Later today, the Yankees will begin their American League Division Series standoff against the Minnesota Twins, who won a 12-inning playoff last night, and expectations are high:
This Yankee team looks as if it could surely survive gnats and rally monkeys and other road ambushes and beat any National League team that showed up near the end of the month. Could. Maybe even should.
By virtue of their 103 victories, the most in the majors, they have raised the specter of the old days, when they used to win the World Series in early October or late October.
Mostly because of the cable television loot that enabled the front office to bring in Mark Teixeira and C. C. Sabathia and A. J. Burnett, this could very well be the best Yankee team since the old gang broke up after the 2001 season. The best defense. The most versatile.
Yankee fans have reason to have high expectations as the postseason begins Wednesday night against the Twins at the new Yankee Stadium.
The vaguely quizzical yet perhaps also slightly horrified look on Derek Jeter’s face Tuesday suggested that he did not want to deal with the high expectations stemming from a special season.
“We’re hot,” Jeter announced to reporters, his mocking tone suggesting he was being overly dramatic. Then he got real. “We’re in the playoffs. It’s a short series, anything is possible.”
Jeter and Manager Joe Girardi and the rest know enough not to be giddy. Jeter and Girardi go back to 1996, when the Yankees began a run of winning four of five World Series. They played for Joe Torre, who after a few years of experience would solemnly remind people that in a best-of-five opening series, things can go bad in a hurry. One bad inning and the whole season is suddenly in jeopardy, in Yankeeland, where only championships count.
This sense of entitlement used to be personified by George Steinbrenner, but Yankee fans — heck, even neutral blokes like me — have long since internalized their Inner Boss. With all this money, these guys ought to win another World Series one of these years, but specifically this one.
They have not won a title since 2000, because of flaws in the lineup, more technical flaws than character flaws, but flaws nonetheless. The Boss is 79 and does not come around much.
Win one for the Boss? Win one for ourselves, Jeter said with his winning smile that softens all sarcasm.
“We’ve done a lot of great things,” Jeter said. “We hope we can continue.”
And alot of that will depend on a pitching rotation worth nearly a quarter billion dollars:
Since taking a three-games-to-none lead over Boston in the 2004 American League Championship Series, the Yankees are 4-13 in the postseason. In 17 games, their starters are 2-9 with a 6.30 E.R.A., allowing about 11 hits per nine innings. That is Paulino territory, or worse.
The Yankees hope to go deeper this October, mostly because of a fortified rotation that includes C. C. Sabathia in Game 1 and A. J. Burnett in Game 2 on Friday. The Yankees invested $243.5 million in those pitchers last winter, and the postseason laboratory proved it was necessary.
All of the starters who contributed to the Yankees’ recent October misery are gone, except for Andy Pettitte, whose Game 2 start in Cleveland in 2007 was the best in that grisly stretch. The Yankees did not even reach the playoffs last year, and it was clear they would act aggressively to stock the rotation.
On paper, the Yankees should handle the Twins easily. But, as I’ve said before, anything can happen in a five game series.
Go Yankees !
