Steinbrenner envy on the part of the money men. The problem is when you build a team like George does, sticking in aging free agents who have past success but are past their prime, you build a team that can weather a lot of setbacks in a 162-game marathon (which the Yanks are doing this year and did do last year), but lack the youth to run the sprint needed when the playoffs come around. It's good for the regular season ticket sales, but not-so-hot when the less-tired arms and bats come up to get you in October.

How much can making it deep into the playoffs really add to team revenue? They already sell out the most expensive park in the major leagues for every home game, they've got ads on just about every square inch of the park and I swear I heard a commercial the other night for the official parking meter of the Boston Red Sox. I find it a little hard to believe that paying a lot of money for a couple of high priced players can really pay off financially.

David:

It's not so much making it deep that the suits want as dominating the media 365 days a year. Theo has tried to get them to back off so the attention isn't so oppressive.

Agreed that the Sawx should hold onto the kids. Can Dusty P play ss? That would solve their most glaring weakness.

From a fan's standpt it's much better to be rooting for homegrown players. Wasn't the 2004 team just about all mercenaries? Iirc Wakefield was the only homegrown player, as even Tek and Lowe only had a cup of coffee in AAA after being traded to the Sawx as kids.

That was the great thing about the Yankee championship teams of the 90s -- Jeter, Bernie, Posada, Mo et al. Cashman finally seems to have convinced the suits in Yankeeland that youth is the way to go, and they've had two straight great drafts and already have 2 of the top 10 prospects in the game in Hughes and Tabata.

It's also about the ego boost the owners and top suits get for being the owner/general partners of the World's Champion. Baseball folks respect the Atlanta Braves for staying at the top for as long as they have, but in the status-symbol concious world the owners like to inhabit, 13 straight division titles would be considered a failure, because the Braves have won just one Series during that time (though Atlanta's post-season problems have been different from the ones Steinbrenner's team have suffered from in recent years).

Except the Yankees have no youth worth building around, with the possible exception of Hughes and no sensible person builds around high school draftee pitchers.

John:

It doesn't even seem to be about winning but about the attention itself.

Uh huh. Philips is the best pitching prospect in the game, now that Weaver's in the bigs. HS pitchers are a long shot. They cease being a long shot after they've dominated every single level in the minors through AA.

Scout.com, BAmerica, and a number of others have come out with their recent updated prospect lists. Right now the Yanks are stocked in the first 100 level talent.

The Sawx meanwhile have no one in the upper echelon. No one. Granted, that's because they have the 3 young pitchers in the bigs now. But they've got little else.

Hughes is a nice prospect who's as likely to get hurt as ever pitch on a quality Yankee club.

Jacoby Ellsbury will be a better major league player than that Tabata character.

The rest of the good Yankee prospects are teenagers they signed last week.

There's a good bit in Newsday today on the horrific lunchmeat they're dangling:

http://www.newsday.com/sports/printedition/ny-spyinside284832014jul28,0,5162560.story?page=2&coll=ny-sports-print

Please. Every single minor league rating that I've seen has Elsbury ranked below Brett Gardner -- ie a speedy contact hitter with no power who might grow up to be Scott Posednik if he's lucky. No Yankee fan looks on Gardner as anything more, telling that Sawx fans have elevated Elsbury so high -- b/c you've got nothing else.

Meanwhile, the true cream of the Sawx minor leaague system is playing in Miami and hey, looky here, Marte, tho the Sawx only briefly had him, is now in the majors.

With every passing day the Sawx 2006 off-season looks more and more like an absolute disaster.

Coco Chanel and Josh McHomer for all that talent!

And each of those prospects listed in that article is better than anything the Sawx have in AA or AAA right now. 3 have looked decent in the majors already.

The guys the Sox have had go back and forth--Van Buren and Lopez--are better than any pitchers in the Yankees high system. Pedroia is Cano and Moss is Melky. The Yanks have high hopes for Hughes and little else that matters.

Yes, Ellsbury is just another Damon/Crisp, but those are valuable.