The New York Yankees finished 84-78 last season and missed the postseason for the second consecutive year. In shortstop Derek Jeter's final season as a professional baseball player, the team fell short of a wild card berth by four games. Could this have been because Jeter was batting second all year?
Some sports writers, most notably ESPN's Buster Olney, believed Jeter's "Farewell Tour" hurt the Yankees chances of making the playoffs. The 14-time All-Star hit just .256/.304/.313 with 47 runs scored, four home runs and 50 RBIs in 145 games, which were by far the worst numbers of his career. New York ended the year ranked 20th in runs scored (633) thanks to various struggles on offense, and the apparent refusal to move Jeter out of the two-hole likely played a role in that statistic.
The Yankees finished just 29-26 in the final two months of the season and failed to catch the reeling Oakland Athletics, who nearly collapsed and missed the playoffs after heading into the All-Star Break with the league's best record. They eventually grabbed the second wild card spot with an 88-74 record.
Nonetheless, the team kept Jeter in the No. 2 spot for the entire season despite his lackluster performance. Now we may have an idea why.
"Sources say [manager Joe Girardi] was in favor of dropping Derek Jeter in the batting order last year, but was overruled by ownership," writes Bob Klapisch of NorthJersey.com. "Girardi understood how explosive the issue was, especially because, according to those same sources, Jeter made it known he wanted to remain in the No. 2 spot."
"Girardi was told to back off; there would be no tug of war with Jeter as he finished out his farewell tour ... Jeter, a shell of his former self, was allowed to exit gracefully."
Many could argue it didn't matter because New York's starting rotation was decimated and didn't give them much hope throughout the season, but down the stretch the team's pitching staff actually did give them a shot with fairly serviceable numbers: in August they maintained a 3.55 ERA (14th) and held opponents to a .237 batting average (8th) and in September they had a 3.40 ERA (12th) and kept opponents at bay with a .240 average (10th). As for their offense, they scored only 106 runs (20th overall) in 28 games in August and just 98 runs (which somehow ranked higher at 14th) in 27 games in September.
Obviously all of their offensive woes couldn't be attributed to Jeter, but perhaps moving him down in the lineup and putting another hitter in the No. 2 spot who was more capable of getting on base could have given them a greater chance to win. A few more victories could have put more pressure on other clubs competing for a wild card spot.
Jeter still had a solid season for a 40-year-old, but the organization can't be kicking themselves for missing the playoffs if ownership demanded Jeter remain in his desired spot in the lineup.
"...the organization's long-established devotion to winning games has been superseded by its effort to cast Jeter in the best possible light, pretending, with his placement in the field and the lineup, that he gives the team the best possible chance to win," wrote Olney back in September.
The future Hall of Famer will never be put in a bad light because of his countless achievements and milestones that he reached as one of the Yankee greats, but many cannot help but wonder what may have been if he wasn't batting second for the entire 2014 season.
