What is wrong with the Yankees

From 1996 through 2000 the Yankees had a dynasty. In this era of free agents and larger than life contracts this is something that is very hard to come across. The only other team that you could arguably call a dynasty since the 1996 Yanks would be the New England Patriots 2001-2004 when they won three of four championships. To see what made these great Yankee teams you have to look at them position by position and how they all worked so well together.
Catcher- Jorge Posada- A homegrown prospect who always gives you his top effort. Never at the top of the line up but for a catcher he produced more than enough
First Base- Tino Martinez- Who would have thought that Mattingly's replacement would produce and mean as much to the team as Tino did. He always put the team before himself, a true winner.
Seccond Base- Chuck Knoblauch- It is too bad that he is most remembered by some for his later Yankee years where he could no longer make an accurate throw from second base to first.
Short Stop- Derek Jeter- The nucleus of these teams, he set an example on and off the field of what it takes to win ball games and be a Yankee
Third Base- Scott Brosius- He was a good player during the regular season but the post season was where he made his impact where he always came through with a clutch hit.
Left Field- Ricky Ledee/Chad Curtis- Never the stars of the team but they served their role
Center Field- Bernie Williams- He never batted cleanup but what Bernie did was extreamly valuable in the way he was always a timely hitter and a man who showed up for big games.
Right Field- Paul O'Neill - One of my favorite Yankees from the dynasty, one of the most intense competitors I have ever seen in any sport.
Pitching- I am not going to go through every pitcher that the Yankees had durring this run but, that is the beauty of it, the fact that they performed as a staff and worked together as a unit

Today the Yankees are a very different team. The gritty players who gave 110 percent every day (Tino, Bernie, O'Neill) are now gone. The biggest problem that the Yankees have right now is a player who goes against everything these dynasty teams stood for, his name is Alex Rodriguez. A Rod puts up some incredible numbers if you do not count the games where the Yankees are in need of his assistance. In the clutch spots where the dynasty Yankees played their best this is where A rod self destructs. The first year I gave him a pass because of the pressure associated with coming to play in NY but ever since then I see him as a prime example of why the team is not winning, the loss of the ability to play good baseball when it matters. That is exactly why the Red Sox have been so good in the past few seasons, they can play in the clutch when it counts.

The efforts that the Yankees took this off season are the works of a desperate General Manager who knows that if the Yankees do not make it out of the first round of the playoffs in the upcoming season that it will most likely cost him his job. Spending half a billion dollars this off season is not what the Yankees needed. I like the Tex signing but other than that it seems to me like a last ditch effort from the GM for anything to help him keep his job. I hope I am wrong and this group of players comes together and resembles one of the dynasty teams in this upcoming season (for some reason I just don't see that happening).