Six home games left. Let John Sterling manage one.

It's been a tough year for John Sterling. A dreadful year, actually.

He missed games with various illnesses. Against Boston, he took a foul ball to the head. He had to watch a particularly gruesome Yankee team. He had to exude hope, when there was none. 

Let Sterling manage!

He's 84. Damn. All bets are off. Every win-warble could be his last. He probably won't travel for the season's final two series. He cannot go on forever. And, for better or worse, we will never see another like him.

Let Sterling manage!

This week, Arizona comes to town. Fuck them. They hate the Yankees with the heat of a billion suns (which was their recent summer, ha ha.) When they beat the Yankees in 2001 - with 9/11 still smoldering - they mockingly played "New York, New York" on the P.A. system. Never forget. The Yankees need to beat their asphalt-burned asses. Boone won't rally this team. They'll need a boost. And they will play hard for The Master.  

Let Sterling manage!

Let Suzyn coach third. Or stay in the booth. Often, she's worked with young announcers this year. Last weekend, when John missed the road trip and she stayed home for Rosh Hashanah, it was the first time in decades that neither voice held the booth. Let me repeat: They cannot go on forever. 

Let Sterling manage!

For 40 years, he's told us what he'll do. He'll move runners, base to base. He'll play "A-B-C baseball." He'll call for a bunt. He'll manage a tight game. He'll put his theories, his strategies, to the test. Once and for all, he will stare into the gaping jaws of Hell and ask the ultimate question: 

Can you, or can you not, predict baseball?  

Let Sterling manage!

Lately, we've had little reason to give a whit. For a few games, there was The Martian. We wrecked his arm. Now, we have Gerrit Cole. God help us if we wreck his arm. Frankly, there hasn't been anything else. This, however, would be a keeper. This would be a game for the ages.  

Let Sterling manage!

It's not as if the Yankees this season haven't scrambled normalcy, when it suited them. Isiah Kiner-Falefa has pitched in four games. (A 2.25 ERA, by the way)  Josh Donaldson threw an inning. They played Anthony Rizzo for six weeks despite signs of a concussion. Good grief, these September games are practically Scranton exhibitions. 

Let Sterling manage!  

The franchise recently celebrated Old Timers Day. They brought out players from the late 1990s. Everyone received a well-deserved hand. John Sterling called those championship games on the radio. He is as much a part of our memories as many of the players. We hope he'll be back next September, when - again, hopefully - the games will matter. But there are no guarantees. 

Let Sterling manage, dammit!

Behold, the MLB leaders in Exit Velo, a list dominated by Yankees. But it begs a question...

Congrats to the Yankees' Titanic Two -  Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton, who grace the Top 14 MLB hitters in exit velocity.

Clearly, when they hit a ball, it stays hut. 

But a question: 

What if, every time they don't hit a ball - that is, they strike out - the Exit Velo is entered-in as "0 mph?" 

What would happen to their 90 mph averages?

Not trying to cause trouble here. I mean, Exit Velo is a fun stat, right? It shows the real sluggers, right? Everybody loves it, right?

Just askin'... 

The lowly batting average - a forgotten stat - heralds a sad and tired time to be a Yankee fan

Might be that, with the lowly batting average, we at IIHIIFIIc are using an antiquated, flimsy measurement of each hitter's value. 

The daily parade of modern, hoity-toity stats includes the WAR, the BABIP, the wOBA, the OPS, the Exit Velo and many others - mathematical stool samples for each and every player. The numbers don't lie, (but they sure can equivocate.) 

Take a gander at the old form box score to the right - (actually, an updated version; the ancient ones didn't include BAs) - which, at least yesterday, keenly showcased the 2023 Yankee disaster. 

Four hits, two runs, a solo shot, and eight Ks. You might as well have watched a bowl of fruit. After our No. 3 batter, nobody in the starting lineup was hitting above .218. That, comrades, is what you call a tomato can. 

Yes - dented, rusted, bubbling from a greasy puncture - that's Del Monte, or Hunts, or Cento, home-peeled and fire-roasted. That's mediocrity, certified. And soon, we shall be done with it.  

 Yesterday's 3-2 loss to lowly Pittsburgh ended whatever acid flashbacks the YES team sought to sell us in the pregame show, when Michael Kay noted that the Yankees had - drum roll, please - the best record in baseball since August 28! (14-5) It was a master class in number-juggling, reminding us how stats can spin anything.

Except for the lowly batting average. Nope. A guy hitting .250 gets one hit in every four at-bats. A guy hitting below the Mendoza Line is a lost cause. And the kid hitting .211 is not - at least for now, anyway - the next Jeter. (I'm sorry, folks. He's just not there.)

After yesterday's sad and tired loss, Kay will need a new, creative stat to juice fan interest. The final two weeks will boil down to exhibition games, with playoff-bound teams facing Triple A squads and cynical tankers, such as Boston. The Yankees will fight to finish above .500, as if it matters. (Honestly, it doesn't.) 

Stats will rise and fall. But the lowly batting average will never go away. Someday - decades from now, when we are dust - crazy Yank fans will look back at 2023 and shake their heads. What a sad lineup. What a sad period, back when the Empire was crumbling. The Hal & Cashman Era. Back when nobody hit. You saw it in those batting averages. What were they doing? Just swinging for the fences? Who was the hitting coaches? How did they get to be so ineffective? What a sad and tired time.

Nothing to see here!

So, comes the announcement that Shohei Ohtani is shutting himself down for the rest of the season. 

I'm truly sorry to see this. I admire Ohtani as a ballplayer, and I think this is a sad loss to the game. What I always had trouble with was not the player but the hype. 

MLB was determined, as ever, to make us believe that we were seeing the best there ever was.

They're determined to do it still. It was bruited about yesterday on ESPN that Ohtani is the first non-pitcher to get to a 10.0 WAR for a season "in so few games."

No statistic better exemplifies the chicanery that MLB has given itself over to.

First, the stat isn't even real. Ohtani as a DH—the only non-pitching "position" he plays—has a 6.0 WAR. Only the pitching gets him up to 10.0.

But the real problem here is celebrating that "in so few games." There were 135 games, to be precise—and there won't be no more.

In his six years in the majors, Shohei Ohtani has missed an average of 28 games a season due to injuries, and has never played in the postseason. 

The same problem afflicts many of his Angels teammates. The great Mike Trout, one of the most exciting and talented players of this generation, has played as many as 140 games once, since 2016. Their teammate, Anthony Rendon, barely budges from the DL.

So it goes for the Yankees, too, of course. And the reaction of MLB...is to start a campaign for Giancarlo Cantrun to make the Hall of Fame.

The bottom line is, you're not seein' great players if you're not seein' 'em. I hope Ohtani will be back, and better than ever. But the Yankees would be fools to give him a whopping big contract after what we know now. And we're all fools to go on supporting this exercise in athlete-wrecking that is baseball today.

 

Should the Yankees have been playing Oswald Peraza at SS?

Hitting stats over the last 30 games

From Day One, it was a given: Gotham City would adore Anthony Volpe.

A local boy. Full of hustle. Big smile. Respects old ladies. Uses the right fork. Flosses. 

And don't get me wrong: I come to praise Volpe, not to bury him. To avoid death threats, let me state emphatically: I adore Anthony Volpe. 

Never - ever! - would I suggest or imply that he is not the Yankee SS of the Future, the next Jeter, the next Dent, the next whatever, because - frankly - that bar of success bounces like Lauren Boebert in her party dress. But lately, in these twilight contests of 2023, I've come to ponder the curious case of Mr. Oswald Peraza. 

Last September, in the days before Starr Insurance, t seemed a given that Peraza was the next Yankee shortstop. He hit .300 over the final month and earned his shot in the lineup. He certainly didn't need another year at Scranton, where he'd hit 19 HRs. He had proven himself. 

Then came the worst Yankee decisions of 2023 - I use the plural, because they did it repeatedly - to play Josh Donaldson at 3B. Over and over, through his injuries and slumps, the baseball brains decided that Donaldson - the cagy vet - was on the brink of breaking out and restoring his MVP luster of the previous decade. Well, it didn't happen. As we all know, Donaldson hit .142 this year, and his 10 HRs netted an incredibly meager 15 RBIs. (Now with the Brewers, as a spare part, he's 5 for 16 with a HR and 3 RBIs. He's all yours, Milwaukee.) 

Last spring, after a hot camp in Tampa, the Yankees announced that Volpe had won the SS position and would start on Volpening Day. Ever since, the Yankees have basically slept on Peraza, who faced the disillusionment of playing his third year at Scranton. (He hit .268 with 14 HRs.) 

And here's the rub: After a year-long experiment, we still don't know if Peraza is a better future SS than Volpe, who - love him as we do - simply has not hit. All year. We've waited and waited on Volpe. And yes, he has 20 HRs. But over the last 30 days, he's hitting what he's hit all year - .202. (On the year, .211.) We keep waiting for a breakout. What if this is what we've got? 

Two months from now, Yankees will have a huge decision to make. Is Gleyber Torres their long term 2B? He'll be 27, a year from free agency, coming off a fine season, and expecting a big contract. If they're going to deal Gleyber, next winter is the time to do it. 

So... what about Peraza? Is he a SS? Is he a 2B? Is he a better candidate than Volpe? Or will the Yankees go out and sign another Donaldson? Are they still sleeping on their future? In a winter of massive decisions, this might just be the biggest.

Prayers for Anthony Misiewicz, as Yanks win meaningless game

They say Anthony Misiewicz was conscious and speaking last night, and let's hope this is the rare case where the Yankees are not pooh-poohing a serious injury, because the gruesome image of that line drive to the pitcher's head will be haunting us for a long while.  

In case you missed it, a 100-mph comebacker hit Misiewicz - a 28-year-old journeyman doing mop up duty - behind his ear and caromed all the way into right field. He lay there for several minutes - our worst fears swirling in the September night - before being carted off. And throughout it, all you could think was, what a terrible fate for such a meaningless event. 

Yeah, meaningless. Last night, the Yankees won a game that nobody cared about, as the Death Barge dutifully plays out a miserable season that shall only be remembered for its disappointments. They are playing a Chex Mix of regulars, rookies and Railriders, up from Scranton, who are seeking to pad their MLB pensions. It chugged along without major problems, until last night. 

Look, I'm not blind to the situation: This is show business. The games must go on. The pennant race doesn't stop merely because the Yankees aren't in it - and haven't been for that last month. You play out the season, and if somebody gets hurt, that's why we have chiropractors, right? But in games against their fellow tomato cans - looking at you, Pirates - who and what are we supposed to root for? And why? A win over Pittsburgh? Another game above .500? Fourth place in the AL East? I'm sorry, folks, but - seriously - who cares? 

Boston has lost eight of its last 10. Say what you will about the Redsocks' quitter mentality, they are crafting a strategic tank job for their next GM. Don't be surprised if they catch Cleveland and/or San Diego, and draft next June in the top 10. Don't be surprised if they rise quickly next year in the AL East. Don't be surprised if they win another world series before we do. They play the long game. They play hardball. 

Meanwhile, the Death Barge pretends these late season games matter, and that when the Yankees win one, we're supposed to rejoice with the overwhelming excitement of a live Beetlejuice musical.

Last night, Starr Insurance won because Pittsburgh - with one out in the ninth - couldn't execute a DP grounder that should be an automatic in high school. And a guy nearly paid a dreadful price. Last night, Anthony Misiewicz was the only thing that mattered. He might be the only thing that matters for the rest of this season. Prayers...

Dust to dust: Searching for meaning in a meaningless universe

In the end, this is it: The Ledger of the Damned.

Don't bother seeking hope in this dumpster fire of stats. There is none. 

Yesterday, the Death Barge split its doubleheader, leaving it tied with Boston - each at 74-73 - for last place in the AL East.  

Over the next two weeks, the Redsocks face a tougher schedule - only one tomato can, the miserable White Sox. Meanwhile the Starr Insurers play six games against fellow Heinz containers, KC and Pitt. As Billie Joe once sang, "Wake me up, when September ends..."

Really, why kid ourselves? These games don't matter. Not a whit. Last spring, we foresaw a division crown, if not a world series. The notion of missing the postseason altogether - or falling below .500? That seemed ludicrous. The Gammonites all agreed: The Yankees ruled February and March. Then came April, games took on meaning, and everything - everything - crumbled.

Who figured:

a) That after winning the SS position in spring training, Anthony Volpe would hit .209, and that defense would turn out to be his best attribute. You know what's crazy? After 147 games, we still donno if Volpe is our SS of the future, or if we'd have been better off with Oswald Peraza. Yeah, Volpe is a fine young player - if he can build on this dreadful season. He turns 23 in April. But can he hit? We still donno. And .209 won't do it.

b) That after having The Season From Yahweh, Aaron Judge would crap the proverbial IT IS HIGH pineapple this year. Yeah, injuries took a toll. But until 2022, Judge's ever-tweakable gonads were the norm. He was always missing time. He'll finish 2023 with about 70 RBIs and a forgettable BA. In April, he turns 32 - the point where a lot of sluggers fall off the golf cart. Can he lead this team to glory? Honestly, we dunno.  

c) That Giancarlo Stanton would hit the wall. He turns 34 in November. Last night, he looked 40. Amid FOX's nonstop cavalcade of graphics, they posted a chart showing that Stanton leads MLB in exit velocity - proving forever the meaningless of that stat. Jeez, I donno what to do with Stanton. Could Artificial Intelligence supply an answer. (Of all MLB front offices, which do you think would be the first to try AI? Of course, the Yankees. Cashman is probably keyboarding stats, as we speak.) But serious, how do we get rid of Stanton. He'll be 34, a fulltime DH, a china doll, and he hits .198. We'd be better off with Meryl Streep. Nobody will take Stanton, even if we pay his salary and throw in Netflix. We are soooooo screwed. Can AI think our way out of this?

d) That the Redsocks would shitcan their GM yesterday, proving that accountability exists, at least in Boston. The FOX announcers noted that Boston has a top 5 farm system. (The Yankees rank all over the place - Baseball America at 11, ESPN at 15, MLB.com at 21, FanGraphs at 25 -not counting The Martian's elbow surgery.) For the Redsocks, last place was unacceptable. Not for us, though. We all know what will happen in the Yankee front office: Nothing. 

They say Theo Epstein is out there, chasing billionaires, looking to buy a team. Wouldn't it be karma? 

New Descriptive Term Needed

Soon, Austin Wells, and several other Yankees, will be batting below .100.

Kudos to the new hitting coach, hired by Boone. 

The "Medoza Line" became the term for batters hitting under .200.

How should we describe what Wells  (and soon others ) will be achieving? 

This is all virgin territory for baseball. 

A level of incompetence never anticipated. 

Ideas?

See? Other teams can do it. How 'bout us?

 

Red Sox ownership saw fit to part ways with their GM.  Could it be a trend?

We can only hope...

Hats off to current Yankee/Starr Insurance offensive leaders

 Yankee Batting Crown Leader

Gleyber Torres

.271

Yankee RBI Leader
Gleyber Torres
65

 Yankee Home Run Leader
Aaron Judge
31

Two games today. On the line: 4th place in the AL East, and the 13th pick next June. The Tankathon...

Also at stake, personal achievements! Aaron Judge could hit number 62 - RBIs, that is. (Fun fact: He has 58.)

Hats off to field general Aaron Boone, who has recorded his 500th victory.

The Yankee historical legacy remains intact.

As always, our news media is fully prepared.

What a beautiful day for baseball. Let's play two!

Lineup of the Dead

 The numbers in gray signify stats for the last two weeks. 

On racial integration, the Yankees' past is an embarrassment

 Today's Washington Post tells the story of Jake Powell. It's not pleasant... 

Shades of 1978: Surging Yanks pull into tie with Boston

I doubt this is what Redsock fans pictured last winter, when hotcakes tickets went on sale for the big September series at Fenway. Four games against their arch rivals, the Starr Insurance Yankees, with the AL East on the line.

Who cares if it turned out to be for last place - the final wild card berth having vanished long ago like Melania in Iowa. The pennant race is over, but the muscle memory remains. 

Close your eyes, and it's still Yanks v Redsocks, BOS v NYC, Varitek v A-Rod, Ben v J-Lo, New England v Manhattan - the war of clam chowders. And make no mistake here: Boston is tanking, looking to next year, while the Yankees race to save Cooperstown Cashman's Christmas bonus. 

But here's an idea: Let's enjoy the stress-free autumn - no heart attack losses, no PTSD meltdowns, no walk-off gut jabs - just a two-month, increasingly dank whatever... 

They cannot hurt us. They cannot ruin another morning or night. Considering the ongoing embarrassment of NY sports - the Jets and Giants? dear God, shoot me - they cannot draw blood. NY sports is why Gotham remains America's cultural and artistic center: They're so awful, so horrible, that people must find alternatives. So see a show, a concert, a lecture, an exhibition. Those men in tights and helmets... they don't matter. 

No stress. And hey, a sweep is a sweep, right?

Yesterday, in game one, with a one-run lead and only one out, Closer Clay loaded the bases on walks. So what did Redsock batter Alex "Mookie" Verdugo do? He flailed at the first pitch, grounding into a DP. It summoned forth one of The Master's longest win-warbles of 2023. I estimated 7.5 seconds, a glorious output for an 85-year-old man. Neither Biden nor Trump could have done it. For one moment, the dream survived, with John electrified by the Jeep brand.

In the postgame, Justin Shackil - pride of Wayne, NJ - dutifully outlined the wild card race, as if it mattered, while Suzyn prepped her Clubhouse Report, and Aaron Boone performed his imitation of Mitch McConnell at the MTV Awards. The Yankees are going about their business, as if nobody anybody is watching. It's sorta sad, sorta enjoyable. But they can't hurt us anymore. Hey, what's on the Turner Movie Channel tonight?  

NYY RIP

 

For decades, the Steinbrenner family has flourished thanks to the efforts of men they have done their level best to abuse and undermine.

Players, managers, general managers—right down to scouts and coaches, and a secretary who once famously brought George a sandwich he didn't like (maybe it was the spittle)—were all publicly denigrated, insulted, demoted, moved on, fired, or even blackmailed, no matter how much success they had.

So it's the greatest irony that the Steinbrenner dynasty is now about to crash because the current heir cannot bear to fire the singularly most destructive employee in Yankees history.

No doubt, Brian Cashman thinks he's dodged yet another bullet thanks to the cosmic bad luck of your New Jersey Jets. (And by the way, was Cashman seen anywhere in the vicinity of the Meadowlands last night? Just asking for a friend.)

The wailing and rending of garments over A-Rod II will no doubt draw some attention away from Cashie's latest fiasco.

But as the estimable ranger_lp summarized for us yesterday:

Yankees this year:
Played a guy with a torn ligament in his wrist for months 
Played a guy with a concussion for months 
Played a kid with a torn UCL for a week
Currently playing a guy with torn ligament in his toe 
Sent 4 pitchers to the IL with shoulder issues 

And then, of course, there is getting no-hit for 9 or more innings for the second year in a row, being nearly shutout or no-hit for weeks at a time, hitting and reaching base at levels not seen since the super-pitcher years of the late 1960s, bad fielding, awful base-running and fundamentals, the most lackadaisical Yankee player ever seen, and general zoning out 

After a while, there's just no hiding stupid. Or lazy. Or unengaged.

Is analytics a bad approach to baseball, as suggested by the now bottomless disabled lists around the leagues? Or is Brian Cashman just particularly bad at learning and applying them? At this point, I don't think the answer matters much. Hey, hey, ho, ho, Brian Cashman's got to go.

But will he? 

Almost certainly not. 

What's doubly vexing about the above list is the echoing silence of the sporting press in reaction to it.

Like many here, I can remember the days when reporters used to scuttle like waterbugs back and forth across the Yankees locker room, eager to see if they could get Reggie to diss Billy, or Billy to diss George, or George to diss anyone and everyone.

Not journalism's finest hour. But nowadays, we see what happens when a free press has been largely coopted or coerced into collusion.

Following The Martian's Crash Landing there was not so much as a murmur on SNY, New York's leading nightly sports show to suggest that maybe the Yankees' training and coaching methods could be at fault. Instead, we got more of what SNY mostly gives us: their experts' best guesses on the random bets that the gambling operations that are sports' biggest sponsors want to promote.  Content and advertising, the perfect synergy!

For that matter, some yutz featured in the MLB-sponsored content advertising on baseball reference.com decided that this week was the perfect time to start the debate on...whether or not Giancarlo Stanton should go to the Hall of Fame. The answer was yes, of course—no need to introduce anything negative into sports talk!

Meanwhile, the Paper of Record continues to wring its hands over the pressing question of whether or not women's professional soccer will ever match the NFL in popularity. (Spoiler alert: The answer is no.)

Reality's a tricky thing, though, with a tendency to come back and bite you in the ass no matter how hard you try to cover it over. 

The Steinbrenner Clan can turn all the attention they want to their real interests, such as building that soccer stadium in the Bronx that will never see the light of day, or even—in the case of George Steinbrenner IV, depicted with his crew here—moving into auto racing. They can put all the women's basketball, and running shows, and golf tips, and Michael Kay interviews they want on YES.

Nonetheless, when the newly inflated, 2024 ticket plans go on sale soon, I suspect they are in for a rude awakening.  The Yankees, after this season, will have led the AL in attendance for 17 of the last 20 seasons. 

I suspect that stops now. And I suspect with Steve Cohen quite willing to spend money and jettison people who can't perform, the Yankees will no longer be the leading baseball team in this town before very long. 

The reaction to this will be slow, and painful. We've already been all but assured that Ma Boone is coming back next year. So is The Brain, so is the whole cast of characters who cannot manage to keep even 20-year-old stars healthy and functioning.  

These moribund inheritors of untold wealth—America's greatest argument for an estate tax that is not named "Dolan"—are able to turn things around about as easily as an ocean liner in the Gowanus Canal. 

Thanks to the decisions they have already made, we are looking at years and years of losing, decrepit, BORING baseball before things even begin to change. And then the change might be for the worse.

The lights are going out all over the Bronx. They won't be lit again in our lifetimes.

Why we fight: The eternal battle against Boston's Army of Death resumes today and tonight

Imagine the expectations last winter, when the lords of baseball scheduled an epic, mid-September, four-game Yankee series at Fenway. A confrontation for the ages - the Yankees vs the Redsocks, a battle that would capture the eyes of America, if not the galaxy. 

Wars would cease. Hollywood would close. Partisan politics would end. Rivers would flow backwards. The planet would shake, turning cities to rubble. 

Instead, what's on the line is:

a. Last place in the AL East.

b. Gerrit Cole's chase for the Cy Young.

c. Estavan Florial.

e. Draft pick order.

Okay, maybe it's not the future of democracy. Maybe it's not even Depp vs Heard, or a debate between Mitch McConnell and Diane Feinstein. Maybe we shouldn't bother. Maybe we shouldn't care.

But gadammit, we do.

Today and tonight, we fight!  

Once again, we stare wide-eyed into the jaws of Hell, battling the big-spending, hate-filled Redsocks - a franchise steeped in racism, which for decades blamed its annual misery on The Curse - a supernatural, anti-American, steaming chunk of dogma, instead of its own shortcomings.

Once again, let me remind you that these are horrible, wretched, human beings - scratch that, they're lizard people - whose treasonous attempts to harm the Yankee Train of Truth (TM) are nothing less than an attack upon God. 

These monsters cloaked in hominid flesh should be probed by MLB, investigated by the government, and sentenced to lengthy terms at Gitmo, where they'd be probed further. They are enemies of the people, threats to peace and harmony, and the mere sight of their B-logoed caps represents a breakdown of morality and an affront to democracy.

Did I mention that they lie like doormats, and that everything they say - such as denying these words - only proves that these words are 200 percent true! Maybe 300 percent. Trouble is, the Redsock-leaning toadies on YES - wearers of Boston underwear - constantly provide cover for them. Did you know that the traitorous David Cone, at the end of his career, pitched for Boston?  It's true!  Yet they let this pro-Redsock puppet ramble on, spouting his Big Papi-distilled venom, to be digested by innocent, adorable Yankee fan children. 

Today and tonight, as we battle this red algae tide of New England smegma chowder, let's show them, once and for all, that we won't forgive their treachery. 

And that is why we fight. Sadly, some of the following links have withered over the years, victims of pro-Redsock bots and hackers, so you must take our word for them.

THIS IS WHY WE FIGHT...


Red Sox complicity in U.S. torture flights

They fed their own fans prison food

They're bigger racists than Joe Torre ever was

Their groundskeepers are thugs


Varitek clawed A-Rod's face, kept his own mask on

Schilling poured ketchup on his sock, called it blood

They decapitate their players when they're done with them

Big Papi had it in for Joba for no reason

They tried to freeze-out John and Suzyn.

They can't lose a game without whining about something.

Damn them. DAMN THEM ALL! 

Today and tonight, for posterity, we fight.

Yanks replace The Martian with The Scrantonian

 

Hell summons a new soul.

There Are No Words

Cashie Stardust and the Wonder from Mars

 

Oh, yeah.

 

Cashie played us all, 

Jivin' us that we were voodoo.

With our Wonder from Mars

He batted from each side,

Hit it far and wide.

Became the special man, 

And we were Jasson’s fans.

 

Cashie loved to bray,

Tellin’ us that we’d be champs soon.

That the kids were all stars,

Or even from Mars.

He had a secret plan,

And someday he’d tell us, man.

 

So where was the Martian?

While that jerk tried to break our balls?

Just the beer lights to guide us.

So he brought him to the show,

And blew out his elbow!

Oh, yeah.

Cashie played for time,

Jivin' us the Yanks were voodoo.

That the kids were for real

And he was the deal.

God, but he was an ass!

He took it all too far,

And thought that he was the star.

 

Making love with his ego,

Cashie sucked up into his mind (ah).

Like a leper messiah,

When his deals had killed the team

We had to give up the dream.

 

Oh, yeah.

 

Cashie played us all…

Jasson Dominguez, RIP, 9/10/23

A dark day to be a Yankee fan; could the 2023 Yankees have bottomed out?

By now, you know about The Martian. Everyone on Earth has heard. Last night, the phone wouldn't stop dinging. Bad news gets gas.

He tore up his chicken wing. It's a Tommy John thing. He'll be out until June, maybe longer. That means a return stint at Scranton and maybe an appearance in the Bronx after the all-star break. He might be done in CF. It's way too far off to ponder, but basically, we are screwed. Thank you, juju gods. Thank you, soooo much.

You also know about the no-hitter. Eleven innings, zilch. Some of our half-innings took less time than the commercial breaks between them. Lambs. We deserved to lose. In fact, we should have seen this coming, considering the one- and two-hit shutouts we endured in recent weeks.

So much for celebrating 1998. This is one of the saddest Yankee teams in our lifetimes - made worse by a sense that its architects will pay no price for shitting the bed. Players will change, but the ownership and front office will stay. They'll probably give themselves raises, as some hazardous duty scale. I gotta believe they get yelled at on the street. I sure would.

(Why do I think they'll stay? Here's the reasoning: Brian Cashman recently jettisoned Harrison Bader, a hometown hero, having concluded that Bader had no future Yankee role. If Cashman were NOT returning, that decision would have been left for the new GM. Hal let it go, because Cash is his man, and the money just keeps flowing, so nobody cares.)  

Today, the best reason to watch this team - Jasson Dominguez - is gone. And it's reasonable to wonder if the decision to promote him - hyping game sales, of course - contributed to his injury. Did he push himself too hard? Did he play a few games in pain? (In Saturday's disastrous 8th inning, he made a weak, rainbow throw from CF, which - in retrospect - looked like a bad omen.) 

What now? Well, a few ideas: 

1. The Yankees should replace The Martian with The Scrantonian - Estevan Florial, who homered twice yesterday at Triple A. On the season, the 25-year-old Florial has 28 HRs, 25 SBs and a .284 average. He'll probably win the International League MVP. (Fun fact: Two Yanks in recent times have won this prestigious award: Shelley Duncan, 2009, and Ben Gamel, 2016.) Florial bats LH, which is the Yankee sickness.

Frankly, it's a crime that he hasn't gotten a chance this year, especially considering the Four Seasons Landscaping of Fanners - Jake Bauers, Billy McKinney, Franchy Cordero and Willie Cahoon - that took his place. 

Yes, the knock on Florial remains his strikeouts. He swings and misses. He has fanned 144 times this year - a rate of 35.2 percent. On the Yankees, Anthony Volpe has fanned 147 times, but at a slightly lower rate (30.8%) Some other K-rates:

Bauers 39.9%
Judge 35.2%
Stanton 31.5 %
Rizzo 26.0%
LeMahiue 24.7%

(Dominguez had fanned 8 out of 31 plate appearances - 25.8%.)

Frankly, I'd like to see Florial get a shot, simply to embarrass the front office, who clearly would be rooting against him. Nothing would more distress Cashman than having to watch Florial go on a hitting tear. For that reason, I doubt the Yankees will give him the light of day. Sad, eh? 

2. We must support Gerrit Cole for the Cy Young. Right now, he leads Sonny Gray - yes, THE Sonny Gray, another Cashman embarrassment - by six wins and a sprig of ERA (2.70 to 2.98.) 

It might be fun to see Gray win it, simply for the CEF -Cashman Embarrassment Factor. Cole could sit out the last three weeks and probably win. But he won't, of course. He's a gamer, our last source of pride, and let's hope the team rallies to support him. He's 13-4. With modest help, he should be 18-2, and drawing comparisons to the all-time greats. I appreciate Aaron Judge's leadership but cannot help but wonder if Cole is the true Yankee captain. 

3. We play Boston this week. Four meaningless games. Truth be told, who cares? Let them beat their chests, as if these games matter. It's time to get excited for football. I hear the Giants look mighty good! This could be their year! 

19 to go, 8 games out

In Europe, of course, WC means toilet.

In the Yankeeverse, it means wild card. 

It's our season that's gone down the toilet.

Old Timers Day just made it painful to see how far the Yankees have fallen

Somewhere around the 8th inning yesterday, Jasson Dominguez may have realized the dark situation he and his fellow Yankee rookies have inherited:

A once-great organization, reduced to selling off its past in order to appear relevant.

As every former Yankee great marched out to take a bow, the magnitude of this season's disaster grew evermore glaring. When the game finally ended, the stadium was filled with boos, the echo of empty seats and the sour taste of David Wells' politics, spouted where nobody needed it. 

The Yankees have 20 games left in this dreadful season. I say, lose them all! It's time to tank. Restoring this roster to championship caliber will take years of development and hundreds of millions of dollars - and that's if The Martian turns out to be for real. 

Yesterday, watching him hold back on two catchable flies, you had to wonder if a) his future is in CF, and b) if stardom at age 20 will be the best thing for him? (It came out yesterday that several voices in the Yankee front office opposed bringing him up this month. Four quick HRs have spackled over shortcomings in his game. Yesterday, we caught a glimpse of those issues.)

Twenty games left. Our offense is dead. The bullpen is shot. We have one starter. Our batting leader is hitting .272. Our 2B has moments like Mitch McConnell. 

We used to be something. Now, we're just Jeter memories and Roger Maris bobbleheads. Damn, it's time to tank. 

Old Timers Day Game Thread

 Hat tip to Rufus T. Firefly

Severing with Sevy: Sir, it's over.

Dear Mr. Severino,

Ever see those AT&T commercials, starring Lily the Counter Girl? She's this Russian-born hottie - Milana Vayntrub, a 10 by any analysis - who is pillowed and padded down to a perky 6, so she can pitch phones for an evil corporation. Lily has no home life, no boyfriend, no purpose, other than to sell service plans. In one 2021 ad, her Hamlet-Emmy moment, LeBron James takes over, causing her to ask, distressingly, "Are you taking my job?" Load the tear cannons. It is Streep. It is Mirren. It is Robbie. 

Vayntrub has been doing Lily, off and on, since 2013. That's a long, long time.

But not as long as you've been with the Yankees. 

Maybe its time for both of you to hang up the - um - cleats.

I say this with reverence to Lily, the loyal phone foot-soldier, and to the 2019 contract  that was meant to make you a Yankee for eternity. It followed a season when you won 19 games and finished 9th in the Cy Young. You and the Yankees seemed a perfect match - Kim & Kanye, J-Lo & A-Rod, Miley & Liam, Joe & Sophie  Everybody wanted the marriage to work. 

Well, it didn't. And it's over. 

Officially, it ended last night, when you suddenly imploded into pain. A tweak of the ol' cabbage basket. Nothing worse. You've had your share. 

But actually, your time on the target range ended in July. 

You'll finish 2023 with 89 innings and an ERA of 6.65. If you were a movie, you'd be House of Gucci. If you were a band, Nickelback. But come February, you'll turn 30, and a new life shall beckon. There is no question of whether the Yankees should re-sign you, or whether you should stay in NYC and try to remain the wholesome Yankee counter girl. To both questions, the answer is a hard, hard no. 

It's time to try a new franchise, a new city, a new set of coaches, a new fan base, a new phone plan. Who knows? Maybe you'll regain the command you lost, when you signed that deal with Mephistopheles Hal.

Finally, a personal note: 

Over the years, we at this blog occasionally have treated you nastily. We weren't always kind. If we were excessively cruel - I should say WHEN we were excessively cruel - I hereby apologize. You never dogged it. You never faked it. It just wasn't meant to be. I believe Jason Giambi summed it up best: They only boo because they want to cheer.  

That said, Sir, I have one request: Leave the AL East. Don't go to any of the teams that outwardly despise us. Don't become their hatred mascot. You can shut us out. You can become a Yankee Killer. Just do it on the West Coast, preferably the NL. Go forth and prosper.

It's time to go. It's time to start a new life, Lily.

Is Carlos Rodon the latest of Cashman's Calamities?

For 13 years, one of the most beloved characters on American TV has been Mayhem, the walking, cackling calamity who sells us insurance. In each 30-second spot, he finds a wondrous way to wreck everyday events and further the ongoing folly of humanity. He is Chaos. He is Loki. He is Allstate.

The Yankees, however, are the team of Starr Insurance, which advertises via a patch on their jerseys in the place where armbands once remembered Yogi Berra, Billy Martin and Thurman Munson. Our Mayhem is Brian Cashman, the GM who since 2009 has somehow managed to destroy every Yankee team, always while seeking to land an ace starter. It's a great ongoing bit. He constantly chases his own, self-described "white whale," and everything falls through.

The list of Cashman's Calamities is striking, not only for its length and breath, but for the names that appear. In many ways, it's a Who's Who of successful pitchers, all with one thing in common: 

Once they donned Yankee Pinstripes, they basically sucked. 

The List belongs in Cashman's personal Monument Park. 

Kenny Rogers

Hideki Irabu

Denny Neagle

Jeff Weaver

Jose Contreras

Javier Vasquez (I)

Kevin Brown

Estaban Loaisa

Randy Johnson 

Carl Pavano

Jaret Wright

Cory Lidle

Sidney Ponson

Scott Erickson

Kai Igawa

AJ Burnett

Javier Vasquez (II)

Bartolo Colon

Freddie Garcia

Michael Pineda

Nathan Eovaldi

Sonny Gray

J.A. Happ

Lance Lynn

James Paxton

Corey Kluber

Frankie Montas

and now... 

drum roll, please...
 Carlos Rodon.

Wait, you say. Isn't it too early to inscribe Rodon into this list of magnificent disasters? Perhaps. But thus far, his numbers look Pavano-esque.

His ERA is 5.70, and - get this - we have Rodon for five more years, at a Hal-busting $27 million per season. Let's hope that contract is covered by Starr. The Yankees sure picked the right product to sew into their sacred sleeves, which once held the memorial bands for Phil and Mickey.  

If Rodon is ready to join the list, I think it's time to wonder WTF is going on? If Cashman were merely rolling dice, a few acquisitions - via random happenstance - would succeed. (Okay, he did sign Gerrit Cole, so there's that. Name another success...) But year after year, Cashman brings in Starr pitchers, who quickly burn up in the atmosphere of NY. Is it the Yankees? Is it Gotham? (This year, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander launched a Mets list.) Is it juju? 

Dunno. The Yankees love to tout their 27 world championships, but most of them happened long long ago in a Yankiverse far, far away. Maybe they should rethink the idea of paying pitchers for the innings they threw in other cities? Ah, but what do I know? In the meantime, they always welcome Mayhem... like themselves. 

DESTROY ALL MONSTERS!!!

 We have this piece of shit for six years?

Jesus forking Christus.

The "Save Boonie & Cash Drive" is in full swing

When Timmy falls into the well, Lassie rushes off to get help. Back home, she barks in a strategic dog code, and Uncle Herpes yells, "DANG IT, SHE WANTS US TO FOLLOW HER!" They save the kid and celebrate around the still, passing mash and the Good Book, until the uncle takes off his belt and - well, let's just say that children who fall into wells need to know better, right? 

So, here's where the '23 Yankees sit: 

They fell into the well. Nobody's coming. But they're passing the bottle anyway.

They're one victory away from the longest winning streak of 2023, and tonight they play the Tankin' Tigers. Diehard fans are expected to forget that this organization has flopped. We're supposed to celebrate the streak. For the first time since May, the sound of Lassie's joyous barking is filling the Starr Insurance telemarketing phone banks in New Delhi. Dear God, people, load the confetti cannons! We're only a game behind Boston in the loss column! Bark! Bark! Bark!

But it's wrong, so wrong... 

The Yankees aren't unveiling the "Youts" by design. (Also "My Cousin Vinny" came out in 1992; don't they have a more modern cultural reference?) This was never the plan. We spent half the season thinking Aaron Hicks would hold LF, and most of the second half with Josh Donaldson at 3B. The Martian wasn't supposed to arrive in September. As the YES team measures his plaque for Monument Park, you'd think Shane Spencer and Kevin Maas and Gary Sanchez and Greg Bird and - add your own horror names - never existed. Sorry, but I can't help but think the Tigers are closer to their next world series than we are.

With 23 left to play, the '23 Yankees are one game above .500 - and 18 behind in the AL East. Those are tomato can numbers.

A month ago, when the team imploded, our lone hope was that this organization, embarrassed and humiliated, would change its ways. 

That it won't continue as MLB's municipal dump for bloated contracts. 

That it would develop young stars rather than sign thirtysomethings near the ends of careers. 

And that the engineers of this disaster would be held accountable.

Well, so much for that. Five wins, and it's none of the above. Moreover, this streak has been a testament to HRs - solo shots, for the most part - a strategy that has failed. Though it was great to finally - after all these years - tag Houston, beating Detroit is like sending Timmy to bed without supper. Why bother? Detroit could be the next Baltimore. And we'll remain the slogging Yankees. Fifteen years from now, we'll feature Ohtani batting cleanup; he'll be hitting .135. 

Really, I apologize for being such a downer. But when the Yankees win, like last night, everything feels great for about two minutes. Then you look at the standings, and you realize that it didn't matter, not a whit. When Giancarlo homers, he's merely padding his numbers so this year's utter failure doesn't look quite so dark. Somebody, maybe 15 years from now, will look at Stanton's stats and say, "Hey, he wasn't so bad, after all. Let's sign Ohtani! Maybe he'll have a big year!" 

I won't be there for that. But I'm here for this, and believe me: Bark, fucking, bark. Timmy is in trouble.