Yankees Have No Room For Kevin Youkilis

Before Yankee fans get bent out of shape about an article that slams the Yanks (this
is more realism, however, than anything), it is important to note that it is fully known
that New York won the World Series in 2009 and reached the American League
Championship Series this past season and makes the playoffs every year. However…

This is more about how the team is built. The average age of the Yanks is 35.6. The
third baseman is out 4-6 months and is due $114 million over the next five years NOT
including incentives. Right field is weak. There is no one to play catcher. All they do is
hit home runs. And the pitching staff, which includes two up and down guys (Ivan Nova
and Phil Hughes) and a 40-year old Andy Pettitte, is still a monster question mark long
term. Oh, and when does CC Sabathia break down and Huroki Kuroda underachieve?

Ah the Yanks. Blessed with more money than baseball Gods can create. Now they have
offered Kevin Youkilis (puke in mouth now) a one-year deal for $12 million dollars to
replace A-Rod for the time being. Yep, $12 million. Isn’t Wade Boggs around instead?

I understand the national media’s perspective on New York and Yankee haters’ opinions.
They are old and slow when they lose but gritty, tough and patient when they win. But
right now, it is more of the former. And it’s not even close.

See this is the same old Yankees. They haven’t groomed a farm arm since the previously
mentioned Pettitte. They keep going back to the free agent well where old, crusty has-
beens await a big contract to finish out their career and sit back to enjoy retirement. And
those players know they will get it, because the Yankees overpay and cannot build a team
anymore. This is the pinstripe system now, and Hank and Hal seem to be ok with it.

Remember Gene Michael? Remember how he wouldn’t trade Bernie Williams or Derek
Jeter or Mariano Rivera or Andy Pettitte? Remember how the team was built around
core farm system players and then the right pieces through the free agent market and big
dollars? It isn’t this way anymore. Yet the rest of baseball is doing it that way. The
Giants, for example, are doing it that way and won the World Series with free agents and
trades built around a farm system pitching staff and National League MVP Buster Posey.

The Yankees may win a World Series here and there, but they aren’t setting themselves
up for runs like the Cardinals or Giants (or even teams who haven’t won like the Nats).
The Yanks won it all in 2009 with A-Rod carrying them and Sabathia pitching and
Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsusi grinding out at-bats, which is great news in the
Bronx. But it isn’t the Giants’ run in 2010 and 2012 or the Cardinals’ run since 2006.

Those are TEAMS. The Yanks are an old, has-been, overpaid, broken down collection.

And in that collection there is certainly no place for Kevin Youkilis.