Are the Yankees Toast?
Posted on August 19th, 2008 in Uncategorized | 7 Comments »
In the Sun, Steve Goldman thinks so.
….the Yankees would have to play at close to a 110-win pace to catch the Red Sox for the wild card if the latter played only .500 baseball for the rest of the season, and that assumes that one of the White Sox and Twins aren’t in the mix as well.
This isn’t how the Yankees pictured their last season in Yankee Stadium, that’s for sure. An inconsistent, sometimes bad team. Wounded stars both young and old. A once-promising centerfielder, Melky Cabrera, having to be sent to the minors after three years in the big leagues. Losing the division not just to the Red Sox, but to the Tampa Bay Rays. Derek Jeter in decline, prompting debate over whether the Yankees should let him go at the expiration of his current contract. A-Rod and Madonna. A-Rod and an unidentified woman in Florida. A-Rod and…a sub-.250 batting average with men in scoring position. (Let’s hope he does better on his nights out.)
So here are my hopes for the rest of the season.
I’d like Mike Mussina, who has never won 20 games in his career, to hit that mark. I’d like Joba Chamberlain to return pain-free (as every baseball fan should; the man is a pleasure to watch pitch). I’d like Mariano Rivera to stop choking in non-save situations, Derek Jeter to finish at .300, rookie Brian Gardiner to continue to show promise, and Bobby Abreu and Hideki Matsui to call it a career. I’d also like Jorge Posada’s arm to heal. And Phil Hughes to return healthy.
I’d also like Carl Pavano to pitch in a game, just for the fun of it.
Oh, and most important—I’d like the Rays or the Angels to kick some Red Sox butt.
7 Responses
8/19/2008 1:46 pm
As a Sox fan, I agree with you about Joba — no baseball fan should root for injuries to young players. I do, however, hope that that the Sox kick ass when he gets back.
Jeter’s old enough that I will definitely root for his decline, however.
8/19/2008 2:07 pm
Me, I’d like Barack Obama to kick some butt!
Obama needs Hillary: discuss.
8/19/2008 2:34 pm
I dun wanna discuss that tho. Soooooo…….no.
8/19/2008 2:36 pm
And I just bought some jam, because yes, the Yakees are TOAST!
8/19/2008 2:37 pm
What’s astonishing is how ill prepared the yankees really have been for the decline of the team. they put all of their pitching hopes with joba, kennedy and hughes. and i don’t see a lot of really great position players (see what happened to cabera) in the wings. they should have done a wholesale sell-off of the veterans a la Billy Beane before the trade deadline
8/19/2008 2:52 pm
Yakees? I like that.
8/19/2008 3:24 pm
think twice: but who would they have moved? Those are the kinds of contracts only the Yankees can afford. Abreu and Giambi are near the ends of their contracts, but who wants them? The Yankees would have to pay all their salaries in order to get even a marginal prospect back, and they’d take a huge media hit for conceding in August. Who else could you move, of the vets? Can’t trade A-Rod or Jeter while Posada and Matsui obviously aren’t going anywhere while they’re on the DL. Basically, I think Cashman did the best he could. Getting Nady was a good move, at least, since it means that they don’t need to resign Abreu for next year and now they’ll sign Sabathia in the off-season to head up their rotation.