I think he is a very competent manager who in one of the toughest spots in professional sports has handled himself and his players with class and dignity. He has had a calming influence on not only the players but the entire organization including Steinbrenner and I think that has helped the team win. He deserves a lot of credit for bringing a sense of style and dignity back to the Yankees and to NY sports in general that goes beyond merely winning. The fact that he has done this and won says an awful lot about Torre. It may well be time for Torre to go but he deserves to be treated with the same kind of respect and dignity that he brought to the they Yankees and to NY sports. The guy has been the leader of a dynasty and he deserves to be able to leave in a gracious manner.
The New York post is now saying that Torre will stay...however its the Post. http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/6046132
how can you call a team that got bitch slapped right out of the playoffs a juggernaut? that's the same misconception that the Yanke organization has, that an all-star line up of players inherently equates a great team, or a juggernaut, when in fact it was a flawed team that perhaps Torre maximized during the regular season but which's flaw was easily exposed in the playoffs. winning in the playoffs is much different than in the regular season, and the Yankees used to have teams that could do both, but if the past six years have tought us anything it's that it doesn't take an "all-star" team to win the World Series. though at the end of the past few seasons the Yankees seemed to have fallen into the trap that they lost not because the team as a whole wasn't good enough and that it was missing one or two MORE all star players, and the fans seemed to have agreed, demanding such a team and applauding them for doing so. tell the Yankees fans that the Yankees spend poorly and you are attacked as being jealous or that a non-Yankee fan can't speak of what it takes to win since no other team wins as much. but the problem the Yanks have is that they have become dependent on spending money just to remian competitive, instead of depending on making smart baseball decisions, neither of which is Joe Torre's fault. he can only manage the team he is given, and this team was flawed and not built for the post season. sure, it is surprising to see this team lose, but upon anlysis it lost for the same reason the Yanks have lost the past several seasons, yet the Yanks continue to sign the same type of players that have failed to win and expected different results. that is the definition of insane, doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
I love this "not built for the postseason" nonsense. The Yankees didn't hit, and they lost, pretty simple. People try to make a big deal out of "small ball" teams like the Angels and White Sox winning the WS, while ignoring the fact that during the playoffs they were killing the ball and scoring alot of runs.
Yes, but those teams were able to get baserunners. That's the key to winning games. The Yankees' lineup in the WS the past few years is built so that if a couple guys get hot, they hit 5 HRs in the game together, and that shakes the pitcher up, allowing other guys to get in on the action. Obviously, the flaw is just what happened. If everyone is cold, everyone stays cold. The Yankees won all year with fast guys on base. Steals. Doubles. And defense. That lineup in Detroit was none of those things.
I'm not sure what you're trying to say here. The players stunk in Detroit, no question, but there was nothing fundamentally flawed about how the team was "built". They had the best team OBP in baseball by .012 points and were .003 points off the MLB lead in team slugging. Who exactly did you want to see more of this series? Bernie who's .332 OBP is by far the lowest of any regular player this year? Melky and his 12 SB's to go along with his decent OBP and poor slugging? The players didn't perform and that's the problem, certainly not that they "rely on the HR" too much or some other nonsense you'll hear to explain why they shit the bed.
And we just don't agree. You solely rely on your stats when you make a determination of success. I look at the intangible side of the game. A guy like Bernie, who throughout his whole career has been a far superior player in the post-season than the regular season, gets my nod in October. A guy like Cabrera who makes a play that Matsui let drop changes a game defensively, and brings you a base-stealing threat to rattle a pitcher from first. All those overinflated stats look really pretty on paper. But like ARod, you can have all the hits in the world when it doesn't count. It's who wins the last game of the year that does.
Wait a minute here. You're using intangibles, yet you give Bernie the nod because he has been a "far superior player" in the postseason? Sounds like you're using stats to me. Point of fact, Bernie has not been far superior in the postseason, he's got a .297/.381/.477 line in the regular season and .277/.373/.483 in the postseason. Of course this rationale also discounts the fact that Bernie is nowhere near the player he was when he was amassing most of those postseason numbers, when he was one of the best in the league. Matsui has also been excellent for the Yankees in the postseason in his career, carrying a .319/.377/.556 line into this season, but I guess that doesn't count. If you honestly think that Bernie and Melky would've made a difference in this series that's fine but just come out and say that it's just your opinion and you have nothing to back it up with, because this cherry picking of stats that are meaningful because they suit your argument and willful ignorance of others because they don't isn't the way to make a point.
they lacked pitching and couldn't manufacture runs, two essentials in the postseason. it has nothing to do with small ball, it has to do with when faced with really good pitching, they crumbled. you can blame it on going cold, but I will applaud the pitching they faced. when you look at this loss and to the Angels last year, they couldn't hit good pitching that was up for the big game. though a lineup with Knoblauch, Brocius, Martinez, O'Neil, a healthy Williams and Jeter seemed to be able to quite regularly. The difference between those type of players and the type of players the Yankees have become dependent on now is night and day, as is the two different results those line ups were able to produce in the postseason.
Knoblauch, Brosius and Tino were all garbage in the postseason, in particular the ALDS. I'm not a Yankee fan so I can't tell you why those teams won where the current Yankee teams lost but if I had to guess it would be their pitching staff is much worse now. People look at the lineup and say it's the problem which is what I take issue with. The lineup doesn't prevent the Yankees from going out and spending 50m more on some starters that don't suck.
The mid 90's Yankee teams were hungry, gritty, had heart, and trusted each other. the current Yankees lack all of those attributes. That's what it all boils down too. It's not the stats, its not the lineup, its the attitude of the players and coaches. If you want to see a baseball team that has young, hungry, gritty, hear filled players who believe in each other and trust one another to pick each other up when things don't go their way... you need to go to Queens.
Actually, yeah, guys like ARod do prevent the Yankees from purchasing high-quality starters. As much as the Yankees spend, it's not like they are playing with the US Treasury to pay out salaries. They're losing money. They have a lot to spend, but not enough to justify all those bats, and top-notch pitching. As for why I discount stats, it's not because stats are garbage. It's about timely hits. I don't care if a guy goes 1-4 in a playoff game, if that one hit is a 2-run double that ties the game in the 8th. We won post-season games over the past decade with timely hits. Scott Broscius. Bernie Williams. Ruben Sierra. Jimmy Leyritz. And who can forget Aaron Boone? That is what wins titles. All that statistical crap is fine for you to talk about in terms of a guy's overall ability. However, as ARod has so graciously pointed out this year, stats don't mean squat.
Joe announced that he and George talked, and they mutually decided he will be returning in 2007. MisterMoss broke the news a little while ago.
Steinbrenner fired himself, but then spoke with folks in Tampa and decided to re-hire himself as owner....
You don't see the difference in the regular season and a short series where managers use their full bullpen to match up on hitters in every game? A team goes into a one week slump during the regular season and then they go out and face 4 or 5 crappy teams in a row with no pitching and get healthy. How many pitchers did Willy use in game 5 against the Dodgers? How many would he have used in game 123 of the regular season?
That's a very good way of putting it. Nice job winston. Can I hire you to translate what I write from now on?
