Photo: USA Today
It’s 2:09 central time. The Yankees are down 12-3 in the 6th to the Red Sox, on their way to their third consecutive loss against the hated rival. In case you missed it somehow, the first game of the series was the type that rips your heart out and steps on it, and the second game was more like a slow, but equally as soul crushing demise. It’s hard to say that those two games summed up the Yankee season because it’s pretty hard to characterize 2013 in the Bronx, but those two in conjunction with today’s unfolding beatdown do effectively ring the closing bell on what has been the single least enjoyable, least exciting, least fun, most upsetting, most off-putting, and most gut-wrenchingly miserable season of my two plus decades of Yankee fandom. I hated this season. (On the bright side, it’s focused me attention outward and I’m currently rooting hard for the Pirates, enjoying the Dodgers thoroughly, and can’t help but watch every inning Clayton Kershaw throws or every at bat Miggy Cabrera takes. But boy did I hate this Yankee season.)
I want to make it clear that this is not just another rant by a self-entitled, coddled and spoiled Yankee fan. By all measures, Yankee and otherwise, this season was awful. As a fan, we had to watch as our franchise player missed the entire first half only to make a one game appearance before going back on the DL–only to make a five game appearance before going back on the DL. Our franchise pitcher has posted career worsts in just about every statistical category known to man. Our former top pitching prospect utterly imploded (a long time coming, mind you) to the point that not only was the 27 year old demoted to the bullpen, but to the point that his first appearance out of said bullpen featured three times as many runs given up as outs recorded. Our highest paid player (who also missed the entire first half plus) became the biggest media pariah in sports history, going so far as to allege that our franchise illegally conspired to keep him from playing by fudging medical records and arranging shoddy medical care. On top of all that, our best-player-by-far is a looming free agent, our best-pitcher-by-far hates baseball so much that he might walk away all together rather than take $15 million for another (legitimate) shot at the ERA crown, and our patriarch/future hall of famer/everyone’s favorite player is abandoning us in less than a month.
C’mon, read that paragraph again. That would suck for a fan whether we were talking about the Yankees, the Cubs, the Astros, or the Hillsboro Hops.
As Jerry Seinfeld once said: part of the joy of being a fan is rooting for the laundry. Yes, of course, but a big part of fandom is rooting for the guys in that laundry. When you root for specific players you root for three things: the past, the present, and the future. We root for Rivera because he has been the greatest closer ever; we root for Jeter’s 3,000 hits, playoff heroics, and captaincy. In Robinson Cano, we recognize greatness in the moment. We root for Robbie because he could do something special at any moment. What this team lacks is hope for the future. We try to root for… Austin Romine??? (yes, that’s how far I had to dig to prove this point) because of what he could be. We root for him develop… into something. We root for Austin Romine for the promise of… Dammit.
But why do I root for Lyle Overbay? For Vernon Wells? For Mark Reynolds? For Travis Hafner? They are less exciting than even Austin Romine–and theyepitomize the 2013 Yankees. Obviously, you’ve heard the narrative before: they are the retreads and castoffs to whom the Yankees were forced to turn after tightening the purse strings and being decimated by injuries…… yada yada yada. That’s true, but it doesn’t make it any less painful. Overbay, Wells, Reynolds, Hafner, et al. are mercenaries to tolerated and appreciated, but not loved. It is impossible to root for them unless they are component pieces of something bigger.
The record indicates they aren’t. For the 2013 Yankees, the mercenaries are the core, and the core is exactly hurtling around its axis. These aren’t exciting, high flying, glad-to-have-them mercenaries. Our group of mercenaries are, for the most part, just happy to have a a job. How do you root for that? These players have done nothing in New York. Their history is not our history. They are not capable of producing anything now. They will not be around long enough to produce anything in the future. They are, sadly, place holders.
But place holders for what? And that’s what takes 2013 from a disappointing “down year” to an existentially depressing crisis point. What are we looking forward to? It’s very possible that our captain is headed for a last hurrah as an oft injured semi-productive first basemen. (Which, incidentally, would be a crushing blow to our current oft injured semi-productive first basemen who himself spent nearly the entire season on the DL.) Our ace with a 95 mph fastball to be feared in October may now be our overpaid three starter with a 88 mph fastball to be feared by the Astros. Our third basemen may miss all of next season plus half the next year for being a druggie and a liar and a cheat and a snitch and etc. etc. etc. Our second basemen may be a future Dodger. Our place holder rental players aren’t holding places for anyone in particular. There’s no stud AA corner outfielder waiting in the wings. The future looks bleak.
And that’s the thing. This year’s Yankee team didn’t excite, motivate, galvanize or entertain. It simply strung along some dim and deluded hopes before unceremoniously ending them. And it served no purpose. This wasn’t a building block. We didn’t suffer through this season for the good of next year, or 2015, or some legitimate vision like that. We suffered through this season because the calendar said we had to.
I’m not sure if it’s good or bad, but there’s really nobody to blame. I’m not calling for the heads of Joe Girardi and Brian Cashman. They both did the best they could given the circumstances and, all in all, performed fairly well. This 2013 just was. And soon–but not soon enough–will cease to be.
-Max Frankel
P.S. If you are an already depressed Yankee fan and the above, which is by far the most depressing thing I’ve written in three years on this website, made you feel worse, might I make a suggestion? Root for the Pirates. Not forever. You and I are still Yankee fans and always will be, but give it a shot for the next month. I think you’ll like it. It’s fun! There’s drama, uncertainty, excitement, AJ Burnett-related anxiety (you remember that, I’m sure) and the chance for magic. I’ve been a Pirates “fan” for almost two months now and I love it. People have ben jumping on our bandwagon for the last century–climb aboard this one, there’s plenty of room!
