And where SHOULD the Yankees be?

 

Once again, I interrupt Schadenfreude Week to riff off El Duque's lament for the 2026 season—one which we have been lamenting, as usual, since June—let's look at where the statistics say the "Run It Back" Yankees SHOULD have finished in the American League in 2026.

According to the amazing people at baseball reference, an invaluable source, that should have been the top of the world, Ma!

Overall, when it comes to Wins-Over-Replacement value (WAR), the Yankees are first in the AL, at 14.1.  A close second is another erratic, under-achieving team this year, the Boston Red Sox, at 13.9.  

Tampa Bay, the team that leads them both by a wide margin in the East Division, is at only 7.9.

Driving the Yankees statistical lead is, unsurprisingly, pitching, at 13.1, compared to 6.0 for the next highest, Guardians of Traffic. The Yanks also have a wide lead in starting pitching—10.4, over 5.5 for Detroit—and even a narrow one in relief pitching, at 2.7 to 1.9 for Chicago.

Where do the Yanks fall down?  Well, everywhere else.

Yankees non-pitchers have a WAR of 1.0, or just about average in the AL, good for 6th place. They do not have a position at which they lead the league—though remarkably, we are only 13th at catcher, above the White Sox and Angels.

But here is the failure, plain and simple. The Yanks got surprisingly, overwhelmingly good starting pitching, and even decent relief pitching. 

Brian Cashman failed to back this with a team that could hit its weight, or pay attention for many games, and a manager who had feel for the game.

What a waste.

Aaron Judge, Jaxxon Dart, and Fill In The Blank (And why it doesn't matter)

I have been a sports fan my entire life. It is my preferred mode of entertainment. I appreciate the not knowing, the not guessing, and especially the not figuring out how it ends.

Well, to be fair, we all pretty much figured out how “Running it back” was going to go. I mean they basically told us that they wouldn’t fix the major problems, we would win ninety-plus games but not the division, and that they would have to beat the Red Sox to make the “real playoffs” .

Yet, even in the above example, we still don’t “know” how it will turn out. The Yankees “could” win the World Series. They won’t. I’d be stunned if they beat the Red Sox. But they “could” win it all.

It’s a crap shoot. Well, crap anyway.

While watching the Giants last weekend, a game where they lost Jaxxon Dart, damaged Malik Nabors, lost Brian Burns, and saw Andrew (Giancarlo) Thomas limp off the field, again, a song kept playing in my head.

It was Jimi Hendrix’s “Castles Made of Sand”.  

Hendrix, while not a castle made of sand, washed into the sea too soon as well.

--

Fandom is such a strange thing. To root for a team is to end the year in disappointment. Pretty much always. For everyone. 

Only one team wins a year and then immediately struggles to repeat. Sometimes going decades in-between “Here comes Willis!” and “Knicks in Five!”  

Some teams never win at all. The Buffalo Bills went to the Super Bowl four years in a row. Four. Years. In. A. Row. From 1991-1994 Didn’t win any of them. 

The Atlanta Braves with Madux, Glavine, Smoltz  etc. won division titles 14 of 15 years and won the World Series once. 

You know who wears all those New England Patriots, “Perfect Season 19-0 Super Bowl Champions” T-Shirts? The ones they printed up for immediate sale?  

“Unused Super Bowl loser shirts are donated by the NFL to nonprofits like Good360, which distributes them to families in need worldwide.” 

Worldwide because the only people in the USA that would wear those shirts are us.  As a thumb in the eye of Boston fandom.   

--

So why do we do it?  Why do we drop $150 on a Tuesday for a ticket with the understanding that they might totally suck that day? That the players you want to see might be taking the day off. That Aaron Boone might decide to have a back-up catcher bat clean up?

Let’s face it if Aaron Boone managed the Beatles they would have kept Pete Best but had him play lead guitar and put John Lennon on drums.

What other ticket has that kind of risk?

So maybe that’s the secret.

The risk. The hope. The lack of guarantee.  Maybe we watch because there actually is a possibility. A miniscule one. That we will see something organic and amazing.

A potential 29-point comeback that looked like it was going to end in failure with our best player missing the final shot. And then a hand comes out of nowhere to tip it in.

Years of suffering erased. Overwhelming joy.  A joy that can only come from years, decades of suffering defeat.  A joy that resonates now and will resonate in nostalgia.

--

Aaron Judge. Jaxxon Dart.  Fill in the Blank. 

Their injuries don’t matter. 

If we win…  if we win without them, it becomes the stuff of legend.

If we lose it becomes yet another deposit in the bank of disappointment we call fandom and will make when we finally win that much sweeter. 

There’s a reason that Chris Chambliss's Home Run brought tears to my eyes.

For the record, right after that we got swept.

The next year Reggie hit three home runs in one game and the tears flowed yet again.

The bank was finally empty.

And then slowly filled up until 1996.  So it goes.

It’s why we watch.

After 157 games, the fate of the Yankees boils down to the frustration of what could have been

Five games left, still treading water, and nothing has changed.

We launched 2026 with concerns at catcher, shortstop, third base and centerfield. Six months later, none of the problems has been resolved. Next week, the Death Barge must face its supreme nemesis, the Redsocks, who have owned us in this Trump-dominated millennium. 

Excuse me if next week doesn't look like a replay of the last 17 Octobers, a lineup of future YES Anti-Classics, to be beamed into our homes like reruns of Glee.   

Keeping with the questionable legacy of Brian "Cooperstown" Cashman, the Yankees are once again limping to the Babadook finish line of a forgettable season. 

Is this some hallucination? PTSD? Is it an A.I. projection? Should we be counting fingers? Will we soon see a sideline report from Tilly Norwood? I always assumed The Matrix was just a movie. Was it, in fact, a glitch in The Matrix?

How else do you explain this...

Aaron Judge has a tweaked calf. WTF is it with calves? Who tweaks a calf walking to the dugout? His fractured rib rehab lasted seven games, ending when he homered. Now, should we even root for his fast return - and the 0-12 that probably comes with it?  

Giancarlo Stanton is a full-blown punch line, bordering on Louis C.K. cringe, as the Yankees publicly ponder his return as a pinch hitter. This is insane. Guy can't run, can't field, and won't have swung a live bat since April. But he might play in the postseason? That is batshit, bull-goose looney, Randall McMurphy, Cuckoos Nest nuts. 

Once again, as in Groundhog Day, we're hoping for the magical transformation of Anthony Volpe. Guy's a Kleenex that sticks to your fingers when you throw it away. They now say Volpe could play 3B. Why not? Ryan McMahon and Amed Rosario sure can't.  

George Lombard Jr. arrived as the next Jeter and has devolved into the latest Isiah Kiner-Falefa. Two months in, we still don't know what we have. 

Our bullpen is flat-out exhausted, as every Yankee victory of late seemed to require Boone to use Blackburn, Headrick and Bednar - all of whom show signs of cracking.

Back in March, we saw these problems. Clear as a bell. We just figured they could be addressed. We had Hal's inheritance. We had a farm system. We had the trade deadline. We had options, we failed, and we're supposed to celebrate Cashman's work? 

I'm sorry. I suppose we should rejoice over making the postseason. Look at the Mets. Look at the Jersey Giants and Jets. But really, who here does not look at the 2026 Yankees and see the cracks?  

Go ahead, owners. Come winter, lock us out! You'll be doing Yank fans a favor.

Game Two Thread – What Rhymes with Urinal Cake ?

09–22–26

The end is... forestalled

Yanks win 2-0, but Suzyn says it's "inevitable" that Tampa celebrates on hallowed Yankee soil. 

That's baseball, John.

Game One Thread – Uh . . . Like . . . You Know . . . Savages

With two games today, the end is near.

Lemme get this straight. Jose Caballero wants revenge. Last year, when the Rays ditched him, they hurt his feelings. He hasn't forgotten. For months now, he's been silently seething, festering, waiting for payback. Now, in this John Carpenter fog of late September, Cabby intends to bring down the jackboot of justice via his personal vendetta scrapbook? 

Sum it up?

I ask - humbly, sincerely - because it's hard to imagine anyone else still chasing the fiery clown car known as the 2026 Yankee season. In theory, the Yankees could sweep Tampa in four games and hit the final weekend like Van Morrison in The Last Waltz, (though they'd still probably more channel Neil Diamond.)  It's not gonna happen. Everybody knows it, including the Cabster. 

God bless the guy for clutching hope, but did he witness the same regular season we did?

The last six months have been a year of runners on second and third with no outs - and we don't score even a run. It's been a year when our Cy Young candidate - the worthy Cam Schlittler - has only won only 14 games. It's a year we lost Aaron Judge, gave up on the Martian, and said farewell to Giancarlo, presumably forever. 

What was the Yankee highlight of 2026?

Watching the Knicks win the NBA.

What finished second? 

Watching the Mets fall apart. 

Soon, the season will boil down to a three-game playoff against Boston. Win, and we'll hug some measure of satisfaction, even after the Dodgers are done with us. Lose and - well - 2026 goes down as one of the most frustrating seasons in recent memory. 

So, today, let's play two. And let's get this pennant race thingy over with. By the time Kimmel does his monologue, the tail of the Titanic should be disappearing under the waves. I hope Cabby gets a few hits.

This is the end. Our only friend, the end. 

See you on the other side.

Schadenfreude Week (interrupted by "Day of Rage") Resumes! Day Five: Can the Mets Rebuild???

 

 

Someone—I think it was JM—said a couple days ago that the real question was whether Steve Cohen and David Stearns could rebuild the Mets. 

That’s a very good question, because it seems to me that the Mets never stop rebuilding. 

Just look at the Steve Cohen “era.” Cohen is, let’s face it, a crooked financier who should be in jail—something that makes him practically a choirboy amongst the sorts of riff raff who own major-league clubs. A self-made man, he also has a head for business.

After the abominable Wilpon & Katz, erstwhile friends of Bernie Madoff, had run the Mets into the ground, Cohen bought the team in late 2020. Sure, he made have wanted it mostly for the casino-real estate grab he was already envisioning out at Willets Point, but he clearly wanted the team to win.

After looking it over for a year, he let Sandy Alderson bring in Buck Showalter to manage, and shelled out for Max Scherzer to join Jacob deGrom in the rotation. He had already signed up Francisco Lindor, who had an outstanding year, as did such homegrown Mets as Pete Alonso, who led the league in ribbies, Jeff McNeil, who won a batting title, Brandon Nimmo, and closer Edwin Diaz.

The rebuilt 2022 Mets took off like a rocket, going 7 games up by early August, and still holding a 1-game lead with 6 to go.

Then, as they have so often over the past 30 years, the Metsies lost three straight to the Phillies Savannah Bananas Braves, finishing tied for the division title, but only qualifying for the wild card game. Which they lost to the Padres, 2 games to 1, despite playing all 3 games at home.

Still, the future looked bright. 

Jacob deGrom chose to sign with Texas, where he did nothing for the next two years, thanks to injury. But Cohen kept spending, bringing in Justin Verlander and Kodai Senga to replace him, and David “Houdini” Robertson as a set-up man. A ground round of catcher, Francesco Alvarez, came up and hit 25 home runs.  

But everything went wrong from the start. 

Diaz, incredibly, injured himself celebrating a win in the demonic World Baseball Classic, and was lost for the season. Alonso and McNeil’s averages drooped. Age finally caught up to Scherzer and Verlander, who started only 35 games between them. The team finished 12 games under .500.

Did Steve Cohen simply “run it back,” as a certain other owner and GM we know would have done? 

No, he did not. Time for the Mets to rebuild. Again

Cohen brought in David Stearns, widely regarded as a boy genius  of baseball for rebuilding Milwaukee. Stearns promptly fired poor Buck Showalter, and brought in an unheard-of Yankees dugout coach, Carlos Mendoza, to manage.

Harsh—and undeserved—as it was to give Buck his walking papers, I thought that Mendoza quickly proved to be a terrific manager, just the sort I would have rather had than Ol’ Mushmouth. 

And it all seemed to work. After a dreadful, 24-35 start, the un-pressurized, rebuilding  2024 Mets turned on the after burners. 

Stearns replaced Scherzer and Verlander with a rebuilt Luis Severino, and Sean Manaea. Along with a revived David Peterson, they pitched splendidly. He sent a message by jettisoning a temperamental reliever after he tossed his glove into the stands.

The team made the postseason by winning a wild, critical game in Atlanta the day before the season ended, then taking a thrilling Wild Card series on a big home run by Pete Alonso off Devin Williams (something that Mr. Cashman rigorously disregarded), thrashing the Philles in the NLDS, and giving the Dodgers much more of a fight than we did, in the Championship Series.

Once again, the future seemed bright. 

I thought the Mets were all set. They now had what I was always saying the Yanks needed: a savvy owner willing to spend money and leave the rest to his cunning GM, and an astute manager.

Stearns seemed like a wizard, snatching Juan Soto from us, along with less noticed but highly useful players, such as Clay Holmes and Luis Torrens. 

Once again, the Mets took off like a house-afire. They stumbled, but still led the division at the start of August. Then they fell flat on their collective faces, going 20-31 to miss the playoffs altogether. 

Stearns immediately went to make adjustments—maybe too many adjustments—letting Alonso and Diaz walk, trading Nimmo and McNeil, bringing in Bo Bichette, Marcus Semien, and Luis Robert, Jr. , talking a lot about “preventing” runs.

You saw what happened. Yet another collapse, thanks to injuries and age. The worthy Mendoza was fired. Kodai Senga’s famous “ghost pitch” was thoroughly exorcised. Alvarez missed yet another half-season with injuries. Stearns brought in his puzzling favorite of a closer, Devin Williams…who also, fortunately for the Mets, missed half the season with injuries.

By the trading deadline, the last-place Mets were…rebuilding. Again. For the third time in six years. While Steve Cohen was talking about “adding” a general manager to help club president Stearns.

So will anything change? Stay tuned!

 

 

 

 

Let us celebrate a night with no game: The last off-day of an off-year that threatens to become an off-decade.

Yank stats, last 15 days

According to one of the evil sports betting cartels - the real-life incarnation of Bond villains - the Yankees enter the final week of the 2026 season with a two (2) percent chance of winning the AL East. 

Two percent. 

Works for milk, I guess, though our batting order is more comparable to skim.  

To win the AL East, all we must do is sweep Tampa, a superior club in nearly every category, which brings to NY its usual, hateful vendetta issues, while having won eight of its last 10... 

While we rest a lost and tweakable Aaron Judge and an overworked bullpen, gasping for air.

While we rehab Jazz Chisholm and ask him to accept a platoon role at 2B, destroying his chance for a golden contract next winter.

While we try to assess what's wrong with Gerrit Cole and how to fix him, without mentioning his age. (Thirty-six.)

While we decide who in creation will play 3B and CF.

While we prepare to ask for even more from Cam Schlittler. 

It's like we're a week into Armageddon and still figuring out the musical playlist. But tonight, no game. (Unless we want to torture ourselves and watch the Jersey Gints.) 

And who the fuck is Schreiber?

 

I went to bed and we were up 4-1. I awake to the taste of pineapple, and not in my mouth.

Boone is saving guys for the three-game battle agains the Red Sox. He's been doing it for a while now, sneakily, so we didn't notice.

He had no intention to make a run at the Rays. And if we finish third behind Boston, well, who cares? Still the same playoff.

When we play Boston, he'll be saving guys for the Divisional Series against one of the .500 teams from the Central or West. Of course, they won't be very good, so he'll be saving guys for the big League Championship against Tampa. At which time, he'll be resting some of out best players and bullpen arms for the Dodgers.

We'll never get past Boston.

The Sunday Game Thread – Blessed Be Da Yank–ees

 

I SUDDENLY LOOKED UP

 ...and was horrified by what I saw on my TV screen.  

Perhaps the worst string of useless players I have ever witnessed:

Wells, Schuermann, Sanchez, Volpe, MacMahon Rosario and Caballero.  Add in a pitcher named

 Fulmer ( most common name amongst shelf-stockers in the CVS chain ), and watching a tie game ( at that moment0 was a waste of time. 

The game was lost the second I saw our starting centerfielder ( Cabby ).  And they waste the arm of Cam Schtitler for this?  When will Cashman and Boone be sent to the retirement home? 

 Yankee fans know the answer is never. 

So the Yankees will never be any better than this. 

I will watch college football any time.  Even the 84-0 game is better than watching the Yankees. 

Where's Oswaldo?

 

There are the gigantic, gobsmacking mistakes that General-Manager-for-Life Brian Cashman makes, such as refusing to even talk to stars such as Manny Machado and Bryce Harper when they wanted to come play for the Yankees, or passing up Justin Verlander for Sonny Gray or J.D. Martinez for Giancarlo Stanton, or refusing to trade Gary Sanchez for J.T. Realmuto.

But then there is the steady, running undercurrent of smaller mistakes he makes month-by-month, season-by-season, that are noticed only by the Cashman cognoscenti but which constantly, steadily undermine this team.

I'm talking about shipping Thairo Estrada to the Giants for cash, or giving up Ezequiel Duran for Joey Gallo, or trading T.J. Rumfield (now on a streak of 23 consecutive games reaching base, and about to become NL Rookie-of-the-Year) for Angel Chivili, or letting the likes of Luke Weaver, Clay Holmes, and Luis Torrens—all of whom the Yanks could have used this season—go for nothing at all.

Or DFA'ing Oswaldo Cabrera.

DFA? WTF?

In a season spent trying desperately to stand Trent Grisham up in centerfield, somehow, nobody noticed that the Yankees' infield is falling apart. 

Just in the week or so since the delirious days of the back-to-back grand-slam games, it's become pretty clear that, promising as George Lombard, Jr., is, he is not quite major-league ready. Anthony Volpe plays second better than he does shortstop—which still doesn't mean he can hit.

The Lollipop Kid, Jazz Chisholm, has managed to slide himself onto the DL after a season full of distracting hijinks (including putting our best player out for the year, while chasing a pop fly in a game that was hopelessly lost). 

Ryan McMahon could never hit and now can't field, but if he takes Hal Steinbrenner's money, he will play, no matter how badly.

So where does that leave us?

Maybe, in need of a gutty, major-league veteran, who was able to fight his way back from a horrendous injury and now seems to have become, once again, a good hitter and able to play second, third, and short???

Nah! 

Where's Oswaldo? He's in Cincinnati, where most likely he will simply become a good, useful utility player—just the sort who fills up the rosters of teams that actually win the World Series, as opposed to the fantasy superstars, the would-be Jeters that Brian Cashman is obsessed with creating in order to demonstrate his genius.

Good luck with the Reds, Oswaldo. We'll be thinking of you, sitting at home for the postseason, as this Yankees team—blessed with its best starting pitching in a generation—once again falters and fails for the lack of players who can reliably provide basic competence.

Damn you! Damn you all to hell!

Watching yesterday. 2-2 late in the game. Said to myself, "You know what? I'd rather watch college football."  

I don't watch college football. Maybe a big game and certainly not in September. 

And even then only the 4th quarters of close games. 

And only I've already read, walked, wrote for an hour, cooked, ate, called friends, checked in on the kids, watched 147 YouTube shorts... 

And only if my imagination has failed me to the point where I am beyond caring. About anything. 

The Yankees have gotten me to the point of beyond caring. The worst part is that it feels permanent. It is why a number of us here are indifferent to the idea that the games won't take place next year. 

Ownership and management, for all the reasons listed today by others have destroyed my love of the game. 

It's unfathomable but nevertheless true. 

I'd rather watch Brockport play Oneonta and I don't even know if Oneonta has a football team. 

Endless Spring

 

Unlike the movie of the same name, what your New York Yankees have now introduced us to is "Endless Spring."

Here we are, almost at the very end of the season, still playing like it's spring training.

The Yankees now have spring training—and then they have more spring training.  And more.

Yesterday, with the division at least still ostensibly on the line, we were still trying out players and lineups.

Can Michael Fulmer close?  (Uh, no.)

Can Caballero play centerfield?  (That would be a big negatory.)

Can Max Schuemann be a pinch-runner?  (I'm sorry—what?)

Meanwhile, the real questions—Can The Martian be a major-league starter?  Is Oswaldo Cabrera ready for the bigs again?  Can Spencer Jones play everyday?—are never addressed.

All so we can be "prepared" to finally start playing hard in a postseason...which our GM says is just a crapshoot.  ("Uh, I never actually said that...")

Crazy.  The Yankees are the best team that never got out of spring training.

As the Yankees stumble toward another finish line, lifetimes of fan loyalty begin to fade

It's almost over... 

Soon, they will not hurt us anymore. 

No more walk-off losses. No more squandered rallies. No more runners left on third, no bullpen meltdowns , no booted grounders, no overruled pitch-call challenges. Close your eyes and shake the Magic 8-ball that holds not only existential answers but the jersey number of the great Yogi. It got late early. It's deja vu, again. It's over, because it's over.  

Soon, the mysteries of this painful season shall be revealed unto us. 

Soon, we will be locked out... and free.

You know that dead bird dangling from our neck since the era of Mickey and Roger? The naive childhood trust we placed in the Yankees, as the team that would never let us down? Well, what's left of it will soon be gone. 

The 2026 Yankees are not going to win the division. They almost surely won't win a world championship. You can feel their heartbeat slowing, their pulse weakening. October will bring their downfall, followed by the apocalypse - a lockout brought on by billionaires who are convinced they are not making enough money. 

After the labor dispute, which might cancel the 2027 season, baseball will never be the same. Time will run out on the game that famously has no clock. 

Last night, the Yankees lost. But honestly, who gives a shit? The season has eight games left. They might as well bring up the rotation from Scranton. They won't catch Tampa, and Boston cannot catch them. The AL East final standings are etched in concrete, if not Trump's Italian marble.  

The Yankees will finish second, a few games behind Tampa, and then play Boston in a three-game series that will define 2026. 

Take a deep breath. For the next two weeks, watch the leaves change. Enjoy the cool nights.  

The next time we see Aaron Judge swing a bat, it might be 2028, and he'll be pushing 36. 

The next time we see the Martian, he'll probably be wearing another team's uniform.

The next time we see Giancarlo might just Old-Timers Day. 

It's almost over, everybody. 

Belief, that is. 

A sincere question

WHY THE FUCK WAS CABALLERO PLAYING CENTER FIELD?

Sometimes, as much as I know he's a total idiot, Boone amazes even me.

And Bednar hadn't pitched since Wednesday. Fucking Fulmer? Really?

The guy doesn't seem to mind losing. He ensures it, time after time.

I GIVE A SCHLITT ! LET'S GO CAM !!!!

 

Schadenfreude Week! Day 4: How they stack up, by the numbers.

 

No Judge? No chance in 2026?

Never mind. Remember our municipal slogan: It could always be worse!

Here are how the Yankees and Mets match-up, by the numbers (and just to be fair, I have also included the Yankees numbers since the start of the 1962 season, when the Mets also began):

World Series Wins

Mets:  2

Yankees: 27

 Since 1962: 8

Pennants

Mets:  5

Yankees:  41

 Since 1962: 15

First-Place Finishes

Mets:  6

Yankees: 50

 Since 1962: 24

Playoff Appearances

Mets:  11

Yankees:  61

 Since 1962: 35

Most Wins in a Season, Including Postseason

Mets:  116 (1986)

Yankees:  125 (1998)

Most Wins in a Regular Season

Mets:  108 (1986)

Yankees:  114 (1998)

100+ Wins

Mets:  4

Yankees:  21

 Since 1962: 11

90+ Wins

Mets:  12

Yankees:  78

 Since 1962: 34*

*Assuming the Yanks will win one more this year.

Winning Seasons

Mets:  28

Yankees:  103

  Since 1962: 56

Last-Place Finishes

Mets:  14

Yankees:  4

 Since 1962: 2

100-Loss Seasons

Mets:  6

Yankees:  2

 Since 1962: 0

90-Loss Seasons

Mets:  19

Yankees:   4

 Since 1962: 2

Seasons Leading in Team Home Runs

Mets:  4

Yankees:  46

 Since 1962: 11

Seasons Leading in Team ERA

Mets:  3

Yankees:  25*

 Since 1962: 8

*Yankees pre-1962 total is probably hire; appeal is underway now.

MVP Awards

Mets:  0 (Oldest franchise never to have had an MVP award)

Yankees:  14 players, 25 awards*

 Since 1962:  6 players, 9 awards

*Number before 1962 would undoubtedly have been higher, save for years there were no MVP awards, or there were different rules, such as not allowing repeat winners.

Cy Young Awards

Mets:  4 players, 7 awards*

Yankees:  5 players, 5 awards+

 Since 1962:  4 players, 4 awards

*Hey, the Mets had to win something, didn't they?

+Only 1 total Cy Young was awarded to both leagues, preventing Whitey Ford from winning the 1963 AL award.  The bastards.

Individuals Home Run Champions

Mets:  1 (Pete Alonso)

Yankees:  14 players, 31 championships

 Since 1962:  6 players, 9 championships

Individual Batting Champions

Mets:  2 players, 2 championships

Yankees:  10 players, 11 championships

 Since 1962:  5 players, 5 championships

ERA Champions:

Mets:  4 players, 7 championships

Yankees:  9 players, 10 championships

 Since 1962: 4 players, 4 championships

One-Pitcher No-Hitters:

Mets:  1*

Yankees:  12 pitchers, 13 no-hitters, including 4 perfect games

 Since 1962:  4 no-hitters, including 3 perfect games

*Mets' no-hitter actually included a hit, by Carlos Beltran.

Times No-Hit By a Single Pitcher

Mets:  8

Yankees:  7

 Since 1962:  0 (Last time Yankees were no-hit by a single pitcher was by Hoyt Wilhelm, in 1958)

All-Time Highest Seasonal Attendance

Mets:  4,042,045 (2008)

Yankees:  4,298,655 (2008)

Times Leading Their League in Attendance

Mets:  6*

Yankees:  61+

 Since 1962: 28

*In fairness, the Yankees don't play in the same league as the Los Angeles Dodgers.

+In fairness, the Mets don't play in the same league as the New York Yankees.

Times Leading New York in Attendance, Since 1962

Mets:  21 (1964-1975, 1984-1992)

Yankees:  43 (no attendance in 2020)

Feel better?

\

 

 

 

Are we back to searching for meaning in a meaningless universe?

In case you went to bed... 

Last night in Arizona, the Death Barge scored five in the 1st and coasted to a 9-2 win - homers by Ben Rice and George Jr. - while the YES barkers reminisced about 2001. You missed zip. The game didn't matter. It could have been the Arizona Fall Instructional League, featuring Dax Kilby, or a spring training nothingburger.

The Yankees' postseason fate - a three-game series vs Boston - is encased in carbonite. And it looks as though we'll do it without a fully healed Aaron Judge, who has caught Giancarlo Golden Calf Condition, which gives us a chance of survival roughly akin to that of the Kennedy Center.  

Surely, by now, you've heard: Judge tweaked a stem and has gone onto the 10-day IL, which means he might make the final weekend against Baltimore. But which Judge will we see? The Hall of Fame captain or the rusty, potential 0-for-13?  

Dear God. After six months of wrangling, 2026 will boil down to three games against Boston, either with Judge flailing at balls in the dirt or Heliot Ramos launching his signature DP grounders? How does this end without us measuring bridges and - gulp - rooting for the Jersey Giants?  

For six months, the Yankees have been unable to find a lineup. Every week, every night, Boone has mixed and matched, a platoon garage sale, with so many permutations that it's almost not worth the currency of caring.  

Wanna know what'll happen? Whatever goes down in game one, Boone will run out a completely different lineup on the second night. If Jazz is hot, it won't matter; next night will be Volpe. Same at 3B. Maybe SS, too, where every ball to Lombard has become an adventure.

Our hope, of course, is pitching. We'll have to shut them down. But it's hard to do when one mistake - one HR ball - puts your team into a bottomless hole. 

Damn. I don't know when I've felt so hopeless about this team. Losing Judge will do that. I always thought he'd be back. Now... who knows? And if next year is a lockout, we may never see his greatness again. 

Damn. I never thought the Yankees could fall so easily. But we watched Food Stamps Hal sit out last winter and congratulate himself all summer. He could have signed Alex Bregman, and our 3B woes would be gone. He could have signed a catcher. Instead, he drew an arbitrary line in the payroll, and though we didn't know it, our fate was sealed. For six months, we've been staggering toward this wild card destiny, this runner-up certainty and - honestly? - a part of me now just wants it to end. Dear God, is this hell?

Gum Dread - Sectombar 18th, 202∂, AZs √s Yankees

OHHHH – HOW YAH DOING, HAL ?

Schadenfreude Week, Day Three! Mets Retire the Number of a Player Most Famous for Taking a Called Third Strike.

So tomorrow the Mets will honor new Hall-of-Famer Carlos Beltran by retiring his number 15. Beltran, you'll recall, is most famous in Mets lore for having been called out on strikes to end the epic, 2006 National League Championship Series.

This was the bottom of the ninth, Game 7—the same game that had already seen Endy Chavez's amazing catch, in Shea Stadium. Mets loaded the bases with two outs and Beltran, their best hitter at the plate against rookie relief pitcher, Loudon Adam Wainwright, who had all of three saves in his career, and looked as shaky as a Trump lawyer out there.

Beltran let the first pitch go by for a strike, swung and missed at the second, then stood as still as the Statue of Liberty for strike three. 

The Mets are retiring his number. 

Oh, Mets.

To be sure, Carlos Beltran had some terrific years with the Mets. 

And hey, added bonus: Beltran also played a key role in another piece of fraudulent Metsian lore. When Johan Santana pitched the team's one and only, single-pitcher no-hitter, back in 2012, Beltran, then with the Cardinals, in fact hit a double down the line. One that kicked up chalk.

In those pre-replay days, it was allowed to stand. 

But I metsgress.

It's all but impossible to imagine the Yanks retiring the number of somebody whose biggest moment was taking a called third strike. Right down the middle. With the bases loaded. With two out. In the bottom of the ninth inning. To decide the seventh game of a league championship series.

But then, a lot of the Mets' retired numbers are, well, just plain weird. In part, this is due to the fact that the team just started play...64 years ago. In part, it's because...Mets.

Consider:

David Wright (#5)—Perfectly admirable player and captain. Made one World Series—in which he allowed Royals to score tying run in 9th inning of clinching game by reading the play wrong, and cutting in front of his shortstop to field a groundball.

Gil Hodges (#14)—Managed Mets to miracle World Series win, but played only 65 games for the team, after Hall-of-Fame career in Brooklyn.

Dwight Gooden (#16)—Great pitcher in his prime, and a tragic story. Won 1 World Series with the Mets—and 2 with the Yankees.

Keith Hernandez (#17)—Captain, star, beloved announcer and Seinfeld guest. Won MVP...with the Cardinals.

Darryl Strawberry (#18)—Great hitter in his prime, and a tragic/triumphant story. Won 1 World Series with the Mets—and 4 with the Yankees.

Willie Mays (#24)—A god—with the Giants. Nice send off from the Mets, but he had little left.

Mike Piazza (#31)—Juicer. Never won a World Series with anybody.

Casey Stengel (#37)—Excellent ballplayer with Dodgers and Giants, greatest manager ever with the Yankees. Amusing ornament with Mets.

Talk about your reflected glory. Fun fact: Of all the Mets' retired player/manager numbers, only Tom Seaver (#41) and Jerry Koosman (#36) won more World Series with the Mets than they did with another team.

The Mets are not only retiring Beltran's number this weekend, they have also produced a documentary tribute to the man, one they play repeatedly on SNY.  

In the doc, Beltran comes off as the Edith Piaf of baseball, saying repeatedly how he regrets nothing. 

Not the called third strike. 

Not his deep involvement in the Houston Astros cheating scandal that cost him a chance to become the Mets' manager.

(Has any other team ever retired the number of a player who was kept from becoming their manager because of a cheating scandal?)

He did clear up one thing for me, though, which was that he did not come to the Yankees as a free agent in 2005, because he had the deepest respect for Bernie Williams, and did not want to push him out of centerfield. While this sounds like just another Beltran excuse, it is confirmed by Bernie himself, in the same documentary.

Don't get me wrong. I love Bernie Williams with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns. But Bernie was already in decline—and already being pushed out the door by Cashman. 

Geez Louise, Bern, you couldn't have said to Beltran, 'Great, man! Come play center, and I'll move over to left.'?

No?

Maybe it's just as well. How else could Cashie bring Beltran in—twice!—after he was past his prime. But that's our Brian.

Everybody sing now:

Non, rien de rien

Non, je ne regrette rien..

Across the Yankiverse, there are several "Aarons" and multiple "Bobby's," but there will only be one Oswaldo.

 Call it the Curse of CarShield or just bad timing, but the Cashman Brain Trust this week DFA'ed Oswaldo Cabrera, ending the 27-year-old's time as a former future of the Yankees.

Over five years, Oswaldo - a rare Yankee bencher to achieve first-name status - played every defensive position but catcher. In his career, he batted .232 with 20 HRs, but his beacon smile long ago won over MLB's toughest crowd. 

To the Yankee scouting machinery, he never recovered from last year's gruesome broken ankle, the result of a hard slide at home in the 9th inning of a tie-game. While teammates winced, Oswaldo asked if was called safe? (He was, and he beamed, while being carted off.) 

And now he's gone, like so many others whose time with the Yankees began with unlimited hope and ended with empty questions of what could have been. We all know their names. Clint Frazier. Estevan Florial. Slade Heathcott... The list goes on, and it's painful. 

They arrived with the gleeful promise of youth. They left, still in their 20s, desperately seeking to salvage their dreams. Even now, seeing their names, I wish for them the best. Is Clint still doing the podcast? Is Estevan in Japan. Is Slade flying planes? There was a time when, in need of something - anything - hopeful, I foresaw them hitting 30 HRs or winning a batting title. Their grand futures would lift me from the pit. 

But Oswaldo was special. No matter what happened, he never seemed to lose hope. Before the broken ankle, he seemed on course to take over 3B. After the injury, they traded for Ryan McMahon, ending Oswaldo's path. But his smile never wilted, even when the Yankees sent him to Scranton for what would become nearly the entire 2026 season. (He played three games with Yankees this year, going 0-9.) 

I don't think Oswaldo is done. He's had a good year in Scranton - 19 HRs, .288. Hopefully, he will hook up with a team that is not Boston, Tampa, Toronto or the Mets. Others have salvaged their careers. Oswald Peraza. Thairo Estrada. Miguel Andujar. It ain't over 'till it's over. 

Considering the wave of prospects who came and went, it's worth asking why Oswaldo became so popular. He even teamed with J.C. Escarra for a hokey car insurance commercial. Why would such a company invest in such minor players? I think it's simple. It was the honest smile. Oswaldo was the kid who wakes up Christmas morning, finds shit under the tree and yells, "There must be a pony." 

This week, the Mets suffered an iconic embarrassment, when their home crowd wildly cheered a home run by Pete Alonso, their former slugger. 

I can imagine Yankee fans doing the same with Oswaldo, maybe next year. If he comes up, if he smiles to the crowd - well - who would root against him?  

Schadenfreude Week, Day Two! "A billion dollars worth of Mets out there and none of them could pick it up."

It's sure to become a classic: Caustic Kevin Brown, somehow an MLB baseball color man, remarking on how three top Mets—Juan Soto, Francesco Lindor, and Bo Bichette—let a pop fly drop between them for a double last night.

One could, of course, say something similar to Caustic Kev. You know, maybe along the lines of:

"$15.7 million and you couldn't get past the second inning in two starts against Boston in the 2004 ALCS."

Or:

"$15.7 million and you couldn't win a playoff game where the Yanks scored 19 runs."

Or:

"$15.7 million and you couldn't keep yourself from slamming your hand into a wall."

No, I'm still not over it.

The Mets, of course, are just phoning in at the end of yet another, weirdly lost season. The Billion-Dollar Bumble completed a three-game sweep at the hands of the Orioles in which they were thoroughly punked. But it didn't really mean much.

The bigger questions involve the three featured stars.  

Francesco Lindor has been a good shortstop and given the Mets four good-to-excellent years at the plate (out of 6). He has been injured and bad this year, though. At almost 33, he looks to be in decline—and has 5 years left on his contract. (More on that, later in Schadenfreude Week.)  

Still would've been better than Volpe, though.

Bo Bichette, who is 28, got off to an awful start. He's been better in the second half, but still a poor season. (He can opt out after this season, but as he's due to make $42 M in 2027 AND 2028, he won't. More on that, later in Schadenfreude Week.)

Which leaves Juan Soto.

I know that many of you are now breathing a sigh of relief over the fact that we did NOT re-sign Soto. 

He is an erratic fielder, to be sure, and he has missed a bunch of games with injuries this year. Jane Leavy, who also knows a lot about baseball, wrote in Make Me Commissioner! that she was shocked to see that much money go to a guy she expects to be a DH in a few years.

And it is a lot of money—a helluva lot of money, even by the standards of professional sports these days. At least $661 mill and maybe more still owed on his contract, over the next 13 seasons. That's a crazy commitment.

Buuuutt...

I still think the Yanks were fools to let him go.

The Yankees have plenty of guys who get injured all the time, play an erratic game in the field, and are owed too much money.  (And Steve Cohen can afford it.  So can ol' Food Stamps.)

Just as Aaron Judge isn't the problem with the Yankees, Juan Soto isn't the problem with the Mets.

We didn't hear much about it because the team was so lousy, but in 2025 Soto finished 3rd in the NL MVP voting, and nearly had a 40-40 season (a real one, Jazz), with 43 HRs, and a league-leading 38 stolen bases.

This year, he's only played in 101 games, but he still has 25 homers and a .907 OPS.

Think we couldn't use that? From a lefty, in the Stadium?

Erratic as he is in the field, Soto's led the league in putouts for a corner outfielder 5 times in his career, and has repeatedly been in the top 10 for assists.  He has 104 stolen bases in just 134 attempts.

And yes, he IS a generational hitter. 

Lifetime .945 OPS. He is an on-base machine, with a .415 OBP that is currently tops among all active players. He already has 386 home runs.

His command of the strike zone is unmatched. You can see how uneasy umps are about calling a strike when he doesn't swing. 

Also—and this is not to be underrated on the current, semi-engaged Yankees—he's locked in on every at-bat, every time, even in all the useless games the Mets play.

His clutchness sparkles in October. He is a terrific postseason player, with 11 homers in 43 games, and a .927 OPS. In two World Series, he has 4 homers, a .326 BA, and a 1.147 OPS. 

Cashman, in a true small-franchise move, gave up four young pitchers and Higgy to get him for just one year, hoping the Yanks could win it all, and we would wave him a fond farewell in our ecstasy. 

Hey, it almost worked. But it was fraud, of course—and the Yanks should've done everything they could to keep this lefty juggernaut hitting before or after Judge for the last few, productive years of his career. Then he should see about getting another righty slugger, because Juan Soto—still jus 27—will be around for a loooong time.

Instead, we'll no doubt get the next Caustic Kev. Whoopee. 

By the time we get to Phoenix, they'll be rising. They'll find the note left hanging on their door. They'll laugh when they read the part that says we're leaving, cause we left that team so many times before.

Yesterday, it was nice to have the reactive Joe Girardi in the bullshit booth, positing in real time to Michael Kay that something in the Yankiverse appeared to be horribly askew.  

It happened in the 6th, when Aaron Judge didn't come to bat with two runners on base. Judge had fanned in his previous two at-bats, but nobody cared. He's Aaron Fukkin Judge, and this was Minneapolis, the Yankees' City of Perpetual Rebirth. Judge had homered the night before, and surely, another was coming. 

Then, instead of Judge - whose statistical doppelgangers include Hall of Famers Ralph Kiner and Willie McCovey - out popped Heliot Ramos, he of 55 career HRs, a recurring mathematical incarnation of Darryl Motley. You remember the Mot-Man, right? In essence, that's who we have to replace Judge.

"Very concerning," said Girardi the prophet. "Very much concerning. "

At that point, everybody in the world - except maybe MBS, the Saudi crown prince, who has other worries, such as the sound of approaching machine guns - collectively feared that Judge's recently fractured rib had begun to bark. If so, 2026 was probably lost.  

With Judge hitting, the Yankee lineup only blinks with Austin Wells and Ryan McMahon. 

Without him, they're the 1983 Runner-Up Royals, home to Motley, Don Slaught and Buddy Banancalana. They are a team a few games above .500 in a league where mediocrity makes the postseason. It's a terrifying difference.

The Yankees don't play today. (Thank you, scheduling gods.) They'll fly to Arizona, where the D-Backs - 7 games above .500 - probably won't reach the NL postseason. Judge's problem - if the Yankees can be believed - is right leg "tightness." If it's a muscle issue, the Sonoran Desert could be a good fit. The entire city of Phoenix is a sauna - weekend highs at 98, overnight lows in the upper-70s - a far cry from wool-socks-and-Carhartts Minnesota. 

Suddenly, the AL East race looks like a joke. Let's stop kidding ourselves:  The Yankees won't sweep Tampa. They're more likely to get swept. And Boston has accepted its three-game blood match, which will pit Cam Schlitter against Garret Crochet. In that game, every run will contain the consequences of a point in soccer. Two runs will make a game feel out of reach.

So, we can watch Friday night knowing that nothing matters, aside from the heat pad on Judge's leg. Today, that's the state of the Yankees. Very concerning, says the prophet. Where's Glenn Campbell? 

WIN GAME – GAME THREAD – º9/1∂/2∂ – "Rocky Rodons"

 

 

Schadenfreude Week Is Here! Day One: A Tale of Two Sluggers.

Picking up off El Duque's excellent post yesterday, I think it's high time we added "Schadenfreude Week" to New York's various "Fleet Week," "Restaurant Week," "Broadway Week," and "Library Week" extravaganzas.  

Yes, folks, it's that wonderful time in mid-September, with days and nights full of heady good weather, when we can shake off yet another lethargic, Yankees summer and dream of Octobers past. The Yanks have once again clinched a playoff spot and a winning record, and we can all wonder if maybe Brian Cashman isn't right after all that the postseason is just a crapshoot ("I, uh, didn't say that.") and we will win the whole World Series.

We won't. But at least, as our Peerless Leader points out, we can all thank the Good Lord that we weren't made Mets fans.

This week has been pure torture for our Metsian brethren (say that ten times fast), beginning with a Monday night game when, once the Polar Bear took his last swipe at a 300th home run, the fans started streaming for the exits—in a game tied 1-1 in the 8th.  

Last night, when Alonso got that 300th dinger, erasing a one-run Mets lead in the ninth against Kodai Senga, a failed starter who the Queens team is hoping to turn into their closer, Pete got a standing ovation and a curtain call—the only time I've seen anything like that since I was at the Stadium in 1982, when a returning Reggie Jackson belted a home run off no less than Ron Guidry.  

(Even Guidry later admitted that he was quietly applauding in his glove.)

The Mets went on to lose the game, remarkably, with two out in the 11th inning when A.J. Ewing, actually a terrific young outfielder, turned the wrong way and hit the centerfield wall, allowing one Coby Mayo (a lifetime .215 hitter), to belt the rarely seen, inside-the-park, standing three-run homer.

Oh, Mets.

Afterwards, the estimable crew on SNY's Sportsnite was divided over whether or not Mets fans should have given the Polar Bear his standing O. Sean Manaea, the Mets' starting pitcher on the night, seemed a little stunned afterwards, wondering—very cautiously—why it was the fans would do such a thing.

With all due respect to Sean Manaea, who lasted all of 5 1/3 innings last night, and is a 34-year-old, journeyman 84-73, 4.15 starting pitcher who has nonetheless accumulated nearly $100 million in that mediocre career, and who is actually making more than Alonso this season ($25 million to $21 million)—okay, I admit it, there's not a speck of respect for Manaea in here—this ain't State v. Tech.

Okay, college sports are now so professionalized that that's not a good analogy. This is not high school, it's not Little League. We're not root-root-rooting for the home team.

And what Mets fans did was actually a good thing: a proof that, contrary to Jerry Seinfeld's maxim, it's not just "rooting for the laundry." 

It seems like a moment ago that Pete Alonso broke Aaron Judge's record for home runs as a rookie, 53-52. Alonso was actually a year younger than Judge when he broke in, and for a while there was lots of speculation as to whether Alonso would be the greater star.

Well, that proved not to be the case. Alonso is not the all-around hitter or even the slugger that Judge is. He has never cleared a .900 OPS in a single season, much less his career. He does not steal bases, as Judge can and does, and he is a mediocre first baseman, where Judge is an outstanding outfielder. 

He strikes out less than Judge does—but also walks much less. He is much less injury-prone—despite getting hit a Mets-record 100 times with a pitch in his career—frequently playing every game on the schedule, but has not come close to winning a single MVP, as opposed to the three Judge won (and the four he deserved to win, you little cheating SOB, Altuve).

Alonso will also be 32 this December, and despite the excellent year he is having for the Orioles, it was not beyond the bounds of reason for Mets GM David Stearns—more on him, later in Schadenfreude Week—to not want to be stuck with a huge contract for Pete's declining years.

The really dick Cashman move by Stearns was letting the Polar Bear lope away, rather than getting something, anything in return. The result has been another, dismal Mets team that has not come close to replacing Alonso in the lineup, or even at first.

Yet who is the greater fool here? When Stearns was trying desperately to let Alonso walk the year before, the Yanks refused to take a one-year gamble on him—even though Steve Cohen had just stolen away Juan Soto (more on him, too, coming up in Schadenfreude Week).

Think Alonso, with his NL-leading 41 doubles, 38 homers, and 126 ribbies in 2025 just maybe would've got the Yanks to the Series again? Does a polar bear, uh, gambol on the Arctic ice?