Hal Steinbrenner apologizes to fans
The New York Yankees are one of the most storied teams in all professional sports. They have won the World Series 27 times, more than any other club in Major League Baseball. However, they fell short of expectations in 2020 and the chairman of Yankees Global Enterprises Hal Steinbrenner refused to make excuses for the team’s disappointing campaign.
“I’m very disappointed, obviously,” Steinbrenner said Tuesday on ESPN New York radio, via ESPN.com. “We invested a lot of time, energy, money into the team last offseason, and we all felt that we had a team that could win a championship, and we failed to do that. We didn’t even come close. So right now, at this point in time, all I can do is apologize to our fans. They deserved a better outcome than they got. Period. I mean, they just did.”
Along with his brother Hank, Hal inherited the franchise from their father George Steinbrenner in 2010 after he had purchased the team in 1973. He had been the longest owner in the team’s storied history and his son is now looking to follow in his footsteps.
George Steinbrenner apologized to Yankees fans back in October 1981 after the team lost to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series. In 2020, though, the team didn’t even make the World Series. They were eliminated by the Tampa Bay Rays in the American League Divisional Series.
“I guess I should be most disappointed with me. I’m responsible for all this in the end,” Hal Steinbrenner said, via ESPN. “It’s disappointing because the expectations, of course, were so high.”
“Our offense was just inconsistent at playing up to their potential to me,” Steinbrenner said. “So many downs with the ups and highs with the lows, and the lows were every bit as extreme as the highs. And the highs were pretty good. When they were on, they were on. But it just seems like every game, including some of the postseason games, you just couldn’t tell which offense was going to show up.”
The Yankees have the highest payroll in the entire league, forking out $113.9m in salaries for the shortened 2020 season. The Los Angeles Dodgers are behind them with a 2020 payroll of $105.5m and the Chicago Cubs in third paying out $89.1m. Unlike the Yankees though, the Dodgers are still alive battling it out with the Atlanta Braves for a trip to the World Series.
New York has not won the World Series since 2009 and are desperate to claim the most prestigious prize in the game once again. It will be interesting to see what moves the team decides to make in the offseason to address their shortcomings, but Steinbrenner has already made it clear that he has no intentions of firing his manager Aaron Boone who will be returning for his third year with the organization in 2021.
“Aaron Boone is a good baseball man. He’s a good leader,” Steinbrenner said. “He has the respect of the players. Aaron Boone will be back next year. That’s just a fact.”
