TAMPA — Since 1996, Joe Girardi’s first season as a Yankee and also the first year the team held camp here in George Steinbrenner’s backyard, the Yankees have reported to spring training with the knowledge that they had qualified for the prior postseason.
Or, in two instances (2009 and 2014), they showed up with a revamped roster after sitting out the previous October.
“And now they’re walking in …,” Joe Girardi continued and then trailed off, seeing where I was headed with the question.
Now they’re walking in having missed the playoffs two straight seasons. Now they’re walking in with a lesser résumé.
Have the Yankees lost their mojo after a pair of disappointing campaigns?
“I think there’s always, when you have veterans that have won before, there’s always a quiet confidence that comes with that,” Mark Teixeira said Sunday at Steinbrenner Field, “whereas young teams, it can work both ways. Young teams just don’t know any better and go out and play great, or, they’ve never learned how to win over a long season and so they fade at the end.
“Overall, I think veteran teams do have an advantage there.”
The Yankees still employ plenty of veterans, even as they begin their maiden voyage with the Core Four wholly retired. Their problem now lies in how many of their veterans seem to be approaching the 18th hole of their respective careers. Teixeira, Carlos Beltran and CC Sabathia all registered terrible 2014 seasons, and all are under contract through 2016, with Sabathia possessing an easily attainable vesting option for 2017. Alex Rodriguez returns after serving a yearlong suspension in 2014, and he looked near the end during his brief 2013 stint.
As we all witnessed last year during Derek Jeter’s painful farewell, there’s little merit in having an acclaimed, accomplished player if he just can’t perform anymore. Well, there’s plenty of merit on the ticket-sales side. Not so much on the field.
Just A-Rod, Sabathia, Teixeira and Brett Gardner remain from the Yankees club that got swept by the Tigers in the 2012 American League Championship Series, setting in motion the current drought. There no longer exists a shared sense of accomplishment throughout the clubhouse. Even though the post-2000 Yankees gained notoriety for their frequent postseason slip-ups, they nevertheless managed to complete the regular-season marathon successfully and showed up the subsequent spring knowing they hadn’t missed a parade by much.
Gone, along with that, is the buzz that annually accompanied this team — more so here at spring training recently than in the corporate environment of new Yankee Stadium. On Sunday, only one player received any sort of crowd recognition, as A-Rod got loud cheers for each round of batting practice.
Girardi said he wouldn’t worry about any of this.
“I still think you understand the expectations when you come here,” the manager said.
“Every team is new. Every year is new,” Teixeira said. “No matter what team you’re on, that’s your expectation. And so we have enough new guys in there that they don’t look at, ‘We didn’t make the playoffs two years in a row.’ They look at, ‘I want to make the playoffs.’ That’s the way every team should think.”
It’s not as though players are running away from the Yankees. Chase Headley came aboard last July, getting traded from San Diego, and he enjoyed his brief time so much that the Yankees became his first choice as a free agent. Andrew Miller turned down more money from the Astros to sign a four-year, $36 million contract with the Yankees. Max Scherzer surely would have taken the Yankees seriously, had they displayed any serious inclination to sign him.
In order for the Yankees to prevent their postseason-free streak from extending to a third straight season, they’ll need a miracle potion of some kind to keep Michael Pineda, Sabathia and Masahiro Tanaka all relatively healthy to lead their starting rotation that didn’t get upgraded, plus receive better contributions from Beltran, Brian McCann, Rodriguez and Teixeira.
Can any of this tie back into clubhouse culture and confidence? I think a little can. Success begets more success. It’s on the Yankees to create new mojo after two injury-plagued, underperformance-heavy seasons that felt anything but magical.