New York Yankees fans love mediocrity in all aspects of their team

If you were in a coma for the last 12+ years, you would probably think that this article would be insane but a lot has changed in the last decade-plus for the New York Yankees.

The Yankees have made the playoffs because they have spent a lot of money on piecemeal players or players that are always injured, which is part of the reason why they haven’t even been to the World Series since 2009, let alone win one since then.

That’s because Brian Cashman has gone from being a great GM to one that should be fired. Also, owner Hal Steinbrenner operates things much differently than his father, George, who passed away in 2010.

They also made a huge downgrade in the managerial department from going from Joe Girardi to Aaron Boone.

But there is one aspect that has not changed: their radio broadcast team.

The New York Yankees radio broadcast with John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman has been awful for a long time

John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman have been partnered together on New York Yankees radio broadcasts since 2005 and for most (if not all) of that time, they have been mediocre or awful.

But this became more apparent this week to some people when Sterling botched another home run call.

Give any excuse that you want (the camera angle that Sterling wasn’t watching anyway because he admitted to not using it until the pandemic when games were done remotely, the data, his advanced age (Sterling will be 84 later this year), or whatever you want), it’s not a great look, especially when your audience cannot see what is happening.

As someone who has broadcast baseball before, it is more difficult than some people think. But for home runs at the major league level, you have a monitor for one. Secondly, watch the outfielder.

If you see the ball fall into the outfielder’s glove, it’s not a home run!

And, most importantly, wait a beat or two. Sterling (or anyone) could even start their home run call. In this case, it could have gone something like this: “The pitch, hit to deep left field, (left fielder Raimel) Tapia back to the track, to the wall, and it is …. (waiting a beat) caught at the wall!”

As they say in journalism, “it’s not about being first, it’s about being accurate.”

But Sterling has long been criticized for his schticky home run calls and being wildly inaccurate on his calls before. Here are multiple examples from all the way back in 2009 of how bad Sterling was.

Here’s a home run call with Alex Rodríguez back in 2013, too.

Last year, the Yankees radio broadcast was ranked dead last among the 30 teams by fans on FanGraphs. Their TV broadcast was also ranked in the bottom half, as they were ranked as the 18th-best broadcast.

Since their TV ranking, though, analyst David Cone (who is widely viewed as their best broadcaster and one of the best analysts in the sport) has been hired by ESPN for Sunday Night Baseball. As a result, in 2022, Cone’s Yankees schedule will be cut in half from 100 to 50.

So with the exception of Cone and a few of their other TV analysts, every aspect of the New York Yankees is mediocre and in the age of Twitter, a lot of Yankees fans might actually like that because it gives them something to complain about.

But in the meantime, other teams that are spending less money in smaller markets are running circles around them and that will likely continue until they clean house in nearly all aspects of the team.