It’s wonderful to see Yogi Berra looking hale and hearty, and accompanied by this tweet from Hall of Fame President Jeff Idelson:
Yogi’s Yankees Will Always Stand Alone
Yogi: “No one will win 5 WS in a row. I can’t believe we did it.
Yogi’s probably right, and for a number of reasons ...
One, Yogi's Yankees (1949-1953) were exceptionally fortunate to reach five straight World Series. In the first four years of their streak, the Yankees won the American League pennants by one, three, five, and two games. As talented and well-managed (by Casey Stengel) as they were, they could easily have lost one or two of those pennants.
Two, Yogi’s Yankees were fortunate to win five straight World Series. While they might have been the better team in all five, we know that doesn’t always matter much. And the Yankees were pushed to six or seven games in three of the five Series.
Three, nobody won more than four straight World Series before Yogi’s Yankees won five straight, and nobody’s won more than three straight since.
Four, the addition of League Championship Series and Division Series has made just reaching the World Series immensely more difficult. And the addition of yet another round to the postseason will obviously make things only more difficult.
Five -- and granted, this is perhaps just a short-term consideration -- if you were going to choose a team that might at least threaten to win a bunch of World Series in a row, you would obviously choose the Yankees because they can outspend everyone else. But as long as the Red Sox are well-managed, they will at least slightly threaten the Yankees' chances to reach the postseason. Remember, in 2000 the Yankees won the World Series despite finishing the regular season with just the fifth-best record (87-75) in the American League. If they hadn't won their division, they wouldn't have been in the playoffs at all.
See More:
