Non-Vintage Yankees

Yankee Snuggie on my work desk....

This can't be right.  There's no way this is the start of baseball season.  Opening day is all about Spring and summer being right around the corner...so why is it I'm in a beanie, scarf and have a blanket wrapped around my legs?   

The weather isn't the only thing that's confusing me.  There's also the weird twilight zone that we have entered where the Yankees have been picked to finish last.  That's right.  The club that defines baseball...that has more world championships than anyone...is being picked to finish behind Toronto (wait...they have baseball in Canada?), Tampa (average attendance lower than a Texas park league game), and Baltimore (perennial cellar dweller).  Oh and the Socks, the other glamor franchise of the AL, is picked to compete with the Yankees for that last place finish.    

Does this look like an opening day outfit to you?

Growing up the most predictable thing in the world was the fact that the Yankees were going to get all the best free agents and compete for a championship every year.  So this off season, as I watched the Yankees let fan favorite and solid players Swisher and Martin walk away over a few million...I literally couldn't believe it.  What happened to the evil empire?  The I'll see your 3 million, and raise it 5 more negotiating tactics that had worked so well in the past?  Old Mr. Steinbrenner must be turning in his grave.

So with all this going on, you can imagine that the stadium was going to feel a bit different....but I had no idea it was going to be as dead as it ended up being.  Literally half the seats were empty.  Cheering?  Nope.  Didn't hear much of it.  Sox sucks chants?  Not a one was started all game.  In a league where the Yankees define so much of the baseball chatter, this non-relevance and passion just doesn't feel right. 

Baseball is better with a good Yankees team.  It's just the case.  And as much as I love the SF Giants, and the Dodgers are an interesting storyline, as are those Nats...it's just not the same.  So here's hoping that the Yankees shock everyone and...gulp..play the part of the underdogs (if you can realistically be underdogs with multiple 100 million dollar players on the payroll, even if they are all ancient and crippled) and make a march to the playoffs.

As the ghosts of Yankee stadium are legendary...but Yankee stadium as a ghost town on game day?  That's just not right.

Rivera finishing the save with a K, the one constant in a Yankee season like no other in my lifetime