Have We Seen the Last of the Greatest Yankee Infield? →

The 2009-11 Yankee infield stands out because of its balance. They had no star comparable to Lou Gehrig in his prime, which lasted from the mid-1920s, until he got sick in 1939, but all four players in every season were good to great. Teixeira, Cano, Jeter and Rodriguez all contributed to the Yankee offense in a way that cannot be said of Dent, Crosseti, Koenig or Dugan. With some luck, Rodriguez and Jeter will be back some time this year, and this foursome may take the field again. They may even play together a bit next year, but there best years together are clearly behind them. Those years, however, are by many measures the very best the Yankees ever got from their infield.

Great Yankee Second Basemen-Where Does Cano Rank

Cano’s place among Yankee second baseman is framed by the same question the Yankees will have to ask after 2013: whether or not Cano will, by that time, be in the decline phase of his career. If Cano can hit the way he did in 2009-2011 between 2012-2015, he will, assuming he stays with the Yankees, have a strong claim on being the greatest Yankee second baseman ever, with more games at the position than any other Yankee and offensive numbers comparable to Lazzeri and Gordon. There is, of course, no guarantee that Cano can achieve this. If he begins his decline after 2013 or 2014, he will probably be remembered as only the third greatest Yankee at his position; and the Yankees will find themselves with a contract that will be very tough to move.

What Smaller Market Teams Might Learn from the Yankees

When Robinson Cano tossed the ball to Mark Texeira for the final out of the sixth game of the World Series, the Yankees won their 27th World Series and fifth since Major League Baseball first used the current expanded playoff system in 1995. The Yankees have now won one third of all World Series since 1995, an impressive accomplishment given how difficult it is to survive a three round playoff system. Clearly the Yankees have benefited from a front office that is willing and able to spend the money needed to put a strong team on the field every year, but just as clearly, there are additional explanations for the Yankees’ success.

Lincoln Mitchell