Kuzul

Overall, the 2010 season was a disappointment because the Yankees did not win the World Series, but last year's championship softens the blow a bit.This is not the collapse of 2004, the gutwrencher of 2001 or the frustrating drought of 2005-08. Instead, this was a good team, but not a great team.With that in mind, let's hand out grades for 2010 to every pitcher with at least 26 innings and every hitter with at least 72 at-bats.Begin Slideshow

In the end, the Rangers were simply better than the Yankees in every facet of the game. During the six games of the American League Championship Series, Texas outscored New York, 38-19, outhit the Bombers, .304 to .201, and outpitched them, 3.06 to 6.58 in the ERA category. The Yanks were also outmanaged. New York was the highest-scoring team in baseball this year and had the third-most home runs, but Joe Girardi's resistance to using small ball sent the Bombers into offensive droughts when the homers stopped coming. The Yankees ranked just eighth in the American League in steals and sac flies and 11th in sacrifice hits. The downfall of station-to-station baseball was never more evident than in the ALCS, when the Rangers stole nine bases and laid down three sacrifice bunts, while the Yanks stole only two bags and had just one ...

Despite winning a World Series last fall, Yankees GM Brian Cashman kept busy over the winter. He acquired Curtis Granderson in a three-team deal that sent top outfield prospect Austin Jackson to Detroit along with lefty reliever Phil Coke, as well as starter Ian Kennedy to Arizona. If not for Granderson's late-season surge that came thanks to hitting coach Kevin Long, this deal would've been a complete disaster. Instead, it's almost a push. The outfielder finished the year hitting just .247 and continued to struggle against lefties, posting a meager .234 average, but he did provide some power with 24 homers and stole 12 of 14 bases. That number would have been higher, however, had his on-base percentage been better than .324. Granderson shined the most in the playoffs, when he led the team with a .357 average. Jackson, meanwhile, is the ...

A.J. Burnett was pitching well until Bengie Molina sent the first pitch he saw in the sixth inning into the left field seats for a three-run homer and a 5-3 lead, one the Rangers would never relinquish en route to a 10-3 victory in Game 4 and a 3-1 American League Championship Series lead. I don't have any problem with manager Joe Girardi leaving Burnett in to face Molina. After all, up to that point, the right-hander had allowed just two runs on five hits over five-and-two-thirds innings and had thrown fewer than 100 pitches. Is that really a line that screams "take him out?" He just made a bad pitch. However, the decision to intentionally walk David Murphy right before Molina is somewhat curious. It's certainly not the worst move Girardi has ever made, but why put the go-ahead run on base for a guy who has killed the Yankees over the ...

Things have gone exactly to plan for the Yankees so far this postseason. New York tanked the American League East so it could face the whipping boy Twins instead of Cliff Lee and the Rangers, and what happened? The Bombers once again easily dispatched of Minnesota in three games, while the AL East champion Rays were taken to the limit before being eliminated thanks to Lee's second dominating performance in the AL Division Series. Now, not only do the Yanks avoid playing pesky Tampa Bay, which took 10 of 18 from New York this season, but they get to square off against the Rangers, whom they have beaten nine out of 10 times in their previous three playoff encounters in the 1990s. Not only that, but the Pinstripes won't have to face Lee until Game 3. The only negative is that New York doesn't have home-field advantage and went 1-4 in Arlington this season, ...

No matter what they say, over the final three-plus weeks of the season, the Yankees played as if they favored taking on the Twins in the first round of the playoffs over securing home-field advantage and having to play Cliff Lee and the Rangers. New York (95-67) seems to have gotten what it wanted and will open up the best-of-five American League Division Series in Minnesota (95-67) on Wednesday night. The Bombers have ousted the Twins from the ALDS three times since 2003, including last year's sweep, and they took four out of six from the AL Central champs this year, winning two of three in the Bronx and at the new Target Field. Minnesota is a highly capable offensive club, finishing second in baseball with a .341 on-base percentage, third with a .273 batting average and sixth in runs scored, but they will be missing the injured Justin Morneau. The Twins' pitching, however, is ...

One of Bernie Williams' most memorable conversations with the late George Steinbrenner had nothing to do with baseball. About eight or nine years ago, the Yankees suspended their annual Family Day at the Stadium, an event during which the players were able to bring their children to play around on the field. Williams' wife, Waleska, was upset because the couple's kids always looked forward to going, so the center fielder decided to take action. First, he went to manager Joe Torre, who told him the decision came from the top. So he called The Boss. "I don't think he was expecting a call from me," Williams, who is promoting MasterCard's new Reserved by MasterCard program, told a group of six bloggers at a recent roundtable discussion in Midtown Manhattan. "I said, 'Mr. Steinbrenner, how you doing?' He said, 'Good. What can I do for you?' I said, 'Well, I heard that we're not having Family ...

It only took six days for Joe Girardi to finally realize the Yankees needed to start winning games or they wouldn't be going to the playoffs. On Sept. 20, I wrote how there was a very real chance of Boston pulling within 4 1/2 games of New York with a sweep at Yankee Stadium and that Girardi needed to stop counting his chickens before they hatched by throwing Chad Gaudin and Jonathan Albaladejo into every game and continuing the farce of Phil Hughes' innings limit. The skipper finally wised up by allowing Hughes to start Sunday's series finale against the Red Sox instead of spot starter du jour Dustin Moseley. Hughes delivered six solid innings of one-run ball and the Yanks got a win they needed badly, despite Mariano Rivera's third blown save in his last six opportunities. Girardi even managed a good game, pinch-hitting and pinch-running at the right ...

Don't tell Joe Girardi, but the Yankees haven't clinched anything yet. The sputtering Bombers, who have lost nine of their last 13, somehow still have the best record in baseball. But their lead entering their final four-game series with the second-place Rays is just half a game, so the American League East title and homefield advantage could very well be decided this week in the Bronx. But there could be even more on the line for New York, who lead third-place Boston by just seven games with six head-to-head meetings coming up in the final two weekends of the season. If the Yanks drop three of four to the Rays and the Red Sox sweep three at Fenway from the Orioles, the potential Wild Card lead would be down to 4 1/2 entering this Friday's opener at the Stadium. At that point, the feisty Sox would pretty much control their own destiny. The time ...

Before the Yankees' painful 1-0 loss to the Rays in 11 innings on Monday night, Manager Joe Girardi told MLB.com that "the division is important because everyone wants their home fans behind them as long as you can. We had it last year and it worked out very well for us. It's important to us."He was obviously not telling the truth.If you really feel that it's important to win the American League East and secure home-field advantage throughout the AL playoffs rather than sneak in as the Wild Card and have to play all your Game 1's on the road, then you wouldn't bring in Sergio Mitre to pitch the 11th inning of a scoreless game with first place on the line in mid-September rather than go to Mariano Rivera, David Robertson, or Joba Chamberlain.Of course, Girardi did hand the ball to Mitre at this critical juncture and the right-hander promptly ...