Raf, great quote. Post that in the water cooler area. it’s a great topic to get the day started on.

Stolen from Netshrine

This post, courtesy of Lee and edited by me

“Let’s not even get into the “character” of those 1970s Yankees teams. That was as bad a set of characters you could find in a clubhouse, which followed another bad set of characters in the Oakland clubhouses where (Catfish) Hunter pitched. So, if Hunter stands for anything “character-wise”, it’s for the fact that character is meaningless when it comes to winning baseball games.

It was just as meaningless to the 1970s A’s and 1970s Yankees as it was the pure myth of the 1990s Yankees being good characters, when that clubhouse was filled with the likes of David “Masturbating” Cone, Chuck “Cancer in the Clubhouse” Knoblauch, Paul “5 Year Olds Are More Mature” O’Neill, David “Too Many Things To Say About Him” Wells, Roger “Most Hated Man In NY” Clemens, Jeff Nelson, Karim Garcia, Darryl “Cocaine” Strawberry, Dwight “Cocaine” Gooden and the rest of those bad characters that the NY media wants to falsely claim are a bunch of good guys. And how appropriate it was that the statutory rape crowd was adequately represented by Luis Polonia’s presence on the 2000 WS Champions.

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Based on the poll results I guess you’re Cashman-hating ways don’t make you not a fan, Steve. You can still continual to call yourself a Yankee-land Zealot.

No, you don’t have to root for every player on the team. By no means. Some players are good guys, some players are bad guys, most are pretty good guys most of the time. There are probably a lot of pretty good guys that did PED’s, so are they good guys in general, bad guys because they cheated; is it mitagated if they started to “keep up with the Joneses”? I don’t know, myself…

Well, let’s take a hard case…let’s take Mike Mussina…

On the one hand…

1) Mussina was aloof.
2) Mussina was arrogant, especially to the media.
3) Mussina wouldn’t defend his teammates by throwing at the opposition when opposing pitchers threw at Yankees’ hitters. The classic case was the game in 2003 where Pedro knocked Soriano and Jeter out of the game in the 1st inning, and Mussina did nothing.
4) Mussina was a straight down the line lockstep MLBPA guy.
5) Mussina was so finicky, the slightest perturbation in his routine would give him conniptions, and it cost the Yanks several times, including some big games.
6) Mussina was no great shakes in the postseason, especially when he lost some stuff late in his career.
7) There were RUMORS, based on a “blind” item in a Peter Gammons column in the 1990’s that Mussina was/is racist/xenophobic. (In an article about John Rocker’s comments about the NY Subways, there is this Gammons quote, which, by process of elimination, seems to point to Mussina:

“What Rocker said was unforgivable. But the fact is, every team has heard similar diatribes those from small towns across America have about New York City. One of the game’s best pitchers, a sophisticated, intellectual graduate of one of the world’s finest universities, has splattered teammates with similar comments and boasts that he will never play without a no-trade clause to the two New York teams.”)

On the other hand:

1) Mussina may not have been aloof; only reticent or shy, or just wished to avoid the media spotlight. That’s not really a bad thing.
2) Some of the media deserve nothing less than arrogance, as arrogant as they are sometimes, especially when they go off on one of their moral crusades. His answers were honest, not cliched.
3) Early in his career, 1993 in fact, Mussina got seriously injured when, after retaliating by throwing at a hitter, the hitter charged the mound. He decided then not to throw at hitters anymore, on the theory that getting hurt in a fight was bad for his career, and just as importanly, bad for the team, because he was the ace of the staff.
(“He once was once accused of drilling a batter on purpose, Seattle catcher Bill Hasselman, who’d had the audacity to hit a home run in a previous at-bat…Both sides were ready when the drilling took place, and it was an ugly scene — with Mussina ending up at the bottom of a pile, from which he emerged with a shoulder injury that would eventually put him on the disabled list for six weeks.”)

Oh…about that Soriano-Jeter double knockout game? The Yanks won it…and Mussina didn’t retaliate, didn’t get ejected, and threw 8 innings of 2-hit ball with 9 K’s for a no-decision in the 2-1 win.

4) He owed his huge fortune to the union, and he knew it, and showed his loyalty.
5) His routine and preparation served him well for 18 seasons. There couldn’t have been two many hissy-fit losses.
6) He was fine in the postseason while he still had his stuff; in the postseason, you’re usually facing very tough lineups. So, when his stuff was diminished at the end, is it really a flaw that he struggled to throw 6 or 7 good innings? In addition, he threw the best performance in his career rescuing the Yanks with multiple innings of superb relief in game 7 of the ALCS of 2003, setting the stage for the miracle comeback that ended with Boone’s HR.
7) An allegation which is nowhere near substantiated. So why bring it up? Because our IMAGE of these players is colored and our opinion of them formed by what we read about them, and what we read may or may be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

In addition, on Mussina’s side:

1) No scandals of significance. A few dubious excuses perhaps, but no scandals.
2) He’s well-liked in his hometown, and does not play the big shot, if news reports can be believed on that score.
3) He was the one who was usually called on to match up with Pedro when Pedro was PEDRO!!, and he was frequently able to fight to a draw the best pitcher we’ve seen over a 5-year span since at least Koufax. In the 4 years the two were on the Yankees/Red Sox he won the head-to-head in the regular season. (7 starts vs. Pedro, 3-2, 2 ND; 54 IP, 32 H, 12 R, 10 ER, 11 BB, 59 K, 2 HR, ERA 1.67, 0.80 WHIP…Think about that stat line for awhile, and the lineup it was compiled against at that time…)
4) He fought as hard as he could, and adapted to his loss of stuff, and did not collapse after his dismal 2007 season, and came back strong in his final year.
5) He left the game on his own terms, on top, after his 1st and only 20-win season.
6) And, if we can trust any player on this issue, it seems he did it all without ever violating the rules about using PEDs.
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Anyway, didn’t mean to write a book, but I say, with all things considered, I rather like Mussina. Personally, would he like me? Doubtful. I doubt he’d even want to know me.That doesn’t matter. Fans form attachments/dislikes for the most idiosynchratic of reasons.

For me, Mike Mussina was always the thinking man’s pitcher. He had superb stuff and command when started. But he worked hard at his craft, mastered many pitches, outthought and outfought his opponents most of the time, was durable, reliable, consistent and frequently brilliant.

Mike Mussina is OK with me. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled by the endorsement.

But i dont see the point of bitching about the same player or executive over and over again as if its going to change something.
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There really isn’t a point. Just like there isn’t a point in arguing the merits, or lack thereof of Jeter’s defense, for example.

It’s good to discuss things, as long as they aren’t beaten into the ground.

this is about a-rod, right?

We all love the Yankees, we just choose to support or not support them in different ways. Those ways most likely describe the type of people we are. That’s neither good or bad, and it makes this blog a lot more fun for those reasons.
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Exactly

my comment in the other thread started this, but i just want you all to know i vote no on this question too in a heartbeat. My point wasnt meant to be seen that i am a fan that “follows the team into oblivion” or be a “homer”. But i dont see the point of bitching about the same player or executive over and over again as if its going to change something. Burnett might not be a great signing, but everyone in the world knew the yankees were going to sign 2 pitchers this offseason, and they went ahead and signed the two top available guys. Would you rather them have signed DEREK LOWE for 70 million? or how about sheets who needed another surgery in the meantime? or would you be ok if they stopped at sabathia? What if they traded for santana last year and spent 170 million on LOWE AND BURNETT this offseason?

I find it hard to believe that people would even entertain such an absurd question. But apparently at least 3 people think that to be a Yankee fan means to accept and support unquestioningly all decisions that the Yankees front office makes?

So I guess because I’m not happy with the ticket plan that the Yankees offered me in the new stadium, that must mean I’m not really a Yankees fan?