All-Time Teams #19: New York Yankees

This is part of an ongoing series where I'm naming an all-time team for each of the current 30 MLB franchises. In an effort to revive this series after a long period of inactivity, I'm placing a little less emphasis on the discussion of the greatest eligible player who is not in the Hall of Fame.

Here's an update of the Hall of Famer per all-time team tally I listed in the Cubs post:

Cubs - 15
Braves - 14
White Sox - 13
Indians - 12
Yankees - 12
Red Sox - 12
Dodgers - 11
Reds - 10
Orioles - 9
Tigers - 9

These numbers include all Hall of Famers, regardless of whether they're inducted as a player, a manager, or in the case of Clark Griffith, an executive. 

A couple teams (Cubs and Indians) have the same Hall of Famer as a player and manager. Of course, I only counted those guys once.

Perhaps it's surprising to some that the Yankees aren't really close to the top of the list. The simple explanation is quite a few Yankees Hall of Famers didn't even make this team, with some even losing out to non-Hall of Famers, although that hardly makes the Yankees unique.

Franchise History

New York Yankees (1913 - )

New York Highlanders (1903 - 1912)

Baltimore Orioles (1901 - 1902)

An asterisk (*) denotes a Hall of Famer.

Starters

C - Yogi Berra* (1946-1963)

1B - Lou Gehrig* (1923-1939)

2B - Robinson Cano (2005-2013)

SS - Derek Jeter (1995-2014)

3B - Alex Rodriguez (2004-2013, 2015- )

LF - Babe Ruth* (1920-1934)

CF - Joe DiMaggio* (1936-1942, 1946-1951)

RF - Mickey Mantle* (1951-1968)

Ruth played a few hundred more games in right, but he's second in franchise history in games played in left field, and was essentially the Yankees' regular left fielder for four seasons. 

Mantle played right in his rookie season before eventually taking over the center field job when DiMaggio retired. This one's more of a stretch, but it's the best way to account for the fact that two of this team's four best players played the same position. 

Cano as the starting second baseman is probably my most controversial selection, and one that certainly would've been different five years ago. His cumulative WAR of 45.1 ranks third at the position, behind Willie Randolph (53.7) and Tony Lazzeri (48.3). But WAR/650 PA tells a different story: Cano - 5.6, Randolph - 5.2, Lazzeri - 4.9. 

While 0.4 WAR per year might not seem like a biggest enough difference to base such a decision on, especially since Joe Gordon's shorter Yankees career rates at 5.8 WAR/650 PA, but I'm skeptical enough of how much of Randolph's value comes from his defense to opt for Cano's offense instead. 

Rotation

Whitey Ford* (1950, 1953-1967)

Ron Guidry (1975-1988)

Red Ruffing* (1930-1942, 1945-1946)

Andy Pettitte (1995-2003, 2007-2010, 2012-2013)

Lefty Gomez* (1930-1942)

You could probably quibble with the order, but otherwise I doubt there's much controversy here. 

Closer

Mariano Rivera (1995-2013)

Reserves

C - Bill Dickey* (1928-1943, 1946)

C - Thurman Munson (1969-1979)

1B - Don Mattingly (1982-1995)

2B/3B/SS - Tony Lazzeri* (1926-1937)

3B - Graig Nettles (1973-1983)

LF/RF - Charlie Keller (1939-1943, 1945-1950)

OF - Bernie Williams (1991-2006)

Leaving Randolph off this team completely is tough -- I briefly considered expanding this team to accommodate him and a few other difficult omissions -- but I could probably put together a pretty great all-time team of players who didn't make my Yankees all-time team. That said, Lazzeri's flexibility to backup at SS as well was the deciding factor in his favor. 

Bullpen

Rich Gossage* (1978-1983, 1989)

Sparky Lyle (1972-1978)

Dave Righetti (1979, 1981-1990)

Mike Mussina (2001-2008)

I'm sure Gossage would choose himself as the team's closer, but everyone except him surely agrees Rivera is a no-brainer. Otherwise, it's a pretty short bullpen, but I've basically been going with 10 or 11 pitchers total depending on the worthiness of 25th man candidates. In this case, I felt Nettles and Munson were more worthy than any of the remaining hurlers. 

Manager

Casey Stengel* (1949-1960)

The Yankees really reinforce how difficult, and perhaps pointless, it is to decide who's the best manager in a franchise's history. Here are the choices:

Miller Huggins (1918-1929): 1067 wins, .597 W-L%, 6 pennants, 3 W-S titles. 

Joe McCarthy (1931-1946): 1460 wins, .627 W-L%, 8 pennants, 7 W-S titles. 

Casey Stengel (1949-1960): 1169 wins, .623 W-L%, 10 pennants, 7 W-S titles.

Joe Torre (1996-2007): 1173 wins, .605 W-L%, 6 pennants, 4 W-S titles.

Of course, it's not just comparing the level of success that makes choosing between these guys difficult, it's the age-old question -- which is especially pertinent to the Yankees -- of whether the manager makes the players great or the players make the manager great.

Obviously, it's probably a combination of those factors, but in the case of the Yankees, it's definitely more the latter than the former. In fact, the Yankees have won six World Series in the 61 seasons they were not managed by these four guys. By comparison, the second most successful franchise in baseball history (Cardinals) have won less than twice that many (11) in more than twice as many years (132), and the Dodgers have won six World Series in 130 years.

That said, Stengel gets the nod because of 10 pennants and seven World Championships in 12 years.

Greatest Eligible non-Hall of Famer

More interesting (to me) than the aforementioned potential second team is a potential all-time team of Yankees eligible for, but not in, the Hall of Fame. 

Thurman Munson is the only career Yankee who's in my personal Hall, but not the real Hall of Fame, so he's my choice here. 

Somewhat surprisingly, Munson's Hall case didn't get the special consideration players with similar circumstances typically get. I suppose he has the double whammy of being a catcher and having an abbreviated career, two factors that, to differing degrees, adversely affect the counting stats voters love. 

Obviously, Roy Campanella had the same potential problem but was unaffected. The guy did win three MVPs. So, perhaps Campanella is the Rickey Henderson to Munson's Tim Raines when it comes to catchers with careers shortened by non-baseball factors. Perhaps that's a stretch, but I'll go with it. 

Next Up: Oakland Athletics