No other franchise in sports history has had the success like the New York Yankees.

Some of the greatest players in Major League Baseball have worn pinstripes. More than 50 Hall of Famers have played for the Yankees at some point in time.

First, we had the Babe Ruth era, which started up Yankees dynasty. Lou Gehrig finished that off some years later by leading the Bronx Bombers to more World Series victories later on. Then, Joe DiMaggio was the face of the franchise in the 1940s, winning nine World Series Titles. Mickey Mantle then took over, and so on and so forth with Reggie Jackson and Don Mattingly over the later decades.

After not winning a single championship in the 1980s, Derek Jeter took over and led the franchise to five titles in the 1990s and 2000s.

So what now?

Jeter is retired from the game and offensive talent is more limited than ever. The Yankees have always been a franchise built more on offense than defense. Outside of Whitey Ford and Andy Pettitte, the best Yankee players of all time are hitters.

By far the biggest addition for the Yankees in last year's offseason was Masahiro Tanaka. The 25-year-old Japanese pitcher showed a lot of promise this season for the Yankees. Even though the Yankees finished the season 84-78, 12 games behind the Baltimore Orioles in the American League East, Tanaka was a huge bright spot for Yankees fans.

This year, Tanaka's rookie season, Tanaka had an impressive 13-5 record despite playing on a team with poor run support and not benefiting from Mariano Rivera closing behind him. The most impressive stat of Tanaka's first season was his strikeout-to-walk ratio. In 2014, Tanaka had 141 strikeouts and just 21 walks. Most importantly, Tanaka's earned runs against average was just 2.77.

To no one's surprise, Tanaka was voted into the 2014 MLB All Star Game.

Tanaka has shown terrific control of the ball. Although he doesn't have the most powerful fastball, Tanaka's splitter and slider can be lethal. Manager Joe Girardi did a good job of not overusing him during the regular season.

Unfortunately, Tanaka didn't play very much in the second half of the season because of arm discomfort and was placed on the disabled list. Hopefully, this injury won't come up next season or any time at all in the future for Tanaka.

Of course, the Yankees and general manager Brian Cashman have much to do fix on the offensive side, but this is now Tanaka's team. If Tanaka can be the elite pitcher many think he's capable of for the next 10 seasons, the Yankees have a very bright future.

It won't be the same watching someone else lead off without wearing a No. 2 jersey in the Bronx. There's no replacing a player like Jeter, but with the Captain gone, Tanaka begins a new era of Yankees baseball.

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