The quietest Yankee offseason in recent memory rolled on this week as the team signed former Red Sox reliever Hideki Okajima to a minor league contract.
That's not normally the kind of thing that qualifies as big news, but the complete absence of other moves by the Yankees makes it worthy of a mention. Since Okajima hasn't been particularly good since 2009, it isn't worth much more than a mention.
So instead of waxing rhapsodic about the low-risk signing of a left-handed relief pitcher, we'll turn our attention to the fact that 2012 is right around the corner. That means it is time to make resolutions and we're here to help the Yankees out on that front.
Derek Jeter: Resolve to just say it with flowers. We kid, we kid. Seriously, though, resolve to let a year free from milestones and contract chases flow into a season that looks the second half of 2011 because we aren't ready to say goodbye to the Captain just yet.
Alex Rodriguez: Resolve to never, ever change. Wednesday's revelation of experimental German medical procedures is just the latest reminder that A-Rod marches to his own, endlessly entertaining drummer and life would be much less interesting if A-Rod started acting just like everyone else.
Brian Cashman: Resolve to treat the makeup of the pitching staff without regard to the fact that you're going to have to pay A.J. Burnett whether he's taking a regular turn in the rotation. If Burnett remains the same Burnett we've seen for the last two seasons, just eat the money and find someone who can actually pitch.
A.J. Burnett: Resolve to tune out paragraphs like the above and summon whatever it was that you brought to the mound in Game Four of the ALDS. You aren't going to blow people away anymore, so just be content to win games however the wins present themselves.
Sports
Curtis Granderson: Resolve to do it again. Last year was either a major breakthrough or a career season and the Yankees could really use the former.
CC Sabathia: Resolve to find a way to close the season with a full tank. The last two years have seen a serious drop in productivity from Sabathia as the playoffs rolled around, so it would behoove the team's ace to find a way to be firing on all cylinders come October.
Joe Girardi: Resolve to find something, anything that you enjoy about your job and hold onto it as tightly as you possibly can. Shots of Girardi in the dugout usually look like something out of a film about the Great Depression, which doesn't hurt the team all that much but it does make for a grim telecast.
Robinson Cano: Resolve to bat third for the entire season. Obviously this isn't up to him, but he can make it an easy decision by simply hitting the same way he did all of last season.
Phil Hughes: Resolve to prepare for the 2012 season in exactly the opposite way you prepared for 2011. Hughes' role is unclear, but he won't have any role at all if he starts the year as poorly as he did back in April.
Jesus Montero: Resolve to live up to the hype. Just think of all the great Post headlines involving Jesus we'll be denied if Montero isn't as good as advertised.
Mariano Rivera: Resolve to close games until they stop playing them. That's been the same resolution for almost two decades and Mo hasn't given us a single reason to wish for a different one.
Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City. You can follow him on Twitter and he is also a contributor to Pro Football Talk.
