New York Yankees 2012-2013 Offseason Outlook

[Abe Frohman]

I expect absolutely nothing out of this team for the next few seasons ...

and i'll just leave it at that.

They went all in for 2009 and it paid off. It all came together that year. Alex played like Alex in October, CC was lights out, Mo was Mo, Matsui had his swan song ... and it produced a ring.

Could've been worse. They couldve spent that 450 mil and gotten squat out of it.

Now, we're supposedly caught up between trying to field a " competitive contender " and trying to get under the soft cap.

This team is not a contender. Hasn't been since 2010 ... so im not buying.

Caught in between. Not able to rebuild, and trying to get under this soft cap.

For this team to realistically compete, we would need for either:

A. Players like Tex, Jeter, Ichiro, Youk to all have All star caliber seasons or similar.
Tex 35/115, Jete .320, Ichiro .320, Youk 25/90 and carry that offensive pop
into October.

B. Prospects to step up and produce real numbers, so that they dont have to go out and
sign bullshet players to fill those slots.

Or both.

Seeing as these scenarios are both somewhat unlikely, i expect nothing.

We cant compete with Texas or Detroit. Both those teams will eat us alive in any series, 5 or 7.

Toronto and Anaheim look like they're even better than Texas and Detroit. This is all on paper obviously, but maybe the paper is all she wrote for this team for the foreseeable future.

[d32123]

Gosh some of you are such negative nancies.

The Yankees will be fine this season. They'll probably get about the same amount of wins as last year, and probably win the division. They haven't lost that much offensive production, and I'd venture to say that the pitching will be better.

[Gusto]

The specific player decisions really aren't the main point here. The main point is that this organization seems to be stuck somewhere between going for it all in 2013 and going cheap for 2014.

The team could have supplemented the moves it made in November by bringing in a respectable ML catcher, a true corner outfielder, and a dedicated designated hitter. With a little bit of luck, they could win 93-95 games and hope to avoid Detroit in the playoffs.

It also could have wiped the slate clean, traded Granderson and Hughes for prospects, and gone with some cheap stop-gap players with the goal of fielding a new-look contender in 2015.

If we learned anything in the 2012 playoffs is that you can't just coast into the playoffs on the back of steady veteran pitching and hope that you'll get some lucky hits. Our pitchers will be one year deeper into their decline phases, and our offense is significantly weaker.

The RAB guys seemed to capture the lack of coherency in the team's current strategy.

http://riveraveblues.com/2013/01/the...olicies-81364/

If the Yankees had signed Greinke, Hamilton, Sanchez, Soriano and Martin this off season, nobody would be complaining about Yankee strategy. The fan of every team would be once again crying foul, and ESPN would be having a field day about the Yankees' gluttony. Signing those players would have committed 88M to the 2013 payroll and an additional 300+M to future payrolls. That's what most fans have come to expect, and what many expect now. (they would also have glaring holes at 2B, 3B, OF and DH)

Instead, the Yankees committed 82.5M new money (so far) to their 2013 payroll securing Pettitte, Kuroda, Rivera, Cano, Granderson, Youkilis and Ichiro ... and only 6.5M to future payrolls. I'll take these players and this financial situation over the above, all day long.

Hal said they aren't done and Cashman has stated it will take time (whatever that means exactly), which tells me they have more in the works. It sounds like they have been developing a trade or two for some time. I'll wait to see what that is, before I bash Cashman for passing on the likes of Keppinger, Chavez, Ibanez, Pierzynski, Ross, etc.

I do agree that Hal's no-extension policy contradicts the need to have lower AAVs, but the Yankees are far from failing strategically. Its just not as exciting to watch.

[NerfBall55]

I'm not disagreeing that Napoli is damaged goods, all I'm saying is that even if there is only a 25% chance that he is the player he was in 2011, I don't see why the Yankees wouldn't gamble $5-6 million on it.

Re-signing Pettitte, Ichiro and Kuroda, and bringing in Youkilis would suggest that the team is interested in contending in 2013. At the same time, fielding the worst catching tandem in professional baseball, signing no DH, and assembling an outfield with two light-hitting lefty speedsters and a two-outcome guy with a lead glove suggests that they are content to finish 3rd or 4th.

You throw 5-6 million around like it's not real money.

But the bolded part is what makes it hard to take anything you say seriously, and you do make some good points about players in other posts. There's nothing to show me that there a 2-3 teams in the AL east that are so much better than NY that we should assume a 3rd place finish, let alone 4th place.

Do I feel we've lost some OF production? Sure. but you keep posting under the assumption that this is it. I'd rather have the 5-6M free so we can buy a salary dump at the deadline.

[Abe Frohman]

Gosh some of you are such negative nancies.

The Yankees will be fine this season. They'll probably get about the same amount of wins as last year, and probably win the division. They haven't lost that much offensive production, and I'd venture to say that the pitching will be better.

I'm confident we do not have what it takes to get it done ... to get past any of those teams i mentioned.

Don't tell me we're fielding a competitive team when we are CLEARLY not as good as those other teams in our own League.

Lets not even mention the NL, where there are a bunch of other squads that would run circles around us.

the 90 + wins are nice. Many fans for other franchises would KILL for a 90 win season.

All im saying is they should just stop with the contender talk, all that WS or bust bullshet.

Its all crap. They set themselves and this fanbase up for failure and ultimately disappointment that way.

The players they should spend on they let slide.

Players like Darvish, Cespedes, Chapman. Players that would NEVER EVER fall to this team in any draft, that couldve been had for just money, this organizations biggest strength ... and they stand pat.

They'd rather hand out the money to aging veterans. Its just dumb baseball.

Baseball is not an old mans game. its won with youth and a slight sprinkle of veteran presence.

When you see the penny pincher of all penny pinching organizations ... the damn Oakland A's extensively scout and hand out real money to a Yoenis Cespedes, thats a guy you shouldve signed.

[False1]

You throw 5-6 million around like it's not real money.

But the bolded part is what makes it hard to take anything you say seriously, and you do make some good points about players in other posts. There's nothing to show me that there a 2-3 teams in the AL east that are so much better than NY that we should assume a 3rd place finish, let alone 4th place.

Do I feel we've lost some OF production? Sure. but you keep posting under the assumption that this is it. I'd rather have the 5-6M free so we can buy a salary dump at the deadline.

Agreed in general Nerf, but not necessarily the last piece. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the '13 OF produces offense on par with '12. I think a full year of Gardner (hopefully in CF) will go a long way towards closing the gap between Ichiro and Swisher. Some modest improvement from Granderson and/or continued renaissance of Ichiro and I think it will be comparable or better. One thing we know for sure is -assuming we switch Gardner and Granderson - it's a huge improvement in OF defense and base running.

[ymike673]

Other than at C the Yankees starters are probably equal to last season. But the dropoff in reserves really should be considered. When A Rod, Gardner, Rivera got hurt last season players like Chavez, Ibanez, Soriano, Jones etc took over and the Yankees took the division. If anyone gets injured this season there really are no really strong reserve players on the roster to replace them. I know there is a lot of time untill opening day but it just seems like the Yankees do not want to spend for any players unless they want to sign a 1 year deal.

[The Comic Book Guy]

Agreed in general Nerf, but not necessarily the last piece. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the '13 OF produces offense on par with '12. I think a full year of Gardner (hopefully in CF) will go a long way towards closing the gap between Ichiro and Swisher. Some modest improvement from Granderson and/or continued renaissance of Ichiro and I think it will be comparable or better. One thing we know for sure is -assuming we switch Gardner and Granderson - it's a huge improvement in OF defense and base running.

I tend to agree. Yankee OFers last year combined to hit .247/.323/.453. A full season of Granderson/Gardner/Ichiro gives us better defense and baserunning than what we had last year, and if they hit to (or surpass) their projections, I think our 2013 OF is a good bet to outproduce its 2012 counterpart.

[DaBliz]

Gosh some of you are such negative nancies.

The Yankees will be fine this season. They'll probably get about the same amount of wins as last year, and probably win the division. They haven't lost that much offensive production, and I'd venture to say that the pitching will be better.

Seriously. This team won 95 games with much of the same team. Barring major injuries, this team will win the AL East yet again. It's been how many years and people still don't understand that the playoffs are a crapshoot?

[NerfBall55]

Agreed in general Nerf, but not necessarily the last piece. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the '13 OF produces offense on par with '12. I think a full year of Gardner (hopefully in CF) will go a long way towards closing the gap between Ichiro and Swisher. Some modest improvement from Granderson and/or continued renaissance of Ichiro and I think it will be comparable or better. One thing we know for sure is -assuming we switch Gardner and Granderson - it's a huge improvement in OF defense and base running.

I don't think this is impossible, but I'm erring on the side of caution. We're losing HRs, and I don't like that.

But we agree - saying the team isn't focused on winning, we're not contending, we're in 4th, Toronto's a lock......all ludicrous.

[Mark19]

For those people who, like me, are frustrated by the front office's penny-wise / pound-foolish approach -- I think you'll find this TYA post pretty interesting.

http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/2013/0...d-effect-47408

What the team has really done, is lost Russell Martin, Nick Swisher, Rafael Soriano, and Alex Rodriguez. Adding Kevin Youkilis neutralizes the effect of losing Rodriguez, but how’s the team supposed to make up the nearly 8 wins the other three provided? This is now an 87 win team, and 87 wins hasn’t won the AL East since 2000.


It’s all in the name of the budget, and though I’m not against keeping the payroll down, this current team is far from “championship caliber”. Essentially, the Steinbrenners handed Brian Cashman a mammoth sized Alex Rodriguez contract, and then told him to keep the salary down. Fans should be upset, especially in ownership, but Cashman is still a smart enough GM to deal with it. He wouldn’t have allocated resources to Hiroki Kuroda, Andy Pettitte, Mariano Rivera, Ichiro Suzuki, and Youkilis if he was throwing in the towel.


In all the recent talk about limited payroll, I think there’s a lot more money left than the team is letting on. For instance, there were talks that Justin Upton‘s $8.54 million average annual value couldn’t fit into the current payroll and 2014. Perhaps they’re just purposefully blowing the budget situation out of proportion, in order to make the Diamondbacks lower their asking price.

[CyYoung4Vazquez]

For those people who, like me, are frustrated by the front office's penny-wise / pound-foolish approach -- I think you'll find this TYA post pretty interesting.

http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/2013/0...d-effect-47408

My assumption is this ownership is headed into the season with the current roster. Guessing they're in the race come trade deadline time. That's when things may get interesting. Part of me thinks if it's the wildcard race, they sit tight. But if they're neck and neck with (let's say) Toronto/Tampa, and sit on their hands, fans will not be happy. At all.

[False1]

For those people who, like me, are frustrated by the front office's penny-wise / pound-foolish approach -- I think you'll find this TYA post pretty interesting.

http://www.yankeeanalysts.com/2013/0...d-effect-47408

Full season from Rivera should offset Soriano. Full season from Gardner goes a ways towards offsetting Swisher, and the OF defense and base running will chip away at any remaining offensive production delta. Martin is a loss; I've been a fan and supporter of his since he was being courted by the Yankees but must say it's funny to have observed all the bashing of Martin on the boards this season and now his departure is being heralded as the end of an era.

They are trying to contain payroll and keep the team competitive. I think they've been successful in doing that, and they still have the offseason and in-season to adjust if necessary.

[False1]

I don't think this is impossible, but I'm erring on the side of caution. We're losing HRs, and I don't like that.

But we agree - saying the team isn't focused on winning, we're not contending, we're in 4th, Toronto's a lock......all ludicrous.

You and me both my man. Although that's the minority opinion if last season's posts here were any indication. Let's see how a sharp drop in HR this year plays out.

[JohnnyDamonfan]

You and me both my man. Although that's the minority opinion if last season's posts here were any indication. Let's see how a sharp drop in HR this year plays out.

Haven't we always said we had too many players codependent on the home runs anyway? Maybe it's better for us a little bit if we do have less people hitting home runs. And are more consistent with getting those key hits . It doesn't matter how they score the runs. Just matters that they score the runs. How many times have we seen it that like 2 or 3 were on base and the man at the plate would ground out into a double play or fly out? So, the way I see it if they have less guys trying to get the home run that could help us in the long run.

[ArodEra]

Full season from Rivera should offset Soriano. Full season from Gardner goes a ways towards offsetting Swisher, and the OF defense and base running will chip away at any remaining offensive production delta. Martin is a loss; I've been a fan and supporter of his since he was being courted by the Yankees but must say it's funny to have observed all the bashing of Martin on the boards this season and now his departure is being heralded as the end of an era.

They are trying to contain payroll and keep the team competitive. I think they've been successful in doing that, and they still have the offseason and in-season to adjust if necessary.

For the most part, I agree with your comments that I bolded, though, as much confidence that I have in Mo, we don't know what he's going to give us and let's face it, he'll be a year older to boot. If he doesn't perform to expectations, that would be a huge setback as it pushes up DRob and a host of iffy relievers. I'm hoping Aardsma returns back to form; that would be huge. Always liked him.

My other concern, when comparing last year's team to our current roster, is age. Can we expect Jeter to continue to be on a roll, or will he revert back to the player who appeared to be in decline? Will Ichiro be the player that impressed us for one month (and the playoffs) or the declining, unimpressive player we saw for the other two months, the same below-average player Seattle fans witnessed the last 2 years? And as much as I love Kuroda and his huge cajones, let's face it, he'll be 38 and more familiar to the hitters in the AL. CC wasn't exactly CC of the past. Do we see a resurgence or a continuing decline? And just how much can (or should) we expect from an old Pettitte, a frustrating Hughes and a crapping-out Nova? There doesn't seem to be a plan to add to the staff, even if just for protection purposes, something I can guaranty that we'll need. Perhaps this gets addressed during the season.

In addition, what will the loss of Swisher, Ibanez and Martin (and ARod) mean to a team that was so dependent on the long ball? What can we expect from the DH position? All this makes it all the more difficult to predict how many wins the 2013 team will have based on the 2012 team.

Based on the roster on 1/18/13, if I had to take a wild guess, and play different scenarios in my mind (age, injuries, decline), I'd guess 85-88 wins. Of course, moves between now and then (including in-season) might add to that number.

[False1]

Haven't we always said we had too many players codependent on the home runs anyway? Maybe it's better for us a little bit if we do have less people hitting home runs. And are more consistent with getting those key hits . It doesn't matter how they score the runs. Just matters that they score the runs. How many times have we seen it that like 2 or 3 were on base and the man at the plate would ground out into a double play or fly out? So, the way I see it if they have less guys trying to get the home run that could help us in the long run.

That has been said a lot on these forums, but definitely not be me and I'm certain not by Nerf.

[Jerkface]

It should never be about hitting less home runs, but acquiring hitters who can do more than hit a HR. When the lineup is full of .200/20 guys, you're going to appear to have a HR or bust offense.

.275/20 and suddenly the team is doing a bunch of different things. I'd trade in some of the HRs for more AVG & OBP, but not to the degree that is going on this offseason. They need some real heady bounce back up and down the lineup to compensate for whats happening right now.

As for moves that would have better prepared the yankees for this season & 2014?? How about Darvish & Cespedes. We knew they were beginning to look ahead to 189 when those guys were available. Both were potentially elite talents in their prime who would be signing deals that were 30%-50% discounted from market value. With Darvish they'd have CC & Darvish and the rest of the rotation could be whatever, no need to bring in a super old guy or depend on FA or trades. With Cespedes they could have let Swisher walk with the knowledge that they have a supremely talented RFer in place for 2013 and beyond. Boosts lineup and defense and he is right handed.

They are stuck in a very risk averse position for free agency, which is hurting their game.

[Maynerd]

This team is not a contender. Hasn't been since 2010 ... so im not buying.

Define "contender."

I'd argue that a "contender" is one who contends for something. The 2010, 2011, and 2012 Yankees all went to the playoffs, and therefore contended for the title.

Over those three years, only two teams in all of baseball went to the playoffs all three times. The Yankees were one of them. I'd call them "contenders."

Over those same three years, fully 15 teams (50% of MLB) played in exactly ZERO playoff games. THOSE teams haven't been contenders since 2010. The Yankees most certainly have been.

[NelsonMuntz]

You and me both my man. Although that's the minority opinion if last season's posts here were any indication. Let's see how a sharp drop in HR this year plays out.

Replacing the HR productivity is my biggest concern about this team right now. As bad as Martin looked for a good part of the season last year, he still hit 21 bombs. We won't get anything close to that from Stewart/Cervelli. Same for Ichiro replacing Swisher (5 HR's vs 24 HR's last season). I'll feel better about Gardner if they move him to CF but we're still losing HR productivity by replacing Ibanez (19 HR's) with essentially no one at this point. I can only assume we're going to see a lot of Jeter DH'ing with Nunez at SS to start the season until Alex comes back.

[Jax Teller]

Define "contender."

I'd argue that a "contender" is one who contends for something. The 2010, 2011, and 2012 Yankees all went to the playoffs, and therefore contended for the title.

Over those three years, only two teams in all of baseball went to the playoffs all three times. The Yankees were one of them. I'd call them "contenders."

Over those same three years, fully 15 teams (50% of MLB) played in exactly ZERO playoff games. THOSE teams haven't been contenders since 2010. The Yankees most certainly have been.

Unfortunately on this board, "contender" means favorite for the World Series. Nothing less.

[ArodEra]

I always thought that contender was a word used to describe Sting's wife Trudie.

[pleasepassthesoup]

This team is not a contender. Hasn't been since 2010 ... so im not buying.

You have an odd definition of contender. What were they the last two years, when they won the division and finished with 97 and 95 wins respectively, one of which ended with them getting to the ALCS? Fairly certain that qualifies as a contender...

[flymick24]

The division got a lot more difficult this past winter, and it appears as though they've done nothing to get better from last year, where they barely won the AL east... In fact, as of right now, they're worse off

[jcarey]

The division got a lot more difficult this past winter, and it appears as though they've done nothing to get better from last year, where they barely won the AL east... In fact, as of right now, they're worse off

They barely won the AL East over Baltimore, a team that has not improved since last year in any significant way. In fact, they're due to regress considerably. The most improved teams in the AL East are the ones that finished 4th and 5th last year.

This is like the Tigers fretting about the Indians because they added some decent pieces during the offseason.