Also,much as I applaud his commitment to player development, can Cashman be forgiven for this horrible bench — for three years now they have skimped on the bench, paying short money for sub-average players. Gardner, the one option who could instantly improve the bench, remains stranded in Pennsylvania.

I think the barometer for a dynamic organization goes further than what moves are made in a relatively weak free agent class, and ability (or inability) to swing a major trade over the off-season. But, again, we’ll agree to disagree, and I certainly don’t think your perspective is a fundamentally invalid one, it’s just one I dispute.

The beauty of baseball is that there aren’t always clear-cut answers to these questions, and you can spend endless time going back-and-forth with very intelligent points. It’s certainly a far more rewarding activity than shouting profanities at each other, or witnessing the sorry excrement show that can be sports radio (to provide one of many examples).

appreciate your well thought out point of view.

ultimately it gets down to how organizations perform to judge those in charge.

you don’t let your main rival win two world championships in four years and react by just adding latroy hawkins if you are a dynamic organization.

i guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.

Kim Ng worked beneath Cashman for many years, and–while she’s now in L.A.–she’s always one of the names floated for an open General Manager’s position. In a male-dominated industry such as baseball, I think that speaks volumes.

I’ll admit the Yankees don’t seemingly have very many hot-shot rising stars in the organization. That doesn’t speak to a person’s qualifications or talents, however. I know more than a few top-flight professors up in the northeast who lack a national profile, but are highly qualified and very good at what they do; just because they’re not household names, does not mean they’re not as successful as those who are.

Brian Cashman also leans rather heavily on Stick Michael, and I’m *sure* Michael is never afraid to speak his mind to Cashman. As a matter of fact, rumor has it Michael was one of the loud voices on the other side of the Santana table. What more can you ask for from advisors, or people outside of the GM position? Someone is ultimately responsible for making decisions, and after a decision was made, the entire Yankees organization stood by it. That’s smart business, and the right thing to do.

As for a personality who would stand up to Cashman or the Steinbrenners who is on the coaching staff, I see Joe Girardi, who was Cashman’s own choice for General Manager.

At the end of the day, judging the internal decision-making process of an organization, and trying to conclude who “stands up to Cashman” and who doesn’t, cannot be done using media reports, or seeing how they conduct themselves in public interviews. We don’t normally know who falls on what side of organizational debates, and a good organization will never make that information public, nor will that organization leak information after a decision has been made in order to undermine previous decisions.

We just need to look cross-town, at Queens, to see what kind of results that can have for an organization.

listen to long , thompson, or eiland talk sometime. you think they challenge anyone?

i keep calling them the bob newhart clones.

i don’t see anyone like antonetti at cleveland working under cashman. i don’t see anyone like josh byrnes working for cashman like byrnes did for theo.

do you see any personality like a bowa or a zimmer in the present coaches who would stand up to cashman or steinbrenner?

i see a bunch of yes men. that’s my reasoning.

if you’re saying they’re not , what’s your reasoning?

Agree 100%, John. But you know the game. When things go bad, it’s usually them who are asked to leave.

He built an old team with a few young guys and everyone bought it as a young team.

The rotation is not improved (unless Perez is pitching hurt, as he may have in Pittsburgh).

He won the Santana lottery and people thought that it plugged every hole on a team that was two years older than the team that overperformed wildly in 2006.

1) Bullpen. The bullpen did a tremendous job behind a pedestrian starting rotation. The warning signs should have been there: Trachsel, Pedro and Perez were eminently forgettable.

2) A career year for Carlos Beltran. One that he will never replicate.

3) Above average for Paul Lo Duca out of the catcher’s spot. Really his career year outside of 2001, and an aberration for that reason.

4) Luck. Their run differential suggests a record of 91-71.

The truth is that the Mets had a totally pedestrian rotation. The names were bigger than the whole.

1) Miraculous production out of Moises Alou in his age 40 year.

2) Miraculous production out of Ramon Castro.

3) General perception that Jose Reyes is better than he is (still pretty damn good).

4) Pedro in his age 35 year and Glavine and El Duque in their age 41 years. How Minaya could have expected two of those three guys to contribute at a high level this year is beyond me.

5) Overvalued Carlos Delgado. After hitting to a 103 OPS+, it should have been no secret that an oddly slimmed 36 yr-old Delgado is at the end of his rope.

6) Overrated Carlos Beltran. Plays CF beautifully, but really doesn’t get on base as he should. Odd in the sense that a lot of his value is tied into his SLG.

7) Overrated Aaron Heilman. Among others. Including Joe Smith.