Is the Era of Yankee Ascendancy Over?

Yesterday was the last game of a disappointing 2013 season. It was a 5-1 victory over the worst team in baseball, the hapless Houston Astros, coming after a long 14 innings.

I say the word disappointing because, in a word, that's what it was. We Yankee fans that have been around since the end of the Yankees' Lost Decade of the 1980's have been pretty spoiled. 16 playoff appearances, 14 division titles, 7 pennants and 5 World Series championships from 1995-2012 will do that to a club's fanbase. The lone year in that time span which the Yankees did not make the playoffs, 2008, was a rather glaring outlier, a freakish fluke that seemed to be the result of a cosmic catastrophe that broke the natural orbit of the MLB solar system. We expect the Yankees to win- if not a World Series every year (because that's too high an expectation for anyone, even The Boss), we at least expect the Yankees to make the playoffs- to give us some baseball in the cool airs of Autumn. It's easy to miss how fortunate we as fans are to have such an expectation. Consider the Kansas City Royals, who have not made the playoffs for 27 years.

The Kansas City Royals have not been to the playoffs since 1985.

Nonetheless, 2013 was not without drama for the Yankees. Our beloved Closer, a living legend, Mariano Rivera, decided to call it quits. He received quite the sendoff by everyone all year. The drama was ratcheted up when Andy Pettite, another beloved cornerstone of the latest era of Yankee dominance, announced toward the end of the season that he'd be retiring for good once 2013 ended. In many ways, this year was more about the legacy of Mariano Rivera (and toward the very end, Andy Pettite), than about the team itself- plagued by injuries and free agency losses as it was. It was a depressing ensemble- an unimpressive assortment of no-name rookies and over-the-hill veterans without legacies of their own- the backups for the backups, as we all waited with baited breath for the mainstays to return.

Mariano Rivera overshadowed the rest of the team, unsurprisingly.

With all the dismal, aging stars pumping out their faint red light, and the rookies that had not quite left their stellar nurseries yet, it was obviously a no-brainer that Mariano Rivera and Andy Pettite would receive the most attention- and both went out in the best possible way, with Rivera being relieved by his fellow remaining Core Four members and Pettite pitching a complete game for the first time since 2006 in his final start against his old team, the Houston Astros. In doing so he is the only pitcher to never have a sub .500 season after 15 years in the big leagues, a big accomplishment that under normal circumstances would at least merit serious Hall of Fame discussion (we all know the reason why Pettite doesn't fall under normal circumstances).

But the season is over now. Pettite and Rivera are officially in the history books. There will be no more gifts on the road and momentous ceremonies. Two of the biggest stars in the Yankee galaxy exploded as supernovae in their final year, and their light outshined the rest of their galaxy. But now that the fleeting glow has passed, what is left of the team?

Andy Pettite pitched a complete game in his final start. (Bleacher Report)

When the mainstays of the team did finally return, they didn't seem to lift our spirits. Curtis Granderson was injured again, and when he did finally come back in the second half, his numbers were not what we would have liked. Mark Teixeira was injured, came back for a week or two, and was then injured again, for the rest of the season. Derek Jeter's year has been an odyssey of DL stints. Alex Rodriguez came back (mostly) fine, but no one cared because of the Biogenesis scandal. He was not the light of hope for this team. Ultimately it was Alfonso Soriano's re-entrance into Yankeeland that was the turning point of the second-half slump, but it was not a big enough turning point to prevent the Fates from keeping the Yankees out of the playoffs for only the second time since 1995.

Upon a survey of Yankeeland at this point, there seems to be a lot of uneven ground. The farm system is not regarded as amongst the best in the Majors. No breathtaking prospects seem to await us. In addition to that, there are plenty of free agents, among them some of the mainstays of the team. Robinson Cano is the biggest albatross of them all. He is perhaps the only reason why the Yankees' lineup managed to claw on as much as it did before the reinforcement of Alfonso Soriano. Rumors have been swirling that he wants a 10-year, $300+ million deal. Personally, I think the Yankees and other teams should have learned the lesson of these massive 10-year deals by now. They have tended to be disasters in the long run. Cano may have had something going for him if he was five years younger. But he isn't. As good as he is, Cano isn't worth that price. The specter of uncertainty will certainly loom large as the off-season progresses.

Granderson is also up for free agency, whose bat has been so productive except for this injury-plagued year. Phil Hughes and Joba Chamberlain are also up for free agency, both of whom have been extremely disappointing (my dad calls Hughes 'Pughs' and my nickname for Joba recently has become 'Jobber'- a wrestling term that means someone that generally loses to make another wrestler look good). It is blissfully unlikely that they will return. Adding to the uncertainty in the rotation, Hiroki Kuroda, who has for the most part been the Yankees' best starting pitcher, is also up for free agency. Nova, who has been the Yankees' best pitcher in the stretch, is a free agent too. Only CC Sabathia, who is coming off the worst season in his career, and thus does not bring much in the way of optimism, is dead set to return to the starting rotation.

 

Mainstays like Granderson and Sabathia were ultimately disappointing.

The skipper himself, Joe Girardi, who truly showed his mettle as a manager in this challenging year, and brought home a world championship in 2009, is also up. Though his decision will more likely be based on family than on money, the specter of uncertainty still looms.

Those are the big ones. Many others are also free agents.

Faint times seem to be written on the wall for the Yankees, which leads back to the original question. Are Rivera and Pettite's exits a sign of the times? Are the Fates turning the pendulum back? Is the era of Yankee ascendancy that began in 1995 over? Or will 2013 become another 2008- a glaring outlier that ultimately becomes erased by further years of continued success?

How the Yankees management handles itself this off-season will go some way to answering those questions. This is the biggest shakeup of the team that I can remember, and it will be up to them to make sure that a winning concoction is brewed. Both the lineup and the pitching needs some serious work, perhaps too serious to be surmounted in a single season.

The next adventures in Yankeeland promise to be at the least suspenseful. Whether they can be as glorious as the Core Four years remains to be seen. It will be a tall order, but such is how champions are made.

We can at this point, only hope for the right decisions. The shadows of playoff-less teams like the Royals however, are always present. Until 1995 (probably '94 if the season hadn't ended early), the Yankees were firmly in it. The right decisions need to be made- and decisively, lest the shadows embrace the Yankees with a warm whisper:

"Welcome back."

Robinson Cano, the off-season albatross. (Image by Keith Allison)