New York Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner wasn’t too fond of team captain Aaron Judge’s recent remarks about the 27-time champions needing to go “all in” on their roster.
Speaking to the media this week, Steinbrenner said that he spoke to Judge about those comments and stated that he feels the organization went all-in last year. He pointed out that the Yankees had their highest payroll ever this past season and believes that the team’s inability to win the World Series doesn’t mean they didn’t try as best they could.
“I did not listen to the entire interview… was I upset about it? No,” Steinbrenner said. “If I was a player, I would have expectations that my ownership group would do everything in their power every offseason to win a championship. We did that this year. We had the highest payroll in the history of the organization. I definitely think we went all-in this season – we had a team that was every bit capable of winning a championship. No, it did not work out.
“I have expectations of my players. I expect them to obey the rules, work hard, listen to their coaches, trainers, strength guys. Expectations are a good thing.”
Not good enough?
Yankees fans weren’t satisfied with that answer from Steinbrenner though. Many feel that it’s not about how much money the team spends, but who they spend it on and if it’s being well spent:
“Highest payroll in organization history with the worst lineup in organization history. Make that make sense…” one user remarked on X.
“He don’t get it man,” wrote another. “We don’t care how much we spend we care that you spend it well. We’d rather see you pay a CF $10M that does something instead of $22M for Grisham.”
“Does the highest payroll in this history of the organization equate to allocating your money correctly? A lot of wasted money on Grisham and McMahon that could of been better allocated,” a third wrote.
Jim McIsaac/Getty Images.
The Yankees’ longest-ever drought without winning a World Series was 20 years – all the way back from 1903 to 1922. Lou Gehrig hadn’t even joined the team yet and the NFL had only been around for one year.
The current drought is the second-longest in team history at 17 years. Fans are desperate to see that drought end soon. Preferably next year.
