack up and leave, New York caved, and went on caving, terrified that more such departures would convince people that the city was only a bigger Detroit, or Cleveland, or Baltimore. That it was just what Walter O’Malley and Horace Stoneham said it was: doomed.

The first concession—and in many ways the most obscene—was letting the original Pennsylvania Station, one of the greatest buildings in the history of Western architecture, be torn down so that an appallingly ugly, new Madison Square Garden could be dumped on top of it. 

 

Suburban white men couldn’t be forced to travel even 15 blocks or so through the mean streets of Manhattan! The new Garden had to be placed smack dab on top of the country’s largest commuter train station, so fans could arrive and depart as quickly as possible, with barely a glance at the greater city.

Next, the New York Football Giants ended their lease at Yankee Stadium, playing games up at the Yale Bowl, making noises about moving permanently to Connecticut, before moving to the crappy new sports complex the state of New Jersey threw up for them in the Meadowlands. 

Ten years later, the Jets joined them there, complaining about the restrooms in Shea Stadium. Encouraged, New Jersey added the Brendan Byrne Arena to the Meadowlands, to maybe lure over the Knicks and the Rangers—and started making eyes at the Yankees.

Once again, New York caved. One hundred million dollars in public money was used to build a stadium in the cratering Bronx—for CBS. In 1982, Mayor Ed Koch relieved MSG and its teams of paying property taxes—forever. (Koch would later claim he hadn’t really understood the deal. Charles Dolan sure did.) 

New Jersey would have to settle for the Nets and eventually the Devils. Long Island got into the act, building the Nassau Coliseum for the Islanders, and trying to claw back the Nets. Meanwhile, Charlie Dolan decided that no taxes forever was not good enough, and tried to see what he could do to sweeten the deal, by getting New York to build him a new Garden, just over 20 years after the last one had gone up.

Where would it end?

 

Long after New York City revived—its population and wealth swelling once more, interrupted only temporarily by the blip of Covid; thirty years of growth that have again made it the wealthiest city in the world—it still goes hat-in-hand to its major-league teams, all but begging them to remain.

Spoiler alert:  they ain’t going anywhere—sad to say.

 

An Above Average Haiku Tuesday - "Like a Good Neighbor" - Edition

 

If you're the opposing manager, why in creation would you NOT walk Aaron Judge?

To insure that our readers are keenly aware of today's presumptive reality, before going straight to the Comments Section to scream about your latest indignity, please take the following IT IS HIGH TEST OF COGNITIVE SENTIENCE. (Note: Octopuses generally ace this.)  

The following chart shows the current hitting leaders in all of baseball. Study it carefully. (If you are an octopus, let your tentacles taste and savor each number.) 

The Question: Does any one particular twosome on any one particular team stand out? (Note: I have added colors to help in formulating your answer.)

If you answered YES, two players do stand out... congratulations, Octomom! You have the timber and fiber of an authentic MLB manager. That means you could decide what to do when playing the Yankees. And, of course, we all know what that would mean: You'd walk the second guy whenever possible.

For now, that's Aaron Judge.

Today, the Interweb is full of suggestions for how the Yankee brain trust can save Judge from being continually motioned to first base with flicks of opposing managers' wrists. There, the slugger festers until the final out of the inning is recorded.   

I won't join that Suggestion Box Chorus. We can move Judge up or down, back and forth, or willy-nilly, but he won't see pitches worth hitting until one change comes about. And its name is Giancarlo. 

Until Giancarlo Stanton starts hitting - (when that will happen is anyone's guess) - Judge will stand there, as exposed as Sally Rand, without a Babadook behind him to strike fear in opposing dugouts.  

Listen: I love Austin Wells. He might just be a great catcher, a Jorge-type, who becomes a lynchpin to winning teams. But right now, he is no reason to pitch to Judge.

Listen: I think Ben Rice is an intriguing young hitter, whose discipline provides a bright future, especially if he can catch. But right now, he is no reason to pitch to Judge.

Listen: We might someday put an asterisk on the date that Jazz Chisholm became a Yankee, as the moment when the 2024 season turned in our favor. But right now, he is no reason to pitch to Judge.

Anthony Volpe? Nope. DJ LeMahieu? Too soon. The Martian? At least a month away. 

A hot Giancarlo Stanton is the reason to pitch to Judge.  And that will happen when it happens. Nothing we can do - except maybe win a few close games via pitching - will matter. Judge will get walked until the next guy is scary enough to make a difference. That next guy is Giancarlo. Right now, he's a double play ball waiting to happen. But one of these days, he will get hot. I think. 

So, get back into your water tank. And a reminder: Tomorrow night begins my annual dRUNK BLOg. Hopefully, by then, Giancarlo will be hitting. If not... as Suzyn says... "O boy." 

Why We Stink: How Nepo Babies and Wealthfare Cheats Wrecked New York Sports, Part VI.

 

So why did the Dodgers and Giants leave New York after 1957, when in fact they were making money hand over fist?

 

The reason was that, like so many sports owners of the times—like so many American of all stripes—they believed that big, old Eastern cities were doomed. 

Stoneham, O’Malley, and their surrogates had muttered quietly for years about how the neighborhoods around the Polo Grounds and Ebbets Field were “deteriorating.” They had, to be sure, seen better days. But city crime levels were only about what they are now, far from the levels they would reach in the 1970s and ’80s.

What they were really talking about—and not always so quietly—was race. They didn’t like how much more Black and Hispanic their neighborhoods and their fans were becoming.

This was the mentality that led to all sorts of teams making crazy moves in the 1950s-'70s. The Braves went from seedy, dilapidated Boston to Milwaukee (and then Atlanta); the Athletics from Philadelphia to Kansas City, then Oakland. The St. Louis Browns to Baltimore, the Senators from Washington to the Twin Cities.

The Giants did this even as an entire phalanx of outstanding Black and Hispanic players was coming up—Willie McCovey, Orlando Cepeda, Juan Marichal, Bill White, the Alou brothers (see above)—but they didn’t much care. They wanted well-off white fans, driving their cars to suburban parking lots.

“If we don’t get out of New York, we’re going to lose money and all the good cities will be gone,” Horace Stoneham told his executive board. 

He also promised that the Giants “will double our present radio and television income” in San Francisco—showing that he stilllll didn’t get how that whole broadcasting-ad-revenue-thing worked.

So they left. Robert Moses sneered publicly at their departure. And sure enough, he had his all-purpose ballpark up and running in Flushing by 1964, with a baseball and a football team to fill it.

 

But Stoneham and O’Malley had walked off with something much more valuable than their ball clubs. They had stolen a big chunk of New York’s self-confidence, and the city had internalized their lack of faith. Could it be true? Could New York really be doomed??

Mad Men.

 

Thanks to some friends and my amazing mensch of a brother-in-law, I was at the game yesterday, ensconced in the obscene, eve-of-the-Revolution Legends Suite. 

(Note on this: it is IMPOSSIBLE to order just one(1) lobster tail here. When I tried, they swept 4 on my plate. Hey, I tried, all right? And I have nothing to say about the sliced steak. Except: delicious.)

In attendance was Jon Hamm, who was incredibly friendly and obliging when it came to the continuous requests for pix and handshakes. He just seemed to be having fun hanging out, drinking beer—and rooting for the Yankees.

To our delight, he went back into the lounge when the section was cleared for "lightning warnings" during the rain delay...and waited it out, going back out when the game resumed, and staying right through DJ's walk-off.  He acted, at least, like a regular guy throughout. (Here he is taking a pic with a couple of my friends.)

The real Mad Men, as usual, were your New York Yankees.

Hey, I can't kick. It was a very entertaining game, even with the rain delay—and not even taking into account the Wall of Candy in the Legends Suite. But the whole contest was also a microcosm of everything we've gnashed our teeth and rent our garments about all season—and beyond.

It was true, as Hammer noted, that the Blue Jays played this contest as if it were the seventh game of the World Series. Yes, I would have preferred to see Judge get a few whacks at the ball. But that is their right, and in the past, we would have considered it an homage to our greatness.

The really weird part is that your New York Yankees—currently tied for first in the AL East and, at 14.2 percent, considered the second most-likely team in the majors to win the World Series, according to baseball reference (yesterday they were at 15.8 percent and the most likely, but after winning another game those computer odds dropped. Don't ask.)—did not play with any such agency or concern.

Again and again, our Napoleon of the Dugout played as if he had a 10-game lead, and the Yanks' July of Horrors was just a distant memory.

A few highlights: 

—"Seems like old times..."

Ah, it took me back to the halcyon days of 2018, watching Giancarlo fail again and again and again and again with runners on base. 

The Yanks left 13 men on base yesterday—and Cantrun personally stranded 9 of them. Through just 7 innings! A perverse part of me was hoping he would get into double digits. But no, he led off the 9th...and grounded meekly to shortstop.

Bases loaded, one out bottom of the first:  fouled out to the first baseman.

Men on second and third, two out, bottom of the third: weak groundout to first.

Bases loaded, two out, bottom of the fifth: struck out. 

Judge on second, one out, bottom of the seventh: grounded to second.

I agree with our Peerless Leader, now on leave. If Stanton can not manage so much as a flyball or a single against pitchers with ERAs in the fours and fives, he shoulda stayed in Scranton. 

—"Leave it to Gleyber."

Again, the perversity of the Yankees: acquiring a guy who actually has a lot of experience playing second...and placing him on third. Jazz actually made some nice stops on hard-hit balls and stole a key base. But he is rapidly reverting to (mediocre) form at the plate. And why penalize poor Oswaldo, who did seem to be coming around?

But no, nothing can stand in the way of playing one of Cashman pet projects—Torres—until he drags us all the way down to hell.

—Grisham.

The back-up outfielder, not the novelist. First, of course, if you're a defensive outfield replacement, you cannot make one of the worst, most inexcusable errors of the year (on the Yankees, now a growing list—and one that is once again due mostly to inexcusable inattention). 

Yet, even after that, Grishie was sent up twice, in crucial situations late in the game. No, he didn't have a bad day at the plate—for Trent Grisham: a run-scoring ground-out, a lead-off single, and a good bunt. And I don't want to see Flopsie Vertigo out there anymore than the rest of you.

But how bizarre is it that your New York Yankees are not only starting a centerfielder who is hitting .184, but don't have anyone on the bench they feel confident in pinch-hitting for him with the game on the line? This is the perfect, Cashman-Boone gold medal in Synchronized Sucking.

—Holmes.

Not his worst outing of the season—that would take some doing—but the man was about one foot and one excellent Judge catch from giving up a game-losing grand-slam to the Jays' fire plug of a catcher,  the wonderfully monikered, Alejandro Kirk. As it was, it brought in the tying run.

I'm sorry to say, Sherlock is not even dependable as a set-up man. Yes, Mark Leiter, Jr., looked terrific, and the rest of our pen performed above expectations—against Toronto's scrubeenie lineup. 

Once again, Cashie has failed to address this team's real needs, in either the off-season or down the stretch. Don't get fooled by our bashing of tomato cans this month. This is not a Yankees team with even a 14.2-percent chance of winning the World Series.

 

So, let me get this straight: Gleyber has been forgiven, and all is well?

 

An old Mad Mag satire of newspaper Personals went: "Igor, come home! You didn't fracture my skull. You just broke my jaw. All is forgiven."

That's sorta how I feel about about Gleyber Torres.

Apparently, he received a one-game penalty box for watching a HR drive hit the wall, and settling for a single. After months of sleepwalking, botching plays in the field and getting thrown out on the bases, he misses one game? One? 

It might make sense if the Yanks had nobody else, but Oswaldo Cabrera has been starting to hit, and DJ LeMahieu had just enjoyed his best outing of 2024 - and then he was benched the following game. 

So, Gleyber's "wake up call" equals LeMahieu's congrats. Huh.

Look, Gleyber's Yankee career is coming to an end. Considering the money they'll throw at Juan Soto - rightfully, I should add - it's hard to see Torres and/or Alex Verdugo returning next winter. But they can't seem to quit Gleyber. All is forgiven. He didn't fracture our skull. He just broke our jawbone.  

Other notes:

1. Last week, the brain trust decided that Giancarlo Stanton, returning from his latest tweak, didn't need a minor league rehab assignment. Okay, fine. 

However... Since returning, he is 3 for 18 - .156 - with one double. Yesterday, batting 5th, he went 0-for-5 and helped justify Toronto intentionally walking Aaron Judge thrice.

Eventually, Giancarlo will hit. (Whether he can run, that's a different story.) In the meantime, though, couldn't he have taken a collar in Scranton? 

2. Ben Rice is sinking: 5-for-33 (.152) with 11 strikeouts over the last two weeks. The guy still looks like a grinder - he takes pitches and battles every at bat, reminder of Brett Gardner. He has a future, but I wonder if it isn't as a catcher? And I worry that the Yankees, moving him to 1B and rushing him, did his future development no favors.  

3. Much is being made about Anthony Volpe re-altering his swing, going on a recent tear (.351 with 5 HRs in the last two weeks) and maybe saving his season. If it's true, fine - although it raises the question of why they meddled with his swing to begin with. 

Frankly, I think Volpe just needed a rest. Guy has played 112 games, come to bat 468 times. Heading into the all-star break, he looked gassed.  

4. Wednesday begins my annual Drunk Blog. I get together with old college buddies - key word being "old" - and we drink nonstop for five days. I'll post occasional drunken rants and hallucinations. They will be brilliant and witty. Unfortunately, they won't make sense. 

Don't worry. I know the Olympian IIHIIFIIc team of posters will protect me in the order better than the Yankees do Judge. See you on the other side.

Game Thread: It's Eli Manning Bobblehead Day!

 

It's also hot and humid as hell!

Fifty games left... and tied.

 

Today, the Yankees could bypass Baltimore - dare we ask? - once and for all in 2024? A ridiculous thought, eh? What toad have I been licking?

Clearly, whatever happens today, the race for the AL East, like that of the presidency, will go down to the final, chaotic moments of 2024 - a year and - perhaps - a baseball season that we shall remember, happily or bitterly, for the rest of our lives. 

Fifty games left. Down to the wire.

If you believe in destiny, the O's sport baseball's best ascending young catcher (Adley Rutschman) and shortstop (Gunner Henderson), plus its best prospect (Jackson Holliday.) 

The Yankees have Aaron Judge and Juan Soto. 

The O's have eight regulars with more than 10 HRs and seven with OPS totals higher than .740. (For both, Yanks 4.)

The Yankees have Aaron Judge and Juan Soto.

The O's have Corbin Burnes and Grayson Rodriguez, a combined 24-8 on the season.

The Yankees have Aaron Judge and Juan Soto.

Today, the Yankees play the worst team in the AL East, at home, with their best pitcher, throwing on extra rest. The O's face MLB's best team, in Cleveland. 

I'm not suggesting that today is a make-or-break moment in the 2024 season. That would be insane. There's 50 left to play, including a three-game series against Baltimore in the Bronx, beginning Sept. 24. 

But the Yankees have Aaron Judge and Juan Soto. 

And today could be the day. 

Game Thread ~ One Down - Two to Go !

 

Are we really doing this? After a glimpse of hope, a Yankee backslide? Ten horrifying thoughts following last night.

So, here we go again: Upholding Newton's Third Yankee Law of Motion, which states that, for each Yankee win streak, there shall be an equal and opposite crapping of the Yankee mattress. 

We win five straight and welcome Toronto - a hateful, sub .500 tanking team, whose star shall never play for us, unless he does. In game one, they score three runs before we record an out. WTF? Are we really gonna do this, go back to collapsing, as we did through most of July? 

Ten ponderings from last night:

1. Gleyber Donaldson returned! It's been a while since a Yankee stood at home plate, masturbating as his magnificent, mighty HR ball soared off into the night... then to leg-out a single, after it bounces off the wall. That's pure Jackie Donaldson, courtesy of the Gleyb. To ice this urinal cake, he later got thrown out at home. Did you know Torres leads the AL in number of times being thrown out at home? Such instincts.  

Across the Yankiverse, after the trade deadline came and went, one question arose: Why is Gleyber still here? 

So, last night, he was humiliated on YES, which showed Aaron Boone benching him, up close and practically in slow motion. It never mattered to Donaldson. Will Gleyber get the hint?  

2. Masterful work by Boonie. No sooner does DJ LeMahieu enjoy a career day, by far his most hopeful night of a sickly 2024, and he sits out the following game, never touches a bat. Pure Boone. 

There are no words.

3. So much for the Jazz Chisholm home debut: 0-for-4 with 2 Ks. We had to know he wouldn't hit 2 HRs per game. A shard of realism over a guy hitting .246. 

4. Marcus Stroman? WTF? The YESsirs spent the last three innings reminding us that Gerrit Cole feels better and Clarke Schmidt will soon throw BP. Stroman, throwing lollypops, couldn't last the 3rd. Terrible. 

5. Last winter, the Death Barge had an open lane to signing Blake Snell. The guy waited and waited, seemingly withering on the vine. On this site, we pleaded for Hal to sign the guy. We were a starter shy of winning the AL East. You could feel it. And we did nothing.

Snell had a crappy spring, prompting smirks from the brain trust. Last night, he threw a no-hitter for SF. The Giants will pay him $23.5 million this year. 

We have Stroman for $18.3 million, this year and next. For an extra $5 million - really, a drop in the bucket for a $240 million roster - we could be watching Snell return to Cy Young form. 

6. Alex Verdugo with a big 0-5 and 3 Ks. WTF? He had shown recent signs of life. Can nobody handle the pressure of leading off, of batting in front of the most damaging twosome in baseball, Soto and Judge? 

7. In Philadelphia, the bottom of our lineup consistently did damage. Last night, the 5-through-8 batters went 1-for-10.

8. Last night, down in Triple A, The Martian - Jasson Dominguez - went 0-for-4 with three Ks. Since joining Scranton on rehab, he's 4 for 18 with 7 Ks and no HRs. The Yankees are probably happy.

Why would I suggest this? Scuttlebutt says the Death Barge is playing contract chicken. If Dominguez fails to see 100 ABs at the MLB level, the Yankees will keep an extra year of contractual control over him. Thus, don't expect him until September, unless the worst thing that can happen, happens: What if he gets hot, and Verdugo reverts to sucking...) 

9. Look, no team looks unstoppable. (Aside from Cleveland, maybe.) Baltimore should be, but they're not. The other day, the O's brought up Matt Holliday's kid, the top prospect in baseball. Last night, in another loss, he went 2-for-3. He'd been a nepo baby bust this spring, then went down to Triple A and found himself. If Holliday is ready - and for real - the O's will receive a huge injection of energy. 

10. Last night, Suzyn with multiple "Oh boy"s. It is the Wilhelm Scream of sports announcers. It should go on her future plaque in Monument Park, next to The Master.

A month of canned bliss beckons. Will the Yankees answer the dinner bell?

The August schedule (teams above .500 in red)

After decades of studying the forensic science of sports juju, I cherish the need to treat opposing baseball teams with a  pretzel-postured respect. 

The last thing I'd ever do would be to label a MLB team of Olympians - (and I grimace, just typing the words) - a "tomato can."

Nope. If you think I'd ever stoop to catcalling, or caterwauling, or poo-pooing the opposition - even if they sometimes do appear in cylindrical skins of rusted tin - well - you've hit the wrong blog. Around here, we respect rival teams, knowing that the '24 Yankees can lose to anyone. Anyone. 

That said, August looks like a month of beefsteaks, of heirlooms, of Romas and plums - 30 days of fire-roasted pasta sauce - as the Death Barge plays teams that have been - well - let's say "challenged" this season. 

Beginning tonight, we play: 

The Blue Jays (50-59)
The Angels (47-62)
The Rangers (52-57)
The White Sox (27-84)
The Tigers (52-58)
The Guardians (66-42)
The Nationals (49-60)
The Rockies (40-70)
The Cardinals (56-53)

Overall, the Yankees face an August against teams who are, thus far, a combined 104 games below .500. 

Not only that, but many of these sad collections just traded their best players for puppies who might not reach the majors until September, if at all in '24. And one, in particular, just lost Mike Trout for the rest of the season. Can you guess who?  

This month, the Yankees play 26 games - only five against winning teams. (This assumes St. Louis will still be above .500 by the end of August.) Let's face it: You make hay when the sun shines. If the Yankees win, say, 18, that would be a .692 winning percentage, and it could vault them ahead of Baltimore in the AL East. (By the way, the O's will play series against Cleveland, Boston, Tampa, the Mets, Houston and the Dodgers - 21 games against above .500 teams - a far, far, fucking far tougher schedule.)

Folks, this should be our month. It needs to be our month. If we're not in first by Sept. 1, something will have gone perilously wrong. 

Any bets? 

Why We Stink: How Nepo Babies and Wealthfare Cheats Wrecked New York Sports, Part V.

You ain't fooling me. Three straight wins against the all-time losingest team in the history of sports (11,302 and counting)? Fuhgeddaboutit. Back to the wake.

The Dodgers’ and Giants’ pleas of poverty back in 1957 might have made some headway in New York—save for a single, feisty public servant.

Crusty old Emanuel Celler was nearly 70, and a little over halfway through a remarkable congressional career that last 50 years. He fought for one great cause after another in that time, proved instrumental in passing some of the most important legislation in our history, and stood up to figures ranging from FDR to Joe McCarthy. 

He was not about to back down to Walter O’Malley. 

Instead, Celler somehow got hold of all of baseball’s revenue sheets and expenses from 1947-56 (With the mysterious exception of 1951—surely a banner year for baseball in general, and New York in particular. MLB may have simply burned the accounts books for that year, they were so good).

It turned out that all three New York baseball clubs, even the stumbling Giants, had made money during this period. Most of all, it put the lie to Walter O’Malley’s contention that the Dodgers would be unable to compete without a new ballpark.

The Yankees, unsurprisingly, had made the highest profits in baseball during the postwar years. But right behind them were the Brooklyn Dodgers. Between 1946 and 1949, the Dodgers had averaged over half-a-million dollars a year in profit.  From 1952-56, that average dropped to $372,149, but it was still the highest profit margin in the major leagues.

How was this possible, particularly with the Miracle Braves of Milwaukee outdrawing the Dodgers by over 800,000 fans? 

The answer, of course, was broadcasting.  

The Dodgers, located in the largest media market in the country, had already put together a national radio network so wide that they were considered “America’s team.” With TV, they made a major-league best, $888,270 for all broadcasting rights in 1956—or over $350,000 more than their entire payroll, before a dime from gate receipts or parking, or peanut concessions was counted.  

Never mind Skiatron and its little tin box (which would go bankrupt a few years later, leaving O’Malley with $123,000 of worthless stock.).  There was this marvelous device known as commercials, ideally suited for the sport of baseball, with its pitching changes and between-inning pauses.

(The Dodgers’ black ink may have been even thicker. Roger Kahn wheedled a Dodgers’ balance sheet for 1953 that he claimed showed club profits at over $2 million that year alone—or more than 50 percent of expenditures.)

Thanks to television, New York’s teams now enjoyed an advantage unlike any they had ever known over the competition—and it was one that would only grow over the next half-century.  

Before TV and radio, it really only mattered how many people you could cram into your ballpark. A well-run, small-market team could easily compete with the biggest cities in the league—as Branch Rickey had proved year after year out in St. Louis. 

With television and radio, it was a whole new ballgame—with New York’s advantage increasing exponentially. 

Minneapolis, where Horace Stoneham first wanted to move, was just the 14^th largest metropolitan area in the country—one-tenth the size of New York. San Francisco, where he ended up, was only one-fifth the size. Even Los Angeles, where Walter O’Malley wheedled enormous concessions for himself and his team out of the city council, was a distant second in population to New York—as it remains today.

The Brooklyn Dodgers were never going to be the Washington Senators—and nobody in New York was going to build them a new stadium for free. The Braves, meanwhile, lasted all of 13 seasons in Milwaukee, before moving on to Atlanta.

Doug K on today's deal

Says Doug K...

Biden just agreed to an exchange with Russia to free Paul Whelan and the Wall Street Journal reporter. No word on who is going to Russia but I'm hopeful one of the people is Gleyber Torres.

"Wait 'til he goes 1-for-13..." Thank you, Marlins, for trashing Jazz Chisholm

Good news: Yesterday, an ex-Marlins suit took to the airwaves to complain about the newly anointed Yankee great, Jazz Chisholm Jr. 

"He’s gotten off to a good start, and that’s going to maybe give him the false sense that he’s the center of some amount of attention,” former exec David Samson told a radio show. “But wait ’til he goes 1-for-13 in New York. In Miami, it gets ignored with one camera. In New York, you’re on the back page of The Post. So be careful what you wish for.”

Damn straight. But but BUT... wanna know what I wished for? 

This.

Yep, I wished for somebody from the Marlins to trash Jazz, to call him names, to question his manhood, to claim he's overrated, and furthermore to say he never flushed the toilet, and was accused of stealing urinal cakes for no apparent reason and for wearing women's shoes.

Most of all, I hoped Miami would accuse Jazz of loafing, of not giving two shits, of being a clubhouse show poodle - because nothing seems to uncork potential in former top prospects than to be traded and trashed. In the manner of fraternity pledges everywhere, I say, "Oww! Thank you, sir, may I have another?"

Seriously, Miami, don't hold back. Say what you mean. Did Jazz not mourn tough losses? Was he full of himself? Did he mope? Did he ever jog out a grounder? Dammot, he must pay! 

The Marlins should come clean about Jazz. Because at 26, the guy has a new life, a new beginning, and whatever happened in Florida - well - I blame DeSantis. All that potential that Miami was denied, it's ours for the taking. Chisholm now has got a sweet little HR porch in right, on a contending team that's thirsty for a spark, and with three big dudes - Soto, Judge and Giancarlo - who will squish him like a bug if he starts bat-flipping like Jose Bautista. 

Look, Chisholm is a showboat. As an old school geezer, I cannot like anybody's long, masturbatory preening at home plate on a homer. But that's modern baseball. Jazz didn't invent navel gazing. What will bring things to a head is if his antics get him thrown out at second, Josh Donaldson-style, on balls that hit the wall. 

With Miami ripping him, that's less likely.  

“I know you’re excited about him because he was on the front of [MLB The Show 23 video game],” Samson went on, deliciously. “That was all [Derek] Jeter doing that. All the talk of Jeter being his idol, it was all ridiculousness. Jazz needed to be traded off this team, and the fact that he was given to the Yankees, whatever happens with the Yankees is fine. He’s not the star; he’s not the center of attention.”

Keep it up, Mr. Samson. Because, ya know what? You're right! It ain't fair. This Jazz guy, he needs to be taken down a peg. He needs to know how lucky he is to have a second chance - with the New York fucking Yankees. Have at it, sir.