Alex Rodriguez is a better baseball player than Scott Brosius
Loved the feedback to yesterday's item. A-Rod is a lightning rod, and we live in a free country where we're allowed to disagree.
Now, that said, I have to blow up two arguments made, in particular, by the A-Rod bashers:
1) "We won three World Series with Scott Brosius, so we can win without A-Rod."
Well, sure, the Yankees did win three titles with Brosius (pictured here in his Linfield College garb). But let's do some amateur statistical analysis:
Yankees Team ERAs
1998: 3.82
1999: 4.13
2000: 4.76
2001: 4.02
(Brosius left after '01, and A-Rod arrived in '04)
2004: 4.69
2005: 4.52
2006: 4.41
2007: 4.49
Notice any trends? Granted, that '00 season was insane; remember, those Yankees won just 87 games and still managed, somehow, to win it all. But otherwise, the Yankees didn't win three straight because they didn't have a superstar third baseman. I feel safe in saying that, if A-Rod were the Yankees' third baseman from '98 through '01, and Brosius from '04 to '07, the pinstriped title count still would've been 3-0, in favor of the earlier era.
2) "A-Rod is a loser because he never played in a World Series."
Puh-leeze. The Yankees wouldn't have sniffed October in 2005 or this year, especially, without MVP seasons from A-Rod. As discussed here, before, yes, he played well below his potential in postseason action from 2004 ALCS Game 5 through this past year, but so have many other Yankees in that time period.
A few other things:
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Comments (7)
It would not bother me at all to see Joe and Donnie go to the Dodgers. I wish them the very best of luck there and am happy for both of them!
Is there any friction between Posada and Girardi? After all, Posada took over the starters job in 1998 and pushed Girardi slowly out the door as a player?
If there is friction between Posada and Girardi, won't this spill over to Rivera also?
RMT, you rabble-rouser, Rivera met with the Yankees today, and it sounds like it was a very amicable meeting. So I don't see any problem there. Check our site for more details.
Are the rumors ture Girardi is looking to add Paul O'Neill to the Yankees coaching staff? I would love for Paulie to be back in the organization in some capacity.
Ken - even better than the "We won with Brosius" argument is "How many World Series did A-Rod win with the Yankees?"
The answer is the same number that as Jeter has won since 2000 - three extra years! - and nobody's running him out of town. And the same as Mattingly, who has ALWAYS escaped the Yankee fan "you gotta win the World Series or you're a loser" tag.
Good times to be an anti-Yankee fan!
Jeff, as you'll see in our coverage, the coaching staff is Rob Thomson (bench), Kevin Long (hitting), Dave Eiland (pitching), Mike Harkey (bullpen), Tony Pena (first base) and Bobby Meacham (third base). If O'Neill really wanted to coach, the Yankees would probably want him to start as a special assignment instructor and see how that worked out.
A-Rod did not play 3b as well as Brosius, Nettles, Robinson or Boyer. Any questions? A-Rod is a better hitter than all the above combined.