Well, this years pitching staff should have enough. I was cautiously optimistic this year coming in, thinking Johnson would have a better year now that he would be adjusted to NY, Moose would be Moose, a full year of those hard sinkers from Wang, Mr "I'm-Happy-as-Hell-To-Be-Out-Of Colorado" Shawn Chacon, and Wright and Small to fill innings at the end of the rotation.SuperTrooper wrote:Baseball is a team game and Jeter has been surrounded by some of the best baseball has to offer since the day he came to the majors. A-ROD has been part of an offensive lineup that has put up astounding numbers the past 3 years. The difference between these "good" Yankmee teams the the "great" teams is:RAGTOP wrote:it all comes down to Jeter is a winner and Arod isn't. Arod is a all around better ball player and as long as the Yankees continue to not win championships the man getting paid 24 million a year is going to take the majority of the blame. Here is an interesting question... whether your a Yankee fan or Sox fan would you trade Ramirez for Arod straight up?SuperTrooper wrote:WEEI was having an interesting discussion on who is really "Mr. Clutch" in NY: Jeter or A-ROD?
Yankmee fans almost exclusively side with Jeter based on what they "see", but the statistical evidence points otherwise. Using the "close and late" stat (ABs 7th inning and later, team tied, leading or trailing by a run) since A-ROD joined the Yankmees:
Jeter .214, 8HR, 16 RBI
A-ROD .278. 14 HR, 28 RBI
I will grant that Jeter has usually hit leadoff during this period, reducing chances for RBIs, but the BA struck me as low for someone labelled "clutch".
PITCHING PITCHING PITCHING
Hitting will cary you through the regular season, but pitching wins in the post season. A-ROD has never been on a team with enough pitching to win championships.
Unfortunatley, Johnson seemed to have aged about 10 years, Chacon is on the DL, and Wright and Small have been inconsistant all year. Mussina has been better than expected, and Wang seemed to be doing well too until last night.
A great book came out recently Birth of a Dynasty by Joel Sherman that chronicles the 1996 team into so much depth its amazing. It's also amazing how much different the 1996 team was compared to the teams of recent years.
In general, it seems Torre's reign has been divided into two halves. One is 1996-2001 when they won 5 pennants in 6 years and 4 rings in 5 years. The teams were built on the ability to play small ball with marginal (not great) power on offense and a solid rotation that would give you everything they had everytime out. I think David Cone's first game after recovering from an aneurism in 96 seems to epitomize that sentiment. The bullpen was always solid and teams knew that Wettland and Rivera were lurking at the end of the game.
From 2002-2005 (I think it's too early to judge this year), the Yankees seemed to have returned to "Bronx Bomber fashion" and playing a style of offense that seems to be sit around and wait for the three run homer, and winning a lot of ugly 9-7 games with less emphasis on pitching.
