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| Friday, January 19 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| New York Yankees Special to ESPN.com | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
What went right? Jorge Posada became the superstar analysts expected him to be. Bernie Williams and Derek Jeter stayed healthy enough to buttress the offense against the team's declining corner players. The front three starting pitchers made 93 starts, with only Orlando Hernandez missing a little time due to injuries. Doc Gooden saved his career with good work in a mop-up/long-relief role. And the Yanks could do no wrong in the playoffs, yet again. What went wrong? David Cone's ERA doubled to nearly 7.00. Expected fifth starter Ed Yarnall hurt his back, had a lousy camp, and was shipped to Cincinnati for Denny Neagle, who gave up 16 homers in 91.1 innings as a Yankee. The back of the bullpen was terrible again. Chuck Knoblauch's throwing problems didn't go away, and his offense took a step down to boot (pun intended). And the Yanks got very little offense from their infield and outfield corners. In retrospect, the critical decisions were: 1. Letting Joe Girardi walk. With Girardi finally gone, taking his suitcase full of chemistry and veteran leadership with him, Jorge Posada got his full-time job, posting a .944 OPS (third among AL catchers with at least 100 PA) in 151 games. The move also saved the Yankees about $3 million in 2000. 2. Trading for David Justice and Glenallen Hill in July and August. Justice hit .305/.391/.585 in 78 games as a Yankee, which paled in comparison to Hill's performance. Hill hit 16 homers in 40 games, slugging .735 in 132 at-bats in Pinstripes. Not all the Yankees' stretch moves worked out (Neagle, Jose Canseco), but these paid off several times over. 3. Giving David Cone 29 starts. Had the Yankees moved to replace Cone sooner with any of their internal options (Yarnall, Ted Lilly, even Gooden), they could have saved themselves the tight September race and near-collapse they faced at season's end. Looking ahead to 2001 Three key questions 1. Can this team win again without addressing the five holes in its lineup? See "A Closer Look" for more. 2. Who fills out the back of the pitching staff? The fifth starter role is open with no clear favorite in the race. Jeff Nelson's departure leaves a hole in the bullpen on the right side, and while Jason Grimsley wasn't very good, he did provide innings that must be replaced. 3. Who plays second? If Knoblauch hasn't solved his throwing problem, can Joe Torre continue running him out there? Will D'Angelo Jimenez get his chance? Or will Torre infuriate Yankee fans everywhere by putting Luis Sojo out there again?
If El Duque's elbow is sound, he's the only good bet to improve in 2001. Rookies Ted Lilly and Randy Keisler could make an impact, but neither was impressive in his September callup. Can expect to play worse Paul O'Neill hit uncharacteristically well against lefties last year, which won't continue. He's also at an age where a falloff is very likely. Tino and Brosius might not get worse, but they won't get better. Projected lineup 2B Chuck Knoblauch SS Derek Jeter RF Paul O'Neill CF Bernie Williams DH David Justice C Jorge Posada 1B Tino Martinez LF Shane Spencer / Henry Rodriguez 3B Scott Brosius Rotation Roger Clemens Mike Mussina Orlando Hernandez Andy Pettitte Adrian Hernandez / Randy Keisler / Ramiro Mendoza Closer Mariano Rivera A closer look There's no single formula for postseason success. Some teams make it there primarily on offense, some on pitching, some on a wing and a prayer. But rarely do teams reach or win the World Series with gaping holes in their games, like a horrendous pitching rotation or a lineup full of automatic outs. Yet that's exactly what the Yankees will try to do in 2001. Despite the presence of at least two and as many as five major holes in their lineup, the Yankees decided to spend their millions upgrading the fourth slot in their rotation instead of fixing the problems they had scoring runs in 2000. Here's the Yankees' projected lineup for 2001, with each player's 2000 OPS and the league average OPS for that position in 2000:
C SS 2B CF 3B RF LF 1BThe typical team gets most of its offense from the right half (the last four positions, or five if you include the designated hitter). Since players with good bats but lousy gloves will move to the right over the course of their careers, most teams find their best bats concentrated on the right side of the spectrum. This, in turn, is why guys like Ivan and Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter and Jorge Posada are so valuable: They allow a team the relatively rare luxury of a solid bat on the left side of the spectrum, so the team can have a leg up on teams that get the bulk of their offense from the positions in the right half ? unless, of course, the team in question doesn't get the expected production from the players on the corners. The Yankees are one of the best examples of such a team in years. Here's the OPS rank within the lineup of each of the team's eight position players (omitting David Justice, who will be a full-time DH in 2001): C SS 2B CF 3B RF LF 1B 2 3 6 1 8 5 4 7And it's not as if the players on the right only look bad by comparison to the superstars on the left. Scott Brosius had the worst OPS of any full-time AL infielder. Tino Martinez finished ahead of just one player -- Ron Coomer, who was non-tendered by the Twins in December. (He found employment with the Cubs, who specialize in aging mediocrities.) Paul O'Neill only managed to beat out Matt Stairs, who hit .227, and Jose Guillen, who didn't have enough at-bats to qualify but nearly beat out O'Neill at .750. Shane Spencer, the star of this group (and, ironically, the lowest-paid by about $5 million), didn't play enough to qualify last year, but his big improvement to .790 would have only put him ahead of Troy O'Leary and Jacque Jones, who can at least play center field. What's worse is that O'Neill, Tino, and Brosius are all well into their 30s and thus are in the dropoff zone, where hitting performances can go off the cliff at any moment. (Some would argue Tino's and Brosius' already have.) So the right half of the Yankees' offense is bad, but is it historically bad? How have past World Series winners stacked up offensively in this regard? And, most importantly, how did they fare in the years after? We looked at the last 20 World Series winners to see how their four corner hitters performed at the plate during the regular season, and the Yankees do not fare well by this comparison either.
| ALSO SEE Yankees minor-league report Klapisch: Chinks in the Yankee armor ESPN.com's Hot Stove Heaters | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
If the Yankees get to the postseason because of their great four-man staff and closer, they'll be favored to win. But getting there is the question mark. Tino Martinez had a dramatic dropoff in production last year. Once you get into your 30s you're allowed to have one bad year, but if you have two in a row the handwriting goes on the wall and the big contracts are gone. With Derek Jeter, Bernie Williams and Paul O'Neill batting in front of him, there will be a lot of guys on base. Tino's RBI total should be much higher than it was last season. He was the heart of the offense in 1997 when he hit 44 home runs but he's been in steady decline ever since.