WFAN host eviscerates Yankees' roster construction, makes harsh judgment on 2023
It is very understandable to be frustrated with both the 2023 Yankees' plan and their performance, as we approach the end of April. The offense feels half-baked. The pitching additions -- Carlos Rodón this offseason, Frankie Montas last deadline -- are both non-participatory. They're treading water in the season's first month, as many thought they might, but it's been a slog to watch, even if we saw it coming.
But they are not, as WFAN's Brandon Tierney called them, the worst Yankees team this century. That's also, for obvious reasons, an extremely silly statement to make; the "worst Yankees team this century" is still a pretty good baseball team, considering the Yankees haven't finished under .500 this century.
Tierney knew that when he began his rant (hopefully), so he used grandiose language to make a point shared by many currently-dissatisfied fans.
Still, it's a wild assertion to make about a team that just won its first four series of the season and didn't lose a set until their sixth.
Do the 2023 Yankees have the worst roster of the century?
They're the third Yankees team in 20 years to win their first four series, for what it's worth. The worst! Of the century!
Worst Yankees team against the Twins since 2001? That dishonor has already been clinched, unfortunately. Worst Yankees roster this century? It's hard to give that award to anything other than the 2013 or 2014 team, with a distinct edge to 2013.
At least they tried prior to '14, importing Masahiro Tanaka, Jacoby Ellsbury, Brian McCann and Carlos Beltrán. Pretty foolish splurge and that team was relying on a cadre of No. 4 starters, but when everyone was healthy, that team eventually formed the nucleus of the (very dull) playoff team that followed the next season. Don't get us wrong. Tanaka missed time. They were still bad. But were they 2013 bad?
That team lived in the shadow of the Boston Red Sox' 97-win masterpiece season, capped with a World Series win. Maybe Tierney was blinded by some of the names on the marquee of the 2013 team, but rest assured, anyone who watched them was not impressed by Travis Hafner, Vernon Wells and Lyle Overbay.
OK, fine, Overbay was kind of good.
David Adams. Zoilo Almonte. Brennan Boesch. Reid Brignac. Chris Nelson. Ben Francisco.
We could go on.
Let the 2013 Yankees be a lesson to you for many reasons here. They weren't good, at all, and couldn't hit a lick, but ... they started the season hot. They probably had people like Tierney defending Brian Cashman's veteran maneuvering after he managed to paper over injuries to Curtis Granderson and Mark Teixeira with several "savvy" signings of over-the-hill Tired Guys. Somehow, this awful team began the year 30-18 before everything fell apart. They had all the "vibes" the 2023 Yankees do not, yet they ended up producing next to nothing in the months that followed; Joe Girardi somehow turned Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera's swan song into an 85-77 record.
You don't have to have faith in this current team, but you have to have more patience than a New York sports radio host. All we ask.