A Biased Look at the New York Yankees, the Greatest Franchise in the History of Sports
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It looks like our cross town rivals (yes, the New York Mets) are doing their best to buy the best team they possibly can. The Mets just started a regional sports network so the team should have some money rolling in from that and they just made a blockbuster deal to bring Carlos Delgado to New York. They’re in the mix for Manny Ramirez and they appear to be the front runner for Billy Wagner.
Unfortunately, the Mets never seem to be able to get the job done on the field. They’ve had the highest payroll before and all it’s gotten them is a World Series beating at the hand of the Yankees. I have mixed feelings about Ramirez going to the Mets because while the Red Sox (my least favorite team) will get a little weaker (you’d assume), the Mets (my second least favorite team by a slim margin) will get that much stronger.
So while George Steinbrenner set the standard blue print for the big spending teams, it looks like the Mets are trying to follow in their footsteps. Good luck, because you’ll need it. Although I wouldn’t mind a subway series in 2006.
And the Yankees raised their ticket prices. I haven’t lived in New York in several years, so this doesn’t mean too much to me. I’ve been to one Yankee game in the last five years and I currently reside on the west side of Michigan. If it means more money for the team, I’m all for it.
Cy Young runner up Mariano Rivera said that the Yankees should make getting Tom Gordon back a priority. Gordon took a slight step back last year, but he was still a quality reliever. It was his first season since 1998 that he had more innings then he did strikeouts. Rumor has it he wants to close again and if the Mets can’t get Billy Wagner, they might try to snag Gordon and make him their closer.
I’d personally like to see bad boy Kyle Farnsworth sign on as the set up man. I know he also wants to close, but it’s not like we’re the Braves. We’re the Yankees, so he’ll come. The only concern is that he has a melt down like Jeff Weaver (another former Tiger) had when we got him a few years back.
The Yankees finished up their deal that will keep Hideki Matsui in New York for another four more years. We’re paying a hefty price (4 years, $52 million), but without a centerfielder, we couldn’t also afford to lose our left fielder.
Matsui becomes the highest paid Japanese player ever, and while he took a step back from an excellent 2004, he still put up solid numbers. Solid enough to know that outside of maybe an aging Brian Giles, the Yanks wouldn’t have been able to find someone better out on the free agent market.
Now it’s time to start locking up some arms. I know there’s not a ton of starting pitching this year, but A.J. Burnett would make a good Yankee.
Sixteen voters got it right and twelve got it wrong. Some idiot actually voted A-Rod third on the ballot, which goes to show you how weird the BBWA can be. Not only was A-Rod a better hitter then David Ortiz in 2005, he actually took the field and made a contribution to the tune of nine runs above replacement at third base (close to one win).
The end result was a lot closer then it should have been as A-Rod took it 331 to 307. Vladimir Guerrero was the only other player to snatch a first place vote (so we know who voted A-Rod third). I like how they start making up statistics to warrant giving the award to the “fan” favorite, Ortiz. A-Rod was a better hitter, got on base more and hit more homeruns. It doesn’t matter how many RBIs Ortiz had after the seventh inning or to put his team ahead, A-Rod was better in 2005, period.
In a couple of hours, we shall see whether Alex Rodriguez walks away with his second MVP, or whether the writer’s screw up another award and give it to David Ortiz. Either way, it should be interesting.
Alright, Brian called it, and I agree with both Gleeman and Baseball Prospectus. Colon wasn’t the best pitcher in the American League, so it’s a shame he walked away the Cy Young. He was outperformed in just about every category that counts by Johan Santana, and it’s just unfortunate the BBWA still puts so much weight on wins.
Joe Torre finished third to Ozzie Guillen and Eric Wedge for manager of the year. No real surprise here either. Whoever walked away with the AL Central was going to win the award, and Guillen edged Wedge (say that three times really fast) in the regular season standings and one of his prizes is the Manager of the Year award.
The Yanks bought out Tino Martinez. No real surprise here as Tino didn’t do all that great and would warrant the $3 million. Carlos Delgado is supposed to be available, so maybe we can get him on board, because Paul Konerko will most likely re-sign with the White Sox. There’s been some speculation that they’ll try moving Jorge Posada to first base and try to pick up a catcher, but I doubt if that’ll happen.
I’m not terribly surprised this. Cano had a solid season by conventional terms (.297 batting average over 522 at bats), but he had a rather mediocre .262 EQA. He was a slightly above average hitter (BRAR 19, BRAA 1) but that gets wiped out by his mediocre fielding (FRAR 17, FRAA -4). He did provide the Yankees with some solid play at a position that they needed help at.
Huston Street had the flashy relief numbers. He finished the season with 50 pitching runs above replacement, so he was worth about two more wins the Cano was.
Jonny Gomes finished a solid third, although you could have made a case for him walking away with the award as well. He had a very solid .305 EQA. At the end of the day, he and Cano were nearly identical in WARP1. Cano had a 3.9 and Gomes had a 3.8, with Cano picking up some points because he played a tougher spot out n the field.
The Yankees are filling out the last of their staff positions as Ron Guidry will be the new Yankees pitching coach. Joe Kerrigan (yes, he was a former Red Sox manager) also joined the team as the bullpen coach.
The GM meetings are this week. Should be interesting to see if anything happens.
Not only do the Yankees have a former manager of the year in Joe Torre, they also have a former manager of the year coaching first base (Tony Pena) and third base (Larry Bowa).
Not too shabby. If we get another arm or two, we’re definitely a lock to win in 2006.
We’ve got a few coaching changes. Larry Bowa signed on to be the third base coach. Lee Mazzilli’s the new bench coach as Girardi went on to take coach the Marlins. There’s also some speculation that Tony Pena might be the future first base coach.
It’s official. Theo Epstein has bailed on the Red Sox for reasons that haven’t yet been determined. He was gunning for the money the Sox initially offered Beane a few years back. It’s always interesting seeing how one action can set off an unusual chain of events. If Beane takes the job in Boston, then Epstein wouldn’t even be a recognized name. DePodesta would have become the A’s GM, where he’d probably be today instead of being fired by the Dodgers.
Alex Rodriguez has apparantly been asked by the team not to attend underground poker games. Whatever. There’s no real news right now, so the media has to dig stuff up like this to fill the newspapers.
Matt Lawton will most likely not be a Yankee next year. He got suspended for 10 games (which will start in 2006) for testing positive for a horse steroid and is a free agent. To make matters worse, he was taking the stuff while a Yankee. I’m sure had the Yankees known about this, they never would have dealt for him.
The rumor had been floating around for a while that a player on one of the playoffs teams was set to be suspended. Guess we finally found out who the guy is.
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