What the Yankees struggles would mean in a perfect world

In a perfect world, this would be the beginning of the end. The Steinbrenner boys would possess no more than a shadow of their father's ability to sign top-end free agents in the off season, Derek Jeter would age 10 years overnight, and the veterans would get hurt egos, causing turmoil in the Bronx every time a starter needs a day off to mentally prepare for his new position in the batting order. Oh wait.

UPDATE: Maybe the world is perfect as all three of these things have happened, with the latter coming to fruition this past weekend.

Ahead of Saturday's game against Boston, veteran catcher, and team leader, Jorge Posada was dropped to 9th in the batting order as a result of his struggles at the plate this season. Manager Joe Girardi wrote Posada's name down on the lineup card, yet an hour before the game Posada asked to be removed from the lineup to have time to mentally prepare to hit at the bottom of the lineup.

Mentally prepare to hit at the bottom of the lineup? Really?

A few words of advice to Jorge:

Uh, Jorge, not sure if you are aware, but you haven't been hitting anywhere in the lineup this year. What do you need to mentally prepare for; hitting worse than your .165 season average? I'm thinking you should just be happy to be in the lineup, at all, with an average so far south of the Mendoza line.

The good news is, Posada is the only Yankee who has been in the news recently for his inability to hit. Oh wait.

Team Captain, Derek Jeter, a lifetime .313 hitter, is currently bringing a .260 average to the Yankees lineup everyday. That's a .260 average after a 3-game stretch, last week, where Jeter went 8 of 15.

The hitting struggles alone are cause for tabloid talk in New York, but the problem is compounded further following an aggressive off season of negotiations in which El Capitan and his agent somehow pulled a three year, 51 million dollar deal out of the Yankees for the soon-to-be 37 year old short stop.

To even the most devout Yankee haters, myself included, both Jeter and Posada have been class acts their entire careers, on and off the the field, so it's hard to say anything negative about either as their aging bodies begin to fail them. Nonetheless, the recent struggles of the two past-their-prime stars are connected to the struggles of a team which has lost its last six games, including a three-game sweep at the hands of the Boston Red Sox this past weekend.

Go back to the off season where the Yankees failed to sign Cliff Lee, Carl Crawford or anyone else worth mentioning, and the Yankees are losing the PR battle more often than they are winning it; not something Yankees fans are used to.

New York is still two games above .500, has a roster filled with All-Stars and future hall-of-famers, and lets not forget that $196 million dollar payroll that allows them to target whoever they want via mid season trades. (As if you needed to be reminded of that last one)

Nonetheless, couple the steep decline of Jeter and Posada, with the front offices inability to sign any marquee free agents this past off season, and you begin to hope, err, wonder, if this is the start of a fall from grace for the Yankees.

Unfortunately, it's not likely to happen. The economics of baseball practically ensure a team with a payroll that big will remain, at the very least, competitive.

Who knows though, if you are Yankee hater or someone who simply wants to see Goliath fail, stranger things have happened.

Maybe we'll find that Osama Bin Laden guy some day. Oh wait.