Twins Fan: I think the Yankees should give us Cano, Hughes, Melky, and Joba for Santana.

Yankees Fan: No way! We'll give you Horne, Gardner, Eric and Shelley Duncan, and TJ Beam.

...and so on, and so forth, and scooby-dooby-doo...

I heard that the Yankees tried to throw in Pavano, but that the Twins said that if they were going to take him, the Yankees would need to add IPK, Hughes, Joba, Cano, Melky, and Jeter. Still, it almost seems fair....

mehmattski: What song is that from. It rings a bell.

I'm really tired of the Santana talk. With any luck, we don't get him and we get to keep the kids (including 2/5ths of our projected starting rotation and our starting center fielder).

I'll take my chances with possible free agency next year, and the development of Hughes, Jobba , Melky and the other youngsters.

For those of us who have seen the farm depleted year in and year out from efforts to get the reigning "superstar", it is scary to hear so many want to go back to that type of thinking.

I think its from Sly....

The rumor mill has already passed the point of stupidity on Johan...I hate to say it, but I'm already bored with Santana stories.

Although in all fairness, Olney raised a good point with regard to the Twinkies' organization and its relationship with its fan base. I highly doubt this deal will get done right now unless someone overpays dramatically. I don't think I could stomach Hughes, Melky, Ajax and $150MM or so for Santana. He would have to be a CY candidate for the next five years to even begin to justify that.

3 4 - Sho'nuff!
"Every Day People" by Sly & the Family Stone
Love that tune!

Yep, it reminds me how old I am. :)

Keep the kids!

I just spent the last fifteen minutes trying to investigate the connection between the song and the infamous mystery-solving dog. Interestingly, the show Scooby-Doo Where Are You debuted in 1968, the same year that the Sly & The Family Stone was released. As some fellow evolutionary biologists might say: looks like we've got some convergence on our hands.

From Goldman:

LOU GEHRIG: I wish I had a better sense of his defense. In recent years, I've frequently had the thought that Joe Torre would have benched him for Doug Mientkiewicz. To paraphrase Paul Simon, "A man he sees what he wants to see and disregards the rest."

The truth hurts the most...

[8.] I awlays thought it was Shoobie-doobie doo. My track record for knowing the right lyrics is pretty bad, though.

BTW: Career RATE2 according to Baseball Prospectus:

Lou Gehrig: 100
Doug Mientkiewicz: 100
Jason Giambi: 90
Miguel Cairo: 92
Andy Phillips: 92
Josh Phelps: 84
Don Mattingly: 102

Using old lyrics.... it reminds me of a 1968 song with the lyrics ..."if you knew, what I knew, what you knew....what I knew"

I think that is what $man is humming as he reads this blog. :)

3 This time around, the farm system wasn't depleted by trading away the youngsters. It was depleted by not having first-round picks; the few they had were poorly used.

You can't just say "don't trade youngsters for veterans." The trick is not to make bad trades. The last such trade I can think of was the Knoblauch deal, and I seem to remember that one working out OK.

I don't want to see the Yankees mortgage the farm, but I'd pull the trigger if the Twins would accept Melky Cabrera, Austin Jackson and Ian Kennedy, perhaps with another low ceiling prospect thrown in - we're talking about getting an undisputed ace in return after all.

8 The scooby-dooby-doo reference is not to the cartoon but to Frank Sinatra's 1966 hit, "Strangers in the Night." Sinatra's sui generis scat signature (derived albeit from Ella Fitzgerald)is famously used in the song.

Very impressive, Johnny C!

Bartap74: How do you replace Melky in that trade? With another 30+ year old outfielder next year? Rowland at the cost of $10M or more per year?

It should be noted that swapping Santana for Kennedy in the Yankees' 2008 starting rotation doesn't solve the "Who's Gonna Pitch All Those Innings" problem. Given that the Yankees would like to see 1000 innings from their starting pitchers, it currently sit as:

Wang (220)
Mussina (170?)
Hughes (150)
Chamberlain (130)
Kennedy (180)

Which totals all of 870 innings, or only 5.1 IP per game.

I don't see this problem getting solved unless the Yankees convince Pettitte to return. Even then, it might be best to have either a six man rotation or have one day be JobaMoose: The Two Headed Monster in order to protect both the old fragile arm and the young prospect arm.

George King ended his column today (http://tinyurl.com/3a6amz) with this...

"Though the Yankees certainly have the money [...] they may not have the talent to land Santana. It generally is assumed throughout baseball that the Yankees won't include Joba Chamberlain in a deal. But will a package of Phil Hughes, Ian Kennedy and Melky Cabrera, who could replace Torii Hunter in center, be enough to top other clubs?"

Whoa there George! Hughes and IPK? Santana better pitch 400 innings a year for that.

Anyone got any analysis that shows what 200 IP of Santana + 200 IP of pitcher du jour (Karstens, Igama, Rasner, whoever) averages out to?

18 I don't think you have to look much further than the 2007 Twins, who had Boof Bonser (173 IP, 85 ERA+) and Sydney Ponson (37 IP, 64 ERA+).

14 How about WANG, Melky Cabrera, and Austin Jackson? Would you do that one?

19 my eyes hurt looking at that.

and i agree with you in 17 - there are a lot of inning unaccounted for as it stands (and i believe even with pettitte).

17 If Pettitte returns, here's my modest proposal - which has zero chance of actually taking place.

Use a 6-man starting rotation, except that you pencil Pettitte and Wang in every fifth day and work the others around them. The rotation would look like this:

Pettitte, Wang, Hughes, Joba, Kennedy,
Pettitte, Wang, Mussina, Hughes, Joba,
Pettitte, Wang, Kennedy, Mussina, Hughes,
Pettitte, Wang, Joba, Kennedy, Mussina,
Pettitte, Wang, Hughes, Joba, Kennedy,
and so on.

The kids (and Mussina) pitch on rests of 5, 5, 5, 7 days. (If it seems like a good idea, they could pitch an inning of junk relief during the 7-day rest.) That would give Pettitte and Wang 32 starts apiece, and the other 4 each get 24.

20 The Twins wouldn't touch that.

20 get rid of wang? hes the only sure thing in our rotation!

i think the twins are in a pretty difficult bind- as buster olney says- how can you trade so much and pay so much when theres just a year to wait. i think that the teams involved keep circling their prey to make sure that the other vultures don't feast, but at the same time, no one eats.

22 You forgot the Mussina Whines Like a Little Girl Problem, regarding him and regular rest.

I say Moose and Karstens become league-average backups to the kids. They come in expecting to throw 2-3 innings every few days, rather than 5-6 innings every five days. This could work something like this:

Day 1: Wang (7+ IP)
Day 2: Joba (5 IP), Moose (2+ IP)
Day 3: Pettitte (7+ IP)
Day 4: Hughes (5+ IP), Karstens (2 IP)
Day 5: Kennedy (5+ IP) Moose (2 IP)
Day 6: Wang (7+ IP)
Day 7: Joba (5 IP), Karstens (2+ IP)

And so on. In addition to reducing the workload on JobaKenHughes, the rest of the bullpen becomes a whole lot more concentrated into the 7th and 8th innings. Some combination of Farsnworth, Britton, Edwar, and Ohlendorf should be able to bridge to Mo as needed, and none of them would be required to go on back to back days.

20 Wang is arbitration eligible now, so no. The penny-pinching Twins will prefer IPK (arb eligible in 2011) or Hughes (arb eligible in 2010).

22 Girardi seems to be a progressive enough thinker that he might be willing to try that. I still think Joba starts the year in the minors to stretch him out, but that just postpones the idea until June-ish.

13 You are correct in principal. But in this deal, if you consider the WINS we gain, and the WINS we lose, plus $35m+ to pay Santana and replace the other 2 players, it's not that tasty a deal.

Santana is tempting. But at what price? And I still think (1) He might be a FA next year (2) if not, Kazmir/Bedard/CC/Haren/Harden would be enough. Our rotation should be very good. Replace our #5 with one of the above, and we are in very good shape.. without lsoing any kids.

14 "Undisputed ace" works only in the past tense. The list of players who dominated from ages 23-28 and continued to dominate from ages 29-34 begins and ends with Greg Maddox. Santana will almost certainly regress. The question is by how much.

Melky + A-Jax = the present and future in center field. Not worth the risk.

16 I don't think Melky is all that impressive. He's pretty good defensively but he's mediocre with the bat and hasn't shown signs of developing any power. We have three outfielders and a DH without him, and Tabata will arrive eventually. If the price for the best pitcher in the AL is dealing with a Rowland type acquisition, I'm still all for it.

25 I thought about the MWLALG problem, bu tI figured this plan would at least give him a regular pattern of use. Hopefully, that would satisfy his OCD - especially since the alternative is even more irregular.

JobaKenHughes - how about Cerberus, the three-headed dog?

26 Do we actually know that Girardi is a progressive thinker? In most ways, he seems like a good old-fashioned baseball man from the control-freak school. I would be very surprised if he'd do anything especially radical as a freshman manager.

30 Do we actually know that Girardi is a progressive thinker?

No, not for sure, but it looks like he is one.

A 6-man rotation could be made to seem un-radical. That team to the north is talking about using a six-man rotation; if they do, that will help a lot. And, if Joba starts the year in the minors, that can be the excuse: "Joba is ready to come back to the majors, but there is no one to bump from the rotation, so we are going to switch to a modified six-man rotation. This will help keep the older guys fresh* and not put stress on the younger arms**."

*Everyone is comfortable with that concept already

**Thanks to the Joba Rules, most everyone should be comfortable with that concept too

31 The next time someone suggests that the Yankees' Cerebus of Young Pitchers shouldn't be on innings caps, I will point them to the following web page:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/pi/gl.cgi?n1=priorma01&t=p&year=2007

No data for this season. Sorry!

31 A 6-man rotation, perhaps. Having two pitchers on a 5-day rotation and the other 4 on a 6-day plan, much less likely.

In general, I think a 6-man rotation is a terrible idea. This is a special case, with 3 young pitchers being worked in simultaneously. But ordinarily, I'd rather see a return to a 4-man rotation. Rany Jazayerli over at BP has done lots of work showing that high pitch counts can abuse a pitcher - but he also advocates a 4-man rotation. (http://tinyurl.com/2mrxvj)

Weaver's Seventh Law: It's easier to find four good starters than five.

(Part 1 of the Jazayerli article is worth reading as well: http://tinyurl.com/3crzub)

Here's a question: when common practice switched from a 4 man rotation to a 5 man rotation, what was the reaction?

25 ,30 The Mussina problem isn't as big as you think.

33 I agree. For that matter I've preached from the mountain top that a five man rotation is a bad idea. Most notably because there isn't a stitch of efficacious data out there that isn't team or player specific that provides any evidence that five man rotations lengthen careers or help statistically. It is hogwash today, was hogwash yesterday, and will be hogwash tomorrow. A five man rotation with each pitcher on an arbitrary pitch count not specific to that player's history and physiology is -- next to the NFL's use of its most talented and athletic players on only one side of the ball -- the most inefficient use of talent in professional sport.

It is nothing more than MLB teams allowing data that applies to the aggregate to dictate decisions arbitrarily without actually benefiting from the anticipated result.

If the Yankees had any guts they would start Joba, Hughes, Wang, and Kennedy, with a fifth starter used when consecutive games played makes it necessary to do so, and to provide some rest throughout the season. With Pettitte in the rotation, Kennedy becomes what used to be the spot starter back in the days of four man rotations. If it aint broke, dont fix it, and there never was anything wrong with a four man rotation, but treating each rotation and player individually was just too much for baseball people to wrap their little minds around, so they simply threw the baby out with the bath water.

34

Modern thought-That it would alleviate many injuries.

Traditional thought-That is was an overreaction to a limited number of injuries that were player specific rather than as to the whole.

It was wrong then and it is wrong now. I do find it rather amusing that the oldest and most effective pitchers in the league came up in four man rotations, and the oft-injured tend to be those who have been babied since little league.

There is no evidence that is any more than anecdotal that moving to a five man rotation has had any effect other than diluting each pitching staff and ultimately lowering the bar for pitchers (e.g. A 4.50 ERA defined as "Quality") -- especially through providing many pitchers who should never have stepped foot on a major league mound, jobs as fifth starters and relief pitchers -- in general, hurting the level of play in the game overall.

36 But there is evidence that IP should be limited for pitchers under 25 or so. That's why I'd still keep the kids on a longer rotation.

36 Another effect of the 5-man rotation is that it takes up a slot that could be used for another bench player. I hate the 12-man pitching staff.

37 Agreed. Just so long as it is player specific, rather than arbitrary. That is why I believe that Mussina and Kennedy should be used to spell Joba and Hughes throughout the year, but that a four man rotation should be used, thereby alowing the team(s) to jettison what amounts to unqualified and well below average relief pitchers from the team, and from the league. The goal should be to use the fewest number of relief innings at season's end, rather than go into the season knowing you will put well over 100 games in the hands of pitchers who should not be recieving major league checks. How this has become accepted practice based on nothing more than baseball people's feelings of inferiority of those managing the "Studies" and fear to speak up and question the results, is beyond me. Why not just let the Doctors and Bill James write your lineup and design a computer model to dictate in-game decisions? Just think how much money teams could save without managers.

38 Agreed. Trading a spot traditionally manned by at the very least a journeyman position player or PH for a well below average relief pitcher is lunacy.

39 I'm a bit confused here. How does going to a 4-man rotation reduce the number of relief innings? If anything, wouldn't that increase them since said 4 starters would tend to tire a bit faster?

41 I'm going to assume he meant that Mussina and Kennedy can act as second starters and therefore reduce the need to have someone like Sean Henn in the major leagues.

But even so, how do the Yankees get innings that way? Bringing back the chart from 17 and updating for the rotation proposed in 39 :

Wang (260 IP)
Pettitte (260 IP)
Hughes (150 IP), Mussina (160)
Joba (130 IP), Kennedy (180)

Would give the Yankees' top six a total of 1140 innings pitched. I know that I wouldn't have as much of a problem with Wang coming in on three days rest, his sinker probably is better, and he's into the part of the career where he could be stretched. Pettitte, on the other hand (again for this exercise we're assuming he's back), has never thrown more than 220 innings in a season and who knows if his elbow can handle it.

The rest of the innings (about 300 of them) for the pitching staff would come relieving Wang and Pettitte, with Mo held out for the 9th inning of close games:

Rivera (80 IP)
Farnsworth (60 IP)
Britton (60 IP)
Ramirez (60 IP)
Ohlendorf (60 IP)

41 I don't think there's any strong reason to believe that pitchers will tire more quickly on 3 days' rest. Enough rest is enough rest; more than enough isn't necessarily better.

There is one way it might reduce relief innings. You're taking the games started by your fifth starter - presumably the worst of the bunch - and distributing them among four who can (one hopes) pitch a ilttle further into the game.

43 See 42 . Its not the number of days rest I'm worrying about as much as the total number of pitches thrown.

As for getting rid of the Henn types, I'd think going to a 4-man rotation would open up a bench spot. I doubt they'd go to a 4-man and jettison a reliever in the process. In addition, you can have a 5-man and still get rid of an extra reliever, a 7 man pen is absurd and results in a) Having at least one crappy pitcher in there who is b) hardly ever used anyways. You can just go to a 6-man pen and forget about having a LOOGY or ROOGY or whatnot.

42 That's a lot of innings from Wang and Pettite. I think banking on two guys to throw 250+ innings and not be dead by the postseason is a lot of wishful thinking.

44 Following up, with a 6-man pen and our large number of guys in the minors, we could play the hot hand and just rotate through the last relief spot or two with the Dundler-Mifflin Infinity Shuttle (TM). Bring up Sanchez, he starts stinking, send him back down and bring up Beam, etc.

All of this is a great exercise in progressive (or in some cases regressive) thinking, but I doubt any of it will happen. The only thing I think we can count on is the innings caps for the rookies, and without Pettitte, it means rough times ahead for the Yankees.

Fans will see Joba leaving after the fifth inning with a 2-0 lead, and watch as TJ Beam coughs it up immediately. As the soft underbelly of the Yankees' pen gets exposed, there will be a push to forget about the innings caps. Hopefully cooler heads will prevail, as I for one am willing to sacrifice a bit in 2008 to see all three of these guys pitching in pinstripes for a decade.

Ok, I think the withdrawl is really starting to get to me: how many days til P&C?