The Way It Was, And The Way It Should Still Be: Change
By Matt Mirro
There will come a day when we find it hard to recognize the New York Yankees or the team we commonly associate with the Yankees. Some of the younger fans like myself probably can’t remember New York without him in the center of everything. A few years back, we couldn’t recognize Yankee Stadium’s center field without Benrie Williams out there or the catcher spot without Jorge Posada or the 9th inning without Mariano Rivera. Changing faces may be the most common trend that no one ever talks about. Legends retire, players move on, our favorite players no longer put on their uniform. In a sport that lives in a constant fear of change, that part of the game will never escape us.
Right now, we’re finding it hard to image the Yankees, to imagine baseball, without Derek Jeter. Yes, I know how weird it’ll be but that’s baseball. It reminds us of our mortality and how even the immortals are, like you and me, mortal. Thirty years for now will we find baseball odd without Jeter? Sadly no. We’ll truly see baseball for the state it is in at that time. It’s hard to imagine that, as we sit in the blue seats, tip our caps, close our eyes and shed tears for our departing captain. Soon baseball will adjust just as it always does.
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Paul O’Neill is gone. Tino Martinez is as well. Joe Torre is in the Hall of Fame. Jorge Posada has hung up his spikes. Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera called it quits last season. Derek Jeter is the last standing pillar in the glorious monument that was once the Yankees’ 1990s dynasty. We all know that after this season, that pillar will be gone thus cementing the dynasty’s place in history, ending the final chapter of some of the greatest teams in the history of baseball. Yeah, I know. You’re feeling old. Every player on the Yankees’ championship rosters is retired. The teams you rooted for. The teams you cheered and cried with every step of the way. When Jeter goes, so do the old memories. It’s a tearful thought. Baseball and it’s personnel are totally different then they were back in those days. Where Jeter once stood now stands Mike Trout. The amount of young talent rising through the Chicago Cubs’ system is an eery echo to the Yankees’
Mandatory Credit: Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports
system from which Jeter, Bernie, Posada, Pettitte and Rivera rose from. The likes of Javier Baez, Starlin Castro, Jorge Soler and eventually Chris Bryant look to be the making of a dynasty in the Second City. The face of relief pitching is no longer the great Mariano Rivera or Trevor Hoffman but instead Craig Kimbrel, Greg Holland, David Robertson and Kenley Jansen. Catching belongs to Buster Posey, Yadier Molina, Evan Gattis and Salvador Perez while the mound is ruled by Clayton Kershaw, Felix Hernandez, Adam Wainwright and David Price who carved their niche by being just as dominant as their predecessors like that of Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez and Greg Maddux. Power hitting has shifted from Bonds, McGwire, Sosa and Canseco to Miguel Cabrera, Jose Abreu, Giancarlo Stanton, Nelson Cruz and Jose Bautista. It is a whole new ballgame.
As I said asked before, will we miss Jeter as much 30 years down the road? Will we mourn his departure as much as we do now? 30 years for now the future of baseball aren’t born yet. The stars of the future are waiting in the wings to be the next great players. Young center fielders will idolize Trout just as shortstops revere Jeter. They’ll wear his number “27” like current students of the Yankee captain wear “2”. Yeah, it’s sad to see Jeter go. He’ll close the book on one of the longest runs of success in history and memories will become that and that only… memories.
But next year when Jeter is no longer in pinstripes will the grass on the field no longer be green? Will the dirt and clay of the infield not cake into the cleats of Jeter’s heir to the shortstop thrown? Will the bases no longer be white and the Yankees uniform no longer bare pinstripes? Will the ball not make the same “crack” when it hits the bat? Baseball is an ageless sport that has a special magic that causes us to think time stands still. When we see the changing of the guard we get unnerved, scared, we start to feel old and maybe begin to realize that time has passed by far too quick. But the game remains the same and on and on the story goes even when the legends leave the field and walk into the ether. Play ball!