This was surely not what they all envisioned, back at the giddy press conferences or over filet mignon at the recruiting dinners, where they doubtless dreamed of long October runs and postseason glory.
Both Jacoby Ellsbury and Masahiro Tanaka signed big-bucks contracts in the winter before the 2014 season, but both were not nearly the factors they hoped to be in their first Yankee taste of the postseason, Tuesday's 3-0 wild card loss to Houston.
Ellsbury did not start and only popped up as a pinch-hitter in the eighth inning. Tanaka was the Yanks' choice to start the game, but only threw five innings and 83 pitches, yanked because of two mistakes and the fact that the sluggers who bashed those blunders out of the park were due up in the sixth.