Man, do the Yankees stink this year or what?

Written on 10:39 PM by Jack B.

I mean I kinda wasn't expecting much since I thought there would be a let-down after last year's "Choke Heard Round the World" but I never expected it them to be this bad. This is just dreadful. Unwatchable. I don't know what's keeping George Steinbrenner from going all Jack Nicholson in "The Shining" after watching his 120+ million dollar version of the Bad News Bears. I know they won today because of Mussina (the only starting pitcher I trust left on the team) but this is going to be a looooong season. And whats worse is I know we're going to hear it from our arch-foes up in John Kerry-land and fans of the Pedropolitans who play at Shea.

The problem is of course is that the team is bloated with big salaries (like Giambi's) and are old. Jeter and A-Rod are about 30 or so and that's young on this team. The heydey of our dynasty came when the core players of Bernie Williams, Mariano Rivera, Andy Petttite and Derek Jeter were just coming up out of the Yankee system and were young. And the reason that happened was because Steinbrenner was suspended for awhile giving Gene Michael leeway to build up the farm system without George trading the young'uns for some washed up over the hill DH (Jay Buhner for Ken Phelps anyone?). Now Bernie is old and about done. Pettite is in Houston. Rivera is not what he used to be and Jeter is the only really dependable one of the bunch left...but there's no one coming up to take their place. Instead we get 40+ year old Randy Johnson in the off season, pitchers like Kevin Brown, Paul Quantrill, and Tom Gordon (those three basically cost us the season last year) back stinking up the joint. Tom Pavano whose main claim to fame was beating the Yankees in the World Series and Jaret Wright who doesn't even look like even a half-way decent pitcher outside of Atlanta (at the same time letting Jon Lieber who was one of the few dependable arms last year go to Philly). I don't know who to blame. Torre will win if he has the horses, but when he doesn't he loses (look at his record as manager in other places). Cashman just does what the Boss tells him and the players have too large contracts to trade - other than the Yankees who could afford them?

I know it's still relatively early yet but I don't think this is going to be a pretty season for the Pinstripes. Not at all. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.