{"id":1212,"date":"2008-11-12T07:00:31","date_gmt":"2008-11-12T06:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=1212"},"modified":"2009-10-18T21:35:07","modified_gmt":"2009-10-18T20:35:07","slug":"the-last-night-of-the-yankee-dynasty-by-buster-olney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=1212","title":{"rendered":"The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty by Buster Olney"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty by Buster Olney (Harper Perennial, 2008), 355 pages.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As a consequence of their third-placed finish in the AL East this season, the New York Yankees\u00c2\u00a0 failed to make the postseason for the first time since 1995.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 While it marked the end of a proud streak,\u00c2\u00a0 Buster Olney would argue that it didn’t truly mark the end of an era.\u00c2\u00a0 The Yankee dynasty that began with a World Series title in 1996 already had been brought to a halt by their game seven defeat to the Arizona Diamondbacks in the 2001 World Series.\u00c2\u00a0 Six further postseason campaigns may have followed, but as Derek Jeter himself admitted in 2004 it was not \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the same team\u00e2\u20ac\u009d that had swept all before them in the second half of the 1990s.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

In truth, there have been few teams over the years that could live up to the collection of talents who won four World Series in a five-year period.\u00c2\u00a0 ‘Parity’ is the biggest buzzword in MLB today and the fact that so many teams enter the season with a genuine chance of winning certainly makes for a great competition.\u00c2\u00a0 However, dynasties are just as capable of conjuring up emotion and excitement, even if they are not well-liked by all at the time.\u00c2\u00a0 Using the events of that dramatic game seven as a backdrop, Olney provides a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the way in which the most important dynasty of recent MLB history developed, what kept it going and why it fell apart?\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Olney, known nowadays as a senior writer for ESPN, is well-placed to offer such insights due to his six-year stint as a Yankees beat writer for the New York Times.\u00c2\u00a0 His first hand experience and invaluable contacts mean that this is an incredibly detailed book, but at no stage does it get mired in trivial facts.\u00c2\u00a0 Descriptions of that game seven and the lives and careers of the Yankee players are used to bring out wider themes in an engaging manner.<\/p>\n

If one theme dominates the book, it is the central importance of one man: George Steinbrenner.\u00c2\u00a0 Olney states that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153most of the Yankees’ non-uniformed employees were truly petrified of Steinbrenner\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and the many examples of him cruelly berating members of his staff (particularly senior figures like GM Brian Cashman) do little to make you respect, never mind warm to, the man.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

The changing leadership style of Steinbrenner and the shifting chain of command over time is the most revealing part of this book.\u00c2\u00a0 Olney argues that the Yankee dynasty developed because Steinbrenner started to allow his executives to make decisions, such as not trading away Bernie Williams and Mariano Rivera when they were prospects, yet this was not due to any great feeling of trust towards them.<\/p>\n

After the ridicule produced by his management of the Yankees in the 1980s,
\nSteinbrenner’s reputation recovered in the 1990s and his leadership style was predominantly designed to shield himself from the blame of any incorrect decisions.\u00c2\u00a0 If a trade worked out well, he could bask in the glory and insinuate (or directly state) that it was his idea all along.\u00c2\u00a0 If the Yankees passed on a trade that would have made them better, such as the potential deal that would have seen them pick up Jim Edmonds for Alfonso Soriano in 2000, Steinbrenner could (and vociferously did) berate the person responsible.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

In some ways it proved to be an effective model, but it was ultimately corrosive.\u00c2\u00a0 Cashman began to find himself battling to impose his authority over the latest ‘expert’ who had Steinbrenner’s ear at a particular time and once the 2001 World Series had been lost, the Boss could no longer resist his urge to call the shots by throwing obscene amounts of money at glamorous free agents against the will of his executives.\u00c2\u00a0 It was a policy that failed in the 1980s and history would repeat itself.<\/p>\n

The difference between the post-2001 teams and the dynasty that preceded them is laid bare in the revealing portraits of those championship players.\u00c2\u00a0 The names are part of baseball history: Paul O’Neill, Tino Martinez, David Cone, Scott Brosius, Chuck Knoblauch, Bernie Williams, Jorge Posada, Mariano Rivera, Andy Pettitte, Roger Clemens and, of course, Derek Jeter (how different the last fifteen years may have been if the Astros had listened to their scout Hal Newhouser and selected Jeter ahead of the Yankees in the 1992 draft).\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are some extremely talented players on that list, but it was their character, both individually and collectively, that really pushed them on to greatness.\u00c2\u00a0 Corny though this sounds, they were first and foremost a team, ably led by Joe Torre and his coaching staff.\u00c2\u00a0 That was the crucial difference to the collection of expensive stars assembled after 2001 once O’Neill, Martinez, Brosius and others had departed.<\/p>\n

This point is emphasised even further in the newly-expanded edition of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, released earlier this year.\u00c2\u00a0 A lengthy introduction provides an excellent guide to the Yankees from 2003 to the present day.\u00c2\u00a0 In particular it highlights the recent attempts of Brian Cashman to steer the organization towards a more balanced roster composed of a few free agent acquisitions and a significant amount of home-grown talent, refusing to see the likes of Joba Chamberlain traded away for a quick fix.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Olney states that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the guts of the 1996-2001 dynasty\u00e2\u20ac\u009d were the product of the Yankees finally \u00e2\u20ac\u0153focusing on their own player development\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.\u00c2\u00a0 Cashman appears determined to follow this model again now that George Steinbrenner has stepped aside to let his sons Hank and Hal run the show.\u00c2\u00a0 Yankee fans can only hope that it will be as successful this time as it was the last.<\/p>\n

Every great team deserves at least one great book devoted to immortalizing them in the annals of baseball history.\u00c2\u00a0 With \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, Buster Olney has brilliantly fulfilled this role for the 1996-2001 Yankees.<\/p>\n

Have you read \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty\u00e2\u20ac\u009d? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments section below. Can you recommend any other similar books? If so, let us know.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty by Buster Olney (Harper Perennial, 2008), 355 pages. As a consequence of their third-placed finish in the AL East this season, the New York Yankees\u00c2\u00a0 failed to make the postseason for the first time since 1995.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 While it marked the end of a proud streak,\u00c2\u00a0 Buster Olney would […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[76,553],"class_list":["post-1212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball-books","tag-book-reviews","tag-mlb-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1212"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5673,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212\/revisions\/5673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}