Hal Steinbrenner all but surrendering to Dodgers marks official end of Yankees era

Aaron Judge Press Conference
Aaron Judge Press Conference | Dustin Satloff/GettyImages

The New York Yankees will always be among the game's premier franchises, as well as the club with the strongest legacy of success. But they will never again be the class of baseball, as long as the Dodgers continue as scheduled and Hal Steinbrenner remains in charge in New York.

This is a reality that most fans came to terms with years ago, but for any still lingering on the fence, it was cemented in stone with Steinbrenner's comments Tuesday.

In conversation with the YES Network — owned and operated by the Yankees, and ostensibly in place to make the franchise look better, not worse — Steinbrenner bemoaned the Dodgers' financial might, an advantage once owned (and nearly invented?) by his predecessor father. The elder Steinbrenner made plenty of mistakes (and his impatience was legendary), but at least he didn't allow one error to compound and stop him from taking additional chances.

His son's perspective on LA stealing his team's thunder? "It's difficult for most of us owners to be able to do the kinds of things they're doing." One year after Brian Cashman claimed the Yankees wanted to be the "mecca of baseball" during the Yoshinobu Yamamoto pursuit. Seems like somebody else has that covered now. Thanks.

Yankees' Hal Steinbrenner admits he and other owners can't match Dodgers

No, the Dodgers did not "break" Steinbrenner; he's always been like this. If you're just waking up to that reality now, then welcome to the party.

It's not like the Yankees don't spend, and there are certainly plenty of MLB franchises that are far less competitive in the market. But Steinbrenner should be aligned with the league's behemoths in the Dodgers and Mets, willing to pay any tax if it marginally improves their chances of taking home a title. Instead, he's seemingly aligned with the Reds, Guardians and Rays, scoffing at the $14 million it took to land Kirby Yates after the rest of baseball ignored him and valued him far lower.

As for the "relatively injury free" season that Steinbrenner knows will be a challenge for his Yankees? That didn't seem to slow down the Dodgers much last year when they blitzed past New York in the World Series with most of their rotation gone. As Don Draper famously said, "That's what the money is for."

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