About the Off-Season: Passing the Torch

About the Off-Season: Passing the Torch

By Tim Kabel

December 27, 2025

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Christmas was two days ago and there are just four days left in the year. The Yankees have continued to slumber peacefully through the off-season and have done virtually nothing to improve the team from the 2025 version.

I had predicted that they would do something before Christmas, but I was wrong. I will double down and predict that the Yankees will make a move before the New Year. After all, they need to do something.

While it is true they could do absolutely nothing during the off-season, that would not be good and it would not help their chances next year. Be that as it may, there remains very little to discuss at this point. I suppose I could go over again what moves the Yankees should make or might make or will make but instead I want to look at something else. I want to dive into something we all have in common.: being a fan.

My father was born in 1919 and passed away much too soon in 1984. My father never took me to a baseball game. Now before we start shaking our fists toward the heavens at my father, it's not as if he took someone else to the games instead of me. He didn't go. He was always working. As I have written before, the first game I ever went to was with my mother and my sister, Penny. That was certainly an adventure. We arrived late, left early and my mother was offended physically and emotionally by the cigarette smoking that was going on. Anyway, I did get to see Thurman Munson hit the 100th home run of his career that day. 

Back to my father, since he was born in 1919, and he grew up on Long Island, he was able to see and hear about Babe Ruth. He would have been eight years old in 1927, when the Yankees had an amazing season and Babe Ruth hit sixty home runs. My father was alive to see Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, and Bill Dickey. He saw the great Yankees teams from the 20s through the 30s, 40s, and on into the 70s.

My mother was actually a bigger baseball fan than my father. She was a huge Mickey Mantle fan. The point is that my parents were able to see some of the greatest baseball players ever. Think about it, my dad was born in 1919 as I said, and my mother was born in 1925. She would be 100 years old if she were alive today. Consider all the players who came and went during those years. I mean it also is fascinating to think how much history happened in their lives. That is a topic for another day, however.

I am my parents’ youngest child and I was born in 1964. Obviously, I never saw Babe Ruth. I never saw Joe DiMaggio other than in a Mr. Coffee commercial or at an Old Timers’ Day. I can't recall ever seeing Mickey Mantle play in a game. Not only did I not see Babe Ruth hit his 60th home run in 1927, but I also wasn’t there when Roger Maris hit his 61st in 1961.

However, I did see the Yankees’ resurgence in the late 1970s. I saw Thurman Munson, Reggie Jackson, Ron Guidry, Sparky Lyle and Catfish Hunter. I saw the down years for the Yankees in the 80s and early 90s. I was also able to see the careers of Dave Winfield and Don Mattingly. Basically, from Ron Guidry and Willie Randolph forward, I saw the entire Yankees careers of many legendary players, including Don Mattingly, Bernie Williams, Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Jorge Posada, Andy Pettitte, and CC Sabathia.

I have been a Yankees fan for 50 years. I have seen the ups and the downs. I have seen many amazing things. I have seen the no hitters that were pitched by Dave Righetti, Jim Abbott, Dwight Gooden, David Wells, David Cone, Corey Kluber, and Domingo German. Wells, Cone, and German each pitched a perfect game. I saw Aaron Judge hit 62 home runs in 2022.

My three children, Michelle, Jack, and Oliver were born in 1997, 2001, and 2005. Michelle and Jack were born during the Yankees’ most recent dynasty. Oliver has only been alive for one World Series victory. Yet they have all watched Aaron Judge and the current crop of Yankees players. They also saw the end of the careers of the Core Four.

I anticipate watching Yankees games for many more years. Hopefully, I will still be writing about them. I am even more hopeful that I will eventually get to write about a Yankees’ World Series victory. Perhaps someday I will write articles reminiscing about the careers of Jasson Dominguez, Cam Schlittler, Carlos Lagrange, Spencer Jones, and George Lombard, Jr.. Maybe my kids will get to see George Lombard III play for the Yankees.

I'm going to channel James Earl Jones in A Field of Dreams right now. Baseball is the common thread that is woven through the tapestry of our nation's history. My father was alive during the time of Babe Ruth all the way through the time of Hank Aaron. I was born when Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays were playing. I never saw them in their prime, but those players and many other greats were active when I was a toddler. I have lived through the careers of Thurman Munson, Don Mattingly, Ron Guidry, Paul O'Neill, Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Jorge Posada, and Mariano Rivera. I have seen CC Sabathia and Hideki Matsui. My kids have picked up the torch and are going with me through the careers of the current players.

My family is not unique. Many families have similar stories with the Yankees and other teams. The point is that the players change. Their careers don't last that long. Very few players play for 20 years. However, you could be a fan for 70 or 80 years. Still, even with that, fans don't last forever either. Baseball does. It endures. Baseball passes through players, managers, coaches, owners, and everyone associated with the game. Baseball also passes through fans from fathers and mothers to sons and daughters to grandsons and granddaughters and on and on. This is certainly true of other sports, but I think it is best seen in baseball. Baseball is passed down through generations of players and fans and it will always remain thus.

One of my biggest regrets in life is never going to a game with my father. I like to think that someday, a very long time from now, he and I can meet somewhere up in the sky (and not somewhere down below where it is very hot). I'm very confident that he will be up there. My qualifications for that might be a little shaky, we will see. However, when we do meet, perhaps we can watch a game together and have a hot dog, if they serve hot dogs there. If they do, I bet they are heavenly.