Author Archives: Chris Calderon

Five reasons to be optimistic about the 2014 Yankees

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This week Luke and I are going to be posting contrasting articles on the what we have to be positive and negative about for our teams next year. As the resident Yankee fan I’ll be starting us off with five things every Yankee fan should look forward to:

1) A younger pitching staff: Last year the three oldest pitchers in baseball played for the Yankees. Two, possibly three of them will not be returning. That means the Yankees get younger by default. We already saw Ivan Nova take a big step forward this season, if he has really figured something out he could be the number two starter out of spring training.

The team is also rumored to be in hot pursuit of Masahiro Tanaka a right handed Japanese pitcher with the Rakuten Golden Eagles. He could be a solid number three behind CC and Nova, that leaves the four spot for Micheal Pineda, who will finally be ready to contribute to the big league club two years after being traded to the Yankees. That leaves the five hole for Nuno, Phelps and Warren to fight over in spring training.

2) A full year of Soriano: I know this doesn’t sound like something to really get excited about, but he was a reborn player coming to New York. A full season could mean 30 homers 100 RBI with a smattering of stolen bases scattered in there to.

3) Less injuries: Let’s face it, last year was a fluke, even a team comprised of baseball playing Methuselahs like the Yankees can’t have that many weird injuries two years in a row. Now pardon me as I go knock on wood.

4) Girardi is back: While managers in baseball don’t have the on-field impact of say a football or basketball coach, having a good manager matters, and Joe Girardi is a damn good manager. He has the highest winning percentage of any active manager (.566) and after this year we have seen what he is capable of. Having Joe back is a big positive for this team going forward.

5) Resetting the luxury tax: This may sound odd, but I’m hoping the Yankees get under the $189 million dollar budget goal. First off, that’s a lot of money, even if they resign Cano there should still be around 60 – 70 million left in the budget for free agents this year. That’s the payroll of the Astros and Marlins combined; or a better example, more then the entire payroll of The Rays, Athletics, and Pirates. The Yankees should be able to compete with that kind of money being spent.

Once the Yankees get under $189 million for a season they will reset their luxury tax hit from 50% to 15%. If they do it this year it will let them spend heavily on the 2015 free agent class, which has a number of talented players that the team could use to retool and build for the future.

So that’s my top 5 reasons to be optimistic for next season, let me know what you think in the comments. Later this week I will be posting my top 5 reasons for Mets fans to be pessimistic about 2014 so stay tuned!

 

The season is over

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Well folks that’s it. Baseball’s regular season is over and the only two teams that matter missed the playoffs. The game goes on though, we had a game 163, which saw the Rangers get knocked out… again. And now the wild card games begin, one game to decide a season, should be exciting.

For the Mets who had been playing out the string for the past month and a half this season was a success. Sure they missed the post season, but 2014 looks promising with young stars like Matt Harvey, Zach Wheeler and Travis d’Arnaud ready to contribute for a full season.

For the Yankees this season was a travesty, for the second time in almost 20 years the Yankee season ends in September their aging stars suffered far to many injuries. This exposed a weakness in the upper levels of the farm system. The yanks don’t have young talent readily available to call up, all the stars are playing A & AA ball, likely a year or two away from the big show. The biggest hit though, was the end of Mariano Rivera’s career, the man wasn’t just the greatest closer to ever live, he was a great man and will be remember as a legend and I look forward to being able to tell my children I saw him play.