A commenter on RAB last night brought up an interesting point.
Has anybody yet considered the out-of-this-world possibility that like all other franchises, it’s ok for the Yankees to have a gap year?
In the back of all our minds, I’m sure we’ve considered this. And as soon as we did, we likely got sick, annoyed, frustrated, flabbergasted, whatever. Most of us probably thought “Wasn’t 2008 the bridge year?” Yeah, I guess it was. The Yankees were only an 89 win team that year, and that was a lot considering how many people got hurt and especially considering that the magnificent combination of Sidney Ponson and Darrell Rasner made a combined 30 starts.
If the Yankees stand pat, as is possible, then the idea of a “bridge year” occurring again is at least a little bit likely. If I had to guess, I’d say the Yankees, as presently constituted, are a 90ish win team. The bullpen is solid and the lineup is–as always–in great shape. However, the starting pitching isn’t in great condition right now and that would ultimately hurt.
As Yankee fans, we’re not used to years like 2008. It’s the only one I’ve really experienced since I was old enough to know what the hell was going on. The Yankees have put themselves in a position so that bridge years are basically non-existent. Obviously, this is a good thing. The goal is to win and the Yankees do that very well and have done so for a long time. We can play the doom and gloom game and say this is going to be a crappy year for the Yankees, but we all know that the Yankees will most likely NOT stand pat and that the starting rotation will probably be tweaked by the time Opening Day rolls around.
Switching gears a bit, let’s focus on ourselves as fans. Literally every team goes through “gap years” and maybe Yankee fans need to start opening up to the idea. There may not be one in 2011 or in the immediate future, but there will be a time when the Yankees are not the class of the league. We always say that the World Series is the ultimate goal and that is healthy. What’s not healthy is for fans to think that the season is a failure if the Yankees don’t win the Fall Classic. That expectation is incredibly unrealistic. While it’s not likely and we shouldn’t be happy if it happens, there is always a chance that the Yankees could have a bad year. If and when that happens, we have to remember the one thing we sometimes forget: it’s baseball; and sometimes in baseball, crazy things happen.
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12 Responses to Gap Year?
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TIQ IQ
I’m sorry! A “bad year on most teams is under 500. Most teams would die to have 85 wins or better over a ten year period. I remember sitting through the mid 80′s and wondering if the Yanks would ever get into the playoffs again. I’ll gladly take one year of 90 wins, if it means rearming for the next 10.
The 2008 gapish year set up the 2009 championship. The Yankees are lucky enough that they get to have gapish years (where they stand a chance of contending even if they aren’t dominating) in between the load and go for it years. You can’t construct a team for the long term without occasionally waiting for the best options out there.
This team fields CC, Teixiera, Cano, Arod, Swisher, Granderson, Posada, and DJ. The idea of accepting or conceding to a “gap” year with a team possessing this range of near-AllStar-to-elite players is utterly ridiculous. Now, the fact that only 1 starter is on the list doesn’t escape me.
But that’s why Cashman is paid the big bucks. If he’s incapable of fielding a WS-contender, find someone who can.
That’s kind of ridiculous you know that right? You basically just said if he can’t win the World Series every year find someone who can.
Despite going from first in scoring to 7th in scoring from 2007 to 2008, 2008 was actually a very good year for the yankees. Its the same number of wins they had as in 2000 when they won the world series. Yankees have had similarly non-amazing seasons a number of times but still made the playoffs because Tampa was horrendous and Boston wasn’t consistently good until 2003.
Reality is the AL East has the 3 best teams in baseball and there are only 2 spots. There are so many moving parts to a baseball roster over 162 games that its impossible to have a very great chance of getting one of those 2 spots every year.
If you look at the Yankees 2008 team we won exactly the same number of games as the 2009 Red Sox team with the exact same results.
If Pettitte comes back, we’re bringing back almost exactly the same roster that outscored opponents by a league leading 166 runs last year, and won 95 games. And the roster will look almost the same as it did in 2009, when the team won 103 games and a World Series. That rotation was led by CC Sabathia, AJ Burnett (and not good AJ either), and Andy Pettitte. It’s easy to lose sight of this given the way the playoffs ended last season, and the way the Cliff Lee sweepstakes turned out. But this rotation will probably be better than the 2009 World Series rotation.
Lost in the Red Sox crazy off-season is that they are losing their best player from last season, plus another all-star caliber position player. They had a long way to go to catch the Yankees, and those two losses put them even farther back. As good as Crawford and Gonzalez are, how much better will they be than Beltre and Marintez were in 2010? Not much.
The Yankees, should Pettitte return, will have lost essentially nothing from a team that, in 2010, was better than Boston. Much better. And while both of those teams will improve, we have to realize what both teams have lost. The Red Sox can expect improvement from Beckett, Pedroia, Youkilis, and Ellsbury, but the Yankees can expect improvement from ARod, Jeter, Tex, Burnett, and Joba.
This has not been a great off-season, but if Andy comes back, we’re returning arguably the best team in baseball during the 2010 regular season. Our rotation will be as good, if not better than the rotation that won the World Series in 2009. We are not overwhelming favorites like we were heading into 2010, but let’s not blow things out of proportion. Baring something catastrophic and unforeseen, 2011 will not be a gap year.
Totally agree. What is wrong with everyone? We had a great team last year with some of our best hitters have career lows. This is (if Pettite returns) going to be pretty much the same exact team with a few tweeks (maybe Montero keeps crushing the ball too). What makes anyone think we can’t win the WS next year?
I think we can compete this year and make the playoffs for sure but World Series? That is a little far fetched… unless we add some amazing talent to the rotation and I just don’t see that happening.
We ended up being the 3rd or so worst team in the AL last year since I’m pretty sure the Rays would have beaten us had we faced them over the Twins in the first round, besides pitching wise we just don’t match up well with any of the “super rotations” in the NL.
Besides even if Andy comes back I don’t expect it to be at the same level he pitched most of last season at and I don’t expect him to be as healthy as he was in 2009 which was the key to that whole run because if he misses time and we can’t go 3 deep in the rotation we don’t win that World Series.
Halladay Vs Sabathia
Lee Vs Hughes
Oswalt Vs Pettitte
Hamels Vs Burnett
The Cardinals won the World Series in 2006. If you make the playoffs, you have about as good a chance as anyone else.
How do you figure? Sabathia is no longer in his 20′s, Andy will be 39 and AJ has had the worst year of career in between then and now? Sure we have Hughes in the rotation now but that’s the exact same rotation we had last season that got thrown around in the playoffs, I could see them being close to as good as 2009 (although I can’t really because Andy like won’t stay healthy) and with the way they changed the schedule you need 4 starters now in the playoffs not 3.
You act like Pedroia, Youk and Ellsbury had bad seasons… They ended up missing most of the year in the case of Jacoby and Cameron and more than half in the case of Pedroia, The Red Sox will be better as long as they pitch better they will be a better than 89 win team by far, they could have been more than last year had injuries not decimated the team, I doubt we get that lucky again.
Jacoby missed 144 games
Youk missed 60 games
Pedroia missed 87 games
Mike Cameron their starting CF missed 114 games
Beckett missed 12 starts
With all the injuries they suffered they really don’t need Adrian Gonzalez and Crawford to replace Vmart and Beltre because Youk, Pedroia, and Ellsbury actually playing a full season will make up for any slack and then some but they actually will because Crawford hit better in the 3 hole last year than Victor did.
Victor Martinez- .302/.351/.493, 149 H, 20 HRs, 79 RBI, 40 BB, 52 K, 1 SB
Carl Crawford- .307/.356/.495, 184 H, 19 HR, 90 RBI, 46 BB, 104 K, 47 SB
Adrian Gonzalez- .298/.393/.511, 176 H, 33 2B, 31 HR, 93 BB, 114, .213 ISO, .378 wOBA, 5.3 WAR
Adrian Beltre- .321/.365/.553, 189 H, 49 2B, 28 HR, 40 BB, 82 K, .233 ISO, .390 wOBA, 7.1 WAR
When you consider the widely different margins of the park and you look at Adrian Gonzalez’s spray chart at Petco last year he ends up with roughly 50 total HRs playing half of his games at Fenway.
I agree that there is no reason to panic but I don’t agree with all the people who think the Red Sox won’t be much better because they have to replace these two big bats, if anything Crawford completely covers Victor and anything Gonzalez does in the future with be 3x anything Beltre can produce going forward and you are going to see all of Gonzo’s numbers go up tremendously in that park with his swing, we are looking at David Ortiz in his prime all over again.
I think fans tend to overrate the 2009 rotation because it performed well in the playoffs. When you have one of the best offenses in baseball and a good bullpen, you can get by without an incredible rotation. And the 2011 rotation could easily be better than the 2009 rotation was.
Sabathia was better last season than he was in 2009. Andy was much better, and while injuries are an issue, he was coming off five straight years of 190+ IP. Let’s not write him off yet. Hughes was far better last season than Joba was in 2009, and still has room to improve. And I like our options for the fifth spot, which was a major issue in ’09.
And what about AJ? Yeah, he really struggled last season. But 2009 wasn’t exactly a career year either. I wouldn’t be shocked if he put together another season like he did in 2009.
2009 rotation:
CC Sabathia: 19-8, 3.37 ERA, 230 IP, 3.39 FIP.
AJ Burnett: 13-9, 4.04 ERA, 207 IP, 4.33 FIP.
Andy Pettitte: 14-8, 4.16 ERA, 195 IP, 4.15 FIP.
Joba Chamberlain: 9-6, 4.75 ERA, 157 IP, 4.82 FIP.
2010 Bill James projections:
CC Sabathia: 18-8, 3.32 ERA, 236 IP, 3.34 FIP.
AJ Burnett: 12-9, 4.01 ERA, 191 IP, 4.05 FIP.
Andy Pettitte: 9-7, 3.86 ERA, 140 IP, 3.82 FIP.
Phil Hughes: 12-7, 3.56 ERA, 177 IP, 3.76 FIP.
And it’s safe to assume that whatever we get out of the fifth spot will be better than what we got out of the fifth spot in 2009:
32 GS, 146 IP, 6.97 ERA
So yeah, our rotation can certainly be better than it was in 2009. Our bullpen is very solid, and while we need some rebounds from key players (Rodriguez, Jeter, Tex) our offense also had a couple breakout performances last season (Cano, Gardner). It might not be what it was two years ago, but it’s still probably the best in the league.
I’m not saying we are favorites, but look at this roster. It’s definitely good enough to compete. If Andy comes back, this is the team that won 95 games last season despite down years from ARod, Tex, Jeter, Burnett, and Joba, and a major injury to Andy Pettitte. This is not far from the team that won 103 games and a WS in 2009. This shouldn’t be a gap year.