Where Have You Gone, Joe Torre?

Sentimental Journey: For all the Boss's bluster, the Yankees are the last team in Major League Baseball to traffick in sentimentality. They cling tenaciously to the past (exemplified by Bernie Williams's too-long tenure) because the team can afford that luxury and has been slow to recognize that it has come at the expense of the future. Now we'll see if they've learned anything. The Yankees pretty much have to sign Jorge Posada, even though he's 36, as first-rank catchers are so rare. But unless the fading Rivera is willing to sign a one-year deal, which is unlikely, it's time to bid goodbye to the greatest closer in the history of the game. Plenty of pitchers can close (surely the Yankees noticed Cleveland journeyman Joe Borowski closing them out of the playoffs), and Joba Chamberlain may soon be ready to become a dominant closer to rival Boston's Jonathan Papelbon.

True Grit: The Yankees champions of Torre's early years couldn't match up with the most recent teams' array of superstars, but they boasted players like Paul O'Neill, Scott Brosius and Joe Girardi, whose hard-nosed baseball produced big-time results. The current incarnation has a grit deficit.

Captain Jeter: Derek Jeter's captaincy has been earned on the field, and one disappointing series does nothing to diminish his reputation as one of baseball's greatest big-game performers. Still, he leads only by example and is too nice a guy to kick some of the butt that Torre was already stroking. Jeter's not the man to jolt the Yankees out of their lethargy; someone else must step up.

Division Winners: The Yankees, with a lineup loaded from top to bottom, were supposedly built to win championships. But in reality they were built to win division titles. Great hitting mashes those mediocre starters from Tampa Bay, Baltimore and Kansas City. But come playoff time it tends to be pitching that prevails, even against the mightiest lineups. As a team the Yankees hit .228, .246 and .253 in their past three playoff series. Repeat after me: pitching trumps hitting in the postseason.

Starting Pitching: The Yankees' starting pitching simply hasn't measured up to that of its rivals in each of the last three playoffs. Which is odd because the team has the money to pretty much land every pitcher it has pursued, some of whom the Red Sox also coveted. The Yankees were either bad judges of talent or they were unlucky. Perhaps both. But these big-money acquisitions have either been total flops or at least significant disappointments.

Bullpen: This is one area in which Torre will not be missed. The Yankee manager would go to the well far too often with whichever reliever he deemed reliable at the time, and team management and fans alike fear Chamberlain's mighty arm would surely be ruined by next August if Torre were still making the bullpen calls. Of course, that's one more hidden cost of the pressure to win the division every year. Torre wound up treating every game as if it were a must-win situation. Sometimes you have to be willing to lose with your less-than-best in May so that your best can do their job come October.