THE STEWDIO: Big Apple Teams Still Rich, Rotten

I can go to MLB.com and buy a World Series ring for three grand, plus shipping and handling.

George Steinbrenner can’t, and neither can Mets owner Fred Wilpon—not unless they want hardware that says “Red Sox” on it.

Instead, the owners of the two New York baseball teams have recklessly wasted hundreds of millions of dollars in their failed attempts since the 2000 Subway Series to assemble champions of their own.

The absurd spending has continued in both boroughs this offseason. Interestingly, the teams seem to be moving in opposite directions. While the Mets have acquired Pedro Martinez and Carlos Beltran to add to a competent core of veterans and top prospects, the Yankees are slowly but surely becoming a team of overpaid has-beens. The Mets could be the best team in New York in as little as two years.

The last four years have been equally painful for the two clubs, but in very different ways. The Yankees have felt the pain so common to their Boston counterparts: the agony of coming tantalizingly close to glory but ultimately failing. If the ghost of Babe Ruth has haunted Fenway Park these past 86 years, then the ghosts of Luis Gonzalez, David Eckstein, Josh Beckett and Johnny Damon should find plenty of cozy resting places in cavernous Yankee Stadium.

The Mets, on the other hand, have endured Cubs-like misery, fielding expensive, pathetic teams for four consecutive seasons. They have averaged just 73.5 wins per year since their last World Series berth, despite a mammoth payroll that consistently ranks near the top of the league.

The ghosts that haunt Shea Stadium do not emerge from opponents of Octobers past, but rather from brash investments that didn’t exactly work out. If you listen carefully and try to block out the din of airplanes flying overhead from LaGuardia Airport, you can make out the whispers of Mo Vaughn, Roberto Alomar, Shawn Estes, Pedro Astacio and Jeromy Burnitz, laughing as they count their money.

The fatal flaw of former Mets GM Steve Phillips was his refusal to rebuild, his stubborn belief that the team would contend and reach greatness with one or two added pieces. He didn’t grasp the concept that baseball isn’t like the NBA, where two superstars can turn any last-place team into championship material. Baseball teams can’t be fixed so easily. Successful teams build from the ground up and then fill in the pieces.

Of the most highly coveted free agents in recent memory, virtually no one has led a bad team to success. Rather, players like Alex Rodriguez kept a bad Rangers team bad while threatening to drive Tom Hicks to bankruptcy. Miguel Tejada and Javy Lopez signed huge deals last winter, but only improved Baltimore’s win total by seven.

Among the top-notch free agents, the successful acquisitions always seem to occur when the star is a piece of the puzzle instead of being the entire puzzle. Manny Ramirez and Vladimir Guerrero, for example, both made playoff-caliber teams even better.

Unlike the Mets, the Yankees were correct in viewing themselves as contenders, and can hence be excused for trying to sign the one supposed missing piece each time someone came along. Unfortunately for the Yankees, not all of their moves turned out as expected. Jason Giambi provided less bang-for-the-buck in 2004 than almost anyone else in baseball. Kevin Brown, meanwhile, earned nearly $16 million but had an ERA over four, made just 22 starts, and got torched by the Red Sox in the ALCS, recording just 10 outs combined in his two starts.

The problem with the Yankees is that as the holdovers from the 1996 title squad grow older or leave, the team is slowly turning into a horde of clean-shaven, arrogant, greedy, faceless mercenaries. Red Sox fans claim that there’s no joy in rooting for the Yankees, and perhaps they have a point.

Boston has a group of self-proclaimed “idiots” like Johnny Damon and Kevin Millar. The Yankees, on the other hand, have idiots in the literal sense of the word, guys like the immature Brown, who broke his hand punching a wall this September, and the overpaid A-Rod, who picked a fight with Jason Varitek on July 24 that ignited the long-dormant Red Sox to a sizzling second half of the season.

The Yankees, admittedly, have made the playoffs an astonishing ten consecutive seasons, and the run probably will not end in the next year or two. Still, the original core from the mid-nineties is nearly gone, and the Yankees don’t have any farm system to speak of. Derek Jeter and Jorge Posada will be productive in the Bronx for at least a few more seasons, but guys like Bernie Williams and even Mariano Rivera are losing value as they age.

As if the Yankees didn’t have enough expensive, aging stars, they finally succeeded this past week in acquiring Randy Johnson, who will be one of the top five pitchers in the AL but will earn a whopping $48 million from New York. Johnson will be 44 years old by the time his contract ends.

While the Johnson signing makes sense in the short run, the Yankees made an awful move this winter in giving starting pitcher Jaret Wright $21 million over three years. Wright has had two shoulder operations, failed his first physical with the Yankees, and has a career ERA of 5.09. His above-average 2004 showing can be explained by luck and by the fact that he played for the Braves, long famous for getting the most out of their pitchers. Wright’s spot in the rotation would have been perfect for a promising young pitcher, if the Yankees had any such pitchers to speak of.

Over in Queens, it looks like the Mets may actually emerge as the best team in New York by as early as 2006. The Mets are finally spending money on first-tier talent instead of washed-up injury risks, and greatly improved their team by signing Pedro Martinez and the five-tooled Carlos Beltran. If top prospects like David Wright and Jose Reyes develop quickly, the Mets will be dangerous.

Kris Benson, meanwhile, established himself this winter as one of the most overpaid pitchers in recent memory, but the Mets can be excused one mishap. Benson is about as average as pitchers can be, sporting a career record of 47-53 and an ERA of 4.28, slightly better than the NL average of 4.41 over that span. He didn’t deserve $22.5 million, but will still help the club.

Omar Minaya, the new Mets GM, deserves credit for a successful offseason.

He is also owed some major props from Red Sox Nation.

Minaya helps the Red Sox regardless of who his employer is. This winter, in signing Martinez, he kept the ace from following the frustrating paths of Roger Clemens and Wade Boggs, star Sox who wound up in pinstripes.

In signing Beltran, Minaya kept the Yankees from filling their center-field hole with perhaps the most complete player in the game.

And last winter, as the Expos GM, Minaya dealt Javier Vazquez to the Yankees, depleting their farm system and giving New York the pitcher who would surrender both of Johnny Damon’s bombs in the decisive game seven of the ALCS.

On behalf of Red Sox fans everywhere: Thanks Omar!

—Staff writer Stewart H. Hauser can be reached at hauser@fas.harvard.edu