This is not the first time we have heard about Yankee vulnerability.
I have had the same group of executives and scouts predict the Yankees’ demise because of an overabundance of age since Andy Pettitte was 30, much less 40.
Media members (including me) have believed this theory. Hence, plenty of pieces have been written in recent years wondering if it is 1965 all over again and the Yankees are facing a sustained plunge.
Fans also have not been immune from pronouncing the Yankees dead prematurely.
But there always seemed an emotional element to these forecasts. Opponents, craving a downfall, have made decisions as much with their hearts as their eyes. Reporters, perhaps, wanted to be the first to correctly declare the end of an era. Fans, the most passionate group of all, are susceptible to the day-to-day ebbs — fanned in this era even more by social media and 24-hour sports outlets.
The difference with this year’s pessimistic projections is that more dispassionate elements have joined the chorus.
The website predictionmachine.com ran 50,000 simulations of the 2013 season, and in just 40 percent did the Yankees even make the playoffs (just 20 percent as the AL East champs). Their average season had the Yankees finishing third behind Toronto and Tampa Bay at 85-77. The Yankees’ lowest winning percentage in the past 20 seasons is .540, which equates to 87½ victories.
The site gives the Yankees just a 4-percent likelihood of winning the World Series, which ranks 12th of the 30 teams.
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Professional oddsmakers also see the Yankees in the 86-87-win range. Jay Kornegay, the bookmaker at the Las Vegas Hilton, had the Yankees over/under at 86. Wynn’s oddsmaker Johnny Avello said he took the Yankees’ over-under from 86½ to 86 in the last week, and “we’re still not getting any money on the over.”
The view is the same for winning it all. With their injury spate, the Yankees have fallen to the 15-1 to 18-1 range to win the World Series. Of the three casinos I contacted, none could remember the Yankees being anywhere close to that high in the past 20 years.
“With the Yankees entering the season at 18-1, this is the longest odds they have been as far as my records go back, which is to the beginning of the millennium,” said Kevin Bradley, the sports book manager at the offshore casino Bovada, said. “Even at those odds, we cannot write a bet on them.”
Kornegay at the Hilton also had the Yankees at 18-1, which put 10 teams in front of them with better odds.
Can all of this be wrong? Of course. Entering September just two years ago, every computer simulation had the Braves and Red Sox at just about 100 percent to make the playoffs, and neither did. And that was with five months of information as opposed to none.
As for the oddsmakers, San Francisco opened at 15-1 last year and won the World Series. Meanwhile, the Phillies had the shortest odds on the board (11-2) and didn’t even make the playoffs, nor did the Angels (third on the board at 7-1). The Yankees (at 13-2) were second.
But these are forums in which emotion plays less of a factor. Vegas casinos are green with money, not envy. And what this all underscores is that the 2013 Yankees, at least when it comes to wide-ranging perception, are being viewed as less formidable as any time since Buck Showalter’s first season (1992).
It is not going to be uncommon to see the Yankees picked fourth or fifth this year. That reflects the top-to-bottom strength of the AL East. But it also speaks to an imperfect storm: Age. Injury. Lack of impact from the farm. Less big spending. And, yes, the quality of divisional foes.
I sense even the Yankees’ front office is uneasy, that the executives are worried about the possibility of the team’s record and attendance both taking a plummet. You wonder if this leads to the kind of finger pointing and infighting that turned the Red Sox’s situation from bad to intolerable last year.
For now, the Yankees want to believe their winning culture buoys them in times of doubt. Last year, they also suffered a slew of key injuries and never seemed to play particularly well for a sustained period, yet won more games than any other AL team. However, the Phillies and Red Sox also thought they had a winning culture going into last year, and both fell apart — Boston all the way down to 69 wins.
The Yankees also hope to weather positional injuries and a general downgrade in talent with a strong pitching staff. And pitching is their strength. But the 1-to-12 staff is not discernibly better than those of their AL East competitors.
Yet, when I told Jorge Posada what the odds were for the Yankees winning a title, the former catcher said, “If I could bet on baseball, I would take 18-1 odds.”
After all, the Yankees still have a strong layer of high-end talent, especially if Curtis Granderson and Mark Teixeira are back playing in a month. If attendance really becomes a concern, then they could be more motivated to make a significant July splash than any time in recent years. If you believe in such things, maybe Mariano Rivera’s retirement announcement is a spiritual motivator (think Ray Lewis).
Also, for the first time in a long time, the Yankees are not beset with the pressures associated with being the overdog. Maybe they can rally around the elevating level of doubt surrounding the clubhouse.
“But this [current perception] can be kind of good, because when you win you don’t want to hear you should have won or you bought it. We want to be viewed as a hard-working team that earned it,” Phil Hughes said. “But this can be kind of good, because when you win you don’t want to hear you should have won or you bought it. We want to be viewed as a hard-working team that earned it.”
They have their hard work cut out for them to make sure their 2013 preseason perception does not become reality.
joel.sherman@nypost.com