Season Preview

Season Preview: New York Yankees

The New York Yankees are going into the 2012 season with a lot of the same pieces that they had last year. Their offseason acquisitions focused mainly on getting better starting pitching than they had last year. They signed Hiroki Kuroda from the Los Angeles Dodgers. Also they traded for a young right hander in Michael Pineda. The most surprising free agent signing was of course Andy Pettitte, who came out of retirement to try and help the Yankees win their 28^th World Championship. After adding those three pitchers they have traded A.J. Burnett to the Pirates and lost Bartolo Colon in free agency to the Oakland Athletics. There was only one real move to help improve the lineup and that was signing Raul Ibanez. He is a lefty hitter who will mainly face righty pitchers.

Weakness: Age and injury

The Yankees have a lot of money tied up with players that are older. Everyone in the infield is over 30 years old (Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriquez, and Mark Teixeira) except for second baseman Robinson Cano. In the outfield Curtis Granderson and Nick Swisher are also over 30 years old. For the pitching staff there are two guys over the age of 35 Freddy Garcia and newcomer Hiroki Kuroda. That is somewhat of a concern because historically as guys get older more nagging injuries will affect their career. And the injury bug has already hit the Yankees rotation with Michael Pineda going on the 15 day disabled list with a shoulder injury. This won’t hurt them right away because of all the arms they have in the rotation, but it is something to keep an eye one when you look at the future of this ball club.

Strengths: Pitching and Experience

The Yankees are going into this season with better starting pitching and a better bullpen than they have had in years. You can start with ace CC Sabathia who has been anchoring this rotation for the past three years. He is a pitcher that you know what you are going to get; he throws 200 plus innings and is capable of winning 20 games a year. He also is great for the younger players to learn from because of his knowledge of how to pitch. Also in the rotation for the second year in a row would be Ivan Nova and Freddy Garcia. Nova won 16 games last year as a rookie and he hopes to avoid a sophomore slump. Garcia is a wily old veteran who knows how to pitch. Hiroki Kuroda will be making his debut for the Yankees this year and it will be interesting to see how the 3.45 career ERA will translate to the AL East. Phil Hughes is also going to be in the rotation and I think that will be the weak spot for the Yankees because he has lost a lot of velocity and the one year he was a starter his ERA was over 4.00.

When you look at the real strength of this team it may lie in the bullpen. You can start with the best closer of all time Mariano Rivera. With Rivera you know what you are going to get no matter how old he is. When the Enter Sandman song comes on more times than not the game is over. Before you get to Rivera the Yankees may have the best 8^th inning guy in the league in David Robertson. After his first All-Star year and having an ERA of 1.08 he is a guy that the Yankees hope can continue his success in 2012. And finally the next big arm in the bullpen would be Rafael Soriano, who was supposed to be the Yankees 8^th inning guy until Robertson flourished under that role. Soriano had an off year last year but he has the stuff to make this bullpen the best in the majors.

The Yankees are a team that has experience of winning championships all over their roster. The captain Derek Jeter is a five time World Champion and so is Mariano Rivera. They have the ability to help the other players young and old on how to win in New York. They have been through it all and that is something many teams do not have. Also their manager has won the World Series as a player and as a coach so he knows what it takes to get the job done and the type of players you need to win another World Series.

X-Factor: Mark Teixeira

Mark Teixeira is a player that can make the Yankees get to the next step if he steps up his at the plate. He is a guy who is capable of hitting forty home runs and driving in well over 100 runs. But the problem with him is that his average has gone down every year that he has been with the Yankees. Almost all teams put a shift on when he steps up to the plate and he continues to hit right into the teeth of it. If he could start to spread the ball around the field more this will help the Yankees be a better team. He is now batting in the fifth spot in the lineup so he is going to have plenty of chances to drive in runs with the guys who hit in front of him. His homerun total might go down but if he could get his average back up to .285 or higher it will greatly improve an already powerful lineup. Also what he brings on the defensive side is remarkable. Since I’ve been watching baseball I have not seen a first basemen make as many spectacular plays look so easy.

Prediction:

I think that the New York Yankees are going to have a lot of competition like always in the American League East. You have Boston who is always going to be a contender with the lineup they have. The Rays are a great young team that have a rotation with experience and live arms. And when you look at the Blue Jays and Orioles they continue to get better every year and are always capable of pulling off a surprise season. Having said all that I still think the Yankees can win the division for the second year in a row because of how improved the rotation looks. But the battle between Boston, Tampa Bay, and New York is going to be something special to watch and I can’t wait for the season to get started.

Greatest Game

Takeem Hedgman is the greatest high school football player I have ever seen. Ever since we were in fifth grade the town was talking about his skill on the football field. He was a legend locally even before he stepped through the doors of Monticello High School for the first time. The news papers would have headlines like, “Takeem the Dream”, “Keem’s Team”, and “Sonic the Hedgehog” for how fast he was. He had speed, quickness, and agility like no one else I had ever seen and people in the community were noticing.

At the start of his high school career he was the starter and he never relinquished that role until he left as a senior. He never missed a game for any reason. But there was always one question about a great player that everyone loves to talk about and debate, and that is; Can he win a Championship?

Up until his senior season that had not come true yet. So Takeem went out to prove to everyone that he could win it all. He had a mentality I had never seen before. During his senior year there would be games where he scored 6 touchdowns and have 300 yards at halftime, and he wouldn’t play the rest of the game. He set the all-time Virginia record for touchdowns in a season with 51 and had over 3,000 yards for the year.

But all of those statistics didn’t mean anything if he never got a ring.

It was an ice cold Friday night in December. The first round of the Virginia high school playoffs were going on and Monticello was losing by 21-17 with 2:32 left on the clock. It had been a hardnosed game all night back and forth. They had the ball at their own 20 yard line and had to drive 80 yards to win the game. At a time like this you usually see teams airing it out and trying to throw down field as much as possible to try and score. But not this team, not with Takeem.

The first play was a hand off to Takeem and he made one cut up field, ran the safety over, and ran for a 30 yard gain. The home crowd went insane, the sideline was jumping up and down getting ready for what we all knew was coming next. Now with the clock running they pitched the ball to him twice and both plays go nowhere. Third and twelve with the ball around midfield and 1:20 remaining on the clock. What do you do? Hand off up the middle and Takeem made the best play in one single run that I had seen. He was jump cutting, spinning, and carrying defenders down field. He got all the way to the two yard line. The field was shaking from everyone screaming and cheering in the stands and on the field. Next play, touchdown. Monticello eventually won the game and went on easily to win the State Championship behind their leader at running back.

It was the first time I have ever seen a team that was willing to stick to the run regardless of what the clock said. With the season on the line Takeem put on a show and it is something that I will never forget as long as I live.