Having the biggest budget in baseball makes life easier for a GM, but it doesn’t guarantee anything. The Yankees have had the highest payroll in baseball from 1999 through present, but didn’t win a World Series from 2001 through 2008 — the years when the Yankees really broke from the pack in terms of team salary. What happens, though, if the Yankees start to better allocate their vast resources?
In his column today, Bob Klapisch notes that the Yankees are setting themselves up to maximally use their resources for prolonged success.
In fact, there are enough baseball executives who think the Bombers are set to run off another mini-dynasty. They have the AL’s most talented roster, they have a $200 million payroll and, most importantly, they’re being run more efficiently than at any time in the last 20 years.
“I think Brian [Cashman] has learned a lot about running a team,” said one rival executive. “He’s made some mistakes, but if you go around and ask people what they think of the Yankees, the answer you’ll get is that they’re intelligently run.”
Yankees fans would surely be happy if the Yankees entered another dynasty period, but what about fans of other teams? Phil Birnbaum opines that while there’s evidence that it won’t damage the sport — he cites soccer’s Premier League, which features a small number of teams spending far more than their competitors — that there are certain fans who would turn away from the sport if the Yankees continue to make the playoffs, while the Royals and Pirates continue to toil in mediocrity.
Bonus from the Klapisch column: “[Girardi] cleared out the anti-ARod residue he’d inherited from Torre, Mike Mussina and Jason Giambi…” Hm. I can see Mussina being an anti-A-Rod guy, but Giambi? Sounds a bit odd, considering what we always heard about the guy.