The Yanks won without them, and then they get on board and the Yanks lost. I don’t think it was all their faults. One could argue that the money they were paying Arod could be better spent on 3 other players to fill other holes (Bench/Bullpen). (Especially after he opted out, and not as much when the Rangers were paying part of his salary).

I hated Clemens before he was a Yankee and his winning certainly made me warm up to him, but the team kept winning. He joined a winning team.

ARod was supposed to make a winning team unstoppable. It is a lot of hype and pressure.

ARod had some great moments as a Yankee and winning cures a lot. Even though I warmed to Clemens, part of me always thought he was a jerk. The Piazza bat incident? I feel the same way about ARod too. Even if he were the clean home run record holder, part of me will always think that he is a bit of a jerk off the field.

Not all of our sports stars are going to be model citizens like Jeter, but especially in a town like NY where the media reports on what you had for breakfast, perhaps we learn too much about these guys? Ty Cobb was a bastard, but I am sure back then, the fans just wanted to see him hit the ball.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/20/sports/baseball/remembering-the-mets-first-spring-in-1962.html?_r=2&ref=baseball&pagewanted=all

[23] Good point about the Lightning-Rod attracting all of the blame.

The one thing I will say is that in those REALLY bad playoff years (back end of ’04, all of ’05 and ’06) A-Rod seemed to take a lot of slings and arrows for the rest of the team. Matsui hit .200 in that Anaheim series, Sheffield hit .083 vs Detroit. And yet we never seemed to hear too much about that.

Catfish Hunter was a piece of shit as a Yankee as well in the playoffs. He was paid to the MAN. But I guess that doesn’t count either because you were just a kid then. Don’t ever want to hear you say anything nice about Catfish though. LOL

It’s why the late 90s Yanks were so easy to root for and why I’m enjoying the Linsanity Knicks so much. A lot of people aren’t recognizing that a big part of this winning string is because the Knicks have been really energized on the defensive end of the floor. Getting stops allows you to go on runs. Going on runs gets everyone, team, fans, coaches excited and into it.

Melo is going to fit with Lin fine on offense. The problem is that any team with Melo and Amare on the floor is going to have a porous D. Personally, I’d like to see the Knicks find someone to take Amare off their hands ASAP. I’m not so sure about his health now and going forward anyway.

Posada wasn’t paid to be the MAN. I don’t have an issue with Posada, plus he did hit that double against Pedro in 2003. Even though that was the shortest double ever. LOVED THAT!!!!

I don’t care about MVPs, I’m glad those are hanging right below ARod’s centaur paintings.

Then again, Mickey Mantle was garbage in several WS too. Let’s not even talk about your boy Posada, a horrible post season player, cause I know you are talking about big guys.

So, Dave Winfield’s Yankee career to you was horseshit?

Interesting about LeBron. We’ll have more on that later in the week when I post my interview with Scott Raab.

I guess we have a different view on what equates to success in the playoffs, because I don’t see the stats you see with ARod prior to 2009. There is that one ALDS against the Twins in 2004 that inflated his numbers, but other than that, I don’t see it (prior to 2009) since he’s joined the Yankees.

What players did prior to joining the team I root for is only slightly important.

I agree with you that Beltran wasn’t treated fairly, should a lot of that anger be re-directed to David Wright instead? I think so. He had an awful series against the Cards, Beltran was really good. I feel you there, that’s not rational.

I don’t think ARod has been treated unfairly in NYC.

Melo hasn’t played a full year for the Knicks yet. The guy won a national championship in college, he was great for the Olympics team, he took the Nuggets to the Western Conference Finals. He’s not a career loser. I’m still willing to give him some slack. Maybe he doesn’t work out. But I don’t see Amare doing much better and he skates.

And I don’t think Beltran was treated fairly. And it’s all because he took that final strike in ’06.

Let’s examine Lebron, Lebron was talking about multiple championships when he went to Miami, but if he fails to deliver on even one championship, or ONLY gets one championship, then why is it wrong for fans to look at his overall career in Miami as a failure? I think that’s fair.

Sports is big money clouded by a lot of irrational behavior, and I do agree with you that there’s a big part of a fan-base where rational arguments never enter into their stratosphere. However, when people expect BIG things from their superstars, who used their talents as leverage to play for a specific team. Then yes, fans start to set really high expectations.

Case in point: see Eli Manning. He got a ton of grief for orchestrating the trade to the NY Giants, but right now he’s delivered. Melo wanted to come here, he better be ready for the shit-storm coming his way if the Knicks all of a sudden stop winning.

If they can’t even do the work they were hired to do, then people do become critical of their work because of the high expectations associated to the title they hold.

Why should the rule be different for ARod or any other big superstar? I’m not against Melo, but I think if after a while the team does better when he’s not on the floor then how can’t we make conclusion that he IS the problem, he’s getting paid big dollas, but he ain’t making any cents (sense) when he’s on the court.

to me, ny has a ton of diehard basketball fans that appreciate the nba moreso than just the knicks. i think that is why there has been so many memorable msg games when a visiting star went off.

Watching vs the Hornets and Nets, he’s got so much to learn, but a really good base to work from. Hoping for the best…