Dude wrote: "In 1996-2000, it wasn't just that they had great chemistry (which they did), they didn't have nearly as much offensive talent so they were forced to play true October baseball."
Hmm. How much less offensive talent did they really have during that 5-year stretch?
In 2006, the Yankees scored 930 runs.
In the World Series Championship year of 1998, they scored 965.
From 1996-200, they averaged 899.6 runs / year. Compared against the 2006 juggernauts, that's a difference of 30.4 runs, or .19 runs / game.
And this difference in offensive talent (am I measuring it wrong?) is meant to be enough to explain the problem with the 2006 Yankees? At this point, I'm even willing to let go of the far more ridiculous assertion: that the problem is that they had too much talent.
Side note: in the 1998 World Series, the only series for which I currently have the energy to make the following calculations, the Yankees also scored 15 out of 26 of their runs on HRs. Or 54%. Or a percent that would have led MLB any of the years for which I've been able to find data. And yes, you should ignore those numbers because the sample size is tiny.
Labels: bill simmons, yankees
