THE 2013 YANKEES: MAYBE THIS IS WHAT WE NEEDED

All along we have been beating ourselves up wondering why a team that has had the proven talents of Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter, Curtis Granderson, Mariano Rivera, Robinson Cano, Ichiro Suzuki, CC Sabathia and Andy Pettitte hasn’t brought us more than one championship over the past five years.  In fact, we’ve only managed to win once in the past twelve years.  That represents the longest dry spell for this franchise since the “dark” era of the mid-to-late eighties.

I thought last season we had one of our best chances.  We won the most games in the American League (95) and in spite of losing the greatest reliever in the history of the game to a leg injury early on, we had squeezed whatever talent we could out of Rafael Soriano to enter the playoffs with a rock-solid relief corps.  We had power and experience at virtually every spot on the diamond and it looked as though only we could stop ourselves.

(In Photo: Rafael Soriano, 2012)
We did.

Even though we had all that talent, this year is showing what we really missed in 2012.  It isn’t something you can measure or quantify.  There aren’t any stats that will show you why this season’s version of the Yankees is better.

But it is, and the reason has more to do with things that are felt and can’t be seen.

Of the players I mentioned above, only Rivera, Cano, Suzuki and Sabathia are active on the roster as of this post.   The rest sit on the DL (Granderson for a second time this year) where they have been for a majority of the season.

Yet... here we sit in first place, atop the AL East with the second best record in the American League.

Our lineup is often referred to as “patchwork” and features guys like Lyle Overbay at first, David Adams at third, Jayson Nix at Short, Vernon Wells in Left  and Austin Romine behind the plate.  The rotation has had to march on with David Phelps and Vidal Nuno playing key roles.  The bullpen has seen the emergence of Preston Claiborne, Adam Warren and Shawn Kelley.  Coupled with perhaps Mariano Rivera’s greatest season (and his last), the “pen” has once again become the pride of the team.

Is it smoke and mirrors?  No, probably not.  Has Joe Girardi’s “binder” finally started getting things right?  Well, no.  It is altogether likely that Girardi has had to burn his binder as the numbers and types of players at his disposal this season don’t fall into any category that you’ll find on paper.

So, what is it?

This season’s team has enjoyed success using instinct, desperation and inspiration as its foundation.  It has gotten back to the very basic definition of “team”.  There is no one star carrying the load.  While it can be said that Robinson Cano is the only superstar on the roster, he hasn’t been the sole hero in each victory.

It seems that every night brings about a different player that carries the team to another “W”.  Where in past seasons the team might depend on the long ball from one of its many power hitters to bail them out of deficits, this year’s squad has had to be patient and whittle away at the holes they have dug for themselves.

Perhaps all along the answer has been right in front of us but we refused to believe it.  Our Yankees lacked that “no one expects us to win so let’s have fun with it” mentality.  For so many years the Bombers have been picked to finish either at the top or right below it.

This season has seen unfamiliar prognostications from the so-called “experts”.  The media and fans of our opponents came into 2013 rejoicing in what they perceived was finally the end of our era at the top.  They were certain that this team could not overcome the many injuries to, and advanced age of our stars.

We can relish the fact that through the first two months of the campaign those “haters” are once again disappointed.

Only time will tell if our team that has been put together with players pulled off the scrap heat as well as those not yet ready for “the show” can keep us at the top of the division.

I just know that right now this squad is winning without a safety net to catch them, and they are having fun doing it.  It’s a formula that separates this version of the Yankees from those that came before it and proves to the world that there’s more to the organization than just money.

It’s exactly what we’ve been waiting for.

   
--Steve Skinner, BYB Guest Writer
Twitter: @oswegos1

 

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