The era when the Dodgers and Yankees regularly played in the World Series is known as the heyday of MLB.
It's known as what's wrong with this sport that they play like clockwork every 43 years.
I understand that what sells well in the media world right now is perpetuating tired opinions. I know that what drives the world today is not letting go of even the most disproven grievances. Because let's not act like Yankees vs. Dodgers in the World Series proves what's wrong with the game and why we need a salary cap. You can leave it at Trite Street.
If you want to make a case for a salary cap because you need to pay your best players and young players more fairly, or just because you want owners to know their fixed costs for some reason, Much better than giving the illusion of competitive balance. . Because it is competence and its evil stepbrother, incompetence, that create the competitive balance.
Here are some realities that are ignored in favor of intuition-level stupidity.
• The Yankees haven't been to the World Series since 2009, and their win that year is their only title since 2000.
• The Dodgers have won one World Series since 1988, in 2020, a 60-game pandemic season.
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The Mets haven't won the World Series since 1986. The Phillies have won the World Series twice since their debut in 1883.
The two Chicago teams have teamed up for two titles since 1917. Although the Cubs won it all in 2016, they hadn't been to the World Series since 1945, and their last championship before 2016 was in 1908. The White Sox won the World Series for the first time since 1917. Since winning the championship in 2005, they have advanced to the playoffs three times without winning a single round. The Angels added Los Angeles to their franchise name in 2005, but since their founding in 1962 they have only appeared in/won the World Series once (2002) and currently have the longest playoff drought in the majors. (Since 2014).
Really, give the White Sox and Angels all the salaries in the world and they'll find a way to No. 4 anyway. Avoiding dollar signs eliminates administrative errors.
Aaron Boone said that every year since he took over as manager in 2018, “it's been a Yankees-Dodgers type of thing,” with both teams competing for each other and each side circling each other, leading to a coastal He said the possibility of a match between the superpowers was open. But “it's hard to get to this point. Considering the success of these two series, 43 years is amazing.”
Still, this tired agenda-driven narrative will persist, just as it did from 1941 to 1956, when the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Yankees played in seven of the 16 World Series games. What we think of as the best era for the sport is a black-and-white dreamscape.
Follow The Post's coverage of the Yankees in the postseason.
But we're not in hell right now, even if it's LA vs. New York, Hollywood vs. Broadway. Because just having the Yankees return to the Fall Classic is refreshing.
Since the Yankees last won in 2009, 16 different teams have appeared in the World Series and 10 different clubs have won, including the Giants three times and the Red Sox and Astros twice each. During the same period, the NFL, with its salary cap, has had 15 different teams go to the Super Bowl and crowned 10 different champions. The NBA, with its salary cap, has had 12 different finalists and 10 champions.
No one seemed to complain about the fourth consecutive season that Stephen Curry and LeBron James faced off in the NBA Finals. Will we really become so anti-metropolitan that we won't all be able to enjoy the first World Series game between two of baseball's biggest stars, Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge?
“I think some baseball purists probably like baseball,” Carlos Rodon said. “I know Fox definitely likes it. There's definitely some glamor to it. But for us in this room, it's baseball.”
Yes, Fox loves having the two largest TV markets. MLB loves that its major television partners get what they want. But in reality, it's okay for everyone to love it instead of acting like this is a scheduled meeting. Yes, the mega team that signed Ohtani and the mega team that traded for Juan Soto made it to the World Series with an annual salary of over $300 million. If something similar happens again next year, please contact me again.
Because, again, if we have to do this, it's the last time the Yankees won the World Series, and the Giants won their first three titles since moving to San Francisco in 1958. The Royals' first time since 1985. The Cubs' first time since 1908. The Braves' first time since 1995. And the Astros, Nationals, and Rangers for the first time ever.
The Yankees are aiming for their 28th title, the most in history, but their playoff road is certainly lined with lower-ranked teams from the Central Division of the American League. no doubt. But last year, when the Celtics won a record 18th NBA title, players like Jimmy Butler, Terry Rozier, Donovan Mitchell, Jarrett Allen, Tyrese Haliburton, and nearly every Knicks star A player missed part or all of the series against the Celtics. It collapsed to keep Boston out of the way.
But as we all know, when the Celtics raised their flag in the sky Tuesday night with the Knicks in attendance for their season opener, there was no asterisk. We call them champions.
In a 162-game season, it's been a long time since you could call the Dodgers and Yankees the same, even though they're playing each other.
