Questions in the Bronx; Can the Yankees Do It In 09?

By Alex Rivero 2/25/2009

With the ending of each baseball season since 2001, it becomes more and more apparent that the New York Yankees, once winners of four World Series championships in a five-year span, are well into a new era defined by something other than the timeless characteristics that propelled them to their success in the late nineties – mainly an unselfish desperation to win and a generous dash of good fortune. The team’s lackluster performance late in the 2008 season, together with crippling injuries, overall inconsistencies throughout the year in both the pitching and hitting departments, and the rise of a more competitive American League Eastern division, proved to be too much for the Bombers to handle in the final year of what is now called “the old” Yankee Stadium.  

If the black-and-white mentality towards winning and losing during the Torre years has served any purpose since the team’s demise in the finale of the 2001 Series, it has been to provide a stark model of comparison to what many believe the team has progressively become – a group of overpaid ninnies far more obsessed with personal issues than the pure, selfless style of play that, for over a decade, was picturesquely manifested in the sole utterance of the word “Yankee.” 

Now, in 2009, fresh off the only season in the last thirteen years where the team failed to earn a spot in the postseason, some of the same question marks that have haunted the Yankee faithful during previous spring training camps continue to linger menacingly: With the addition of another offensive superstar in Mark Teixeira, will this be the season that the Yankees finally put up booming offensive numbers with runners in scoring position? Will Mariano Rivera continue to be the rock of the late innings at 40, or will the Panamanian’s near bulletproof pitching repertoire succumb to the heightened pressures of a beefed up AL East? Will Derek Jeter – who turns 35 in late June – still be able to confidently lead his teammates with his quiet bravado, his glove, and (italics) his bat, or is 2009 the beginning of the team captain’s looming decline?   

And then there’s the Riddler himself, Alex Rodriguez. In what has been building up to be the most unpredictable first at-bat of his career after a ridiculously active and public offseason that included a nasty divorce from wife Cynthia, forays with 50-year-old Madonna, and revelations of being called “A-Fraud,” the fragile superstar will have to face the pressure and prove himself after he dug himself even deeper in admitting performance enhancing drug-use as a member of the Texas Rangers in 2003. What perhaps should have been a spring training of optimism for the hungry Yankees with some key additions to the roster has now morphed into a scavenger hunt for dirty facts and an eager anticipation, not for C.C. Sabathia’s first start as a Yankee, but for the crowd’s reaction to Rodriguez’s official first 2009 at-bat in Baltimore’s Camden Yards.   

All this in a season where it appears that the Yankees will need A-Rod’s unmatched offensive potential to be a consistent force for 162 games. 

What makes the A-Rod saga so intriguing to so many people – aside from the fact that, for better or for worse, he is a Yankee for good -- is the fact that the man had dedicated his entire life and professional career to serving as a darling, a model for the baseball community, for young fans to emulate, and for older fans to admire as an example. He has always been hailed as the player that will eventually top both leagues in most major offensive categories, including home runs, for all time. His signing after the 2003 season was welcomed euphorically, but a string of unsuccessful postseason series, highlighted by his own horrible performances in each of them, has soured his diplomatic status in the South Bronx. Now, in what can only be seen as a watermelon chunk on top of an already messy sundae in the steroid problem, Rodriguez will have to scrub his name clean by flawlessly excelling in the area where he has failed most miserably in the past – when it matters most.   

This, of course, begs yet another question; can Alex do it?