...are the New York Yankees.
After a several week delay caused by various things, I played out the Alt-1925 World Series over the last week or two. The Yankees won in 6, and the series definitely had drama, though it was distributed oddly. The Yankees had to come from behind in Game 1, relying on three scoreless innings of relief by Bullet Rogan to let the Bombers scratch back against Jesse Barnes, eventually winning 5-4 in the 10th on a walk-off walk (by Rogan). Buffalo came back to wipe out New York 11-2 in Game 2, scoring 7 against Pennock and another 4 against an ineffective Red Faber while Guy Bush pitched masterfully. Game 3 was Buffalo's turn for a walkoff. Art Nehf pitched masterfully but the Yankees drove up his pitch count and eventually took the lead against J. Fike. Rogan couldn't hold the lead, however, and handed a 9th-inning jam to Jose Mendez. Mendez struck out Lee with Combs on third, but Critz pulled off a squeeze play to give the Blues the win and a 2 games to 1 edge in the Series.
The Yankees offense took control in the next two games, resulting a 14-1 Game 4 win (Luque and Brown held down the Blues so most of those 14 runs were unnecessary) and an 11-5 Game 5 win (the Yankes were up 10-3 late, and Grove gave up the runs in the 9th). Traynor had 9 hits in the two games, scoring 8 runs.
This set up Game 6 back at Yankee Stadium. The Yanks jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the 1st, extended that that to a 7-2 lead by the end of the 4th, and despite Art Nehf throwing 3 2/3 perfect innings in relief the die was cast. Fitzsimmons pitched 7 decent innings and Jose Mendez bent but didn't break in the 9th--he allowed three hits and a walk, but Mackey cut down Tierney trying to steal (a busted hit-and-run, I think) and in the end Mendez struck out Cox as the tying run at the plate to end it without Buffalo scoring.
Pie Traynor was the series MVP, going 14 for 26 (.538) including a home run. Peckinpaugh drove in 9 and hit .400, a great series and especially so given he often seems to struggle in the postseason. Ruth and Charleston added home runs from the New York side, while Joseph, Williams, Gehrig, and Lee hit home runs for the Blues and Joseph had a .400 average to lead their regulars. In the end it felt like it was the Yankees' depth that carried the day--it wasn't like a single person put the team on their back, but rather the batters kept the line moving and tacking on and the pitchers either would be able to keep the Blues at (more than) arms length or wouldn't. Traynor arguably padded his stats in two blowouts. The two best individual performances for the Yankees were on the same day, and each one kind of made the other one unnecessary: Traynor's 5 for 6, 4 runs scored day happened while Luque pitched 1-run ball (with Brown pitching in a couple of scoreless relief innings). So, while there were absolutely dramatic moments and for a while it looked like the Yankees might be in real trouble, in retrospect it almost looks inevitable.
So what now? We head into an offseason where nobody has retired, and in theory the 1926 Yankees roster will be the same as the 1925 one. However, 7 players on the 25-man roster are 35 or older: Mendez, Cobb, Collins, Cy Williams, Faber, Luque, and Santop. Mendez will turn 41 before Opening Day and Cobb will turn 39 before the calendar year ends. In real life, all of these players except Mendez had perfectly good seasons in 1926, if injury-shortened ones in some cases. Mendez had a terrible real-life 1925 and didn't play in 1926. Vance should be back off the IL before Spring Training, so somebody will need to be sent down who is currently up. But otherwise, it seems like Plan A is to run it back (to use the current term) and then adjust as needed while trying for a threepeat (and a 7th straight pennant)...
For now, after the tickertape parade our attention will turn to the Dominican and Cuban Winter Leagues, the latter of which will use Organized Baseball players, and trying to finish off ballparks to use for the sesquicentennial. Those seem like topics for another post, however...
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