Injuries certainly didn't help the Yankees in '08, but I believe the larger problem was simply that the Yankees were finally surpassed in talent-accumulation by a division rival other than the Boston Red Sox. They weren't a playoff caliber team, anymore. Even the Blue Jays had a significantly higher run-differential and a better Pythagorean record.

Their outfield was atrocious, and thanks in part to the $42 million they had tied up in Abreu-Damon-Matsui, Xavier Nady was all they got to "bolster" it.

Much was written about what Phil Hughes, Jobabot and Ian Kennedy would do to improve the pitching staff, but it was unreasonable to expect their contributions to be so immediate, just as it was also unreasonable to expect Mussina and Pettitte to be anything more than expensive mediocrity(though, as it turned out, Moose pitched quite well). Top to bottom, the Yankees had one of the worst and most overpriced rotations in the AL, and the performance of the pen(including what was possibly the greatest of Mariano River's many great seasons) could not off-set that.

Now the team faces some decisions. Giambi, Pavano, and Abreu(the latter two possessing club options) would represent around $50 million in salary if let go. Mussina and Pettitte are also potential free agents and seem to be considering retirement. This could be a pivotal offseason for the transitional Yankees. Brian Cashman is not stupid, but he will likely have to be very persuasive to convince ownership not to dip their toes too deep into the free agent pitching pool, which looks to be as toxic as ever this year. Sabathia is likely to get a monstrous, monstrous contract, and given the abuse he's been put to the last two years, I'm not sure he's worth Johan money. Whatever his contract is will likely dictate what the next tier of pitchers(Derek Lowe, A.J Burnett, Brad Penny) receive. It doesn't look like there's much of a bargain out there, and the Yankees no longer automatically have the fallback option of putting together a blockbuster trade for a guy on a bad team like Jake Peavy.

MisterJLA is RACKing awesome.