The Pride of the Yankees

By John Gottlieb

It’s unbelievable that when you play by the rules you are still chastised as the worst in all of sports. It's a lofty title to uphold, but one it becomes the Yankee moniker before the start of every baseball season.

Pardon me but boo-hoo for the rest of Major League Baseball and the rest of the whole sporting landscape for that matter.

I’m sure I don’t have to, but I will remind everyone that despite having the highest payroll for the last six years the Yankees have ZERO World Series titles. That’s right, they’ve been stuck on good ole No. 26 since the 2000 Subway Series.

The Yankees are the worst in all of sports when they win and the worst in all of sports when they lose. When they win it's because they're supposed to and when they lose it's because there is no way all of that high-priced talent can come together as a team. I guess you're damned if you do and damned it you don't. That's a pretty rough standard to be held to.

How can you blame the Yankees for the market they’re located in? Being in New York has its perks, and one of them is drawing four-plus million fans.

Do the Yankees exude some sort of arrogance? If you spent $200 million for a team you’d expect them to win. Do we equate arrogance with lofty expectations? If so, then count the Yankees guilty as charged.

The Yankees won four World Series in five years behind homegrown talent, including Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Bernie Williams, Jorge Posada and Andy Pettitte.

Other than the 2002 Angels no other team since 2000 has used as much of a core of homegrown players than the Yanks’ dynasty.

Maybe they spend their money unwisely but that goes to show that despite being in the playoffs, the team that spends the most usually doesn’t win, which should give hope this year to the Phillies, Twins and Cardinals.

Jay Leno’s got an extravagant, expensive collection of cars, but would the late night talk show host send his Porsche Carrera GT to the junkyard if it blew a transmission. I don’t think so. He’d probably replace the V10 with a V12 and up the horsepower from 605 to whatever you up that kind of machinery to.

It’s the same thing with the Bombers. If Johnny Damon breaks his leg in spring training you can bet that the first call Brian Cashman will make is to John Schuerholz in Atlanta.

I’m not sure why everyone has a problem with what the Yankees do. Is it because they put a winning product on the field (at least throughout the regular season), or is it because if they have a deficiency they go out and fix it?

Of course the Royals can’t make the same moves that the Yankees can, but their owner is David Glass. Never heard of him? He’s just the guy that owns one the biggest companies in the United States (Walmart).

The new owner of the Pirates is Bob Nutting, who is the President and CEO of Ogden Newspapers and Nutting Newspapers, a chain off 38 dailies, 43 weeklies/shoppers, 14 magazines and 51 independent telephone directories.

These guys have all the cake it takes to turn the franchises into competitors, but they spend the money poorly (Gil Meche) or they don’t spend it at all. Don’t blame the Yankees for that.

You don’t get to join the fraternity of baseball owners unless you have a lot of money and you play nice-nice with the others.

Am I to believe that David Glass can’t afford to keep up with George Steinbrenner? No, Steinbrenner just wants to win more and is willing to do whatever it takes, within the rules to do so.

Just wait until A-Rod decides that he wants a contract extension after this season and threatens to opt out of his deal if the Yanks don’t give him five more years at $100-plus million. The Bronx Bombers would tell him to take a hike.

Also keep in mind that the Yankees are only paying $16 million this season for Rodriguez. I can give you 29 other teams that would do that if they could.

Now that Brian Cashman has control of the organization the Yankees have shown fiscal restraint. If they were the big, bad Yankees with George Steinbrenner calling the shots then Carlos Beltran would be patrolling center and Barry Zito would be the talk of the town.

The Yanks added Doug Mientkiewicz, Kei Igawa and Andy Pettitte this season, while shedding Gary Sheffield, Randy Johnson, Jaret Wright and most certainly Bernie Williams. New York would’ve gotten rid of A-Rod and Jason Giambi too but they wouldn’t waive no-trade clauses.

And whom did New York get in return for these future Hall-of-Famers and Jaret Wright? Humberto Sanchez, Kevin Whelan, Anthony Claggett, Chris Britton, Ross Ohlendorf, Steven Jackson, Alberto Gonzalez and Luis Vizacaino. There is a possibility that two or three of these players will see time in the majors this year.

The Yankees are a team with weaknesses, including aging starting pitching, the lack of a dominant relief pitcher (other than Mariano), and a gaping hole at first base. I’m sure if they wanted to they could've bettered themselves with some major league ready talent if they were "the worst in sports".

Nope, they’re building for the future. The Yankees farm system was a laughingstock just a few seasons ago, but ESPN’s Keith Law ranked them in the top five this year.

When you hear baseball fans complain about what the Yankees do it’s because they wish the owners of their favorite franchise was smart or savvy enough to do the same. What would make the system fairer? Do the Yankees need to be put a competitive disadvantage because they make so much money? Why don’t we make them play with 20 guys on their roster instead of the 25 everyone else gets? How about we put a cap on the number of All-Stars one franchise can have? Where does the line get drawn?

There is no salary cap in baseball and there never will be thanks to the strongest union in the world. That is the only way to even out the playing field (just like the NFL), but don’t hold your breath. It ain’t gonna happen, baseball has gone on strike for less.

As for the Red Sox, if the Yankees are the worst in all of sports the Red Sox are not far behind. This is a team that spent $222 million this offseason behind only the Chicago Cubs. (The Yankees rank ninth in offseason spending this year.)

Sorry if my math is a little off, but as best as I can tell the Yankees’ payroll will be roughly $45 million more than Boston's this year (and that doesn’t include the posting bids for any of the import pitchers on either team), compared to last season when New York’s payroll was close to $75 million more. Boston is catching up and doing it quickly.

So while that was a beautifully disturbing love story of the couple in Boston, the Red Sox are a team going with their fifth different shortstop in the last five seasons and also signed an outfielder that won’t play with a hangnail to a five-year, $70 million contract.

Look in the mirror. The playing field is slowly but surely being leveled in baseball.

If the Yanks are the worst in all of sports because they will do whatever it takes, again within the rules, then why even pick a team and devote your time to it?

“You play to win the game.”