Thursday, October 21, 2004
Yankees Long Slide Downhill Begins...
I'm still grinning from ear to ear. On the same day that Curt Schilling bitch-slaps ARod in the national media for his ball slapping ways, the Red Sox blow out the Yankees in Game 7 in New York. Beautiful.
By the way, if you did not hear Schilling's appearance on the Jim Rome show last night, let me recap a few key quotes he made about ARod. He called A-Rod's karate chop at the ball "punk" and a "stupid ass play" that was "so unprofessional it was a joke." He went on to talk about the Yankees being a class organization and said "you would never see Derek Jeter do something like that" and that ARod's play was "anything but class." He ended by saying that A-Rod (and he also mentioned Bonds at this point) was an amazing talent but "from a respect standpoint, there wasn't much there to begin with." Beautiful. Tears well in the eyes.
Many other sites break down the game well. I just wanted to take a moment to reflect on what this loss means to the Mariners. I think it means that the Yankees will NOT be a player in the Carlos Beltran sweepstakes.
Hear me out.
The Yankees payroll is at $175 million and EVERY player (except for Jon Lieber, who has a team option that will be picked up) is under contract for 2005. The Yankees have a glaring hole in first base if Jason Giambi is done, and their pitching staff obviously needs some significant help. So with a payroll jumping over $200 million potentially just to fix those problems, will they also go after Beltran?
I don't think so. This past offseason, the Yankees picked up ARod and his $25+ million dollar contract just to stuff it down the Red Sox throat, and show that they could do what the Red Sox could not. And we saw how ARod led the Yankees in the ALCS. 1 for 17 in the final 4 games, and a slap that may have single-handedly had the Yankees looking in the mirror and saying "how did we come to this?"
Yes, Carlos Beltran had a monster postseason, and may be the perfect fit for the Yankees outfield. But George is a fix the problem kind of guy. Aaron Boone hurts himself, go sign ARod for 3B. Need better pitching - let Pettitte and Clemens go and pick up Brown and Vazquez. With the backfiring of that move, the Yankees may instead focus millions of dollars on young starting pitching and lefty relief help and eschew the outfield. Or so I hope.
By the way, if you did not hear Schilling's appearance on the Jim Rome show last night, let me recap a few key quotes he made about ARod. He called A-Rod's karate chop at the ball "punk" and a "stupid ass play" that was "so unprofessional it was a joke." He went on to talk about the Yankees being a class organization and said "you would never see Derek Jeter do something like that" and that ARod's play was "anything but class." He ended by saying that A-Rod (and he also mentioned Bonds at this point) was an amazing talent but "from a respect standpoint, there wasn't much there to begin with." Beautiful. Tears well in the eyes.
Many other sites break down the game well. I just wanted to take a moment to reflect on what this loss means to the Mariners. I think it means that the Yankees will NOT be a player in the Carlos Beltran sweepstakes.
Hear me out.
The Yankees payroll is at $175 million and EVERY player (except for Jon Lieber, who has a team option that will be picked up) is under contract for 2005. The Yankees have a glaring hole in first base if Jason Giambi is done, and their pitching staff obviously needs some significant help. So with a payroll jumping over $200 million potentially just to fix those problems, will they also go after Beltran?
I don't think so. This past offseason, the Yankees picked up ARod and his $25+ million dollar contract just to stuff it down the Red Sox throat, and show that they could do what the Red Sox could not. And we saw how ARod led the Yankees in the ALCS. 1 for 17 in the final 4 games, and a slap that may have single-handedly had the Yankees looking in the mirror and saying "how did we come to this?"
Yes, Carlos Beltran had a monster postseason, and may be the perfect fit for the Yankees outfield. But George is a fix the problem kind of guy. Aaron Boone hurts himself, go sign ARod for 3B. Need better pitching - let Pettitte and Clemens go and pick up Brown and Vazquez. With the backfiring of that move, the Yankees may instead focus millions of dollars on young starting pitching and lefty relief help and eschew the outfield. Or so I hope.
