yankonyankee

Someone asked how they evaluate players? They overvalue them! Merry Christmas everyone!

Sanchez is doing something historic right now. He keeps this up, they'll be putting him on 60 minutes. Who is this guy signed from an international draft hailing from the Dominican Republic? Yanks apparently signed him at 17. He's been a top 100 prospect since 2011 as rated by baseball america, mlb and baseballprospectus. This guy's on pace for +70 runs. That's Bonds territory. And if he's doing this clean? He's bigger than Trout, he's friggin' moby dick right now. You have to expect him to fall back to earth, but if he doesn't? WOW. Yanks will have their next Superstar historic hitter. Sox are losing theirs. Too bad the season's ending soon. We'll have to wait for next year to see how Sanchez does over a whole season. Right now, he's tearing it up to the finish line. Should be interesting in TO. Encarnacion - should the Yanks sign him? They'd make a good 1-2 punch. Even Bautista on a 1 or 2 year deal. What Papi is doing is unbelievable. One of the game's best hitters is retiring while still being one the best hitters. Papi's a living legend and a HOFer. Giving him the busted phone was a great gift. Would have been funnier if it was the O's dugout phone, however. But I can understand a team not giving a gift to a guy that beat you. To the victors go the spoils. This Yank fan will be happy to see Papi stop beating on the Yanks. The shoes on the other foot this time. Yanks lost a lot of their great players from the last decade. The turnover appears to be quicker than expected. Should be a fun season next year, too. The Yanks have entertained me this year.

Sox made a statement already with one game to play, crippling the Yankee's chances at the division. The Pinstripes' WC hopes appear shot as well. Jays and O's are still hanging around and are positioned well for the WC spots. It's very possible all 3 AL E. teams make the playoffs. It's been a good race. I have no favorites now that the Yanks appear out of it. may the best team win. Wow. ESPN has a section entitled 'Chalk' devoted to the hyperfinancialization of sport, betting.

I still don't think the Yanks have a very good team, which might not matter in the parity rich AL East. Yanks probably have to win 16 of their last 24 games to win the division. Since they play 14 of their last 24 games against AL East teams ahead of them in the race, it's still possible. Crazy times.

Yanks still have 7 games against Boston, 4 with the Jays and 3 with the O's. Next up, TB for 4 games in the Bronx. Hide the women 'n children 'n lock the door! The Yankees are coming. The Yankees are coming. GO YANKS!

Yanks have plenty of games left against the O's, Jays, and Sox. While the Jays have the best chance of winning the division, the Yanks are playing as well as anyone right now. They'll be a tough out and even if they miss the playoffs, there's a good chance they will spoil a few teams' playoff bids. There's a good chance Yanks have a better Sept. than a lot of teams ahead of them. That's baseball for you; it's unpredictability is humbling.

In this age of parity, you just need to be around .500 to give yourself a shot - go on a hotstreak and you can sneak it. The team was going nowhere - then they jettisoned some vets, injected some youth, and good things are starting to happen. It's increasingly a younger man's game. I said the Yanks had no chance of making the playoffs this year. In my defense, with the team they had. But, it's a lesson. With sports, no one knows what the hell is going to happen.

The Yankees are coming! The Yankees are coming. AL East might become a 4 team race. Whoever gets hot at the end could win it. Yanks are smoking right now.

Yankees decided to get younger, trade today for tomorrow; if Chapman could move a few more players, I think he would, but it would have probably involved Yankees eating even more money. Steinbrenners are paying a lot of money right now for diminishing returns. CC/Arod/Tex/Ellsbury/mccann/Gardner/ - are all not playing to what their salary expects of them. If you're a Yankee fan and want to help the Steinbrenners pay for these guargantuan salaries, buy a Star Wars commemorative Yankee hat or other merchandise, sponsored by mastercard. Yanks don't have the same advantages of money anymore. There are a lot of rich teams out there. But once a few more names are off that list, Yanks should be able to outbid opponents for a star like Harper, plus these prospects might help. I think rating all these farms is bull#$@. more about perception than reality. Show me a farm that's churning out great talent and it's the best. Real results at the ml level. Prospective results in the minor leagues are useful for fantasy leagues and general managers because it's one way other Gms assess prospects worth. If people perceive (as they are now saying) Yanks have the number 5 farm in baseball and you buy into that dubious claim, then it should help the Yanks in trade negotiations. Anyway, target: 2019/2020 before Yanks are expected to win another WS? Who knows? Even with the Yanks out of it, baseball is still exciting. Lots of parity today.

I don't place too much stock in what either Erod or Koji did in this game. Vanilla Ice has more hits than this yankee team. Also, I don't know how starters can be effective with only 2 pitches. Bullpen - okay. Why aren't pitchers learning more pitches in the minors? Yankees have brought up guys with only two pitches as well. They can be effective for a span, but not consitently so.

Elktonnick - I can appreciate a man on a mission. OCF: Operation CAN Farrell. Here's the thing, though. Sox need pitching. Focusing on the manager is like a guy who finds out his wife's got herpes from f$%#ing another man, and instead of confronting her about it, he decides to clean the house - you know, becomes mr. clean for a day, shaves his head, puts on a white t-shirt, lifts some dumbbells a couple of times to get a pump, and then tackles that mold, scrubs the sh$% out of the mildew, even gets those hard to reach places between the tiles, and then takes a big sigh of relief after the job's done. But his wife still has herpes on top of being unfaithful. Go ahead, can the manager. I'm a Yankee fan. I'd enjoy the circus. But the pitching problem's still there. Cleaning the house is easy. Dealing with a dirty wife isn't. By the way, the Sox win a few games and the Robespierres go back to slumbering; the reign of terror with the blood flowing in the streets can wait for another day.

Lots of folks want Farrell fired. Why not Jerry Remy for manager if Farrell's canned? He's a Boston celeb in the local market and former player. Fans like him. They should text that poll on NESN, see what people think. And the closest thing to a bar chat is an internet live chat room, the kind run on java. Cheer up, Sox fans. Yankees have a worse record.

As for starting rotations, Yanks could have as good a one as anyone else in the division by year's end. The division is still open. Yanks aren't great, but they are still entertaining, at least for me. For this year at least, if the Yanks were to buy ( and I think a lot of people are already asking/speculating on what they might sell), they could seek to upgrade a bat or let the young guys struggle to develop or sign a pitcher and opt to try to outpitch teams. I don't think the Yanks will be able to outslug the 3 teams ahead of them. Instead, with their pen so strong, they could continue with one of their goals/hopes at the start of the season, which was outpitch and win some close games. But their pitchers have to be very good. Sox, O's and Rays have some fearsome hitters. It's still too early to sell anyway. I'd say another 3 or 4 weeks will decide. Sox on the other hand, have a lot of young exciting players who have shown greatness in their short time up. They shore up that pitching a bit, and Sox fans will be very excited. They'll probably have to give up some talent to do it via trade, but they are flush with positional players stock in the minors. Have a good season, everyone.

I don't count them out either. But I don't expect them to make the playoffs even if they aren't mathematically eliminated yet. I think there are sufficient reasons to make this a reasonable expectation. But you never know. Yanks will have to get younger. Father time catches up with everyone. I don't expect Arod to hit 40 hrs anymore. They need some power in that lineup.

Right now, the O's are a bigger threat. Yanks still aren't an automatic win, however. I can still see them finishing the year at .500

That hr he missed and they are reviewing won't count as part of balls hit hard. But you needed to extend the foul pole to measure that one. Arod is hitting like CC is pitching - both need to be smart because they've both lost something.

He's old - lot of wear. might never see him play for the yanks again. Yanks looking at Refsnyder - they're already in rebuilding mode and don't acknowledge it.

As a team, Yanks are dead last in baseball in % of balls hit hard, worse than the Phillies and Braves who don't use a DH. They just aren't hitting. Team looks old and overmatched offensively. Puts a lot of pressure on their pitchers, too and we've seen a lot of the younger pitchers struggle for a variety of reasons, and pressure to not give up runs might be a contributing factor. Baseball is a competitive and demanding sport. For old guys dealing with 160+ games almost every day wears on them. 2 months in and it looks like a losing season. Every team needs to rebuild. Question for yankees is how fast they can do it. We'll see.

my aim was to entertain. You make many sensible points. Thanks for the kind words. Never use Taz in the Roger's Centre would make a great T-shirt.

Like the weather, umps can be bad. Even when the weather is good, it isn't 'cooperating.' Why do people say this like they have an entitled view of reality, like the world is there to serve them. Umps aren't cooperating either, even when their zone is benefiting your guy. And if they are cooperating, he's probably betting on the game, grounds for firing. It also represents an investment opportunity for the casual fan, especially if you're a down on your luck type who happens to have an uncle who is an mlb ump. Umps have a lot of power. They're like gods. A good person to pray to before a game. maybe send some gifts. If both teams did this, it would increase the rivalry. We'd see more fracases like that between TO and Texas. Who wasn't entertained by that? I don't want to see automated zones, suck the life right out of the game. Who wants to see a manager argue balls and strikes with a computer? You'd always lose. Blow it up, it wouldn't change the next ball or strike call. But a human is corruptible, open to influence. So why don't umps get suspended or fined for a bad game? Short of settling the differences on the field in a drop down WWE steel cage, (people aren't ready for that yet, least of all the umps, who are blind and obese), what's stopping the commish from handing down suspensions on a weekly basis after a thorough review of the last week's shift? Could even post a state of the league address on youtube or mlb.com. Another problem right now is managers don't have enough power. managers need a union - they get suspended all of the time (Gibbons had a worse last week than the drug dealing truant at the local high school), and fans blame them for almost every loss. most losses are a result of a multitude of causes. There are a few times when it's glaringly obvious it's one man's fault. Even the sun had a part to play in the ball bouncing off Canseco's head resulting in a homer. Also the pitch selection, the pitch, and the hitter obligingly hitting the ball. But most losses can be summed up as a result of a lot of things '$%#@ing up.' Plenty of blame to go around. No need to be stingy. But if they ever settled matters on the field, Farrell would garner a lot of sympathy as a a cancer survivor, besides which, umps would be very reluctant to beat on a man in remission - there would be an uproar. It all would work in Farrell's favor, I imagine. That being said, I like what Girardi brings to the table. He looks like he could still catch a game. Umps - watch out.

Actions speak louder than words. Resort to violence.

Tim Raines

All true, but team fortunes are changing in a hurry these days, especially season to season.

he Empire Strikes Back isn't just a movie. It'll happen, just might not be this year. I'm not upset. ---------------- Davidoff - NYP BOSTON — Start small and think big. There’s your solution to the Yankees’ early-season misery. The Yankees’ offense woke up Sunday night at Fenway Park against David Price, so naturally, their pitching fell apart, with Nathan Eovaldi, Ivan Nova and Dellin Betances teaming for an 8-7 loss to the Red Sox, a series sweep by the home team and the Yankees’ fifth straight loss, giving them an overall record of 8-15. Brutal. You want a repeat of 2005, when the Yankees enacted a series of changes on May 2 with an 11-15 record? Of course you do. That now exists as the gold standard of in-season reboots. The Yankees recalled Robinson Cano and Chien-Ming Wang from the minor leagues — they also enacted a few other changes (Tony Womack from second base to left field, Hideki Matsui from left field to center field and Bernie Williams from center field to part-time designated hitter) that didn’t stick, although no one remembers that part — and finished a stellar 95-67, winning the American League East. Don’t anticipate such a revolution this time. That’s because those moves resulted from an actual revolution of sorts. General manager Brian Cashman, much of his roster put together by people besides him, received the green light from George Steinbrenner to clean up things however he saw fit. Cashman put together the bulk of this 2016 group, however, so he won’t be as desirous to blow it up. With that in mind, here’s the road map to a subtle yet successful rejiggering of what we’ve seen so far, beginning with the easiest stuff and working up to the hardest: 1) Bench Chase Headley for Ronald Torreyes. This won’t require so much as a roster move. Headley, signed with the Yankees through 2018, owns a .423 OPS this season. Consider that CC Sabathia’s career OPS is .551. Modal Trigger Ronald TorreyesPhoto: AP Is Torreyes a long-term solution? Of course not. For now, though, put in a guy who will give you a consistently competitive at-bat. Headley, who went 1-for-4 with a single Sunday night, has not met that low bar. 2) Put Luis Severino on double-secret probation. These Yankees, like last year’s Yankees, are walking the tightrope between transition and contention. It wouldn’t necessarily make sense to trade prospects or take on a big contract. Yet if the prized Severino can’t keep the Yankees in games, then he must return to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barres, where Luis Cessa and Chad Green — the two pitchers the Yankees received from Detroit for reliever Justin Wilson — both have performed well. Severino will start the Yankees’ next game, Tuesday night in Baltimore. His last start, at Texas, wound up as his worst, as he lasted just three innings and allowed six runs. “He’s never [gone] through a stretch like this,” Girardi said Sunday afternoon. “For him, that’s why I talk about just ‘Pitch by pitch. Slow it down a little bit.’ But he did show the ability to make adjustments last year, when he was struggling.” 3) Give fewer at-bats to Carlos Beltran, Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira. Yes, even after A-Rod’s four-RBI outburst on Sunday night. There is reason to believe that the more rest the Yankees’ three senior citizens get, the more effective they’ll be. A-Rod conceded late Sunday night that he benefited from two recent days off to rest his left oblique. Girardi made the right call Sunday not starting the switch-hitting Beltran, even though it meant starting lefty hitters Jacoby Ellsbury and Brett Gardner against Price. Aaron Hicks, who is vastly superior to Beltran on defense, must get regular opportunities, and Dustin Ackley should get a chance to prove last September’s outburst meant something. And if any of the trio of elders gets banged up, the Yankees shouldn’t hesitate to put the player on the disabled list to recharge the player’s batteries and give themselves (and us) a look at minor league outfielders Ben Gamel and Aaron Judge. 4) Solve the Ellsbury problem. This might be unsolvable, what with the center fielder in the third year of a whopping, seven-year, $153 million contract. At the least, the Yankees can alert the baseball world that Ellsbury, who doubled twice Sunday, is available at a heavy discount and see if someone bites. None of this can equal calling up an all-time Yankee (Cano) and a groundball machine (Wang). It’ll help, though. At this juncture, would anything hurt?

MLB: Yankee Stadium Introduces a New Way of Alienating Fans Eric Schaat You’ve heard of the $13 beers, the top-down strategy of keeping the 99% out of premium seats, and other types of alienation in play when you see the New York Yankees at home. Sadly, the disciples of Steinbrenner were just getting warmed up. On Opening Day 2016, Bronx brass unveiled one of the most offensive new quirks we’ve seen in a ballpark: mini-suites covered in dark glass that block the view of fans going from concessions stands to their seats. In a twist that would make HBO’s John Oliver and his Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cringe, the Yankees surprised fans at the home opener against Houston with their latest twist in elitist excess at the Stadium. We came across them walking to right-field box seats when, to our left, we noticed glass enclosures tinted dark blue standing between us and the field. The little party areas, which measure about 15 ft. by 10 ft., replace what were previously open-air spaces between the concessions stands and field-level seating. Unlike pillars, ushers, railings, or other natural obstructions, these eyesores were neither part of the stadium’s original design nor a welcome distraction to anyone in attendance on Opening Day. They effectively eliminate the ability for fans to experience the game while they return from buying a meatball sandwich ($14), two-foot cheesesteak ($27), or 12-ounce beer ($9.50). They also shut out fans in cheap seats who want a glimpse of what a premium location looks like. We’ve never seen or heard of a ballpark where fans walking to their seats were cut off from the action on purpose by a team. There is nothing inherently wrong with the boxes, mind you. If they had clear glass, there would be no issue. You would see the game around people enjoying a gin-and-tonic and bean dip inside their enclosures. But the Yankees’ decision to tint the windows creates another barrier between the corporate class and everyone else. It’s part of an ugly progression. As a season-ticket holder who transferred into this pricey locale from the old, rough-hewn Yankee Stadium, I experienced firsthand how the new Bronx cathedral shifted its focus to the privileged class. Fans who had quality seat locations were by and large disappointed with the new arrangements across the street. There were whispers of ticket brokers and corporate clients getting priority, but no one knew for sure. (Personally, I just let my ticket package lapse after the 2009 World Series.) The more overt changes have been impossible to dispute, from the sky-high concessions prices to the private entrance and dining room that are part of the “Legends” experience. HBO’s John Oliver set his sights on these luxuries and highlighted comments by Yankees COO Lonn Trost that made new Stadium ticket policies sound like they were intended to keep millionaires separated from fans of lesser means. Clearly, the Yankees did not create a stadium for the people when they moved the fabulously valuable franchise across 161st Street. New York has assumed separations for the super-rich and 99% already, so that part is to be expected. When they built physical partitions that began blocking the game from fans’ eyes, they crossed another line. This brand is about exceptional baseball and the thrill of the live event. Taking that away from fans — all fans — undoubtedly has The Boss rolling over in his grave. http://www.cheatsheet.com/sports/mlb-yankee-stadium-introduces-a-new-way-of-alienating-fans.html/2/ --------------------------------------------------------- Yanks going where the money is, which is increasingly in the hands of a few privileged elite. It's a profit-making venture and won't change until the system falters. The criticism would be better served if it employed a larger scope.