Have A Nice Winter Vacation, Yanks

UPDATE:  I still don't feel good.  Getting tired, but I think that I have a few extra minutes in order to write a proper blog post today.

Tonight, I am going to talk about the Yankees and how they lost their chance at making it to the World Series.  There is a subset of people in baseball (and even outside of baseball) that either like or loathe the Yankees.  While I don't loathe them, I'm not really a fan either.

Yes, I understand the history of the baseball team and what it has meant to the sport.  I respect George Steinbrenner for what he was able to do with the Yankees as a whole while he was alive but I think it's about time for the Yankees to stop overpaying for players that are doing nothing for the team.

Since I'm not really a Yankees fan, I'm not really sure about the make up of their team, but I do know this.  There are several players on that team that either need to retire or need to move on.  The Yankees have a penchant for paying millions of dollars to players that are older than most average baseball players.  These players, while once good - in their prime - are on the slow decline and really don't deserve the money the Yankees are paying them.  Also, there are several players - Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez, I'm looking at you - that have had a tough year.  Not only did Jeter break his ankle last week on a routine play but Rodriguez was benched for the last two games of the series.  I think that might tell you something about how management feels about him.

Sure, ARod and Jeter will tell the media that they'll be back in Florida in the spring and that they'll compete again next year, but I have a feeling that the injury to Jeter might be harder to recover from and ARod might find another team.  I'm not saying that's going to happen but it could.

What the Yankees need to start doing is investing in their future - with their minor league system.  They have shown MLB that spending a lot of money on several players has not worked to its full effect over the past few years.  Maybe they should come up with a new strategy.  One that doesn't require them having an operating budget over $225 million.  Just a thought.

I'm not saying they need to go all out like the Houston Astros, though.  I just think that the Yankees need to find some happy medium where they don't spend all the money on just a few players and have nothing to show for it.  If they were smart and developed their minor league prospects and either dealt them for better talent or even used them, then it's possible that the Yankees are just a couple of years from getting back to the World Series, where they feel they belong every year.


Until tomorrow.