Sunday, October 08, 2006

Reflections on a "Nice Little Season"

Betty is hiding out in D.C. this weekend, nursing the end of a baseball season.

Though she's attracted to the fierce youth of Detroit and the joy of Willie Randolph, Carlos & Carlos, and David Wright's Mets, she's still bitter about the Yankees.

The New York Times really laid it on thick today, which Betty appreciates. The Yankees don't go out to have a "nice little season" or to offer a "humanitarian" lift to downtrodden Detroit. "Now begins their season of blame," announced Tyler Kepner.

Bimbo recommends the Yanks conduct a "spiritual analysis" of themselves before lifting a finger. It seems little intellectual energy is being devoted to spreading funds around and investing in players with character and the ability to fit into a greater vision than themselves. This year's postseason line-up may have been feared at first, but in the end it delivered little more satisfaction than a disconnected greatest-hits album.

Betty has some suggestions below, but let's heed Bimbo's point and recall that this team should have been able to at least HIT, and instead they choked. Something beyond strategy is at play here, and only sedating or surpassing that something can turn this team around.

That said, the Bombers would be wise to remember that their greatest talent is always homegrown, not imported: Jeter, Cano, Bernie, Matsui, Melky, Mariano, Posada (not to mention Gehrig, DiMaggio, Mantle). And some of their greatest postseason heroes have been pretty pedestrian, everyday guys, not celebatters and throwers: think Paul O'Neill, Scott Brosius, and Tino Martinez.

Betty enjoys the high standards to which the Yankees hold themselves, so why not unload A-Rod and play a little Moneyball, skipping the discarded fallen stars and going straight for the unknown young talent? The Mets, A's and Tigers got it right. Let's catch up this winter, in time for next fall.

THAT said, congratulations Yankees (especially Jeter, Cano, and Wang), for winning your division, and for bringing so much happiness, for a time, to all your fans.

1 comment:

Speed McQueen said...

Did you fools just suggest that Hideki Matsui was homegrown? That's some Mat-sui generis thinking, friends, as Godzilla is not a product of the Yankee farm system but, well, Japan. Sheesh!