Thursday, October 8, 2015

As the winter parlor games begin, and as interest continues to fall, the Yankees are staring into a long, self-inflicted quagmire

Today, Joel Sherman offers his Yankee face-lift plans for 2016. (Empty the farm system for Sonny Gray!) So does Anthony McCarron, (though it's even more depressing.) Every Yankee web site in captivity is trotting out next year's makeover, and it's reminiscent of Mike Tyson's old line: Everybody's got a plan, until they get hit in the mouth.

In this case, our sock to the jaw comes from the Yankee royal family, most notably Prince Hal "I'm Not Cheap" Steinbrenner, who has now run the Empire for most of eight years. I'm Not Cheap is hesitant to sign any more big name long-term deals and pay the luxury taxes, and - let's face it - he should know. He and brother Hank were there during the renegotiation of A-Rod's doomsday contract. Hal's the one who signed Jacoby Ellsbury to seven years, Brian McCann to five and gave Carlos Beltran a three-year deal two years after we declined to give him a two-year deal. Chew on that. In fact, every long term woe the Yankees face has one common denominator: I'm Not Cheap signed off on it.

Well, I have no 2016 Yankee makeover. It's not in me. Frankly, it's a parlor game that we fans are supposed to play in order to boost our spirits whenever the franchise kicks us in the nuts. "Hey, Yankee fans! let's think about next year!" Screw that. I won't play. It still hurts too much. We failed to give Mariano and Jeter a final post-season, and as far as I'm concerned, losing a one-game playoff is no better. It's taken three years for us to march into Big Muddy, and it may take three more to march out. Hey, fans, what should we do next year? I DON'T GIVE A SHIT.

But here's something I do believe:

If the Yankees stand pat - that is, roll into 2016 with the same tired horses who barely qualified for a glue factory this fall, we won't even make the Wild Card.

This winter, four major free agent pitchers will hit the market: David Price, Zach Grienke, Johnny Cueto and Jordan Zimmermann. Right now, the official line goes that I'm Not Cheap will pass on all four. Too expensive. (Not that he's cheap, of course.) But if the Blue Jays sign one of the above, we can forget the 2016 AL East. We'll play for a Wild Card. And if Boston signs one - as they seem prone to do - that whoosh we will feel in May is the Redsocks shooting past us, because they may have sucked this year, but they won't suck forever. Unlike the Yankees, Boston is willing to rebuild, and they have a formidable core of rising stars.

Last week, the real numbers came in for 2015. Yankee home attendance fell. They sold an average of 39,922 tickets per game... first time in I'm Not Cheap's reign that the numbers fell below 40,000. (In 2010, we averaged 46,922.) Viewership on YES also tumbled, while it rose for Mets games. Expect that trend to continue. I mean - seriously, is anyone looking forward to seeing this same tired team try again? Prince Hal still has more money than he can count. But considering his love of counting coins, we could be on the cusp of a feedback loop - that is, declining interest spurs declining revenues, which spur declining payrolls, which spur declining teams, which spur declining interest...

It's also called a quagmire.

And Sonny Gray isn't going to pitch us out of it.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

LETS MAKE IT SIMPLE HERE...LETS CUT TO THE CHASE...HAL MUST....MUST..BRING HOME AT LEAST 2 FREE AGENTS THIS OFF SEASON IN ORDER FOR US TO BE RELEVANT...(THAT'S GOING TO COST ROUGHLY $300 MILLION OR MORE)...WE NEED A PRODUCTIVE RIGHT HANDED BAT AND I BELIEVE JUSTIN UPTON IS A FREE AGENT. (I AM NOT CRAZY ABOUT HIM, HIS NUMBERS ARE NOT THAT GREAT,BUT THEY ARE GOOD). I JUST DON'T KNOW ENOUGH ABOUT HIM...CAN HE GET A HIT IN THE CLUTCH?...WILL HE STRIKE OUT OR POP UP WITH A MAN ON 3RD AND 1 OUT? JUDGING FROM HIS PRETTY LOW AVERAGE, (I THINK I SAW HE HIT .250 SOMETHING), HE SCARES ME..IS HE A GOOD FIELDER?..HOW IS HIS ARM?..I JUST DON'T KNOW..THE PROBLEM IS I BET KID CASH, AND HAL DON'T KNOW EITHER...I DON'T WANT TO GET A .250 HITTER THAT COMES TO US AND TURNS TO A .220-.230 HITTER (SEE CURTIS GRANDERSON)...AS I STATED BEFORE, I REALLY THINK MICHAEL BRANTLEY IS A WINNING PLAYER (ALTHOUGH HE IS A LEFTY HITTER), HE HIT .310 THIS YEAR (GOD HOW WE NEED THAT), AND HAS ALMOST THE SAME AMOUNT OF RBI AS UPTON...PLUS, HE MAY COME CHEAPER BECAUSE HE HAD ONLY 15 HOMERS THIS SEASON. HIS LAST 2 SEASONS HIS OBP IS .380....AS FOR THE PITCHING...STAY AWAY FROM CUETO!..HE CAME TO THE AL AND GOT SHELLED! I AM ALWAYS LEERY OF NL PITCHERS (CASHMAN IS NOT, HE LOVES THEM, BUT NEVER REALIZES THEY KILL US (SEE JAVIER VASQUEZ- TWICE!)..ALL ROADS LEAD TO DAVID PRICE...THE SOB IS GOING TO GET 200 MILLION, BUT TEAM HIM WITH SEVERINO, TANAKA AND THE REST OF OUR STAFF, NOW WE GOT SOMETHING.....GIVE REFSNYDER THE FUCKING EVERYDAY 2ND BASE JOB (THIS WILL GIVE US ANOTHER RELEVANT RIGHTY BAT-PLUS HE HAS A GOOD TRACK RECORD OF GETTING ON BASE-HE DRAWS WALKS).....OHHHH! WTF!...CASHMAN AND HAL ARE GOING TO DO THEIR OWN FUCKED UP "SPIN" ON THINGS ANYWAY..BUT DO THEY ACTUALLY HAVE THE BALLS TO DO NOTHING AND PUT THE SAME SHIT ON THE FIELD NEXT YEAR??.....CASHMAN ON THE RADIO YESTERDAY ALSO WAS SAYING HOW AFTER JUNE 1ST, STEPHEN DREW WAS "GOOD"..AS HE WAS THROWING OUT STATS LIKE OPS, AND FUCKING NONSENSE LIKE THAT...I WAS IN MY CAR LISTENING, AND I ALMOST DROVE OFF THE ROAD!!! THE SONOFABITCH WAS DEFENDING HIS PRIZED "LOW COST-5 MILLION" PICKUP!!!..CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT SPIN ON THINGS?...HE ACTUALLY WAS TRYING TO SAY HOW GOOD OR "SERVICE-ABLE" DREW WAS (I FORGOT THE EXACT WORDS HE USED, BUT THEY WERE CALCULATED AND INTELLIGENT SOUNDING)....FUCK THIS SHIT.

ceeja said...

Well they free agent position players. Not a lot available: Heyward, Upton, Cespedes, Gordon, Weiters, Davis, Span.

I'd sign Davis. He can get ABs at DH, 1B, OF, 3B.

ceeja said...

Other than Davis (and I don't see how you can say you can't find room for a guy who hits 50 homers/year), I'm not a fan of any position player signings. As for pitching, I think Price would be great. Let's hope Toronto absolutely craps out in the playoffs.

There are internal solutions. Murphy gets more ABs at C; Bird at 1B; Refsndyer/Ackley at 2B; Jagielo at 3B; Heathcott in the OF. Might as well play the kids and see if they can do it.

cabish47 said...

With the drag of the mega contracts for old, hurt, declining players, the same poor performance is guaranteed next year. A big time pitcher will make the team watchable, but does anyone think it will be more than a pretender?

Rebuild. If necessary crap the bed for three years. Let the big contracts expire. Hoard draft picks. Develop a dynasty (see 1996-2001). If that is the plan, I'll sign up for it.

Hermodorus said...

I feel like I am watching Fox News (or worse -- Tom Friedman) in the aftermath of W's Iraq invasion.

All following strawmans are courtesy of RAB (a YES subsidiary btw):

"Any time a Yankees season ends without a World Series title, the coaching staff and management will have their job security called into question. "

" The decision to bench Jacoby Ellsbury in favor of Brett Gardner in the wildcard game will be second guessed until the end of the time — or at least until people have something new to complain about.."

"The Yankees are largely distraction free — even something as serious as CC Sabathia checking in to rehab more or less blew over — "

The franchise and ownership always gets the benefit of the doubt over the righteous indignation of die-hard fans. All critical fans are equivalenced into lowest common denominator baseball-ignorant trolls.

As predicted some schlub coach will be let go (Espasada at 3rd was floated by RAB in the above "article") to atone for a few poor decisions to send runners home. The water-carrying and excuse-making is endless. Again, long-time RAB reader, but this is now where I go for the goods. Dare I be the one to ask it Axisa's BBWA membership has tarnished his yankee credentials??

"Suck.On.This" -Tom Friedman, courtesy of the Grey Lady

Anonymous said...

I GUESS WE COULD GO AFTER CESPEDES (RIGHT HANDED HITTER)...BUT HE WILL COMMAND A FORTUNE....AND I DON'T TRUST HIM EITHER.. THERE HAS TO BE A REASON WHY HE'S BEEN ON 4 TEAMS IN LIKE, 3 YEARS. HE PROBABLY DOES A "CANO IMITATION" EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE AND WON'T RUN BALLS OUT-HE'S DONE IT ALREADY WITH THE METS.....GOOD BAT THOUGH...GREAT ARM......

george said...

the yanks blew a 13 game lead.Girardi sent the same walking dead out there every day and plays stupid.For the time being we are stuck.We have carlos and tex.Hopefully we get a draft pick from tex.

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