New York Yankees face depletion of their farm system because of various reasons –trades, free agent acquisitions, the aging or departure of the players who had formed the core of the Yankees during the late 1990s and allegedly poor coaching. Buster Olney, in his book The Last Night of the New York Yankees Dynasty, argues that George Steinbrenner's management style resulted in the players burning out psychologically. Sportswriter Larry Mahnken has jokingly proposed his theory in the form of "Curse of Clay Ballinger" meaning the New York Yankees will never again win the World Series until either they make amends to utility player Clay Ballinger who left following the 2001 season or they win the championship anyway. While quite a creative explanation by analogy with the Curse of the Bambino, this tautology is all a joke and not a thing to be taken seriously.

Several sabermetricians have argued that success in the playoffs is mostly the result of luck but the fact remains that the production of the New York Yankees' core players has decreased steadily since their 1996 World Series title. But the New York Yankees are listening! They’ve seriously upgraded their pitching staff with Carl Pavano, Jaret Wright, Mike Stanton, Felix Rodriguez and Randy Johnson but no one knows why Carlos Beltran wasn’t signed up. George Steinbrenner has his hopes up with Randy Johnson. He feels proud that the team has finally landed the greatest left-hander in the game, filling the void left last winter when Andy Pettitte departed for Houston and David Wells headed to San Diego as free agents. .

The 6-foot-10 Johnson joins a rotation that features Mike Mussina, Carl Pavano, Jaret Wright and Kevin Brown. General manager Brian Cashman is all excited about the 41-year-old Big Unit, too as he was the man who made Yankees lose two championships in 1995 (American League Division Series) and 2001 (World Series). He gave the New York Yankees the bona fide No.1 starter. New York Yankees sent pitchers Javier Vazquez and Brad Halsey, catcher Dioner Navarro and $9 million to the Diamondbacks for the five-time Cy Young Award winner, who passed his physical on Monday.

Major changes have been made for the New York Yankees 2007 season. Gary Sheffield has been traded off to Detroit for pitching prospects and pitcher Jaret Wright to the Orioles for Chris Britton. Japanese pitcher, Kei Igawa, signed a five-year contract with the Yankees, after he won the negotiating rights with a $26 million bid. Former Yankee, Andy Pettitte, also signed up for the 2007 season. Randy Johnson was traded to the Arizona Diamondbacks for Luis reliever. Three minor leaguers were also brought in. One of the famous and greatest Yankee hitting instructors, Don Mattingly has been promoted to bench coach and according to speculations that are doing rounds, Mattingle might even replace Joe Torre, the team skipper. Bernie Williams, the longest-tenured Yankee outfielder was offered the opportunity to join the non-roster Spring Training, but he declined.

The world's first $200-million baseball team has appeared in 39 matches, out of which they won 26 World Series.

For more information visit: http://www.ticketmayor.com/sports-tickets/New-York-Yankees.php