As we well know by now, nothing pisses Lupica off more than when the Yankees succeed at something. If they do, he'll do his best to shit on whatever parade he can.
Yankees win World Series? "They bought it." A Yankee gets the MVP? "Fine, but where's the World Series ring, you selfish jerk?" Yankees do not win World Series? "What a waste of all that money. They should have won, but failed."
Etc., etc., and so forth. When the Yankees signed Teixeira yesterday, my guess is that there was a mean-spritied little busybody in New York who needed to change his underpants.
Christmas spending spree always in season for Yankees Tuesday, December 23rd 2008, 10:17 PM
It would have been ridiculous for the Yankees not to go after Mark Teixeira, to not pay him and his bag man, Scott Boras, whatever they wanted. But then it was ridiculous, and phony, of Brian Cashman and the Yankees to pass on Carlos Beltran at $100 million a few years ago. At the time the Yankees wanted you to believe that they had some kind of budget. They don't.
Lest anyone forget that Lupica is in love with the Mets (and, to a lesser extent, the Red Sox) here it is in the first paragraph. Of course, this is an apples/oranges comparison. At the time, the Yankees did not need Beltran as much as they needed Teixeira now, and when you're talking about payroll they still had huge contracts on the books then for Giambi, Williams, Pavano et al which were not ready to come off of the books. Lupica still doesn't seem to realize (or chooses to ignore) that lowering your payroll (or perhaps staying in the same neighborhood) is exactly what "having a budget" means. It does not mean you have to lower your expenses; it means usually to stay close to the same financial output. That is what budgeting is.
When Beltran was available, the Yankees thought him overpriced for his talent and the market, and they were not about to move into a new stadium. The comparison is completelty invalid.
Maybe now they have finally spent enough money, after eight years of the greatest financial advantage in the history of professional sports, to finally buy back the World Series.
No mention of the Red Sox spending the two largest payrolls to ever win a World Series, the 2004 champs with but one homegrown player on the roster. No mention of his precious Mets and their spending.
If not, Manny Ramirez is still out there. You can never be too sure. The last time the Yankees were sure they had put the Red Sox away by getting the hitter the Red Sox wanted was with Alex Rodriguez nearly five years ago.
Now he's just trying to be cute.
Teixeira is younger and a switch-hitter and a better buy than Ramirez and he gets his money from the Yankees the way C.C. Sabathia and A.J. Burnett did. Really: The Yankees would have been stupid not to do it, even if the Yankees now commit more than $400 million in future salary - for three baseball players - at a time when Cashman wants to still tell you how much money he had coming off the books.
Cause and effect. The fact that so much payroll has come off the books should be an indication that the Yankees had the ability to spend again without severely changing their payroll.
But then if you were the Yankee general manager those are the books you'd want to talk about, too. Last winter, Cashman and the Yankees committed around $270 million to A-Rod when they were bidding against themselves, then another $100 million to Mo Rivera and Jorge Posada. Rivera and Posada, you may recall, were around here when the Yankees could beat everybody without outspending them two or three times to one.
You know, Lupica was complaining about the Yankee payroll in the 90's as well. Revisionist historian now wishes to claim the spending made sense back then.
"Re-investing" is the way team president Randy Levine described his team's spending the other day. This, of course, at a time when Levine expects New York City to re-invest in the Yankees by giving them $259 million more in tax-free bonds so they can finish building their new stadium.
But this is who the Yankees are. This is what they do. And all they do. Yankee fans, at least the ones who can still afford to go to the ballpark, love it. Bag men like Boras love the system most of all.
There were two teams being hit with a luxury tax the other day for the 2008 season: Yankees and Tigers. Neither one made the playoffs. The Yankees, of course, paid a lot more in taxes because they were more than $60 million clear of the Tigers. And Cashman thinks he gets to be thin-skinned because people point out his team spends money like this year after year and hasn't been in the World Series since 2003.
Fairly sure Lupica doesn't understand the luxury tax system. The reason - the main reason - the Yankees are spending so much more than the Tigers is not because they simply had a higher payroll, it's because the Yankees crossed the payroll threshold three years (or more) in a row, which brings with it additional penalties.
So now the Yankees try to get back there, win their first Series since 2000, with a payroll that is way more than twice what the Phillies spent to win the World Series last October. Maybe after $180 million on Teixeira and $161 million for Sabathia and $82.5 million for Burnett the Yankees can not only get back into the playoffs but get out of the first round for the first time since 2004.
So bitter. So insecure. So mean spirited.
"You keep swinging for the fences," Cashman said the other day, when Sabathia and Burnett were the latest free agents to show up for Yankee money and talk about how it was always their dream to wear the Yankee pinstripes.
Cashman sure does swing for the fences. He's a sultan of swat, just from the baseball Brunei.
Lupica would suggest perhaps the Steinbrenners pocket the money, or give Cashman a $50M bonus this year.
Cashman talks constantly about a farm system that is supposed to start producing young talent any day now. Just not today. Never today. Developing young talent is something the riffraff are supposed to have to do.
Chien-Ming Wang. Joba Chamberlain. Phil Hughes. Robbie Cano. The centerfield combo of Gardner/Cabrera. Most of the bullpen corps. These are just the recent guys of course who don't count for some reason.
The Yankees write checks and want to be carried around the room for keeping their payroll at around $200 million when nobody else in baseball is close. It must have been a hardship in the old days, winning with guys such as Brosius and O'Neill.
We really can never get through a Lupica Yankees rant without mentioning Brosius, can we? Brosius really only had one good year with the Yankees. They won despite - not because of - him most years.
Also I don't understand the "guys such as" including Paul O'Neill. O'Neill was a good player. Not a Hall of Famer, but an All-Star caliber talent who won a batting title and had good power.
The total outlay of new Yankee money spent in the last two baseball winters is now nearly $800 million. Now the Yankees will try to save money on people such as Andy Pettitte so that they can say that they signed all these big-ticket players and kept their payroll under what it was last year. It is absolutely essential for Cashman to look as if this makes him some kind of numbers cruncher.
So wait, Lupica is admitting that despite this temper tantrum, the Yankees may actually cut spending this year? Also don't give me these tears for Andy Pettitte. The Yankees did him a huge favor of loyalty last year when they picked up his option in the middle of his HGH scandals. Is Pettitte really worth more than $10M/yr?
Even as he now has four players on his roster making more than $20 million per season: A-Rod, Sabathia, Teixeira, Jeter. They have about as much money invested in those four as the Phillies do in their entire baseball team.
Not quite. Also the Phillies' payroll is about to jump, with Cole Hamels and Ryan Howard in arbitration. If we're to talk about bad contracts and overpaid players, let's not forget that the Phillies are still paying Jim Thome to play for the White Sox.
You cannot do this in professional football, as much as owners such as Jerry Jones would like to.
Other things you can't do in football: carry bats on the field, bunt, steal bases, get called for a balk on a pump fake, or field different teams when you're on offense and defense. That is because football is a different sport in many, many ways and thus this comparison is invalid.
You cannot do this in the NBA, because even when teams such as the Knicks go wildly over the salary cap, they aren't out-spending the competition the way the Yankees do, year after year after year. Again: There is no sport where one team, if it has the resources, can attempt to buy this sort of edge.
Yes, you are also in love with the Knicks, I forgot because, well, nobody gives a shit about the Knicks.
The Yankees don't have to apologize. The way they do business, it would have been insane for them to pass on Teixeira. But it takes no genius, or vision, to do this, for Cashman or anybody else. Just deep pockets and owners desperate to look big.
Ok, so why have you spent two pages berating them?
So maybe the Yankees have finally spent enough money to win, after spending a couple of billion on salaries and revenue sharing and luxury taxes and somehow managing not to win a World Series since Mike Piazza's ball ended up in Bernie Williams' glove in October of 2000.
I thought you just admitted the payroll may go down this year. Also, still bitter about 2000. We get it.
Maybe, at long last, they are back to being the best team money can buy. But if they still think they might come up a little short, why not buy Manny, too?
Because Manny is a jerk and would fit in just fine on the Mets.
Man, was I stoked to rip into the insecure, mean-spirited busybody today after reading this total piece of dog crap, but it seems I was beaten to the punch on the Lupica-bashing.
Thus, I direct your attention to Mr. Tremendous' take. No need to double up, when we pretty much have the same things to say.
You knew it was going to happen, or you should have. After years of throwing Alex Rodriguez under the bus repeatedly, Mike Lupica is saying that A-Rod should leave town and opt out of his deal because of the way he's been treated in New York. By others. By people not named Michael Lupica. Usually I offer commentary throughout Lupica's articles, but this time I'm just going to post a few portions from it. Also, is that photo from 1995? Has anyone seen Lupica lately? Maybe it's his high school yearbook photo.
With all that's happened here, Alex would be wise to opt out Thursday, July 12th 2007, 4:00 AM
Think about something else from A-Rod's point of view. Not mine or yours or Cashman's or even George Steinbrenner's: Why would he stay? This is a Yankee season nobody can blame on him, a season that has him right where he wants to be, which means pinstriped hero, at least for now. All he has to do is keep hitting. When the season is over he doesn't have to be bashful or phony this time, tell us it is all about the farm system the way he did when he went with the Rangers. He can just sit there while Arte Moreno of the Angels or the new Cubs owners or even John Henry start throwing money at him. You think the Red Sox won't be in play if A-Rod is in play? Come on. They spent $51 million just to get a seat at the table with Daisuke Matsuzaka. Not only do they have the money in Boston, they have something else: An opening at shortstop. A position Rodriguez gave up to come to New York and play next to a shortstop who sometimes seems reluctant to give A-Rod the time of day. Scott Boras, A-Rod's bag man, is right: There is no reason for his client to negotiate with the Yankees right now. What's in it for A-Rod, except perhaps for the stroke of seeing the Yankees reverse their field and try to negotiate a new deal with him when they said they wouldn't do that for a pinstriped World Series hero such as Mo Rivera? Maybe the Yankees think they have enough money to trump all the reasons A-Rod has for getting out of New York when the season is over. And you better believe he has his reasons, whatever he says in public, and you better believe the Yankees know exactly what they are:
The treatment he feels he has gotten, up until this season, from an awful lot of vocal Yankee fans, all the ones who wanted to drive him to the airport after the way he hit last October against the Tigers and want to carry him out to Monument Park on their shoulders now.
The treatment he has gotten in the media, not just here and not just on the sports pages, but on the front pages when he got caught with that strip-club blond in Toronto. As A-Rod's stats get gaudier, by the way, his sidemen are now blaming his off-field problems on the tabloids for that. Right. The tabs did it! The Post must have fixed him up with the blond on Match.com. The treatment he got from Joe Torre in last year's playoffs when Torre batted him eighth against the Tigers. A-Rod can hire skywriters to say he and Torre have kissed and made up on that one. You know when No.13 will forget where he hit that day? On the 13th of Never.
Finally, there is the treatment he has gotten from Derek Jeter. You weigh in however you want on this relationship. But A-Rod thought that by agreeing to leave shortstop, even though he was on his way to being the greatest shortstop in history, he could get Jeter to forget the lousy things he said about him in Esquire magazine. He was as wrong about that as he was yelling at some backup third baseman in Toronto and thinking nobody would think it was a big deal.
Suddenly, without a single point added to his postseason average as a Yankee, A-Rod appears to be the one holding all the good cards. Suddenly, it is the Yankee variation of the old Bob Arum line: Yesterday I was lying, today I'm telling the truth. Yesterday they weren't negotiating. Now they are. It is easy to see how they can't let him walk without at least making him an offer. But really: Knowing what we know about A-Rod, why would he stay?
I know, typical Lupica Yankee hatred/glee in Yankee failure/doom and gloom nonsense. Lupica is obviously wishing and praying A-Rod goes to the Red Sox so he can say what a coup it was for John Henry to land such a great player. Lupica, you moron, if A-Rod has problems with the press coverage in New York, why in the hell would he go to Boston, which is even worse to its sports celebrities? ("Oh no, Tom Brady is wearing a Yankees hat! On a street! National emergency, front page news!")
Lupica rails against the "tabloids" as part of the problem (specifically mentioning, of course, the Post and the blonde woman in Toronto while ignoring the Daily News' continual front page stories about how Alex went to a poker room and played poker, which wasn't illegal).
Mike Lupica shows precisely in this column why he's a two-faced jackass: he's saying shame on you to everyone for driving Rodriguez out of town while he was the one driving the bus. Anyone remember the congratulations and praise Lupica gave A-Rodthe day after he won the 2005 AL MVP?
Bonus Lupica action:
Former ESPN.com Page 2 columnist Jason Whitlock on working with Lupica:
Q: In one of your most memorable appearances on The Sports Reporters, you got into a tiff with Mike Lupica and Mitch Albom when you said sports was just ‘entertainment.’ Lupica told you to go work on ‘Entertainment Tonight.’ You haven’t appeared with either of them since. Have the three of you kissed and made up? I don't have a problem with Mitch Albom. Lupica is an insecure, mean-spirited busybody. He's upset because I put a clown suit on him on that show and in a follow-up column I wrote for ESPN. His little disingenuous overreaction to an opinion I'd stated previously on the show was staged to try to put me in a bad light. I guess no one had ever informed Mike that the E in ESPN stood for Entertainment. The Little Fella probably won't let the producer (Joe Valerio) have me back on the show again. That's cool. They're mostly upset that I wouldn�t participate in their Barry Bonds witch hunt and help them single Bonds out as the creator of steroids. Lupica doesn't like to be disagreed with, and he's spoken so abusively to that producer for years that the producer probably doesn't realize people are allowed to disagree with Lupica. I enjoyed my time on the show. But if the price of admission is stepping to Lupica's drum, I'm more than happy to go without.
Well it's been a while since I did one of these - which actually used to be the primary focus of my old blog - but I happened upon another article by New York's preeminent jackass. Now as to be fair, I've only read the first two paragraphs so far, so I'll be commenting from a fresh perspective as always. However, let's all bear in mind the typical Lupica gripes:
Loves the Mets and Red Sox. Hates the Yankees.
When the Yankees sign a free agent, it is "George trying to buy a championship."
When the Mets sign a free agent, it is the genius of Omar Minaya combined with ownership "laying it on the line" for their fans.
Randy Johnson is a punk.
Jason Giambi is a cheater and a punk.
Alex Rodriguez is an overpaid, choking punk.
Ok so with that out of the way, let's get to it.
Weight of the World
LOS ANGELES - Here are the most prominent big-ticket Yankees who have not: Mike Mussina, Jason Giambi, Hideki Matsui, Alex Rodriguez. Have not meaning they haven't won a World Series. Have not yet, might not ever. If there is one thing we have learned the past five years at Yankee Stadium, it's that the money all these Yankees make doesn't guarantee anything anymore in baseball.Randy Johnson won somewhere else. Not here. Gary Sheffield won somewhere else. Just not here. Johnny Damon just got here and Carl Pavano, who won with the 2003 Marlins, has never really shown up. Maybe the two of them can make a difference this year.
Ah here we go. Typical Lupica "haha, you haven't bought a championship in years!" garbage.
We constantly talk about the core of Yankees who have. Meaning HAVE won a World Series here: Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams. We constantly act as if they are still the Yankees, even if the Yankees haven't won the Series since 2000. It is a nice thought. Except for this one big thing: The have-nots have them outnumbered now.
Pretty surprising that the number of players on a team for six straight years are outnuumbered by the players that haven't been there as long, I know. You mentioned the Marlins above though and their exciting 2003 victory. You know how many Marlins are still there from 2003? Two. Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis. The Angels won two full seasons after the Yankees. Who's still there? Only two more players than the Yankees are still on the roster: Brendan Donnelly, Frankie Rodriguez, John Lackey, Jose Molina, Adam Kennedy and Garrett Anderson (and Tim Salmon is trying a comeback, but he hasn't exactly been around). There aren't even that many of the vaunted Red Sox World Champions left anymore.
Guess how many Mets are left from their last championship? Zero. None. I guess we constantly act as if Hernandez and Carter and Knight and Strawberry are still the Mets, even if the Mets haven't won the Series since 1986. It is a nice thought. Now for the most part, the have-not Yankees have delivered the kind of numbers they were supposed to. Mussina fell off a little bit last year because of injury, Giambi seemed to be breaking down entirely in 2003 before he got big and strong again. Rodriguez became the MVP of the American League last year after a productive but odd first year at the Stadium that ended with Joe Torre finally having to bat him second.
I can't believe I'm going to do this, but I'll defend Joe Torre there. It wasn't Rodriguez's fault that he "had to bat second." That was probably the best position for him to bat. He got more ABs and was an OBP machine, and the Yankees didn't really have a better option.
Matsui has been swell, if not quite the defensive wizard in left we thought we were getting. Called Godzilla, plays like it out there sometimes.
He plays like Godzilla? Meaning what, exactly? Is he attacking airplanes, fighting giant moths or stepping on Japanese fans in the bleachers? What the hell does that mean? Mussina, in fact, pitching for a new contract, has been one of the great pitching buys in free-agent history. It is usually nuts to give a pitcher, especially a starting pitcher, a contract as long as Mussina's, six years and $84 million. But he has pitched into the last season of that contract, mostly at a high level, even if his playoff record is only one game over .500. When he's been healthy he has pitched and won and for the time being, is pitching at as high a level as he has since he put on a Yankee uniform.
Yep, bring up records. You love that. A guy can lose 1-0 and he's garbage. Mussina has been the best Yankee postseason starting pitcher since he's been on the team. Go ahead, look it up. Statistically, he's easily outdistanced Johnson, Clemens, Pettitte, Brown, Vazquez, Weaver, Wells, etc. I know this because I looked it up and didn't just look at a W-L record. Only the Yankees have not won a World Series in those five seasons he has already pitched here. They have not won since they paid Giambi the $119 million, a contract they would have done anything possible to get out from under as recently as one year ago. Mussina has pitched in the Series twice. Giambi has been there once, even if he wasn't much help three years ago. A-Rod? You know about A-Rod. He was one inning away from the Series in 2004 before the sky fell on him and everybody else.
Yeah, that's when he choked, right? Odd to mention that here, in the same breath as Rodriguez. They all knew the deal before they got here, A-Rod better than any of them: George Steinbrenner is not just buying big names and big numbers, he always believes he is buying the championship.
I think he believes he's acquiring the best players possible to make the best team possible. I mean I could be wrong, but my opinion of what Steinbrenner "believes" is just as valid as yours. We hear now that the Yankees have this crackerjack farm system. We'll see about that.
Who wants to bet the only prospects Lupica has heard of are Phil Hughes and Eric Duncan? You mention Tabata to him and he'd probably think it's a new type of italian sandwich. Since they stopped winning the World Series, they have considered the rest of baseball their farm system, every time there was another big-ticket guy they wanted. Carlos Beltran says hello. Mussina was supposed to be a difference-maker, Giambi was supposed to be a difference-maker after that 2001 World Series, when the Yankees could only produce 16 runs in seven games against the Diamondbacks. A-Rod was supposed to be the ultimate difference-maker, because not only were the Yankees getting him, the Red Sox weren't.
They were difference makers. The difference is that - last year for example - you take away Giambi or Rodriguez and the Yankees don't even make the playoffs. "These guys could have gotten their money somewhere else," Torre likes to say. They could have. Torre says he understands the responsibilities of the uniform. So do the new hired guns who show up every year. It's just that the core of have-nots keeps growing, like the payroll. Have not won here.
Yes, every year the number of players there from a specific fixed year in the past that are still on the roster - or still even active in baseball - dwindles. Clemens, O'Neill, Martinez, Brosius, Cone, Mendoza, Neagle, Nelson, Stanton, Tessmer, Watson, Yarnall, Turner, Delgado, Sojo, Kelly, Bellinger, Johnson, Polonia, Spencer, Thompson, Jose, Justice, Canseco, Hill and Leyritz all played for the Yankees in 2000, the last time they won the Series, and yet none of them are active in the majors. But I suppose they should all still be Yankees, because then the "haves" would out number the "have nots." A team with those guys plus Jeter, Williams, Posada and Rivera would win about 30 games. Most started by Clemens. Maybe this is the year when the old Yankees and the new Yankees finally become one team.
I'm assuming you're only "one team" when you win the World Series? It used to be you could come here for big money and easy rings, the way Roger Clemens did. Not anymore.
It was never easy rings. For you to say that completely invalidates the efforts of those players who won those four championships, you jackass.
BONUS LUPICA! If the Yankee pitching goes south this year, does the old man still blame it on Mel Stottlemyre?
No, since he's no longer a pitching coach. Kind of a silly question. Keith Hernandez should not have said what he said about the Padres' female trainer being in the dugout, and his bosses were right to reprimand him. But I still like listening to him do Mets games on television, because more and more he shows you why he was one of the smartest players on a ballfield anybody ever knew about.
Uh, the guy won A RING with the Mets. The LAST ring. He should still be on the field! Can somebody explain to me in a logical and straightforward way why the Red Sox traded Bronson Arroyo? Did they actually think they had too much starting pitching?
No, they thought they didn't have enough outfielders because they lost Johnny Damon. Wouldn't it be something if the White Sox won again with both Jose Contreras and Javier Vazquez in their starting rotation?
It would be something, considering both of them mentioned after they left that the great Mel Stottlemyre didn't pick up the flaws in their deliveries. If Roger Clemens comes out of retirement to pitch for the Yankees or the Red Sox, does that mean he doesn't want to spend as much time with his family this summer as he did the last two?
No, it means he's coming to New York for the money and easy rings. How come Pedro Martinez never has to inform us that he's only human, the way Randy Johnson did the other day?
It's because Pedro isn't human. He's from the planet Zorzax. Why doesn't Randy Johnson have to inform us why he attacked an old man on the field? I love watching Johnson pitch, but when did it become our job to give the Big Unit a Big Hug?
No, it's your job to write about sports, and you do a piss poor job of it. Originally published on April 30, 2006, by a Jackass.
The Yankees once won nine World Series in 10 tries with Joe DiMaggio as their center fielder. After DiMaggio came Mickey Mantle. When the Yankees made it back to the Series in the late '70s, Mickey Rivers played center, and before he started to fade, Mick the Quick was some tough out at leadoff, and some player. Finally, in this generation, it was Bernie Williams in center as the Yankees won four World Series in five years. Bernie was such a champ in center, for such a long run, the Yankees apparently decided he would be out there forever.
Hey what about Whitey Whit? Or for that matter, since we're talking about great Yankee centerfielders, why no mention of Hall of Famer Earle Combs, he of the three rings and life time .325/.397/.452? Oh, you've probably never heard of him and were too busy trying to justify Mickey Rivers as a great centerfielder. Rivers of the two championships. And when did he start to fade? Because in 1978 (his second championship year) his stats were at best mediocre (.265 /.302 /.397). He played six more years after that and only once in those years were his numbers as poor as in 1978. He only played in New York for 3 1/2 years.
What I'm trying to say, Mike, is that I see what you're trying to say: the Yankees have had a number of very good centerfielders in their history. You're just doing a piss-poor job of explaining that.
It is not just any piece of real estate, center field at Yankee Stadium. But that is what it became in 2005. We saw a fading Bernie, Bubba Crosby, Tony Womack, Melky Cabrera and Hideki Matsui. Matsui was the best of the lot, but only because he looked a lot more solid in center last season than he did in left.
Really, it is just a centerfield. Just because great players played there before doesn't mean you need "this generation's Joe DiMaggio" out there just to make you feel all warm and fuzzy.
Now there is no one in center field for the Yankees. Imagine that prime piece of real estate with a "Help Wanted" sign where DiMaggio and Mantle used to be.
Yes, the Yankees are looking for a centerfielder. It's November. The winter meetings haven't even come yet. A couple of years ago there was a "Help Wanted" sign at first base, where Gehrig and Foxx and Bauer and Mattingly used to play. There was a "Help Wanted" sign in 1996 where Elston Howard, Thurman Munson, Yogi Berra and Bill Dickey used to play. In fact, the Yankees have had a history of great catchers in the World Series. Why no outcry when they signed Joe Girardi in 1996?
If the season started tomorrow, Bubba Crosby would be the starting center fielder on a team still more expensive than the last two World Series champs combined. So you have to say that it is a lucky thing for the Yankees that the season doesn't start tomorrow.
Your Mets don't have a catcher. If the season started today, Ramon Castro would be the starting catcher. Lucky thing for the Mets the season doesn't start tomorrow, huh? Wait, no, how is it "lucky" that the season doesn't start in November? Boy, the Yanks really dodged a bullet there, what a bit of good luck that the regular season has been pushed back until March this time!
If you don't think Brian Cashman is changing the way the Yankees do business, right in front of our eyes, then you are not paying attention.
It is early in the baseball winter, for Cashman and the Yankees. For now, though, the Yankees get off to the same kind of start in the offseason that they did in the real season. Yankee fans can only hope that their team comes on strong at the end, after the Mets and the Red Sox - the only competition that matters in George Steinbrenner's universe - have stopped making headlines and deals.
Every year you bitch about how the "rich get richer" and how the "Yankees are trying to buy a championship." However over the past two seasons, Omar Minaya has overpaid for every free agent he can find (Pedro, Beltran, Wagner, taking on Delgado's bloated contract....)
"We've worn the winter crown for a long time," Cashman said yesterday morning. "Seriously, it seems like every year we're declared the champions of the winter. My goal is for us to be the champions next October."
Steinbrenner called then on the other line. Cashman said he would call back in a few minutes. When he did, he was asked how the old man was doing these days, with Josh Beckett to the Red Sox and Billy Wagner and Carlos Delgado to the Mets and even the Blue Jays making some noise with B.J. Ryan, indicating they think they can play with the big boys now in the AL East.
"(Steinbrenner) is just fine, thank you," Cashman said, and then he was talking again about all this activity with the Mets and Red Sox and nothing from the Yankees, at least so far.
"People say we're not doing anything," Cashman said. "I keep reminding them that the shaping of the 2006 Yankees, in my mind, began in May of '05."
He means after that Sunday game against Toronto when he decided to take Womack off second and put him in center for the time being, and give the kid, Robinson Cano, a chance at second. That was also the week when Chien-Ming Wang got his first start.
Yes, trying to build a team sometimes takes more than from the last out of the World Series until when you think the season should start, which is apparently November 30th.
"This thing wasn't working," Cashman said yesterday morning, which is the same thing he said to Joe Torre last May when they decided to shake things up.
After that the Yankees didn't make a big trading deadline move. They stuck with Cano, who started to hit like a young star. Wang became a solid starter, got hurt, came back. Aaron Small came out of nowhere. So did Shawn Chacon. The '05 Yankees got fixed, on the fly, with small moves instead of big money.
So why are you criticizing everything?
Cashman decided things had to change with the Yankees, that they couldn't just keep throwing money at aging stars, that they had tried that for five seasons and a billion dollars in payroll and taxes and hadn't won a World Series.
Besides, that job is now taken by Minaya and Ricciardi.
"You know what my goal is?" Cashman said. "To get better with a younger team and a smaller payroll."
It will be interesting to see if he sticks to his guns on this if Johnny Damon is still out there in a week or two, or even a month. The Red Sox are offering Damon three years, somewhere shy of $30 million. Scott Boras, agent to the stars, thinks he can get Damon five years at least, especially if B.J. Ryan is getting five years from the Blue Jays and Wagner effectively has five years with the Mets.
BJ Ryan is 29 years old. When his contract expires, he will be as old as Billy Wagner is today. What does any of that have to do with Damon, an aging centerfielder whose defense has slipped in past years getting a 5-year contract? Was Ryan overpaid? Yes. Was Wagner signed for too long by your good pal Omar? You betcha. Would a Damon 5-year contract be even stupider? Of course.
It is also fair to wonder what would happen to this sudden fiscal sanity at Yankee Stadium if Carlos Beltran were out there this winter instead of last winter. The Yankees didn't want Beltran at $100 million last year, less than the Mets paid. Omar Minaya grabbed Beltran knowing this year's free agent market was going to be thin.
If Beltran were out there this year, he wouldn't command nearly as much since Minaya overpaid for him based on a hot October, and his desire to compile the All-Latin All-Star team.
Maybe the Yankees were smart to pass. Or maybe he would have hit like a star with Jeter in front of him and A-Rod and Sheffield and Giambi and Matsui behind him. Maybe Beltran will come back big this season and again look like somebody who would have solved a lot of problems for Cashman's baseball team for the next 10 years.
Well he certainly didn't hit like a star in Shea.
"Right now, it's a good market for other teams to fill their needs," Cashman said, "and a bad market for the Yankees."
"But," Brian Cashman said, "it's early."
The availability of the two pressing needs on the Yanks - CF and bullpen - have both had problems. There effectively ae no centerfielders except through trades. The bullpen arms have mostly been overpaid, signed early with other teams for personal reasons, or were waiting for the big moves of Ryan and Wagner. It is early. The trade market should heat up at the winter meetings.
Early in the offseason, sure. But a little late for the Yankees to have noticed Bernie was looking older than the monuments. A little late to start thinking about a replacement. The New York Yankees don't have a center fielder. It is big news until they do. Help wanted.
The Yankees noticed this in 2003. They signed Kenny Lofton. Torre played Bernie anyway. They noticed it in 2005. They brought up Cabrera. They moved Matsui to CF. Torre played Bernie anyway. Don't put this all on Cashman, you jackass.
I knew - I just knew - Lupica would have a column about how great the Beckett trade was for Boston. I knew he'd say how terrible it is for the Yankees moreso than it's good for Boston, because he hates the Yankees more than he loves the Red Sox. So far I've only read the title, but let's explore the buffonery that is a Mike Lupica article.
Bosox trump Yanks with their new ace
Ah good. I knew you'd frame it this way. By the way, Beckett is not an "ace." He never has been anything more than an above average pitcher. He wasn't even the "ace" of his last team. It looks like the Red Sox have hooked Josh Beckett. From the time Josh Beckett made Game 6 of the World Series all about him, from the time he took on the Yankees and the Stadium and pitched one of the great closeout games in the history of the Series, the Yankees have wanted somebody exactly like him. They have wanted a big, strong, tough, young guy who could stand there and do everything except dare you to hit his fastball.
Beckett's game went right in with everything after Don Larsen, especially when you consider the circumstances and the stakes. Sandy Koufax struck out more guys against the Yankees in 1963 and Jim Lonborg pitched a one-hitter in '67 and Andy Pettitte beat the Braves 1-0 and Johnny Podres was 2-0 against the Yankees in his own closeout game in '55. And there was Bob Gibson in '67, and Blackjack Morris in Game 7 in '91. There have been others in the grouping after Larsen.
I know he's a Yankee now, but Randy Johnson single handedly beat the Yankees in the 2001 World Series, so I know there's no need for you to give him any sort of credit. Yes, in a limited sample size, Beckett has been good in the post season. He's been very good. Blackjack Morris? Was Jack Morris ever given this nickname? Not really. You do a Google search and there are about 3 or 4 hits referring to the former pitcher, most on blog and journal sites. You're probably thinking of Jack McDowell, Mike. But I'll give you a pass on that one. Beckett will be remembered with any of them, even if he gave up five hits that night. Because the Yankees never had a chance.
How did they never have a chance? Pettitte and Rivera combined for 1 ER in 9 innings. In fact, the only Yankee you'll ever praise (Jeter) made a critical error that led to that unearned run. 2-0 is not "never having a chance." 8-0? Sure. It was two years ago. Everybody still talks about the high fastball he threw past Derek Jeter late in the game, one Jeter still hasn't seen.
I have not heard anyone mention or talk about this since 2003. I must not know everybody. The Yankees went out and got Javier Vazquez the next year from Montreal and he was going to be their Beckett, a horse who would go for years. He lasted one. So they went after one of Beckett's teammates, Carl Pavano, who was supposed to be the next best thing, even if he had only had one good year as a starter in his life. They got Jaret Wright out of Atlanta, because he looked tough, too. And they got Randy Johnson to be a geriatric version of what Beckett had been in Game 6, even if Johnson was about twice Beckett's age.
Vazquez wasn't supposed to be "their Beckett." He was supposed to be a young pitcher without injury problems who could throw 200 innings per year with a respectable ERA and high strikeout totals. Nobody expects 200 innings from Beckett. Pavano was the best available free agent by all accounts, and the Yankees needed pitching. Does anyone remember that when the Yankees signed Pavano and Lupica went on a rant, he was advocating Sammy Sosa for his beloved Mets: "If the debate is Sosa or Floyd, there is no debate. I would rather have Sosa in a Mets uniform than Cliff Floyd any day of the week. I would rather have his bat in the Mets' lineup than Mike Piazza's, off what we saw from Piazza last season. I would rather have Sosa than Shawn Green." - Mike Lupica, November 14, 2004. Piazza OPS: .778 Floyd OPS: .863 Green OPS: .832 Sosa OPS: .671. .671. In the American League. In a hitter's park. Yep, there's the guy we should listen to for player advice and predictions! Anyway, I digress. I said to Brian Cashman one time, "You guys still haven't ever had a Beckett." He said, "We don't draft high enough to get one. Then by the time they've turned into a Beckett, they're not available."
Josh Beckett finally became available the past couple of weeks. The Red Sox grabbed him.
They had to take a fading Mike Lowell along with Beckett. They had to give up Hanley Ramirez, whom some people think is the best shortstop prospect in anybody's system right now. Doesn't matter. The Yankees got clipped. Two years this month from when the Red Sox grabbed Curt Schilling, they grab Beckett. A 25-year-old Schilling this time.
I don't know who "some people" are, but I do know it's not the Red Sox. Ramirez was supposed to be the heir apparant to Nomar. Then they traded him, and Cabrera was supposed to be the stopgap. So they promote their big shortstop prosspect, right? No, they sign Edgar RenterE6 for four years, completely blocking Ramirez. They didn't even have him try and learn a new position, like third base. It doesn't look to me like the Sox thought much of Ramirez.
As for a "25-year old Schilling" he's only had one outstanding season (2003). His ERA+ that year was 132. Jason Schmidt led the NL that year with a 183. It was the first time in 5 years that Randy Johnson - who you repeatedly claim is worse than Beckett - didn't lead the NL (he lost significant time to injury that year). Schilling has never led the league, even in all of those years with Johnson on the same team. Neither has Beckett. In his best season, he didn't even crack the top 10. There are reasons why this happened. There are more pressing needs Cashman needs to fill. Beckett is still better than any starting pitcher Cashman has. In the game that is always being played between the Yankees and the Red Sox, even after they have both gone out in the first round, the Red Sox score first, and they score big.
Statistics say Beckett is not better than any starting pitcher that Cashman has. I know you hate statistics though.
The Red Sox don't go for a knockoff Beckett like Pavano. They hold onto Jon Lester, the lefthander who is supposed to be an even better arm than either Jon Papelbon or Craig Hansen, the St. John's kid. They do this even though the Rangers thought they had the inside track on Beckett by offering some of their prospects, plus their terrific young third baseman, Hank Blalock.
The Red Sox wanted Pavano badly last offseason. Matt Clement was Plan B.
Also, Blalock has only been good at home. On the road last year, he hit .231 BA, .276 OBP, .335 SLG, .611 OPS.
That's certainly a lot closer to "terrible" than "terrific." Mike Lowell' OPS was .658. Tony Womack's OPS was .556. Blalock has been essentially the average of the two. The Yankees were never really involved with Beckett, for whom they have lusted for two full seasons. They didn't want to take on Lowell, a third baseman they don't need, one who fell to .236 and eight home runs last season and is owed $18 million over the next two seasons. And they can tell themselves that they made their amazing run from 11-19 to 95 victories and a tie for first in the AL East with a rotation that included these seven starters, all of whom are still under contract:
"I believe that from June on, we had the best record in baseball," Cashman said yesterday. "Am I comfortable going into next season with a rotation that will include five of those guys? Yeah, I am."
First of all, they won the division, they didn't tie. Yes, the records ere the same, but do you honestly think if that Sunday game mattered that Torre would have rested regulars and tarted Jaret Wright? Also I'm pretty sure that you can get a pretty decent starting staff out of five of those guys. Cashman still has to find a center fielder. He is still looking for a bullpen, because after Mo Rivera and Tanyon Sturtze, he has no bullpen. Johnny Damon is out there as a free agent, but not at the ridiculous prices Scott Boras is talking about, and not for five-to-seven years. The Yankees like Brian Giles but not, Cashman says now, as a center fielder, more as a fourth outfielder and DH.
OK, OK, hold the phone. YOU were the one that was saying Giles was going to be a centerfielder, NOT Cashman. Cash and Torre in fact seemed to prefer Matsui in CF to Giles (though given the choice I'd go ith Giles). However: you've still got it wrong. You honestly think Cashman is exploring signing the best hitter available (yes, I'm including Konerko) to be... a 4th outfielder??!!? You think they're planning on giving Giles the "Ruben Sierra role" of 4th OF and part time DH?!? Sheffield in right, Giles on the bench or at DH on a dialy basis?
Lupica, you've done it. This is officially the most asinine thing you've ever come up with. Congratulations! Who knows, maybe in the old days - last winter - Cashman would have taken on Lowell's contract, even without a place to play him, just to get Beckett. He didn't bite this time. So the Yankees were never really in play here, probably wouldn't have been even if they had been willing to move Wang and Robinson Cano, something Cashman is not inclined to do at this time.
No, last winter Cash stated he wasn't trading his top prospects either. For now, he holds onto the few prospects he has, especially now that they are more than prospects. Maybe this really will be a baseball winter when other teams lead the league in headlines. And of course this could all change fast, because these are Steinbrenner's Yankees, and the old man is probably twitchy right now that the Red Sox have Beckett and he doesn't.
"We have other needs," Cashman kept saying yesterday.
Maybe those needs wouldn't seem so pressing if Johnson, the lefty geezer version of Beckett, hadn't gotten bounced all over the Stadium and finally booed out of the place in Game 3 against the Angels, the game he was hired to win. Maybe one of these days, in a game the Yankees absolutely have to have, a Yankee will do to somebody else what Beckett did to them.
It's amazing that you're calling Johnson the "lefty geezer verision" of Beckett. You've already aid Beckett is the better pitcher. Their 2005 ERA+ was nearly identical (117 v. 119). Johnson pictched 225 innings to Beckett's 178. Johnson's WHIP: 1.13. Beckett: 1.19. Johnson: 211 Ks. Beckett: 168. And remember this season was a "disaster" for the Big Unit. Let's not even go back to 2004 where Johnson's 171 ERA+ dwarfs Beckett's 108 (barely above average). It's a disservice to Johnson to compare him to such an inferior pitcher, and it's ridiculous to call Beckett better than anyone on the Yankee staff. Before Beckett does it to them again.
Let's hope he keeps clear of those blisters.
Jackass. Originally published on November 23, 2005
Guess who's back with another asinine column? Why it's New York's Premeire Sports Writer™, that's who! Yank focus way off center
They can do better than Giles
Awesome. We're not even through the headline and already I'm convinced Lupica has no idea what he's talking about. This could be fun. There is no more glamorous piece of real estate in all of sports, not one, than center field at Yankee Stadium. It belonged to Joe DiMaggio once, and Mickey Mantle. For a long, proud, classy run, that real estate has belonged to Bernie Williams. Now we read and hear that Williams' successor out there might be Brian Giles of the Padres. We hear that the Yankees have searched far and wide and that Giles just might be their man. If that is true, they need another search committee.
Yes, Giles may be a stopgap in center. However, there aren't a lot of good centerfielders available, Mike. How about you list some? Juan Pierre? You want to do the Cano-for-Hunter swap? And yes, the Yankees have had a lot of great centerfielders. They've also had a lot of crappy centerfielders. Besides, who says Giles has to play center? Torre said he may play Matsui in center, and Cash said he may play Bubba Crosby in center. Signing Giles doesn't change either of those. Hopefully it lets Sheffield DH. Giles is a tough out, and a gamer. He had some big years for bad Pirates teams once. There was a season when he played 108 games in center field for the Pirates, even though this would be difficult to prove, since nobody has actually seen the Pirates in years.
Oh ho, you got us there. Discount those games in center because you didn't see the Pirates. Brian Giles' last big year with the bat was 2002, when he hit 38 home runs and knocked in 103. Last year he hit 15 home runs for the Padres, in 158 games and 545 at-bats. That is a lot of home runs to misplace in just three years, even playing half his games in that new ballpark in San Diego.
No it isn't. If a guy's HR rates go up if he's traded to the Rockies, you'd be the first to blame park factors. My guess though is if you don't know a lot about the Pirates, you probably aren't an expert on the Padres or their stadium either. Besides, why are you just picking home runs? There are far more important stats.. OBP, SLG, OPS... Yes, his HR totals dipped slightly, but when you play in a park like that even on the road expect home run totals to dip a bit because you're not playing long ball. It's difficult to adjust your approach depending on where you are. You know though? That's my opinion. Why don't I instead provide you with some facts: Giles' OPS+ since 1999 (his first qualifying season): 1999: 157 2000: 158 2001: 153 2002: 173 2003: 148 2004: 126 2005: 148
Except for 2 aberrations (a monster 2002 and a sub par for his standards but still very acceptable 2004) his numbers aren't all that different. But yes. His home run totals went down. Continue.
But it is all around that the Yankees are so sweet on Giles that Joe Torre wants to recruit him, and that the team is prepared to pay him the rather insane amount of $33 million over the next three seasons.
How is that an "insane amount"? $11M per for one of the best hitters in baseball? Ok, I'm about to throw some "crazy stats" at you, Mike. Ones I'm sure you've never heard of, such as WSAB (Win Shares above bench). If you take Giles 23 Win Shares (according to the Bill James Handbook) and then calculate them vs. how much players on average make per win generated for their team (I could go into a long discussion explaining how all of this works, but that would be an article in and of itself. If you're interested, Hardball Times is a good starting place) you'd see that $11M is cheap. The average FA made $1.3M per WSAB. A net share win value of $0 would mean you performed exactly up to your contract expectation. Giles in 2005 had a net win share value of $13,298,869, which when combined with his salary of $8,333,333 would equal a real world value of $21,632,202. Ok so James predicts a drop off in WSAB in 2006 for Giles to 18. Runnin the same figures, should Giles exactly match James' prediction, his net win shares would be $7,735,285 at a salary of $11M. How is a guy who is paid $11M per year but produces at a rate of $18,735,285 a bad investment? Only around here does that make perfect sense. Giles is getting up there in years, he's already had the best years he's going to have in the big leagues, and he's expensive. Historically, that has made guys like him irresistible to the Yankees.
How much do you want to bet it makes sense to other teams as well? I mean the Padres offered him 3 years at $21M. The Padres. This is the team that never pays anyone. They offered him a cut in salary. It was a below market offer. I'll guarantee you Giles gets at minimum two other offers that match or beat $11M per for 3 or 4 years from other teams besides the Yankees. Maybe Giles would come here and play a swell center field, be on base all the time. But to get this overheated this fast about a potential Yankee center fielder who's not even a center fielder - who's only played 36 games in center over the past four seasons - makes you wonder how different the new, user-friendly Yankee front office is from the old dysfunctional Yankee front office.
There is no guarantee Giles would play centerfield. Why is that stuck in your head? And do you offer up another viable solution? Corey Patterson? I keep hearing that Torre really likes Giles. Why? And how much has he seen him lately? The last time Giles played in the American League was 1998, when he hit 16 home runs and knocked in 66 for the Indians. Whatever he was doing at the time sure must have rung the skipper's bell. That and whatever he saw of Giles on DirecTV last season.
Torre's probably seen as much of Giles as you have of the Pirates. Oh, by the way though, Torre isn't the general manager and isn't negotiating contracts. He calls the FA that he's asked to. The guy went golfing with Albert Belle to try and woo him, for crying out loud. "He's a baseball player," a manager who has managed against Giles for a long time said yesterday.
Ok, this is one of my favorite quotes of all time. You hear it constantly to describe someone. It's supposed to be a compliment to the way the guy goes about his job. But you never hear "that guy John, who drives the bus? He's a bus driver. A real bus driver." But I digress. "He can still hit and he'll walk a lot. But he's a right fielder. If he's not a right fielder, he's a left fielder. What he's not is a center fielder."
It is why this can't be the end of the star search.
We are only halfway through November. This is clearly a year when the trade market is better than the free agent market. The Yankees can't possibly have decided that Giles, who wasn't a regular center fielder in San Diego, is the best possible choice to be the next center fielder at the Stadium.
Again, please suggest something better, and please show where anyone has said Giles will be in CF. Johnny Damon faded down the stretch for the Red Sox last season. After he hurt his shoulder, he made Bernie seem as if he had Vlad Guerrero's arm in comparison. And Damon still fits what the Yankees need - he's an actual leadoff man, for one thing - more than Giles ever could.
........ did I just get that right? You want Johnny Damon? You think Giles isn't worth $11M per for 3 years, but are ok with Damon's demand of $40/4 yrs? You say Giles is an "aging ballplayer whose best days are behind him and then you suggest... Johnny Damon? You think Johnny Damon is a "actual leadoff man?" The Yankees already have an actual leadoff man. His name is Derek Jeter. Damon's WSAB was 13 in 2005. He was worth $13.7M in real dollars. That's $8M less than Giles was worth. Reportedly it's Giles' .423 on-base percentage that is one of the things making Torre and Brian Cashman weak at the knees. Is that all it takes to get big Yankee money now? Or maybe they have this idea that you can plug any decent outfielder into center at the Stadium these days. That's the kind of thinking that sent Tony Womack out there last season, for about 20 minutes, anyway.
.....again, what? You have a problem with Giles getting on base? And you know, if Womack had a .423 OBP, he'd still be playing OF for the Yankees on a daily basis and this would be a moot point. The Yankees just overpaid Hideki Matsui. I like Matsui a lot. They still gave him too much money and too many years. Now there seems to be a pretty good chance that they might be ready to overpay Giles. The Yankees keep saying they are going to change when it comes to throwing money around. Maybe they can't.
They're not throwing it at bad players. A lot of money just came off the books. Would you trade Kevin Brown and Bernie Williams for Giles and Matsui if you also got and additional $6M per year in payroll of the books? The Yankees need to get younger, they need to get faster, they need to move Derek Jeter back to No. 2 in the batting order. And they need a pure center fielder who can go get it. Giles is a solid player, an All-Star player once, a splashy hire for the Padres when they got him in 2003. But if you think he covers any of those Yankee needs, send up a flare.
If they need to get younger, why are you advocating Damon? Why does Jeter need to go back to the 2-hole? His production as a leadoff hitter has been outstanding. In fact, his numbers leading off are better than those in the 2 spot. No, he doesn't cover your listed "needs." However, those needs are irrelevant because you're a jackass. Giles was #3 in the NL in WSAB last year. Numbers 1 and 2? Pujols and Lee. I'd say that he's better than an "All-Star player once."
When you first heard the Yankees might be interested in Giles, the next thing you heard was that he might not want to come East, being a Southern California kid. At this point, Giles' agent, Joe Bick, nearly tore a rotator cuff reaching for the phone and telling anybody who would listen that this couldn't possibly be further from the truth. Bick is no fool, not when there is Yankee money on the table suddenly.
Always remember what another owner said once about that:
"There is Yankee money and then there is everybody else's."
Ok, I'll keep that in mind, chief! Cashman has been saying for months that the Yankees can't just throw money at their problems anymore. He was still saying that when the Yankees were out of the playoffs and Aaron Rowand, the White Sox center fielder, was catching everything he saw in the ALCS and then in the World Series.
Another thing the Yankees say is that they want to cut payroll. Apparently what that means is they wait for old bad contracts to come off the books before they start offering new ones.
New contracts? Because a 3 year deal for a stud player isn't a bad contract.
My prediction anyway is that you're going to see Pavano as a Dodger and Bradley as a Yankee, or Pavano in a three team deal with Brad Wilkerson or Aaron Rowand as a Yankee.
In addition to Giles in RF.
You jackass. Originally published on November 18, 2005
This used to be a regular segment on my old blog. I've been waiting for Lupica to post another asinine column where he shows his bias and complete lack of understanding for the game. Don't worry, Mike. I'll be keeping tabs and pointing out your idiocy so nobody misses anything by "New York's premier sports columnist!"
Yank greats & Alex a World apart
This is referring to which "Yank greats"? Babe Ruth? Lou Gehrig? Scott Brosius?
Alex Rodriguez is exactly what he was when the Yankees traded for him 21 months ago. He is their trophy third baseman, more of a trophy third baseman than ever now that he has won his second MVP award in three years. He is just not the trophy the Yankees had in mind.
He's an MVP third baseman. I'm pretty sure if you went back in time and asked Brian Cashman before he completed the Soriano deal "would you be satisfied with his performance if Alex plays good defense and wins an MVP in his second year?" that Cashman would be very happy with that. But you're referring to the fact that Rodriguez didn't guarantee a championship... which is exactly what you've been mocking the Yankees about (trying to "buy" championships) in this paper for years now.
"We can win three World Series, with me it's never going to be over," Rodriguez said yesterday. "I think my benchmark is so high that no matter what I do, it's never going to be enough, and I understand that."
What a guy.
He just won the MVP and it wasn't enough for you. You're spending this article throwing him under the bus.
The definition of benchmark goes something like this: A point of reference for a measurement. A-Rod knew exactly how big Yankees were measured when he decided to move here from Texas and move from shortstop to third base. The idea that the expectations for him are now ridiculously high is ridiculously low comedy.
The expectations are just as they should be for someone who is routinely discussed as one of the great baseball players of all time. That is what he should understand. He knew the deal as well as he knew the deal when he signed for $252 million.
He won the MVP, which is the award for the best player in the league. He was the best player in the AL in 2005. If the expectations are that he should be the best player in the league, well guess what? He just did that.
It is why there are an awful lot of Yankee fans who remember him as much for that .133 he hit against the Angels in the division series and for that 5-4-3 double play in the ninth inning of Game 5 as for all the gaudy numbers that got him past David Ortiz in the MVP voting. The bull's-eye on A-Rod's back that he alluded to yesterday? He put it there himself when he elected to become a Yankee.
No, people remember it because you keep mentioning it. What about Sheffield? Matsui? They didn't do much against the Angels, did they? Alex hit into a double play, yes. Did that end the game? No. Was that the reason the Yankees lost the series? No. And what about Sheffield? Why isn't there a bull's-eye on his back when he elected to become a Yankee? Where is Matsui's bull's-eye? Randy Johnson? Did only Rodriguez get a bull's-eye?
Of course there is still plenty of time for him. He has only been here two years, which means only two of the five since the Yankees last won a World Series. He is still the true face of the 21st century Yankees, the new Yankees, never to be confused with the old Yankees who won four Series in five years for Joe Torre. He is the richest player on the richest team, one that has spent $1 billion in payroll and payroll taxes since 2001 and still hasn't been able to win it all.
Yep, George puts his money back into his team. What about your beloved Mets, Mike? They're spending, right? They haven't won since 1986, am I correct? Boy you must be really proud of that team, full of drunks and drug addicts (Gooden, Strawberry, Dykstra, Hernandez). I bet none of those guys had bull's-eyes though, so that's ok. Seriously though, I hope nobody confuses this team with the old teams. Because as we all know, we'd waive Rodriguez if only Charlie Hayes would come out of retirement.
He is always going to be the new guy you look at first. Not Giambi, not Sheffield, not Mussina. Not Randy Johnson.
Him.
He's the guy you look to first to produce, since he's the best hitter in the league. You look at him first to heap criticism on the team's "failure."
He is the best player on what everybody calls the best team going into every season. He is the richest player in history playing on the richest team in history. He hasn't won yet and the Yankees haven't won since 2000. So far they are made for each other.
Yep, he makes a lot of money. Glad you brought that up again.
"Maybe when I retire is when the critics and all that kind of stuff will end," he said yesterday.
Puh-leeze.
OK, now I'm pretty sure this is Lupica admitting he's never going to stop his assault on A-Rod. Mike, pay attention here: you're the critic. The guy won the MVP despite the fact that you've spent every article since September talking about David Ortiz and how he's the best player since Roy Hobbs.
He had an amazing season, the greatest season any righthanded hitter has had at Yankee Stadium since Joe DiMaggio. Only Barry Bonds has had grander numbers than A-Rod in this time in baseball. It probably won't take A-Rod as long to make a World Series as it did Bonds. It may happen as soon as next season. Still: He is two years a Yankee and 10 full years in the big leagues and he hasn't been to the Series yet.
Yep. Mattingly was the last Yankee MVP. He didn't make it to the series either. I guess that means he was a terrible ballplayer. You love Joe Torre. He won an MVP. And yet he never played in the World Series. I suppose he sucked as well.
So far there is a Wilt Chamberlain quality to him. He has the most amazing numbers and the fans don't love him the way he wants them to and he still hasn't won. Chamberlain was eight years in the NBA before he finally won with the 76ers.
Could it be because every time they pick up a paper there's a jackass sportswriter ripping him to shreds?
The voters for the MVP award judge the candidates only on what they do during the regular season, not during the playoffs. Good thing. The last big postseason swing A-Rod made for the Yankees was a home run swing in Game 4 against the Red Sox, 2004 ALCS.
I suppose Ortiz was instrumental in the Red Sox glorious 3 and out.
In the last nine postseason games Rodriguez has played as a Yankee, he is 4-for-32, a .125 batting average, that one home run, two RBI. He was 1-for-12 over the last three games against the Red Sox in '04 and 2-for-15 against the Angels. No RBI for those eight games. Why is this relevant today? Because he's the one who says that winning three World Series will never be enough here.
You're really missing the point Mike. In fact, this article is making Alex's point for him.
Don't talk about the Series after your team can't get out of the first round. "One of these days," one Yankee said to me during the playoffs, "(A-Rod) is going to stop squeezing the bat so hard when we need him the most."
He isn't the only star Yankee who let his team down in the games I am talking about. No one in this city has ever thought of putting all of this on Rodriguez.
What?! That's what you've been doing since the last out of the ALDS! That's what you've done in this very article!
But it is hardly unreasonable to suggest that there were plenty of times over the past two postseasons when one swing from him, one Papi-like swing, could have changed everything for the Yankees.
Ah, I knew it was coming. Papi. You love Papi. Papi's team won 2 less games this postseason you know.
A-Rod was tremendous in August and September when the Yankees really started to come on. He hit 20 home runs the last couple of months. He had 48 for the season and 130 RBI and a slugging percentage made out of platinum and you know all the rest of it.
So, wait? He carried his team into the playoffs? Without him they wouldn't have made it? Yep, what an asshole he is! What a non-clutch asshole!
Yesterday should have been a day to celebrate that part of his season, not share the burdens of being A-Rod. He's the one who threw that one out there. Three World Series? Is he kidding? Yankee fans would settle for one.
Today should have been a day to talk about Rodriguez's award, and not another excuse to throw him under the bus, you jackass. If it should be a day to celebrate his season, why then is the front page of your paper dedicated to Rodriguez promising not to do something that wasn't illegal in the first place but out of which your paper made a big deal?
A Yankee wins the MVP for the first time in what, 20 years? Here are the front and back covers:
FRONT: ALEX WILL STOP DOING SOMETHING LEGAL BACK: LOOK HE STILL HASN'T WON ANYTHING, HA-HA
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