Why We Hate The Yankees

Thursday is a huge day in New York City baseball. At 5 p.m., the identity of the team that “posted” the most money for the right to negotiate with prized Japanese pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka will be announced.

The posting process is a bidding war. Teams post silent bids, the team bidding the most gets the exclusive rights to sign Japan’s next big thing.

I'm going to break the suspense for you all right now; if you don't want to know which team will win the bidding, stop reading here.

*Spoiler Alert*

The winning team will inevitably be the Yankees. Yes my friends, the Yankees.

The number is likely to be over $20 million dollar, or more than $5 million dollars more than the Marlins' entire payroll in ’06. Call it ESP or woman's intuition, but somehow I doubt the Marlins are getting this guy.

The usuals remain interested. Us, Boston, both LA teams and everyone’s sleeper, Texas, all desperately seek starting pitching and in the case of Boston and New York, do not want to see the other team win.

Unlike other free agents, there is no draft pick compensation for Matsuzaka. This is simply a question of which team wants to spend the most money.

Unlike with other free agents, Matsuzaka does not know much about the culture of baseball. For Matsuzaka, it will be a matter of dollars and exposure. To the rest of the world, the Yankees are baseball.

It is terribly unfortunate that maybe the most coveted pitcher in baseball happens to be so out of the loop. Matsuzaka has not seen what we have seen with the Yankees over the last couple of months: a team that is finally cracking.

I have a new hero in Gary Sheffield. In an interview Wednesday, Sheff finally said it:

"My situation, honestly, the truth about it, I never was comfortable," Sheffield said. "I was always feeling a little insecure about where I fit here and where I belonged, or do they want me here? And I had to play on those terms, and I was being a man about it and going out and trying to do my job under the conditions."

For the first time one of the Yankees' giant egos has spoken out against the “Pleasantville” that the Yankee organization tries to convey to its fans. Here’s a guy who should have been MVP in 2004 and for ’04 and ’05 he was far and away the Yankees scariest hitter.

And now he is angry. He is saying everything that we all see, but no will admit.

Simply put, the Yankees are a joke.

They are a failed attempt at meshing too many huge egos. You can’t have this many superstars and expect them all to be happy. It just isn’t baseball. But that is what the Yankees are. Just a collection of the last year’s big free agents.

"Everybody knows when they go out and make moves,” said Sheffield. “They make moves based on who's hot at the time or who's the top free agent. Who's this or who's that?"

It is unfair that this is the case, but this is also the reason why baseball makes so much money. Baseball loves the Yankees and their free spending. Revenue sharing leads to the Yankees generating millions for other teams with both their national and worldwide appeal.

Unfortunately for them, the rest of baseball is smarting up.

America is finally being exposed to the Yankees that we all know and hate. A miserable clubhouse; a struggle for the spotlight; a clash of egos; and most significant, a place where the best player in baseball is the scapegoat, blamed for everything.

Yes, I know A-Rod has struggled in the postseason. But for 29 other teams in baseball, just getting to the postseason is more than sufficient.

There isn’t a team in baseball that wouldn’t want A-Rod right now, especially at a tad over $16 mil a season. But the Yankees, their fans and their media are ready to throw him to the curb.

There isn’t a team in baseball that would bench Gary Sheffield or Jason Giambi in a playoff series, against a lefty and righty, respectively, for that matter, even if they aren’t swinging a hot bat.

And there isn’t a team in baseball that can lose with so much more talent than everyone else, year in and year out, and still retain their manager and their general manager.

Other then the Yankees.

Baseball is waking up to all of this. The Bronx is where egos go to burn and stars turn second fiddle.

The Yankees are less a sure thing to win it all than they are a sure thing to blow up in the postseason and blame the whole entire world, except of course Derek Jeter.

Three years ago, every player dreamed of the chance to don their pinstripes. This is no longer the case.

So now comes time for Daisuke Matsuzaka, the one guy out of the loop. If he ends up in pinstripes and he is as good as advertised, that would be a big hit to us all.

Which is why we need to hope that someone else “posts” a higher bid. Yeah it would be nice if it was the New Mets, but with a $20 million post and a salary starting between 12-15 mil, we are talking about a $17 million dollar a year pitcher. That is a lot to spend on some dude from Japan, even if he has his super-secret “gyroball” that is unhittable and physically impossible.

So let's send this guy to Texas or send this guy to Anaheim. Hell, let him play for the Dodgers.

But if he ends up in the Bronx, well, pray he suffers some freak body malfunction, in which he is completely fine other than in his pitching shoulder.

It sure would be fun to continue to watch these assholes crumble.

Vaya con dios.

Sip