After last night’s game, I am ready to officially announce that I have no hope left for the Yankees putting together a streak of out-of-their-minds baseball that will vault them into the 2008 playoffs. It is not going to happen. I drew up a 5-point plan for making it happen eight days ago, and that plan has somewhat come to fruition: Melky got demoted, Matsui had a clean rehab and returned to the lineup. Hughes, however, did not excel at Scranton and may end up staying there through this weekend, so I was wrong about that one. Chamberlain is trying to come back, but it is extremely unclear when his return will happen, if at all.
The fifth point, though, is the problem:
“Jason Giambi, Robinson Cano and Derek Jeter's offensive games come alive, and with the re-insertion of Matsui, the lineup consistently performs to the level that they were expected to coming in to the season.”
Jeter and Cano’s bats have looked a little livelier of late, but The Big G is just an abomination. It has gotten to the point where he is literally only good for one of the three true outcomes in each of his at-bats: a walk, a strikeout or a homerun. Regardless of the statistical analysis camps that will claim that these types of players are useful and helpful for offenses, having this version of Jason Giambi as the #5 hitter in the lineup is doing absolutely nothing for the Yankees.
Last night’s game was lost by Johnny Damon’s inability to remember how to play center field. However, more games this season have been lost thanks to major failures by his buddy The Giambino in situations hitting with men on base. The fact that he has remained implanted in the lineup, consistently hitting right behind A-Rod no less, boggles my mind. Yes, there was one month of this season when Giambi was killing the ball to all fields—but those days have quickly vanished, replaced by his pull-happy “swing for the fences” mental approach to hitting. Kevin Long has been quoted before saying that he tells Jason all the time to hit to left field, but for whatever reason he just simply can’t do it.
Giambi is synonymous with the entire 2008 team. They both have had limited moments of success this year, but neither have come close to sustaining them. They have had a ton of opportunities to produce runs in ways that aren’t home runs, and yet they can never get it done on any type of consistent basis. Defensively neither has been very good, but the defense has not cost them as many games as the poor offense. Thankfully, they will no longer be around once the calendar hits October.
It’s funny, Giambi came to New York talking a big talk about wanting to win a championship, loving the Yankees tradition, etc. Yet he has never changed his game to win a championship. He couldn’t adjust to being a DH, even though he gets paid tens of millions (now twenties of millions) of dollars a year to basically do what the Yankees need him to do to help them. He brought the BALCO baggage with him but at least handled that media firestorm carefully and decently. As a result of his BALCO baggage, he has been on the DL or banged up or somehow incapacitated for most of his time in pinstripes.
And, of course, the team hasn’t won anything in the life of his 7 year deal. That World Series in 2003, the only one he (hopefully) will ever be a part of, he was mysteriously out of the lineup to start Game 5 with some type of phantom injury, even though it was oh, the WORLD SERIES and the Yankees were coming off a heartbreaking extra-inning loss in Game 4. Not to mention he was one of their biggest offensive players that year (that game somehow had Giambi AND Alfonso Soriano out of the lineup, by the way).
Of course, in that game he pinch hits and hits a meaningless home run in the 9th inning, so apparently he wasn’t hurt badly enough to not be able to jack a meaningless home run out of the park.
That kind of thing will be what I remember of The Jason Giambi Era—meaningless home runs that don’t provide much beyond letting Jason pose and still have the numbers that make him out to be a dangerous power hitter. Really, he is a selfish player who made zero adjustments or sacrifices for this team in his 7 years with the Yankees. This year the coaching staff put all their faith behind Giambi being able to stay healthy and play first and be a middle of the order hitter.
He’s stayed healthy, he’s played first…but he hasn’t rewarded the Yankees’ faith with any real production. All in all, a bad case of misplaced faith in The Great Giambino, a Yankee that will not be missed when he’s in another team’s uniform come 2009.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Friday, August 15, 2008
The Melk Man has left the building, presumably riding out on the back of The Big Sexy like an excited young boy taking his first pony ride. Melky Cabrera has been demoted to Scranton-Wilkes Barre, replaced on the roster by Brett Gardner. In a corresponding move, Richie Sexson has been released and replaced on the roster by utility infielder and 32-year-old career minor leaguer Cody Ransom.
Glad to see Gardner get another shot with the big club. He’s an unbelievable threat on the bases and he grinds out long at-bats. Granted, speed and grinding didn’t help Gardner do better than a .153/.227/.169 line in his first stint, but the message is clear: ineptitude to the level of Melky’s will not stand, even if it was allowed to for three months too long. A real pessimist could argue that this is making a change for the sake of making a change and that it doesn’t change anything for the Yankees 2008 playoff hopes, and that pessimist would be hard to argue with because they’re mostly right. But addition by subtraction is a real concept, and perhaps both these moves are meant to do a little wake-up work for all parties directly affected:
Melky Cabrera: Pretty obvious, but it can affect him a lot of ways. He can’t take for granted that he’s a part of the team anymore, either this year or for next year, meaning it’s crystal clear that he’s going to have to earn whatever future he’s going to have with the Yankees. It’s a shame that he will undoubtedly be a September call-up when rosters expand, which is what makes this move too little too late. Instead of letting him stew in the minors and recalibrate and maybe figure out how to hit again via an extended stay, he’s really getting a 2-week excommunication to western Pennsylvania. In the bigger picture, though, it means that Austin Jackson’s chances of cracking the big league team in 2009 have increased exponentially, and it’s open season for who plays CF for the Yankees on Opening Day 2009.
Robinson Cano: It takes away his number one buddy, and it means he’ll have to fly solo if he’s going to head out to Manhattan clubs to get ripped and pick up ladies dying to hang out with one or more of the New York Yankees. Also, Cody Ransom’s call-up shows that maybe his virtually unwavering playing time isn’t going to be guaranteed if he continues to play lazy, uninspired baseball. A start at 2nd for Ransom against a left handed starter would be an eyebrow-raiser, for sure.
Brett Gardner: A chance to redeem his putrid offensive performance upon his first go-round with the Yankees. He has notoriously been a slow starter when he’s advanced a level through the minors, and the jump from AAA to MLB is arguably the hardest a professional player makes. It will be interesting to see if he adjusts to big league pitching the 2nd time around, if he’s more aggressive early in counts when he gets fat pitches, or if he sticks to always running a 2-strike count and too often being called out on strikes.
Johnny Damon: He will be expected to play more CF than he has in the last 2 years. His arm is still terrible so teams will still run on him when they have the chance, but his legs have been healthy all year. Hopefully he can still track down balls when he has to, and hopefully an extra level of exertion on his body by playing center won't negatively effect his sterling performance at the plate so far this year.
Wilson Betemit: Inexplicably, he backs his way into a bigger role on the team. Since I doubt Gardner will be seeing a starter’s amount of playing time, the lineup will frequently feature Johnny Damon in CF, Nady in LF and Betemit or Giambi as DH. Joel Sherman of the Post broke the news of these roster moves, and in his write-up he brings up the potential increase in his P.T. To me, this is a boneheaded move if it occurs; granted, tonight’s lineup does not feature Betemit (Gardner is in CF and Damon is the DH), but I don’t see that lasting, especially if Brett continues to struggle at the major league level.
Cody Ransom: He’s a 32 year old guy whose never played in the bigs before; to him, this is the chance of a lifetime. Hopefully he can get himself a couple of hits and play some good D when he’s on the field, and maybe catch another organization’s attention, maybe parlaying a big league roster spot for 2009.
Richie Sexson: Well, not a good couple of years for The Big Sexy. I’m sure some team will take a flier on him for Spring Training 2009, but he has suffered a precipitous fall from one of the league’s biggest power threats and a decent 1B option. He didn’t do a terrible job with the Yankees, but he also didn’t seem to be taking any different of an approach at the plate—meaning still a lot of swings and misses, and not much production.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Today is dark on the schedule, so it makes it easier to let the ineptitude of the team’s now mercifully completed road trip really sink in. 3 wins out of 10 games away from the Bronx. Utterly pathetic, even when you consider that three of the losses were against baseball’s best team—two of those games the Yankees were in positions to win, so you can’t chalk it all up to being overmatched or outclassed by a better team.
Even the off days seem dark considering how far behind the team has fallen and how little time is left to make this season relevant. Based on how bad the team looks right now, I’m driven to consider what the roster might look like next season as an alternative to dwelling on the present. It is going to be an extremely interesting offseason for the Yankees, and it is extremely premature to be speculating on what will happen, but I am going to run through a short list of moves I think need to be made:
A) Bring back Brian Cashman. He has a plan that needs to be carried out for a while longer—he has put the organizational onus on drafting the best players available and being willing to overpay them, thus stocking the farm system for the first time in a long time. It has not been all sunshine and roses (See: Expectations for Hughes and Kennedy in 2008), but there is still so much talent in the organization. It should be Cashman who decides which of those guys to keep and which of those guys to move, and he should be given the chance to use all the pieces he picked to put together a championship. Sign him to a 3 year deal, and if he hasn’t produced a winner by year 2, maybe he doesn’t live to see year 3.
B) Say goodbye to Jason Giambi, Bobby Abreu, Richie Sexson, Wilson Betemit, Ivan Rodriguez and *gulp* Carl Pavano. These guys are either flat-out free agents, or have team options that should not be picked up (Giambi & Pavano). That’s 20% of the active roster already deleted right there. Out of the group, Abreu is the one that I would consider bringing back, but only if he wanted to take an incentive-laden 2 years guaranteed/3rd and 4th year option deal. On the open market, though, he will certainly get a better offer than that.
C) Offer a ton of money to CC Sabathia to return to the American League, not drift further west towards his Oakland hometown. Out of all the other “marquee” free agents (Mark Teixeira, Ben Sheets, Adam Dunn for sure, guys like AJ Burnett and Rich Harden have options), Sabathia is the best fit for the Yankees. Much debate revolves around replacing Giambi with Teixeira, but he will demand a long (7 year) contract for money that supposes that he’s on the level with Albert Pujols or other elite-type first basemen, which he isn’t. Plus, there are enough position players on this team under long-term contracts, and adding another extremely long deal to the mix removes any of the gained financial flexibility from the departures of those 5 players I mentioned earlier.
D) Try to fill the voids created at first base and in the outfield through trades and potentially low-key free agent signings. This is where Brian Cashman can get really creative. The team has stockpiled a lot of prospects since the organizational philosophy shifted in 2005—this is probably the best offseason to start exchanging trading chips for major league talent. You have to go out there and scour the Earth to see if there is a first basemen that is not aging, has athletic ability, is a decent situational hitter and can play good defense. The philosophy shouldn’t be, “We need a new power threat who can mash 30 HRs!”. It should be, “We need to find the best baseball player available at this position, who fits our needs both financially and on the field”. First base has to be the priority in terms of trades, but if a deal came along for an outfielder who fit that previously mentioned profile, AND has experience playing CF, I would hope that Cash would jump at that.
E) This last point kind of goes along with Point D. Decide the fate of the hideously obnoxious tandem of Melky and Robbie by asking some tough questions. Cano is going to end up having his worst full year in the majors, and he has looked God awful while doing it, but we’ll talk about his buddy in CF first
Melky has become an abomination at the dish, and is quickly losing playing time to Johnny Damon and Justin Christian. His value is much lower than it was during the offseason last year, but he is still only 24. Do you try and deal him in any trade you want to make to fill other voids left by Abreu and Giambi? And if you do, are you signing a stopgap to replace him, or giving Brett Gardner a chance to win the job in Spring Training, or what? And if Melky is still around, you absolutely have to tell him that he must earn any playing time he’s going to get in 2009. He didn’t have any competition for the job this year, and it burned them in the end because it seems like he now takes his job for granted.
As for Cano, the Yankees have to decide if he is their best option as a second baseman for the next 3 years. They have to recognize that other teams would want Cano due to his previous success, age, and cost-controlled nature, on top of a lot of raw talent that teams would think they could tap in to. All those things combined, Cano is the commodity that would land the Yankees the biggest return of talent if traded. If you can land a difference-making offensive player, or if you miss on Sabathia but there is another bigtime pitcher available, you have to consider trading Cano.
All these things considered, it will certainly be an interesting offseason in the Bronx this fall.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Three important little baby steps last night for pivotal Yankees in this 2008 season. We'll start with the only one that occurred outside of The Bronx.
Ian Kennedy's line in his first start at AAA Scranton: 7.1 IP 1 H 0 R 0 BB 8 K. A drastic turnaround from Ian's putrid performances in pinstripes thus far this year. The quality of the Charlotte Knights lineup he decimated may be less than what an American League opponent can offer, but he needed to see that he could still pitch to a high level somewhere. He wasn't going to get this type of sudden boost of confidence pitching in New York, where only slight improvement would have still left questions swirling about his status in the rotation. Now, though, he shifts the pressure onto Kei Igawa and Darrell Rasner this upcoming weekend. He gets to rest until Sunday, and gets to know that if either of those two falters in Motown, he could pitch his way back into the Bombers' rotation.
The likelihood of one or both of the newly-added starters faltering this weekend seems high, especially considering the track record of Kei Igawa. That allows Kennedy to put the pressure on himself to perform well in his next start on Sunday, knowing that it might get him a ticket back to New York for a start next week. I honestly trust Kennedy performing under the self-implied pressure of trying to pitch his way back to NY, more then I trust Igawa and Rasner both performing well under the real pressure of being in the Yankees rotation and facing a great lineup.
Even though the Yankees lost last night's game in crushing fashion, two big things to take away from it were key hits by Jason Giambi and Robinson Cano. The more shocking to me was seeing Giambi drive in runs with a hit to left field. Who knows if he'll be able to build off that, but seeing that he actually got a semi-important hit for once is enough success for one day. Cano has had little spurts of productivity during his slump (his home run Sunday, last night's hit), so the key for him seems to be just putting together a legit slump-busting hot streak.
For a night they no longer could be categorized as certified corpses in the middle of the Yankees' lineup. Neither could Andy Pettitte be faulted on this night, as he turned in an excellent performance, keeping the starting pitching momentum going into tonight when Wang matches up with the surprisingly unhittable Cliff Lee. The lefty will probably mean Shelley Duncan and Morgan Ensberg both in the lineup, meaning more nearly-automatic outs at the bottom of the order.
There's no need to spend too much time deliberating over Joba Chamberlain's failure last night. He's due to have some games where he gets beat, and last night was one of them. It's a story because he rarely slips, but it won't snowball into a concern because he's got too good of an arm and too strong of a psyche to let it.
I'll be real interested to see how tonight's game goes, though, and if Cliff Lee can really keep his unreal season going.
Monday, February 11, 2008
With the apparent foresight of 8 months, the New York Post on Sunday declared that the Yankees will not make the playoffs in the 2008 season. Granted, the sub-headline claims the team will "struggle to make the playoffs". Still, George King's article certainly reads like an epitaph sent out to the mourning fans of a team that's made the playoffs for 12 straight seasons.
King makes it clear that anyone looking through a Pinstriped Prism be on alert immediately in his piece, claiming that the team's young pitching has achieved a dubious level of "premature adulation". In other words, slow down that hype machine, Yankees fans; these rookies aren't really that good. If that's the case, and they've just been overly lauded without merit, you, even the most irrationally loyal fan, can't think the team can contend in 2008, can you? Really going right for the heart of the man or woman who thinks 2008 is their year already, George! And only in your article's first graf, no less.
With the rain adequately doused on the 2008 Yankees' parade, A-Rod, Abreu, Posada and Rivera's returns are cited as a case of wasted money. King's logic dictates that since you're banking your franchise on the arms of 3 20something pitchers who aren't yet anything to write home about (I mean, Hughes/Chamberlain/Kennedy only won 8 games combined in '07, even Mike Mussina did more than that), you should be stockpiling assets for 2 years from now, when you can really (hopefully) contend, with the development of whomever is left standing out of The Big 3.
This logic does not bode well for those that utilize hindsight at all, but then again, nothing the Post writes bodes well for those types of baseball fans. Had the team abandoned all its veteran Free Agents, as King is now suggesting, and gone in the rebuilding direction, one can only imagine the back-page abuse that would have been directed at the Yankees. However, that's not really the issue here, since you can't criticize what the Post never had a chance to write. The issue is the identity of the team, or at least what George King thinks their identity should be. Since they ended up opening the Steinbrenner purse and paying the old guard to stick around, now the angle has to be that the team is worse than it was last season and can not improve. Therefore since the team's faces stayed 90% the same, and since they got bounced in the first round last year, it's a sign of regression, and a sign of a team that thinks it can contend when really, uh...not so much. This should really be dubbed 2008 Chicago White Sox Syndrome (Orlando Cabrera, Nick Swisher, Octavio Dotel...Detroit Who?). The Yankees, however, don't quite fit into that mold just yet, as I'll argue here.
King's concern of identity crisis is a legitimate one to a degree, since it is impossible to expect or predict status quo performances from the retained Free Agents of 2007. A-Rod won't recreate his absurd numbers from 2007. Similarly, there is going to come a time soon when Jorge Posada's skills begin to decline, and it might be this season (the likelihood of them completely vanishing overnight seems very low, but for the sake of the argument, it is there nonetheless). Likewise for Mariano, who goes through rough patches more than he used to and no doubt that will continue.
To say that none of these players should have been brought back, however, makes zero sense. The crux of my argument against that thinking emerges when you consider the anemic possibilities for replacements for each player, both internally and externally.
Catcher
Paul LoDuca or some other retread for 1 year, instead of Jorge Posada for 4 years, when there is no internal "catcher of the future" lurking anywhere in the Yankees' farm system? To me, this is the easiest call out of the 4. Four, though, is the key number in regards to this particular scenario. The four year length of Posada's contract is no doubt frightening, and it puts a lot of pressure on Jorge to above all maintain his abilities with the stick, even if his legs fall out from under him within the length of his contract; at least after this season, the DH logjam will be somewhat lessened by the departure of Jason Giambi upon the expiration of his contract, opening up the possibility for Jorge to transition to a DH/occasionally playing the field kind of guy.
Closer
The elephant in the room here, is Joba Chamberlain. Since it's widely regarded that the Yankees were bidding against themselves for the services of Mariano Rivera, and since it's clear that Joba could handle the closing job based on his run in the bullpen in 07, why go to the lengths of a 3 year deal with Rivera? This to me is the only case where the departure of the old guard could have been covered from within. And yet out of the four, it would have been the highest-profile loss, yes even with A-Rod included. In terms of what he's meant to the pitching staff's success in the 9th inning for the past 10 years, a ton of noise would have been made about whoever was replacing Mo. That's even considering if Chamberlain was christened as the replacement. I don't think the franchise wanted to put Joba in the position of dealing with the endless "can you replace...can you close...can you handle the transition from 8th to 9th?" questions that would have come with being the 2008 closer. Plus, I really do believe that the organization wants him in the rotation in 2008, be it starting in April, July or September.
Right Field
One more year of Bobby Abreu, for 16 million, is in no way the same as the signings of Rivera and Posada; A-Rod exists in his own stratosphere, which we'll attempt to enter after this short talk. If anything, it's the biggest no-brainer of the 4 since the team had control of Abreu's option and had nobody to bid against at all. The number of dollars is a bargain considering the exorbitant contracts OFs are signing these days. Plus, the Yankees' few valuable position prospects just so happen to be outfielders, with one of them even playing full-time in RF. So, with that said, the retention of Abreu for only a year actually does lean more towards the youth movement than the "old guard" philosophy. You keep Jose Tabata and Austin Jackson motivated all throughout the 2008 season with the carrot dangling over their heads that might as well be playing a recording of Brian Cashman saying "You know, we don't have anyone signed to play right field for 2009, plus Melky Cabrera is looking at a make or break year, so..." (not any type of direct quote, mind you, but possible nonetheless). If competition is the buzz word of this upcoming 2008 Spring Training in regards to the pitching staff, it might as well be the modus operandi of the 2008 season for those two highly-touted outfield prospects as well. Plus if the season completely falls apart by June (possible depending on injuries, God knows what else), you can always peddle Bobby Abreu at the deadline to a team looking for an offensive upgrade. So he doesn't even belong in the same breath as the other 3 returning players.
Third Base
Basically, there was no one out there that was going to cover for the lost production of A-Rod. The scenario that George King proposed, letting everyone walk, would have only made sense if A-Rod was completely gone from the Yankees universe once he opted out, something that seemed possible in late October. Then you can get away with changing the identity of the team completely; however, since that didn't happen, you still stick to the formula of trotting out a deep, patient lineup of hitters to surround A-Rod and make sure you've still got the 9th inning in the hands of the tried and true. With these pieces still in place, you can still mash your way through the rough patches your own starting rotation encounters. Joe Crede, Scott Rolen or Eric Chavez playing 3rd, and someone like Hideki Matsui or Jason Giambi or Posada batting cleanup in lieu of A-Rod, would not have allowed you to throw 2-3 rookies into the rotation and asked them to develop on the fly. People seem to quickly forget that the rotation was in utter shambles for most of last season, when Carl Pavano (hah) was the Opening Day starter, then pulled a Carl Pavano, Chien-Ming Wang and Mike Mussina both spent time on the DL, Kei Igawa was getting bombed, and so on.
Yet the team was carried at points by its offense, particularly A-Rod. That's why you pay him $27 million per year, because there are going to be points when he single-handedly wins you games; you couldn't find that anywhere else, and you're still going to need it at points in 2008. How that will be working in 10 years is another story, but this is more about 2008 than 2018.
The difference, though, will be that you won't be tossing never-will's like Jeff Karstens, Darell Rasner and Chase Wright at teams in desperation (that is, barring injuries to any of The Big 3, which will be the worst case scenario of this Spring Training), but instead will be trotting out your organization's supposed future and saying "give us a chance, learn on the job, mature as you will" because your team can still put up runs, especially against the teams with the thinner pitching staffs (Baltimore and Tampa, I'm looking in your direction).
To wrap up that article by George King, though, he also claims that Phil Hughes will somehow be dogged by the fact that he's the guy the Yankees wouldn't trade for Johan Santana. First, that's just wrong, since he was eventually included in the offer, which to me still was the best one Minnesota got (maybe I'm just partial to Pinstriped Phil and not Phil Humber). To be more accurate, the guy they wouldn't trade is Ian Kennedy, since he was the desired "seal the deal" throw-in prospect that the Yankees just wouldn't ante up.
This idea that Phil will be remembered as a "could've been Santana" demagogue is ridiculous, except for the possibility that it just hints at the idiotic questions Mr. King will be asking him upon his first bad outing of the season. Something real friendly like "How does it feel to know that you pitched so poorly, when the team could have had Santana instead?" Obviously that's a little too harsh for a beat reporter, and he'd ask something with a little more tact, but that's clearly the type of question he alludes to.
Furthermore, King questions why the team would give Robinson Cano a long-term deal while simultaneously saying goodbye to his mentor/taskmaster Larry Bowa, since Cano is simply, according to King, "not a hard worker". Glad to see that Cano is given zero possibility of maturing and becoming a hard worker on his own without Bowa; and wait, didn't the team just hire a taskmaster manager? Shouldn't Joe Girardi's rep for being a tight-ass be enough to cover for the defection of Larry Bowa? Also, it's not like Cano is suddenly making 15 mill a year for 10 years, they just signed him through his arbitration years to avoid having to negotiate year after year with him until he reaches free agency. Not something so outlandish for someone that's done nothing but produce since he was called up. So now we're to believe that his habits will deteriorate and production slow up, because he doesn't have to play year in and year out to up his arbitration number? Maybe that is accurate, considering how greedy and number-driven the modern athlete appears to be, but in this case I will plead Yankees Bias and say that I hope the presence of A-Rod as an emerging mentor for Melky and Cano (it's weird to think of considering A-Rod still loves having mentors himself at 32, but it's still a fact), plus the manager's philosophy of hard work and preparation, will be enough to keep Cano on the straight and narrow.
In closing, what the article as a whole gives readers is the image of this 2008 Yankees team as one marred by bloated contracts attached to players who no longer deserve them. It also discredits every young talent that Yankees fans can be and are excited about for one reason or another. If it's an attempt to set the bar low for the 2008 season in the Bronx, it succeeds; its only legitimate argument for setting that bar low, however, is the state of shambles that the Yankees' pen is in, something that I will write more in-depth about in the coming days (really cross your fingers about LaTroy Hawkins and Kyle Farnsworth, Yankees fans!).
The other problems that George King latches on to, as I've tried to explain in the above words, seem silly to me. If it's just for the sake of conjuring an eye-grabbing tabloid read, something that doesn't escape me since this is the New York Post I'm talking about, then so be it, he's doing his job and trying his hardest. The identity crisis, though, just doesn't seem to exist. The team's lineup is still good enough to trot out there against Boston, Detroit and Cleveland, and while there are question marks galore, don't try to create them about players who need not have them stuck above their heads. For me, that would be 20 year old pitchers with lots of ability, since they all come with questions (health, ceiling, consistency), as well as proven veterans, and a steady, young second baseman.
Dedicate your article's question marks to the mess at 1B and in the bullpen, instead of trying to drag down the starting rotation and lineup. My argument remains that one of those two will certainly be a strength coming into the season, and by the middle of the season when everyone is catching Pennant Race Fever, they should realistically both be strengths. Either way, this is all extremely premature since we're still 9 days away from the team's first full workout in The Girardi Era.
But don't let it be said that the New York Post isn't out there making bold statements in February, and stirring up doubt about each and every one of the 25 potential 2008 New York Yankees.
