Yankees Joe Girardi and the hobgoblins of little minds

The Yankees Season Starts in October

First, Girardi manages differently between the first four months of baseball and the last two.

Four months is a long time, even in baseball years. Joe’s smart enough to know that the team that leaves camp is going to position the Yankees for the last two months, a quasi-second season before the playoffs.

He has to get every ounce of talent out of the group that Cashman gives him in any hopes of getting more at the trade deadline. So, those first months Joe almost gives to the players as a tryout.

Jeter always said the regular season is the pre-season; I think Joe shares a somewhat similar outlook.

Sometimes, like last year, the team plays poorly enough that the Yankees become sellers. Since that is a possible outcome, Girardi might be stuck with certain under performing or injury-prone players for 162 games. It makes managerial sense for him to give these players every chance to be successful and defend them in the press.

But this year, and more often than not, the team declared itself worthy of upgrades. At the end of that fourth month, important new impact players were added and drags on the team banished; see Tyler Clippard.

And once this new team was formed, Girardi as usual began to manage it differently. In August, and even more so in September, feelings start taking a back seat to performance. And just as students start heading back to school, Girardi starts cracking the books.