With the Yankees, Complacency Rules

By Paul Semendinger

November 11, 2026

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The Yankees continue to disappoint. We are now a third of the way through November and the team has done basically nothing. I don't expect them to do anything. There is no collective energy. There is no urgency. The New York Yankees are content the way things are.

Understand the following because it is true - there is no urgency because the Yankees have no real desire, none whatsoever, to do the necessary things to build a team that is a World Championship caliber club.

The Yankees sell their fans on hope - not greatness.

The Yankees are complacent.

They are content.

There was a time when the Yankees main goal was to build great teams that had a legitimate chance of winning a World Series. That is no longer the case.

The Yankees now build teams to be a little better than the weak American League so they can be part of a pennant race and create (false) hope that the playoffs just might, if they're lucky, play out in their favor. (Spoiler Alert - They playoffs haven't played out in the Yankees favor. Since this approach was adopted, the Yankees have never won a World Championship.)

One reason the Yankees are content is that there are fans that are satisfied with this approach. These fans celebrate the Yankees over .500 record year-after-year and the fact that they often make the playoffs. They call this an indication of the team's continued success. But it's not success. It is failure. For the Yankees, this is failure.

The Yankees' main talking point, the one they sell their fans and the media on, is that their goal is to win the World Series. Along with this, they market the team's great history. They talk about the 27 World Championships. They sell items celebrating the past championships and claim they're all about winning, but being, in truth, they are anything but.

Now, to be clear, for any other franchise, being over .500 all the time and being in the postseason most seasons would be good enough. But this should not be not good enough for the Yankees. It never used to be. And it's still not. It just isn't. This is a fact that so many seem to miss. So many miss this point.

The Yankees don't sell t-shirts and uniforms and hats and all sorts of merchandise celebrating the 1918 team or the 1931 team or the 1973 team or the 1991 team. No, no, no... they sell tons of items that celebrate their championships. The Yankees have made a fortune selling their fans on championships- on winning - on being the best.

But they no longer are.

The Yankees of today want their fans to celebrate that they're a little better than pretty good, but that's not what the Yankees symbolize in the sport. Or, at least they used to.

When one is the standard for greatness, the goal must be to continue to attain that greatness. The goal should not be, for the Yankees, to be content and satisfied with being just a little bit better than pretty good.

I will try to explain this in a new way.

It was said that owning the Yankees was like owning the Mona Lisa. Both were examples of greatness.

The painter of the Mona Lisa was, of course, Leonardo DaVinci. DaVinci was a master. He was one of the greatest ever. When DaVinci created a work of art, the standard was higher for him than almost anyone else. DaVinci was expected to produce greatness. And he did.

If Leonardo DaVinci created a somewhat good work of art, better than most, but certainly not up to his standards, and made it to the finals of an art competition, but lost, that result would not have been celebrated. All would have wondered why he failed because when one is the greatest, even second place is considered failing. DaVinci was expected to produce greatness time and time again.

History does not celebrate "almost," but the Yankees want their fans of today to celebrate being just good enough. The Yankees are designed to be almost good enough every year - and they expect, hope, and want their fans to be satisfied with that. The Yankees sell their fans of a great history and the false hope that they are finally going to produce another championship.

I don't believe in the Yankees' approach of today. I don't believe in them trying to be "good enough.". I don't buy their charade. (And I am surprised so many do.)

We celebrate people like DaVinci because they set the highest standards.

Setting the highest standards, winning championships, is what professional sports is all about. This is especially true for the Yankees, who, because of their great history, must be judged differently than any other team.

Another example of this approach can be found in Beethoven who while already a master, achieved his greatest work in his last symphony. Beethoven didn't seek to write something ordinary because he had already achieved greatness. He wanted to be even greater. That used to be how the Yankees operated.

The goal of the Yankees goal used to be greatness. The Yankees were DaVinci. They were Beethoven. They sought to be the best. And they were the best more often than any other team.

Today the Yankees don't wish to be Beethoven. They're content to be Jan Ladislav. Very few people today have heard of Ladislav. The reason? He was a very good composer, but he wasn't one of the best. Beethoven was great. This is why Beethoven is remembered.

And this is why the Yankees of today will be forgotten in the annals of history except as a poor facsimile of what the team and the franchise formally stood for.

And that's a shame.