1. Tim, you're one of the most insightful Yankee writers around and your content is usually much different than the other major papers.  What is it about the NY Sun which allows you the opportunity to write in such a fashion?

If we do exactly what other papers do, there's no reason for anyone to read us, so we come at things from a different angle. Honestly, I'm just surprised we don't have more competition in this area.
 

2. Conversely, since you incorporate a more sabermetric and analytical style, do you feel that you are, for lack of a better term, limiting yourself to a smaller and more select audience?

No, not at all. I don't think baseball fans are interested in nothing but whether or not Joba's fist-pumping is costing the team wins or whatever. Everyone who watches baseball understands things like park effects and replacement level on an intuitive level, so there shouldn't be anything limiting about using them.
 

3. Let's get into the Yankees and in particular an article you published on July 1st, entitled "2008 May Be Yanks Best Chance in Years."  In the article, you imply that this current season will be the closest the Yankees will get to winning the division over the next few years.  You cite the continued maturity of the Rays' young talent and the Red Sox having more players in their prime as the main reasons for this.  Can you further explain your opinion on this, even in light of the Yankees' devotion to player development?  Also, does this mean you believe the Yankees will be a 3rd place team over the next few seasons?

I wouldn't want to overstate it, because the Yankees are obviously really good and have a lot of young talent, but they're definitely in some trouble.

The Rays are sick. They have Longoria, Kazmir, Shields, Crawford, and Pena on long term deals for pennies on the dollar, Upton, Navarro, and Garza under cost control, a tremendous farm system with tons of starting pitchers and middle infielders nearly ready for the majors, a great eye for cheap fill-in players, and most important of all, they have Cliff Floyd. I don't want to just repeat a riff from my column, but this is a team like the mid-90s Indians or the Moneyball A's and there's no reason to expect they won't win at least 90 for several years.

The Red Sox obviously have some problems with age as Varitek, Ramirez, and Lowell are getting up there while Ortiz looks like he might not be aging too well, but they also have Youkilis, Beckett, Papelbon, Pedroia, Lester, Ellsbury, and Matsuzaka, who are all in or approaching their primes. Replacing Ramirez and Ortiz is going to be a burden, but they have a pretty diverse portfolio—a lot of their key players should hold their own for the next few years or improve, and that will offset what they lose to age.

It's hardly as if the Yankees have nothing, but when you have so many key players who are 34 or older, and so many of your young players are pitchers who haven't done much in the majors, it's hard to count on
being able to offset the decline. So with one team that's better than the Yankees now looking likely to improve, and another that has some of the same problems but is better set up to deal with them, I get a bit pessimistic about their chances.
 

4.  In the last two seasons especially, the Yankees have shown a great reluctance to trading any prospect with any perceived measure of value.  At NoMaas, we've been huge advocates of building the farm, but is there a point where organizations become too enthralled with their own prospects?

Sure—I don't think the Yankees are there yet, but falling in love with your prospects can be really dangerous. One of the things the Yankees were doing well a decade ago, and that the Braves have always done
well, is picking out which prospects aren't going to develop and getting rid of them while they're still shiny. The whole point is to put a good team on the field, not to hoard prospects.
 

5. Robinson Cano is currently sporting a line of .246/.285/.358 -- good for an OPS+ of 72.  However, if you look at his BABIP, it's at a very low .252, yet his line drive rate (19.1%) is 2.2% better than in 2007.  Is this a case of Cano having a terrible season, or is this a monumental case of bad luck?

I think it's basically a fluke bad season, but that's what you're going to get from a guy whose value is so tied up in his batting average. Some years he's going to hit .340 and look awesome, and some years he's going to hit .250 and look like dogmeat. He's probably a true .300 hitter; as long as he does that and plays good defense he'll be fine, and I still think he'll contend for an MVP award or two.
 

6. By most reports, the Yankees front office plans to turn the season around by looking within the organization and waiting for players to revert to the means.  Is this a sound strategy?

It depends. I'm not sure it's a good strategy if the idea is to make the playoffs this year, especially because part of the reason they're even doing as well as they are is that some guys like Damon, Matsui, and Giambi are playing above their mean, so that even if others improve it will probably all cancel out. It might be the right thing to do in the big picture, though.
 

7. Derek Jeter:  What is up with this guy?
 
You can write it off as him playing hurt, but he's going to be hurt—he's 34 and has a lot of mileage on him. If you look at guys like Roberto Alomar, Ryne Sandberg, Barry Larkin, and Alan Trammell, they all lost it at around the same age. I wouldn't be shocked if he has a comeback in him, but this might just be what he is at this point—which isn't honestly all that bad except by his own standards.
 

8. If the Yankees did decide to become sellers at the trading deadline (a situation that would be very surprising), which players do you think could obtain some good value in return?

Nothing they'd want to part with aside from maybe Abreu, Pettitte, and Mussina, and possibly Farnsworth. Looking at what Sabathia and Harden fetched I doubt they'd get much for any of these guys.
 

9. Tell us something which you forecast about the Yankees or a particular Yankee player which turned out to be correct.  And how about something you missed the boat on?

I figured Rodriguez would opt out and that he'd get around a $300 million contract, which I thought were connect-the-dots type predictions. I was very wrong when I figured that the Yankees wouldn't
take him back. I was also spectacularly wrong in claiming they should give up in 2005 and last year. It's really easy to focus on how old the team is and not how good it is, which is really what matters—which
is why while I think the Rays and Red Sox are going to be better teams over the next few years in theory, I'm leery of being too emphatic about it.
 

10. Any plans to start a NY-Sun affiliated baseball blog?

Not really, although if anyone has a good argument for one they should feel free to shoot me an e-mail at tmarchman@nysun.com.