Lou Gehrig hadn't played a single game for the Yankees in 1940, yet he was being blamed for them not living up to expectations.
Between 1936 and 1939 the Yankees had won four consecutive championships and were establishing themselves as the premiere team in baseball. Those teams were anchored by Lou Gehrig, who played for the Yankees from 1923 up until 1939 when he was forced into retirement. By 1938, Gehrig had started to show signs of slowing down or at least that something was wrong as he batted .295/.410/.523. While these numbers aren't necessarily bad, they were down from his normal career numbers and down from his 1937 campaign in which he hit .