The Hipster Yankee Fan

I've never been the best in terms of Halloween costumes. One year, my senior year of college, my buddy and I went as Lloyd and Harry from "Dumb and Dumber" and we did it really well. The blue and orange suits, top hats, canes, etc.

This Halloween I decided to go as a hipster. I'm about as generic a guy as you'll find so I thought this would be a clever and inexpensive way to have a good Halloween.

I went down to my hipster buddy Jason's house so that he could make my costume.

A pair of white hightops, tight jeans, a Weezer t-shirt, corduroy blazer with an "I Drink Liberally" pin on the breast pocket, a mesh hat, scarf, and, somewhat later, some giant headphones -- I had my giddyup, I was ready to go.

Jason and I could not be more different people but we remain good friends. He is into art and vegetarianism while I like sports and fried food.

He is a Yankee fan while I am, of course, a Mets fan.

So we sat there at 8 p.m. on Friday over a bottle of Jack Daniels and talked life. Jason's a really smart, interesting kid on the fast track to a prominent law school. I am a pretty bright guy who dreams of beating Theo Epstein (or whoever that new guy in Texas is) as baseball's youngest GM.

So there we were, the Meat and the Intellect, and the conversation progressed to baseball and this blog.

Jason tried to argue with me how he would want to drink with Alex Rodriguez. That he was a classy guy and whatnot. I gave this one no shot and said, "no, A-rod is a ......"

Jason then went on to make a pretty interesting point. He asked me, "How could you not love the history of the Yankees?"

See when you think about baseball's past you think of Babe Ruth, Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle. Sadly, a lot of baseball's history belongs to the Yankees.

I'll be the first to admit that I have a soft spot for Notre Dame football, the storied franchise in College Football. Does this make me a hypocrite?

Had the hipster called me out?

My response? "Fuck the history."

The Yankees of 2005 have about as much of a connection to the Yankees of the 1920's as I do to to hipster culture. That is, we both share the same costume.

Babe Ruth was a fat, sloppy, drunk who partied all night and played baseball by day.

Mickey Mantle was a womanizing drunk who happened to also be the best switch hitter of all time.

Derek Jeter is a well groomed, politically correct celebrity who can do no wrong.

Which one of the three do not fit?

See the Yankees of today use their history as a way of making themselves feel worthy and entitled to being "The Almighty Yankees."

Unfortunately, the Yankee greats were a bunch of good old boys who partied and played ball, the way jocks are supposed to do things.

Going back to Friday's blog, I asked myself would I want to drink with Mickey Mantle or Babe Ruth. The answer is a resounding yes.

These guys were fun, wild ball players. They were Lenny Dykstra with a ton of power. They were "DUDES."

Yet these guys, who more resemble Steve Howe than Mariano Rivera, are what give the Yankees their storied history. People talk about the numbers that they put up and the championships that they won and not the debauchery that they caused. These guys are about as far a cry from the class of today's Yankees as I am from liking art.

Truth is, I find the Yankees of the past to be very likable.

Am I amazed by how good Mickey Mantle was. Yes. Do I care that he was an abusive drunk? Nope.

Do I get the chills thinking about Babe Ruth calling his shot in the World Series. Of course. Does it matter to me that he was a fatzo who never found a piece of food he wouldn't eat? Not at all.

Do I think Derek Jeter is a clutch player who may be as smart as anyone to ever play the game? I do. Do I care that Derek Jeter is a really classy guy? Not one bit.

On Halloween night, as I was walking to the party I was going to, thrown by some solid Long Island Mets fans (note: the only acceptable Long Islanders) I was stopped on 17th and 3rd ave by two grungy looking kids, a guy and a girl.

The girl said to me, "I know this may be weird, but umm, like, do you know where I can score some pot?"

I laughed for a second, to which she added, " It's just that i saw the Weezer t-shirt and I thought... well, you know."

I told her sorry, I'm the wrong guy and walked away. I felt vindicated. My costume worked.

Does this make me a hipster? After all, a fellow hipster and fan of hipster culture thought I was one.

The answer is no, of course not. Sharing a uniform does not make you something you're not.

The 2006 Yankees of A-Rod and Jeter share no connection to the Yankees of old. They are stiff, boring people who are good at baseball. They aren't wild and crazy, nor are they very likable as ballplayers. There is pretty much no connection between the Yankee greats of today with the Yankee greats of the past.

Except that they wear the same uniform.

RIP G-Baby,

Sippy Momo

Drinking Buddies?

Chad Johnson on Al Harris who is covering him this week:

"There are two things for brother Harris this week," said Johnson. "The bad thing is he has to cover me. The good is he can save 15 percent by switching his insurance to Geico."

Every day at work I spend most of my day refreshing my inbox, hoping for something funny to look at. When my good pal Kenny from Camp sent this to me this morning, I died of laughter. I'm a huge Chad Johnson fan and am all about this years Bengals. In fact, I have recently ordered a T.J Houshmanzadah jersey.

This quote is awesome cause its from the Chad. Hes one of the games best receivers and he is also one of football's most colorful people.

He sort of embodies why we all played sports in the first place. Sports are fun.

From the ages of 5-14 sports was what you did as a kid. They were fun, innocent and pretty much perfect. They bonded you and your dad who took you to little league.

When you hit high school sports become fun but in a different way. All of a sudden you are bigger and stronger. You have a different camaraderie with your teammates. You are more of a family. After games you drink and chase girls with your teammates. Sports start to become a part of who you are both on and off the field.

When I studied abroad my junior year of college in Dublin, Ireland, I had the pleasure of playing basketball for the University College Dublin.

We would practice twice a week, which consisted of scrimmaging and about nothing else. It wasn't really serious but it was a lot of fun.

After every practice and game me, my teammates and coaches would always go to the bar. I'd sit there and watch my starting power forward smoking a cigarette with my coach and would smile. This shit was really fun.

Now that we have gotten to that age, sports and drinking almost come hand and hand. You watch a game with your pals and you drink. The one complements the other, and everything is perfect.

So I was thinking about this very simple concept when I was thinking about surprise, surprise, the New York Yankees.

I thought about how they perceive themselves as the almighty Yankees. How they have short hair and don't allow facial hair and how they think of themselves as America's team.

Then I realized. There is not a single dude on the Yankees of any substance that I would want to go drinking with.

See my good pal Zim always jokes about stuff like this. How fun it would be to pound a 30 rack up top of a hay stack in Iowa with Kyle Farnsworth, go to a bar watch him, beat the shit out of about 12 dudes, and then take a couple gawking Midwestern ladies to pound camp.

Or how much fun it would be to spend a night in a club with the Mets big trio of big brothers Uncle Cliffy and Killer Cam and their little brother D. Wright.

Cam: "Yo D. Wright, you want this Tangueray and Hi-C?"
D-Wright: "Can't Mike...We got a big game tomorrow!!!"

And for me personally, I would love a night on the town in South Dakota w/ Travis Hafner just to really see what that is like.

But can you honestly tell me you want to go drinking with A-Rod. That a night at Marquee w/ Derek Jeter would be that fun. Sure, you'd get a lot of ass, but, seriously, the guy is a deuce.

How bout slugging beers with Randy Johnson and Mike Mussina?

Wait a minute, I got it...Ripping shots with...JORGE POSADA!!!

Before I go on, let me say this. Tanyon Sturtze is the man and maybe the world's biggest meathead. I saw him in a bar at about 3 a.m. on a Wednesday trying to punch every person in sight...(But is he a true Yankee?)

The Yankees have the most unlikable bunch around. They are not fun. Sure they may have been in a previous life (or when they had smaller contracts for their first team). I'm sure Giambi was the man back in Oakland, smashing beers, singing karaoke with Barry Zito, and coming up with the immortal team motto: "Hit like an All-Star. Party like a Rock Star. Hammer like a Porn Star." But now, he is a giant subservient loser.

The Yankees, and their holier-than-thou image, dont allow their players to be cool or likeable because that is not professional.

I got a hint for you guys. You are athletes. If you want to be professional, be a doctor or a lawyer. Having worked one year in a law firm I think it is safe to say that you can not be "professional" and like your job. You act professional because you have to for your job.

About a week ago World Series Champ Aj Pierzynski was in a bar to celebrate winning the ALCS...http://community.webshots.com/photo/409039300/409472456ALACcJ... Take a look. Does this scream professionalism? Of course not. Do i like him more because of it? Of course.

Baseball is fun. These guys live everyone else's dream. They make a ton of money to play the sport we all love and then go out and be worshipped by every woman in sight.

How much though would Pierzynski be scolded by Yankee Brass if these pictures appeared on Page 6?

My point is this. baseball is a game and a fun one in that...The Yankees try to take this away from their players. They run a business not a baseball team. Yes, baseball players should be good people. I'm not condoning rape or anything bad like that that.

But we want these guys to have a good time. We live in a celeb-obsessed culture because we like seeing these people live the good life where we are left to imagine, what if?

I like seeing A. J. Pierzynski mash dongs by day and slay blondes by night, and I'll be damned if there is anything "un-baseball" about that.

But, if you want to root for a bunch of squares in suits, Go Bombers.

Otherwise, there are 29 teams made up of dudes who happen to be really good at baseball that are cooler than you and I. Probably is a lot more fun to like them, don't you think?

Still, they are no Keanu,

Sippy Momo

The Bronze Glove

It was the first Friday night basketball game my senior year of high school. I had long since quit basketball but I attended a bunch of the games to watch some of my good friends who were still on the team.

My high school was playing the school of my good friend, who we will call J-Murder, a kid who used to go to our school.

Midway through the third quarter, J-Murder, a Bo Outlaw type, caught an elbow to the nose. J-Murder's nose started to bleed, just a little bit. But then I saw it. See, me and Murder go way back and I have always known him to be a kid who wants to showcase his toughness. Whether it was how much he could drink or how much he could lift, he had something to prove.

I'm not trying to knock the guy by any means -- he's one of the best... But what did J-Murder proceed to do? He took the little bits of blood gushing from his nose and wiped it all over his face...

This kid was tough.

This story triggered a comparison in my head as I watched last night's game 4. With 1 out in the 9th inning of yesterday's game Juan Uribe made a tremendous play...

He dove into the stands to make the catch on a Chris Burke pop up. This was a huge play in a 1-0 game, but it was also an amazing play. It didn't seem possible when the ball was coming down, but he made it look easy. So what did Uribe do. He got up, threw the ball to Joe Crede and ran back to his position.

I rewind about a year to this call:

"A fly ball just foul down the left field line...Jeter is under it, and makes the play....and wait, Jeter is still running, and look...He just dove into the crowd...WHAT A WARRIOR!!!"

Jeter's play was annointed as one of the grittier plays of our time, even though it was unneccesary. You can look back at the tape for yourself here: http://derekjeter.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/players/jeter_derek/multimedia/index.jsp -- just scroll down to the "2004 Video Highlights" and click on "7.01: Catch in Stands vs. BOS". What's amazing is how Deej caught the foul ball some 5 feet in foul territory and could have easily stepped to his right and allowed his momentum to carry him up the left field foul line, but instead decided to dive into the stands.

(Incidentally, if you'd like a clip of someone diving into the stands when they actually need to, you can see David Wright doing just that by clicking on the following link and scrolling down to the highlights from June 18: http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/multimedia/tp_archive.jsp?c_id=nym&ym=200506).

I bring all this up because I have been dying to write an article about how bad a defensive player Derek Jeter is.

Sure he is tall and yes he has patented the jumpman Jeter (which makes the women of New York go crazy) but this guy is flatout a below average defensive player.

He has an average arm and subpar range, but when he throws and runs to his left, yes, he looks like a leader...

In a number of defensive statistics created by Stats. Inc, to measure a player's defensive efficiency, Jeter ranks in the middle or below amongst all other American League shortstops.

Range Factor: 12th, 4.46

Range Factor = (Putouts + Assists) x 9 divided by Defensive Innings Played

Range Factor, simply stated, is the number of plays MADE per game at the fielding position. It is better than Fielding Average in several respects: It can be calculated for almost any player this century and it takes into account the fielder's own ability to get to a batted ball -- thereby rewarding the more gifted players at each position. Note that players can only be meaningfully compared to other players of the same position when using this statistic, and early in the season numbers are often skewed as players chances are not yet normalized.

Zone Rating: 8th, .847

This statistic tracks the locations of EVERY hit ball for EVERY game played. The Zone Rating (ZR) system is different because the area of responsibility, or zone, for each fielder is considered a "playable" area and does not account for balls hit into a "Bermuda Triangle", a "No Man's Land" or other impossible-to-field balls. A fielder that turns a double play is credited with 2 outs in the ZR system as their play on the ball actually resulted in both outs versus Defensive Average which only credits the 1 out.

STATS, Inc. books area available at every bookstore and their work is updated on a yearly basis for player comparisons.

These stats show a couple of things.

Most importantly they help to highlight why Jeter's defensive celebrity is so unwarranted.

These stats are statisticians' more complicated ways of showing that Jeter lacks range. A ground ball in the hole that forces him to field and do the jumpman on is a ground ball that most other SS' make look routine. His reaction to the ball is slower which forces him to make a more difficult play.

Second, whereas Derek Jeter needs to run and then keep running to make his "heroic catch," Juan Uribe can get under the ball, set himself and make a play.

Unfortunately inefficency gets you on Wheaties boxes whereas skill finds you in baseball annonymity. Flash is better than skill...Thats New York for you, I guess.

That said, I just wanted to congratulate the Yankees on a 5th straight World Series Championship-less year.

Time to start talking Konerko and Burnett... You guys definitely deserve them.

Kind of slow today but needed to get this one off my chest.

true,

Sippy Momo

Thank god the Yankees play baseball...

Think about this lineup: Kidd, Bryant, McGrady, Duncan and O'Neal. Add Ray Allen and Ben Wallace coming in off the bench for shooting and defensive sparks and throw together 5 anybody's.

This team may never lose an NBA game...

This team, assuming an avg salary of $5 mil from the remaining 5 bench players combines to make roughly $150 million dollars (sadly, about $45 million more than the Knicks... GO ISIAH... remember though, this is Yankees2000, not Isiahisdumberthanmydog).

Under the NBA's current CBA/salary structure this team could never be assembled. The exchange of talent, especially the top players, is very difficult as teams are forced to circumvent a soft salary cap of about $50 million dollars.

Just imagine, though, that the NBA did not have these rules.

The team at the top of this page would be the New York Knicks.

They have more money than anyone else (by far). They play in the greatest arena in the world. They play in the greatest market in the world. Sounds a lot like the Yankees of basketball.

Here we have it. The perfect, unbeatable team... for 3 times the NBA salary cap.

The Yankees assembled a team for $208 million dollars with nothing but a weak luxury tax serving as a deterrent to their spending... Interestingly enough, they spend slightly more than 3 times baseball's median team salary (that would belong to the Detroit Tigers, who, with a payroll topping out at $68.8 mil, finished 2005 with a 71-91 record to show for themselves). And yet in spite of their spending, they can't win a thing anymore, at least not when it counts.



Last night's game 3 was one of the greatest World Series games of all time. The game went 14 innings, lasted almost 6 hours and saw about 500 pitches thrown... But having grown obsessed with this blog, all I could do is look at this game in respect to the Yankees.

I looked at the Astros lineup, and then compared it to the Yankees lineup (Astros starter/Yankees starter):

C. Ausmus/Posada
1b. Lamb/Giambi
2b. Biggio/Cano
SS. Everett/Jeter
3b Ensberg/A-Rod
LF. Berkman/Matsui
CF. Taveras/Williams
RF. Lane/Sheffield

You can make a very strong argument that not a single Astro would start over the Yankee that plays their position. Not one.

Sure, Berkman and Matsui may be a coin flip. And Biggio may end up a Hall of Famer when all is said and done...

And I realized that this is both the beauty of baseball and the cause for baseball's downfall.

Watching the Astros last night, I was watching a team. They play small ball, they pitch and defend well. They were playing a White Sox team who for the most part does the same thing...

And the Astros can win playing this type of ball.

The Astros prove that any team can win a baseball game.

But this is also MLB's argument for allowing the Yankees to be, well, The Yankees.

Here is the World Series featuring baseball's 10th and 12th richest teams -- so everything is ok, right? Clearly there must be no correlation between spending and winning... Or at least to MLB, not enough of a correlation.

It's ok that the Yankees pay roughly $50mil more than the two World Series teams combined, because, hey, the poorer teams made the Series and the Yanks didn't -- what more do you need to know?

It's ok because the A's (21st highest payroll) and Indians (26th) contended all season long...

It's ok that the Yankees are almost guaranteed a spot in the postseason because, as the Beer Man in the upper left field nosebleeds at Yankee Stadium can tell you, the Devil Rays (29th) had a winning record against the Yankees this year (11-8).

Clearly, none of the above listed facts changes the reality of baseball's competitive imbalance. No matter how poorly the Yankees played against the Devil Rays or how well the A's and Indians did most of the year, the game does not belong to any of the latter three, but rather to the former, the bully in the Bronx.

Why? Well, a big part of the reason is that the suits running Major League Baseball want the Yankees to win. When the Yankees win, ratings are higher, thereby generating greater revenues and making all of baseball's owners more money. Combine that with the Yankees' ability to draw fans on the road and the Yankees are a slam dunk for baseball's shot-callers.

So as long as this model holds, which figures to account for at least the foreseeable future, nothing is going to change, and the Yankees will continue to be, well, The Yankees.

To which all I can say is: thank god the Yankees play baseball. In any other sport, a team with the resources of the Yankees would win every time.

Imagine the Colts with the Chiefs' O-Line, the Jags' front 4, the Bronco linebackers, the Raven secondary and the Pats coaching staff... Tough to see too many losses there.

But baseball is different. On any given day a team can win or lose. That is why the Astros were swept out of Shea in May and are in the World Series today. That is why A-Rod put up MVP numbers for 162 games but struggled through 5 more. That is why Vlad Guerrero was 0-for-the ALCS.

Baseball is a game of streaks. For those that have played, you know that there are times when the ball looks like a volleyball and others when it looks like a golf ball.

Baseball is a game where one pitch or one error in the 2nd inning can determine a game.

So thank god the Yankees play baseball, cause at least now they can lose. And at least now I don't have to worry about Kobe Bryant becoming a Knick.

Utah, give me Two...

Sippy Momo

I Don't Know What I was Thinking

A Friend of Mr. Glass' here, filling in for Sippy Momo. Mostly the same format as old SipMo usually goes for, but I won't make comparisons between Yankee fans and Nazis. Anyway, vaya con dios should be back tomorrow, in the meantime, let this blog's answer to Doug Mientkiewicz see you through.

Like many other Mets fans, few things rile me more than talk about Yankee Magic. For a fan born in the early 1980s, the mystique of the pinstripes was essentially unknown until the mid-to-late 1990s, when the Yankees emerged from their long and longed-for slumber to win the 1996 World Series over the equally loathsome Atlanta Braves.

Was it Yankee magic that carried the Bombers to their first championship since 1978? Of course not; a team that goes 18 years without a World Series appearance can hardly lay claim to divine favor.

Nevertheless, 1996 was the launching point for the modern legend of the Yankees, and the birth year of their fans’ detestable sense of entitlement. The Bombers reeled off four consecutive victories in the 1996 World Series, and went on to post 10 more consecutive Fall Classic wins, thanks in no small part to Armando Benitez. The year was 2000, and Yankee Magic was everywhere.

In the years since then, Yankee Magic has done little to bring the Bombers their coveted 27th World Series championship. Unfortunately enough, thathasn'tn’t stopped players and media types around the country from talking about it. Not even their historic collapse against the Red Sox in the 2004 ALCS was enough to shut up the likes of Giambi, A-Rod, and all the rest when it came to the matter of pulling on the Pinstripes, and how doing so for the first time was a dream come true.

There’s no changing any of that, and I can’t say I’m surprised that players on the team still say that kind of thing. Now that they’re Yankees, I suppose I don’t blame them for doing so, even if I reserve the right to hate them for it.

White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper is another story.

In a report published in the New York Times on October 21, Tyler Kepner wrote the following:

"Without saying it, the White Sox pitching coach Don Cooper strongly hinted Friday that he would be interested in becoming the Yankees' pitching coach if they approached him after the World Series.

Cooper is signed through next season, and there is no guarantee the White Sox would let him leave. But he is a New York native and pitched for the Yankees in 1985.

'Twenty-six world championships intrigues me,' Cooper said. 'My focus is here. I want one. They've got 26. I mean, who wouldn't want to be a part of that? Who wouldn't want to work for Steinbrenner's Yankees?'"

Think about that for just a minute. Here you have a guy who has guided a talented pitching staff all season long. He’s brought them and the long-suffering city of Chicago to the World Series. He has the chance to lead the White Sox to their first championship in 88 years. And just before stepping on to baseball’s biggest stage, what does he do? He talks about the 26 world championships another team won once upon a time.

I don’t know whether Cooper was called out by any of the local Chicago media for his comments, and I don’t know whether he was booed lustily by the hometown crowd that has waited so long for a reason to cheer. I hope he was. He certainly deserved whatever he got.

He deserved it because he, like so many other people in baseball, seems to have no concept of why it’s special to lead an upstart team to its first World Series in X-amount of years. Why it’s special to root for a team or be part of a team that doesn’t win every year as a matter of birth right.

Red Sox fans can say whatever they want about Curt Schilling, but at least he got it. He knew he could either be yet another link in the Yankee chain or he could go to Boston and become the sort of legend who never dies.

Lost in all the talk about Yankee Magic and the aura and mystique of pulling on the Pinstripes is that winning is meaningless unless you know what it is to suffer. The Yankee fans who celebrated the championship in 1996? I wouldn't have said it at the time, but you know what? Good for them. Eighteen years? They earned it.

What do Giambi or A-Rod or Cooper or current Yankee fans know about that? All they know about is the 26 championships and all the other tired talking points that inform any of the interviews they give or any of the programs aired on the YES Network.

It’s astonishing to me that players and coaches wouldn’t seek out the opportunity to beat the Yankees, to be a part of something more enduring than the machine. But even more depressing than that is the story of a guy like Don Cooper, a pitching coach in the midst of one of the truly special runs in recent baseball history (overshadowed, fairly or unfairly, by last year’s Red Sox though it is) and yet all he can think about is Yankee Magic, about being a part of those 26 championships.

I thought we had moved on. I thought five years and many bad defeats along the way would be enough to change the nature of the discourse surrounding the Yankees.

As Mr. Glass would say, "What can I say?" -- I don’t know what I was thinking.

RIP Dougie Doug,
A Friend of Mr. Glass'

Do we need Villains?

In my favorite movie, Major League, there were a few villains. There was the Yankees and Clue Heyward. There was Rachel Phelps, the callgirl turned owner who wanted the Indians to lose. But that movie wasnt about beating the bad guy. Instead, it was the good guy, our team, The Cleveland Indians "winning the whole fucking thing."


In Point Break we see Johnny Utah, a hero of mine, take on the coolest most captivating bad guys in recent film history, the Ex-Presidents. These surfers by day bank robbers by night, led by Bodhi, are just so damn cool that you almost want them to get away with their crime. You just need to see them on screen.

In baseball, I have the Mets. They are my Major League. They could be playing the Braves or the Brewers and they will always be my #1. I get the same chills watching them win as i get when Jake Taylor points to the bleachers before his dramatic Bunt and Run rbi single to win the game.

On the other hand there is the Yankees. Like Bodhi in Point Break, I need the Yankees. They are so good at being hatable that I am drawn to them. I need them to win so I can continue to root for them to lose. I need Jeter to hit .310 and date Vanessa Minillo so that I can yearn for the day when David Wright hits .320 and canoodles with Lindsay Lohan.

So then the age old question comes about...What do i like more, loving the Mets or hating the Yankees?

In my heart i like to say loving the Mets, cause deep down i think that is true. the 10 run 8th inning game on June 30th, 2000, with my Dad and my dearest Squall man at my side, was one of the best moments of my life.

At the same time, when Luis Gonzalez blooped a single over the outreached glove of a smiling for the camera Derek Jeter, I felt a similar bliss. Me and my buddy's blasted "we are the Champions" and poured champagne on each other and celbrated in laughter as our yankee fan friends, who had been forced by shame to watch in another room, sat there in disbelief.

I bring these sides up now as I think about this year's world series.

I love the world series cause it is baseball and it is baseball's biggest stage. I am forced to like it as a baseball fan but deep down i really do just love it.

But i dont yearn for this world series. I dont lose sleep like when the Mets made it in 2000. I dont talk about it constantly like when the Yankees make yet another fall classic.

Instead, after a 6 hour marathon at my favorite sports bar, where my fantasy football dreams were shattered by Lamont Jordan and the Detroit Lions Defense (Thats right, the Detroit fucking Lions), i went with a lovely coed for some chocolate cake and coffee.

We had a nice time and in the back of my head i knew that i was missing the first couple of innings of game 2. But i didnt yearn for that game.

I am usually the first to cast aside a female for a major sporting event. Ive never been a huge proponent of mixing girls and sports. But at 9pm last night i was happier to be shmoopie with this girl than to be SM "dude"back at home.

On my train ride to work this morning i thought about what i had done.

Was I a sellout?

Had i lost my balls?

Perhaps.

But while i see every movie about baseball, there is only one Major League.

and while i think Keanu Reeves is the messiah, he will never face a better group of bad guys.

I realized. I love the Yankees. I hate them so much that I need them. Its like the more my brother beat me up when i was 6, the more i wanted to fight him.

In the soap opera that is baseball, we need the Yankees. For fans of the 29 other teams a world series comes once every ten years. This being the case, we need the Yankees there so that we can root for them to lose.

Otherwise we have what we have this year. The White Sox and The Astros...Podsednik vs. Ensberg...and me sipping rasberry tea instead of watching the first 4 innings...And not truly hating myself for doing so.

Surfing's the Source,

Sippy Momo

Not much going on in Yankee Land

Call it a hunch but i think things might start to fall apart in Yankee land...I really do.


Yesterday Leo Mazzone, the former pitching coach for the Braves and one of the better pitching coaches in the game turned down the job as the Yankees pitching coach.

The Yankees assumed that Mazzone, the top Free agent pitching coach, would come to them. After all they are the Yankees and that is where the best come.

But Mazzone went for friendship over money.

Mazzone signed on to be the pitching coach for the Baltimore Orioles so that he could work beside his best friend and Orioles manager Sam Perlazzo. Imagine, choosing the fitting situation over money and the Yankees.

Remember Jason Giambi...Remember how cool he used to be.

Backwhen he was with the A's Giambi was really really likable. He had long hair, tattooes and was the frat boy that defined the Oakland A's. He was the leader of an up and coming playoff team.

Then he sold out...Big Time. Giambi chose to come to the Yankees for 120 million, short hair, covered tattooes and the role of 5th fiddle. (note: The A's offered him 7 and 105 and the chance to be god)

Good for Leo.

This years free agent crop just does not have the saviors that the Yankees always turn to.

Out of the pen, there is BJ Ryan and Billy Wagner. These guys are closers who will command closer money. Unless the Yankees want to pay 8 mil for a lefty set up man ( I wouldnt put it past them) neither of these guys are coming.

Scott Eyre, Charles Clareman and Joey Eischen are the more affordable options, but im going to go ahead and say that 99% of Yankee fans have no idea who these players are. (Note, one of these players is not real, see what you know, Yankee fans. One of these guys could be your 4 mil per setup man)

In terms of starting pitching, the Yankees will most likely throw 5 and 60 at AJ Burnett. Then his arm will break and Yankee fans will say how bad he is...Sound Familiar.

In terms of bats, Brian Giles comes to mind, but he wants to go play with his brother. I wouldnt be surprised to see Konerko have a huge world series and the Yankees throw the bank at him.

I can see the papers now... May 14th, 2006..." Paul Konerko earned his pinstripes today."

I hope and I pray that bad karma finally bites the yankees in their rear end. Playing for the Yankees has become a chore and nearly impossible. Alex Rodriguez will probably be the MVP and everyone hates him.

If it is the case that anyone who comes to the Yanks is expected to be god, as they are paid, then why would anyone want to come here.

The Yankees have become a team of squares. Baseball people are starting to choose baseball over prestige.

Could this be the offseason that baseball finally turns on the Yankees?

Sippy Momo

I had a good talk with my pal Ace last night. Talk about a story. All this kid does is lift weights and pick winners. Good luck pal.

The Beauty of sports...

Last night gave me the chills. The Astros won the series in 6. My buddy, we'll call him Ace, made $50,000 bucks on a bizarre futures bet on the Astros to make the world series. Most importantly, Bagwell and Biggio finally did it...

I was 17 years old that last time i felt that true happiness from athletic accomplishment. My oldest friend in the world hit a bases clearing double to lead my high school baseball team to the state title.

I remember running out from the dugout towards him at second base and giving him a big hug. Ben and I first played little league soccer when we were six years old. We played west side little league baseball together at age nine, for the Dolphins, forming a very stellar 3-4.

Over the years, Ben became one of the better players around while i was somewhere closer to the middle. This was ok to me. In my eyes, we were a package deal. Biggio and Bagwell.

So there we were, 11 years after we first played together and he had won us our first real championship.

That euphoria can only be reached so many times in life and more so...It only SHOULD be reached so many times in life.

Last night I watched as former Mets bum turned Astro phenom Dan Wheeler pitched the final out. The game was over and the camera's immediately went to Biggio and Bagwell.

The two future hall of famers started playing together 15 years earlier. Finally they won.

This was all that was right with sports. Biggio's smile was genuine. Bagwell hugged him appearing unsure how to truly react. They won after years and years of struggle. I was happy for them and truth is, I don't like the Astros.(goes back to my fear of the dangerous Kevin Bass)

Try and picture Biggio and Bagwell.

Now try and picture A-Rod and Randy Johnson grabbing a big hug from Gary Sheffield after the Yankees won their 27th world series, Arod's first.

Not as sweet, huh?

According to the Yankees, their media and their fans, the Yankees are supposed to win every year.

Every year they obtain the best talent possible to put a winner on the field.

Unfortunately, that is not what makes sports great.

Sports are awesome because everyone strives to win. Athlets yearn for that "one shining moment." That is why people root for the underdog. If you win everytime it takes away from the joy of winning.

Would last night have been special of Biggio and Bagwell had won the world series the last five years? How bout if the Astros added every player money could buy?

The answer to both of these questions is no.

Sure, Biggio and Bagwell are no longer the Astros' best players. But the Astros are still Bagwell and Biggio's team.

In the 90's i hated the Yankees. They were great and they were better than the Mets. However, they won and they won as a team. They were Jeter's team.

Today, i still hate the Yankees. They are still great and they are still better than the Mets. But now, even when they win, it is not as a team. They win as a collection of talent far greater than anyone else's.

In the 90's the Yankees were Jeter's team. When the Yankees won, Jeter was the hero that led his team to victory. It was almost a nice story and probably was to people who dont share my hatred.

Like watching Tom Brady lead the Pats or Matt Leinart lead USC, there is something beautiful about seeing one star lead a dynasty.

The Yankees are no longer Derek Jeter's team. The media/fans might try to claim this to still be the case. This is because these people want an excuse for why Arod and Randy Johnson under perform in the clutch.

The Yankees have become a team that MLB roots for because it makes its owners money.

No longer can they be a team that people root for for the good of the game.

They are no longer a dynasty.

They no longer even resemble a real team.

They are no longer Jeter and Bernie...They are $208 million dollars.



As long as it makes you happy


Sippy Momo

Thank God Joe is Back

Since the end of the 2005 season, there has been much talk that Joe Torre would not return to manage the Yankees. At a tad over 6 million dollars per year, (more than 1/5 of the Devil Rays payroll, Joe Torre has proven to be one of the great managers of all time...Ever?

894-1003...

again.

894-1003...

These are not jinxed #'s like those of 4-8-15-16-23-42.

This is the managerial record of one of the greatest managers of all time, BEFORE HE GOT TO THE YANKEES.

Joe Torre may be the most overrated of all the Yankee greats. As a manager in the American League his only real job is to manage a bullpen. A skill that i will later talk about being him being very bad at.

In the late 90's all he had to do was this.

"Jeff Nelson, you face the righties."
"Mike Stanton, you face the lefties."
"Mariano, close out the game."

Rocket science.


Im pretty sure ive even seen Joe asleep thru the first five innings of a game. In the late 90's the yankees were simply the best team. They had the best pitching, lineup and bullpen in baseball. They were also perfectly assembled and balanced. There were not a lot of conflicting egos as a perfect combo of veterans and youths led to a stable Yankees clubhouse.

Things have changed since. With the 15mil per guys that the Yankees have been bringing in throughout the new millenium issues have arisen.

Is it Arod's or Jeter's team?

Joe Torre is considered the master of a calm clubhouse. If this is the case how do the Yankees ever lose?

On paper, the yankees should never lose a game. They have what should be the greatest lineup of all time, great pitching and a great bullpen.

Lets look back over the last couple years to show how good old Joe shanked in every dept.

The Lineup: 2,3,4,5.

These are the places in the batting order that Alex Rodriguez, arguably the best hitter in the game, has hit in the Yankees order.

The second the Yankees lose two games, Joe Torre fumbles his lineup searching for the fix. While short term this may work, thus pleasing your always watching boss, this is not a consistent long term solution.

The bullpen: This is my favorite.

Paul Quantrill was brought on board in 2004 to be the Yanks 7th inning guy in front of Tom Gordon and Mariano Rivera.

Quantrill was amazing in this role, until he tired.

95.2 innings later.

Tom Gordon was brought in to be the lights out 8th inning guy. Which he was, until he tired out.

90.2 innings later.

Combined: 2004 post season 15.6 inn, 10 ER ( 2 might important scapegoats)

Gordon and Quantrill were maligned for their postseason ineffectiveness. They were also both in the top 5 in innings pitched among relivers.

A tired bullpen, no one's fault but the manager's.

Finally the clubhouse...

Take a look at the Red Sox. Take a look at the A's. Take a look at the Angels. Now take a look at the Yankees.

Which one of these four teams doesnt fit.

While these other big namers in the American League appear to be having more fun and appear as loose as possible,(see: smiles, hoody's in the dugout) the Yankees appear to be the stiffest bunch in town.

Sure they cant have long hair or tattooes.( Sorry Dan Johnson, the Yanks might not be for you in 4 years ) But this doesnt mean that the team shouldnt be relaxed. Or that Gary Sheffield should be calling himself the leader of this team. Or that Arod should secretly hate Derek Jeter's "can't do anything wrong" presence.

This is all the manager's job.

If he can't manage a bullpen, can't find a consistent lineup, and can't a good clubhouse, why exactly is he so great.

Is it because the Yankees make the playoffs every year? The Yankees would make the playoffs every year with my brother managing the team. (For those who know the big Momo, he's not into the whole sports thing)

But for 6.2 mil per year and the amount of credit that he has received, Joe Torre should be able to handle all of this.

But he doesnt, and the Yankees continue to lose.

In which case.

Keep Joe around.

Surfing's the source.

Sippy Momo

The saddest thing I ever saw

In the 1920's and early 1930's, Germany was recently devastated from World War I and was a country in need of rebuilding. The people of Germany, especially the youths were desparate for new leadership, a better economy and a better way of living. Adolf Hitler then emerged.

This man came out of nowhere and almost miraculously took to the head of the ranks of Germany. In many ways, he was a brilliant politician. He is considered one of the better public speakers in history and had a way of lifting people's spirits that is almost unparalleled in recent time.

One of Hitler's main agenda's was establishing the great race. In establishing this great race, he gave people who emodied this superior race pride and an overwhelming sense of power that many had never felt before.

All of a sudden you could be a fat, pudgy, social outcast and all of a sudden that was ok. Because you were better than all minorities. Germans became Nazis because Hitler made them believe that they were better. All of a sudden the herd was developed. Anyone who wasnt a nazi was inferior and Nazis needed to let them know this.

Before i go on, i hope am not offending anyone by discussing Nazi Germany.

Anyway.

About three years back, me and a friend of mine went to Yankee Stadium for a Mets vs. Yankees game sometime in the middle of the summer.

I had bought a couple of tickets on ebay in section 41, home of the bleecher creatures.

So we showed up in our section to sounds of boos and chants of "faggot, faggot." I thought to myself, this isnt the best thing to be saying at all, but especially not in front of the groups of children sitting smack in our section.

I looked around my section at who was chanting. Most of them were male, late 20's early 30's, ugly and kind of awkward. If you were to put me in a room individually with any of these people i would destroy them. But as a group they were tough to outwit.

They had more chants to say about how "gay", "bad," "fucking shitty" the mets were that i almost couldnt get a word in. I was hoping the Mets would help me out by scoring some runs, but, C'MON, this is the Mets here.

There was one man, 5'9, 210 lbs, really annoying who stood out as the groups leader. I think his name was Joe. I guess he was the head of the bleecher creatures. Everyone looked at him to lead in completely irrational and annoying banter that lasted pretty much the entire game.

Finally, when YMCA came on in the 5th inning(note: that one is a huge winner), we caught the best of it.

This entire section of grown men and women stood up and sang.

"Young men..." etc... until the chorus came. Here's where they got brillant. So instead of YMCA they all stood up and pointed at me and my friend and said " You are so gay, " which clever enough, rhymes with YMCA.

I sat there and could only laugh. Sure these guys were having some fun at me and my buddy's expense, but this was honestly the saddest display of humanity id ever seen.

and then it happened. Right as they were pointing at me i h ad a flash back to a 10th grade history video on WW II.

And here we had them. This generations nazi youth.

As individuals they were all weak, sad, demoralized people. But with the yankees and the bleachers as their foundation. They felt strong.

They rallied around one irrational terrible leader, Joe, who got off on the power.

They picked on the smaller defenseless men, us Mets Fans, and there was really nothing we could do.

If we were to fight them, their SS, aka stadium security, would throw us out of the stadium and arrest us. Instead, all we could do is take it, without a fight.

They would point us during YMCA, as their leader sang, just like the nazis would Zig Hile (sp?) Hitler.

It was really an amazing thing to watch.


While the Yankees and their fans are not murderers, they share so many of the qualities that young Germans did upon the rise of Adolf Hitler. In their sad lives with little else going on, the Yankees, their overpowering army of resources and their constant domination, provide these people with some hope.

They make winners out of loser and give a community to those who would otherwise be outcasted. I guess in some ways, this makes the Yankees a symbol of hope, right?

Better to have pride in yourself than hope in someone else.

To each his own i guess.

Sippy Momo

Where'd they all go?

I was walking through the streets of new york and a smile came across my face. In about a three block walk i must have saw 6 mets hats. 2 hats/block is a # you expect out of those precious black and white yankee hats. After all, on top of being the hat for new york's big winner, it is also as trendy as jeans skirts and uggs were too the lovely women at my alma mater, The University of Pennsylvania.

But amazingly, I saw no Yankee hats. I arrived at my favorite sports bar where i go every sunday to watch football and amazingly, still no Yankee hats.

Finally, on my way to work today, no Yankee hats.

I bring up these hats because they symbolize the Yankees and what they are.

The Yankees are a trend.

A trend that is so last season.

Yes, there are true Yankee fans. People have been fans their whole lives and have received endless amounts of shit from me and my friends over the years in an attempt to rile them up.

But New York is not a Yankee city, like Yankee fans try to argue. The Yankees are as much New York as mesh hats and good restaurants. They are the team in style.

I make this point to defend the city of boston. A friend of mine from boston was arguing(surprise, surprise) with his friend from westchester, a yankee fan about which was the better baseball town.

As a proud mets fan, who will happily admit that nyc is not a mets town, i sat their and i observed. The Yankee fan made the same yankee points that all yankee fans make, and no one wants to hear.

Meanwhile, i saw a side of my buddy that i never really saw. This kid had passion. He argued a ton of points about the spirit of boston and how boston is the red sox. I would have to agree

I make the trip north to boston a couple of times a year to see my brother and some friends out there. The minute you get to south station you see souveneir stands with boston t-shirts and Red Sox t-shirts. Everybody, tall, short, black, white bleeds navy and red. There is no divide and there rally arent too many people that dont care. The Red sox are boston.

12 months a year.

Now im not saying there arent yankee fans like this. Yes, there are many yankee fans around talking about how the yankees are going to pry away the Lyle Overbay's and BJ Ryan's of the world(note- if bj has to cut that hair, it would be a crime). However, there is a much greater % of bomber fans who have no idea who these players are.

New York does not bleed the yankees. The day after the season ends and Yankee fans finish complaining about how their 208 million dollar team couldnt win, the Yankees all of a sudden disappear.

Mets fans dont have to deal with this. If i see a kid in a mets hat, he is not wearing it cause he likes the hat, or because its cool or sad to say, cause the team is winning. Being a mets fan is a 12 month commitment, honestly, cause why else would you be a fan at all.

There is no argument between new york and boston. I dont really think there is an argument about new york vs. anywhere. 95% of "new yorkers" arent from new york yet 95% of "new yorkers" are yankee fans. New York is a city that is too hip and cool to be a real sports town.

Club hopping and baseball are two things that dont mix. Neither does red wine or fuagra. Sports are made for the average guy and everyone who comes to new york tries to be something so much more.

The Yankees arent a baseball team. They are a U2 concert or a broadway show. Derek Jeter isnt a baseball player. He is a celebrity. George Steinbrenner isnt a baseball owner. He is a baseball businessman.

These are all things that the mets dont have to deal with. Neither do the sox, or the Diamondbacks or any other team in baseball.

While i always want the mets to win, there is one thing about them losing that i really like. Losing weeds out the "yankee fans." People dont pack shea cause its the thing to do. The people that go, love the mets.

Next year remains 2006.

Sippy Momo


Also, i would like to retract a statement i made in a previous blog. Jeremy Burnitz is not a bum. He was having a monster season in 2003 before he was traded away. J Burn RIP. And either way, things dont get more entertaining then watching hack and miss terribly at 58 footer.

Hypocrosy in Yankee Land

The Yankees went into the 2005 season with George Steinbrenner's dream pitching staff.

He acquired Randy Johnson, arguably the greatest non-jewish lefty ever, for Javy Vazquez some prospects and $9 million dollars.

He signed the top national league free agent pitcher available, Carl Pavano, for 4 years and a drop under $40 million.

Then he signed 15 game-winner Jaret Wright from the Braves for another 3 years...

Combine that with potential future hall of famers Mike Mussina and Kevin Brown and the Yankee have the perfect pitching staff... ON PAPER.

If you think rationally, as though maybe money/thought did matter, you may notice somethings about this Dream Staff that had the Yankees organization and their fans creaming themselves.

1. Randy Johnson is 42

2. Carl Pavano was 18-8 last year. Before 2004 this guy was ten games under .500 in arguably the most pitcher friendly park in baseball

3. Jaret Wright may have won 15 games in 2004. But, in the 7 years before the 2004 season he won a whopping total of 18 games. Thats right, 18 games. Or on avg a tad above 2.5 wins per season for seven years. What caused this medicority? hmm. arm troubles...I guess thats worth $20 mil

4/5. Mike Mussina and Kevin Brown have both seen their best years far behind them. They are both in their later 30's.

So what happened?

The Yankees dream pitching staff, put together by Steinbrenner and his little red headed step child, Brian Cashman, tanked.

Randy Johnson pitched like a 42 year old for most of the season. Hist fastball would top off at 94mph instead of 98mph. Thats almost $7 mil per/mph dropped

Wright and Brown- pitchers with a history of serious arm troubles- surprise, surprise...had arm troubles.

Pavano got rocked to the tune of 4-6 with a 4.77era before he got hurt.

And Mike Mussina, he was well a decent pitcher...who happened to be making $17 mil.

Every fear that Yankee fans may have had before the season came to fruition.Yet magicly, the Yankees survived. The miracle trio of Wang, Small, and Chacon some how won games to the tune of 25-8.

The dream team on paper, built by the front office, stunk and the misfit fillin's were miracles.

So who is to blame and to praise for the Yankee shortcomings and successes.

Now lets take a moment to think about this. The Gm/owner overpaid, overevaluated, over everything a pitching staff that he put together that turned out to be no better than the Tampa Bay Devi lrays staff. And then three nobody's came in and saved the day.

You know who must be at fault: THE PITCHING COACH.

See, Mel Stottlemyre has to be guilty. Right? Come on? Even a little? I mean he is the one that caused Wright and Brown to hurt themselves again. And Mussina and Johnson to be old...Right?

Well that is who Mr. Steinbrenner had to blame.

Mel Stottlemyre was essentially driven out of town in a very nasty separation after the Yankees lost in the ALDS. This is a pitching coach who worked wonders on three nobody's to save a pitching staff. Yet HE is George's scapegoat.

Sorry George, you are the asshole. Today Don Zimmer, the yankees former bench coach and last year's scapegoat, came to the defense of Stottlemyre. Most Yankee players and coaches are doing the same.

See, if youre going to praise Joe Torre for being a good manager all these years (Note: i could manage the yankees of the late 90's with one hand in my pants and the other scratching my ass) then Mel Stottlemyre's coaching performance this year is one step short of mother Teresa.

Unfortunately, in the hypocrosy that is the Yankees, Mel is to blame and Steinbrenner feels vindicated.

George Steinrenner expects the Yankees to win the world series every year. Every offseason he looks to see who is available, looks at their stats, sees something good and overpays for them. He is not a baseball guy. He is a money guy.

This expectation to win the world series has Yankee fans turning their backs on the AL MVP. Only Yankee fans could call their mvp a bust.

This expectation has the Yankees calling Randy Johnson a total bust. The guy won 17 games with a 3.79 era and was second in the league in strike outs.

These expectations make the fans angry which makes Steinbrenner angry so he needs to find a scapegoat. Since it cant be him and it isnt HIS players that HE overpaid for. It has to be someone. Why not the PITCHING COACH?

Not only are the Yankees hatable as a team, but their owner is an asshole who cant admit that he made a mistake. Bad team, Bad morals.

I hate the yankees,

Sippy Momo

$208 million dollars

This is the # that most Yankee haters bring up first to describe what they hate most about the yankees. This, after all, is the Yankees payroll, $84 million dollars more than 2nd and greater than the bottom five teams in baseball combined.

While this number might piss us off, there is a number that is equally if not more hatable: $54.4 million.

Keep in mind this #, 54.4 million, and take a look at the ten bottom teams in baseball salary wise.

21. Oakland: 55,869,262
22. Texas: 53,891,258
23. Washington:48,581,500
24. Colorado:48,107,500
25. Toronto:45,038,500
26. Cleveland:41,830,400
27. Milwaukee:40,234,833
28. Pittsburgh:38,133,000
29. Tampa Bay: 37,975,067
30. Kansas City:36,881,000

You will notice that most of these teams find themselves at the very bottom of baseball's food chain. The Royals, Pirates and Rockies are perennial losers and dont seem to have any real future in sight.

Then, there are the Indians and A's at $41 mil and $55 mil respectively. Going into 2006, there arent two scarier teams in all of baseball.

Still, anyway you look at it, the better teams are often the teams with the most money.

So now, lets go back to this #, 54.4 million dollars.

No, this is not the amount of money the yankees pay their infield: Thats around $50 mil when you factor the part of A-Rod's salary the Rangers are paying.

No, this is not the amount of money the Yankees pay their opening day starting pitching staff: Sorry folks, that # hovers around $65 mil.

No, this this is not the amount of money that the Yankees almost paid to buyout Jason Giambi's remaining 4yrs, 82 mil on his contract.

And sadly, no, this is not the money that Hideki Matsui dropped at late night Japaneese whore houses (something he is apparently famous for).

So, what in god's earth does this # mean?

54.4 million dollar is the amount of money that the Yankees paid players NOT to be on their postseason roster. Thats right, our beloved bombers have more money that they are invested in players not to play, than nine teams have invested in players that they pay to play.

Below is the list of post season out casts aka "Dead Money":

Kevin Brown: $15.7
Carl Pavano: $9.0
Jaret Wright: $5.7
Steve Karsay: $5.0
Mike Stanton: $4.0
Felix Rodriguez: $3.0
Paul Quantrill: $3.0
Javy Vazquez(money paid in the Randy Johnson deal): $9.0
Total: $54.4 million (Thats a whole lot of pitching)

Note: this # does not factor in Bernie Williams' $12.3 mil salary which proved worthless in his final season in pinstripes

There are three reasons that this # pisses me off more than anything.

1. The most obvious of them all. No other team could survive a season like this.

Any other team in baseball can hardly recover from the loss of one key player and almost never with the loss of two. Look at the A's this year with Rich Harden and Bobby Crosby(combined 2005 salaries:$1.1 mil)

But $54.4 million dollars in unused contracts: That is $7 mil more than the White Sox and Cardinals combine to pay their starting rotations.

That is more mistake than the NBA salary cap and roughly twice the NHL cap.


2. With all this "dead money," Brian Cashman is considered a smart executive: This is actually the part that I wanted to highlight most in this blog.

See there is no telling how much, if any, control Brian Cashman had over the Yankees. Clearly, George Steinbrenner's hard on for big names drove the Yankees to pay $26 million dollars this season for Randy Johnson. So there are two ways to look at Cashmen.

1. He did nothing except listen to Steinbrenner
2. He made more decisions than people think.

If the first scenario is true, then Cashmen hasnt proven a thing. He is not a genius executive that all baseball teams should covet. Instead, he is an overpaid pawn.

If the second case is true, then Cashmen is a moron.

Say what you will about Aaron Small or Robinson Cano. If Aaron Small was this good, why wasnt he a Yankee 10 years ago. And yes Cano, and Chien Ming Wang were good. but does a .320 OBP or a 4.02 ERA really scream messiah, or is this possibly the case of an over hyping new york media (see Friday's blog)

Even with these players, if the Yankees were Cashmen's mess, than these players dont make up for $54.4 mil.

3. My third problem relates a lot to the 1st and 2nd problems and deals with my beloved Mets and their late gm, Steve Phillips. Steve Phillips, the mets gm that led them to the 2000 world series, was driven out of town just a few years later.

After 2000, to further improve the Mets he acquired Kevin Appier(who he later turned into Mo Vaughn), Robby Alomar, Roger Cedeno and Jermey Burnitz.

Truth is, none of these moves really worked. Appier pitched pretty well in his first year but was overpaid (4yrs, 42 mil) and needed to be moved. Vaughn never fully healed from knee injuries, Alomar was passed his prime and Burnitz, he just wasnt very good.

Steve Phillips quickly became public enemy #1. (Little is talked about how he drafted David Wright or was the Gm when they signed Jose Reyes.)

I hated him. You hated him. Everyone hated him. And for good reason. He had driven a world series team into the ground...He took on $40 million dollars of bad contracts and the team could not recover.

Wait a minute

40<54.4

and Brian Cashmen is the most coveted exec for this winter's GM vacancies.

What all this shows is that the Yankees financial situation makes them nearly invinsible. They can fail more than 1/3 of baseball can afford to succeed and still pay more salary than any team in baseball.

They still pay over $150 mil in postseason contracts and that does not even factor in the late season trade for Matt Lawton ($7.75 mil) .

Basically, the Yankees can be the biggest morons in baseball, which they are, and still make the playoffs every year.

This is just one more reason for Yankees2000.

Vaya con Dios,

Sippy Momo

THE CURSE:

The date was October 26h, 2000. Maybe the worst day of my life. I watched my beloved Mets lose to the Yankees, the team i hated more than anything in the world, in the biggest series of my life.

Yankee Fans celebrated yet another championship like it was just another day in the old ballpark. I wanted to kill them all.

Little did they know, things were about to change. These Yankee teams of the late 90's were the brainwork of Gean Michael. Michael developed a core of young talent from within the organization (Jeter, Williams, Rivera, Pettite, Posada) and surrounded it with some key veterans (O'neill, Clemens) to assemble a well balanced TEAM from top to bottom.

I highlight team for a reason. This was the last year that the Yankees ever had one.

After 2000, things changed.

The 2000 offseason was the famed offseason that saw Alex Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez and Derek Jeter combine to earn $601 million in guaranteed contracts. The big spending in baseball ignited "The BOSS" to finally open up and show off how big his pocketbook was.

That offseason the yanks went and threw $17 mil per year at Mike Mussina. This was really their first ever huge free agent signing. You may remember that Clemens was obtained for Wells. O'neill for Roberto Kelly. Most Yankee moves for that matter were done on a pretty similar scale to everyone else in baseball.

The 2000 offseason is when the Yankees became "The Evil Empire."

Over the next four years, the yankees bought every player in town. Giambi, Sheffield, A-Rod, Randy Johnson. Look at this list and you could almost gasp.

There was an onion article back in '03 that joked, " The yankees guarantee the world series by signing every player in sports." Well all of a sudden they had.

No longer did they have to fight to make the playoffs. They had to make the playoffs. After all, they had an all star team.

They took baseball and made it unfair. There was the Yankees and the rest. They had a payroll in 2005 that outpaid the bottom 1/6 of baseball teams combined.

Do I care about their payroll...no

It just gives me one more reason to hate them. More so, it makes rooting for this team a little bit sad.

See the beauty of sports is like the beauty of a lottery ticket. When you buy that lottery ticket, you play some lucky #'s and then you think to yourself, what if? If i win i can buy a new house, my life will be set, i can buy a new car, i can take care of my family. All these dreams, even if they seem real for only a short time help build the best feeling you can possibly have...hope.

Sports does the same thing. For an entire year, I sit there and hope that the mets will be great. Every single game means something to me. This hope brings my friends together. For Yankee Fans this hope does not exist. Over the course of a 162 game season the Yankees will make the playoffs every time. And if not everytime, they will certainly be in it come September. With these expectations, Yankee fans lose the joy of hoping for 11 months of a season, which to me is really sad.

So i started this blog because i now believe the Yankees are cursed. They have taken away the purity of baseball, turned their fans into monsters who sit there and think of Arod and Randy Johnson as their own, and they have taken away 1/4 of the al playoff spots for as long as baseball holds their current salary structure.

The Curse of the Mighty Dollar. They are cursed for turning baseball into a game of money and not grass and dirt.

I will be updating this blog often, bashing the yankees, their fans, their players and just about everything about them.

Enjoy,

Sippy Momo