just curious.

No direspect to Mo, but I really don't want to hear how hard it is for A-Rod to be A-Rod.

The Yankees should re-sign Moose, but I didn't think it would take more than $12 million. The market is tight for pitching.

Heh. Obi-Wan Rivera. It fits >;) (And no Juan Rivera cracks, even if he makes it back to the Bronx.)

Suppan
SPLIT 32G 190.0IP 207H 100R 21HR 69BB 104SO 12W 7L 0Sv 96.3P/GS 1.45WHIP .277BAA 4.12ERA

Wright
SPLIT 30G 140.1IP 157H 76R 10HR 57BB 84SO 11W 7L 0Sv 84.3P/GS 1.52WHIP .283BAA 4.49ERA

They are very similar pitchers and yet Suppan is going to get $10/year for FOUR years! The first $4 million of Wright's $7 million optio are already gone, they are sunk costs. So do you want to pay Wright $3 million for ONE year or Suppan $10 million per year for FOUR years? That is a no brainier!

Also, in a free agent market like this one - where guys like Suppan are expected to make $10 million per year for four years, you could trade Wright for something as Spring Training approaches.

Do I WANT to keep Wright? No, the guy drives me bananas but based on what else is out there and all the stories about MLB owners looking to spend like drunken sailors in a Bangkok house of ill repute... seems like an easy call to me.

but yes, props to mr. rivera for being the first to stick up for him. now that november has rolled around, it seems the time is finally right.

no disrespect to mo, but the entire team had an entire season to step up. anything now seems to be a bit of an empty gesture. the time to do this was july or august.

this is why i don't hold the captain's latest remarks (the "he's here so we support him" line) against him. he's consistent.

i don't know... mariano rivera is a mythological creature deserving of as much respect as anyone in the game, but i think patting him on the back for this is a bit much.

4 I have no beef w/ Mo. He's the best - and is as close to a true role model as any professional athlete can be. I will (hopefully) be there when he's reading his HOF acceptance speech, and I can imagine I'll be a bit choked up. I appreciate his defense of A-Rod, I just cringed a bit at this part '"It's not easy being himself sometimes," Rivera said. "It's tough on him."'. But - at least he said something real.

I guess I'm just sick of the A-Rod drama, and now a bit sorry I've contributed to it a bit here this morning. My bad.

Then again, $7MM for a year of "the devil you know" might not be such a bad deal.

Could go either way on that one.

Well... you get a day or 2 of grief from the media, and then you are forgotten.

What about if you are one of the greatest players in history, work very hard, give up your position for your team, humble yourself to Derek, and average .290/.390/.540/40/120
for your team?

If you are ARod, you are literally put under a microscope and hounded by the media, like no one in history before.

If there was NO media blitz on ARod... if he were judged solely by his performance and his perceived character, how many of you would EVER consider trading this guy?

If we drive ARod out of NY and he is traded, next to the Babe, it will be known as the worst trade in the history of baseball. The Yankees will never live it down, and it will be rubbed in our noses even when we lose the ALDS in 2049.

And J. Wright costs us 3mil next year. Who can we get for 3mil who will put up similar numbers?

you can get back something for him instead of losing him for nothing. even if you pay a team 3 mill of his 7 it beats cutting him loose.

As for the Mystique of Mo (and that, ironically, is the Real), he's done nothing to dissuade me from believe me that he's the real soul of this team, whereas Jeter is obviously the heart. It's sad that we get caught up in the comparison BS that certain media types have pushed as soon as A-Rod came to town, and I may be naive to think that no one on the team really wants that...

But whether they say it now or during the season, you have to admit that they remained focused on larger issues throughout the season despite what the fans and media were saying, so I'm willing to give a player like Mo the benefit of the doubt because he generally doesn't have to say much, and doesn't have much to say anyway. Which in a way makes what he does say all the more profound to the fans. That's the Mystique of Mo... >;)

1. It's not that Jeter has any special magic, as opposed to any other player. It's that he has a position - team captain - that no other player has. No matter who the other player is, I think it's appropriate for the captain to express some support on behalf of the team.

2. It's not just what he didn't say, it's what he did say. He could have said, "Everyone has slumps," or "Everyone makes errors." Instead, he said, "Everyone gets booed." That's curt and dismissive, and worse than saying nothing at all.

3. I'm not blaming any of the problems on Jeter. I'm not saying he could have solved them. Maybe it would have made absolutely no difference at all - but it would have been worth the try, and it would have been the right thing to do. Hell, it might even have helped the team win, and it certainly couldn't have hurt.

An analogy: I was at some meaningless late-season game this year where the Yankees were getting killed. Ninth inning, Jeter hit a routine grounder to third, an easy out - but he still busted his ass down the line. He did it because, well, that's what you do - and because maybe, once every couple of years, it could start a miracle rally.

It's kind of the same. Standing up for a teammate is what you do. And who knows, there's that slim chance that it really will matter.

It would have reflected well on Jeter if he had said something supportive, just as running out that grounder reflected well on him. Instead, I thought his comments did not reflect well on him.

Notice that my feelings have absolutely nothing to do with the other player. It's only about Jeter and his role as captain.

By the way, I'm surprised no one's followed up on Jon Heyman's SI piece which included a notice that the Yankees are interested in bringing Pettitte back.

http://tinyurl.com/y5wq3d

also, matsuzaka said outright that he'd prefer the yankees over all others.

[crossing fingers]

22 JL, I thought she was being sarcastic, honestly... but you have articulated very well one side of my internal conflict with Jeter's stance this season.

If the Yanks are going to pony up for Matsuzaka, and I think they are, why not save the money owed to Wright when Rasner et al are much cheaper? Besides, the roster spot is valuable too. Follow me here:

Yanks' payroll: 06/07/change, as best I can tell:

A-Rod: 16M/16M/0
Jeter: 19M/20M/+1
Giambi: 18M/21M/+3
Moose: 17M/12M/-5*
Unit: 16M/16M/0
Sheff+Abreu: 17.3M/15M/-2.3**
Damon: 13M/13M/0
'Zilla: 13M/13M/0
Mo: 10.5M/10.5M/0
Jorge: 9M/12M/+3
Pavano: 8M/10M/+2*
Farns: 5M/5.25M/+.25
Myers: 1.15M/1.25M/+.1

*Presuming he signs for $12M/year
**Presuming Sheff is traded, only Abreu counts for next year
*They have to pay him anyway; if he's hurt again, sub in Karstens or Henn with an extra $400K say

So, those 13 guys, in total, make $2.05M more next year than they did this year.

Figure a backup C and a backup IF cost about $1M each, which is about what Cairo and Stinnett/Fasano made this year. That's 15 guys, still just $2.05M more.

Cano, Wang, Proctor, Bruney, and Melky will all be around next year. I think each will end up with $20-$40K more, so say they go up by $200K. That's 20 guys, $2.25M more.

Figure one of the Kevins and either Rasner or Karstens makes the team, in place of Bernie (~$2M) and Villone ($2M). That's about another $1.5M saved, so 22 guys, $.75M more.

Trading Sheff will hopefully add a young pitcher; he probably adds $1M. So 23 guys, $1.75M more.

That leaves 2 spots - a 1B/DH type and hopefully Matsuzaka.

The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of nixing Wright. I'm not even sure what he'd fetch on the trade market, so why take the chance of picking up the option?

EX-cellent...

Picking up Wright's option will cost more than $3 million. I'm pretty sure that the buyout doesn't count as salary, so that just costs $4 million. If they pick up the option, it's $7 million + $2.8 million luxury tax. So the marginal cost is actually $5.8 million.

Of course, because of that same luxury tax, they can't sign a $5.8 million player with that money. It could only be a $4.14 million player. So the numbers are a little different, but the outcome is basically the same - for that amount of money, you might as well keep Wright.

Q to everyone - have we seen the last of Andy Phillips?

If it keeps them away from Suppan, we already come out ahead.

Sheff & Phillips for Duke - straight up.

42 Those are not pretty numbers he's had the last couple of years, plus he was hurt. That's not an even trade.

Platooning on the Yankees is often a problem. Joe doesn't seem to like it much, and he's frankly not very good at it. Rather than a lefty-righty platoon, he's likely to play the guy whose belly is more full of guts at the moment.

Also, Joe's 12-pitcher fetish means that the Yankees only have 4 bench players. I hate using a spot on a guy with Mxyzptlk's limited skill set.

looks like he only made 2 errors at 1B, too, but i didn't check the more detailed fielding numbers.

looks like he only made 2 errors at 1B, too, but i didn't check the more detailed fielding numbers.

"So Mo has come to A-Rod's defense in a statement at his restaurant last night. It occurs to me that what someone on the blog comments that follows wrote is true for me as well: when I look back over these Yankees 10 years from now, I think I will remember Mo most of all. Jeter is always big in my heart, and I will always love Jorge, but when it comes to a man who is the epitome of class and professionalism and the Yankees dynasty from 1996 to 2001, I think Mo beats them all. This is a guy who builds churches in the off season!

Next year is his last year on contract and he wants two more after that. We've got like 3 years of Mo left, at the most, and then one weekend in Cooperstown. Let's make the best of them."

Mo is the best. My brothers and I grew up in CT and we are planning a trip to Mo's place in New Rochelle soon.

54 Excellent.

I also like the "Obi-Wan Rivera" from 8.

Good thing it is not Obi-Ruben Rivera because then Jeter would have to keep an eye on his lightsaber ;-)

i was unaware of this rumor until today:
"But there may be loopholes. It can be in the Japanese team's best interest for the winning bid to come from a team with which the player wants to sign, since that is the only way the Japanese team gets money. So a Japanese team could make an under-the-table deal with a U.S. team in which only a portion of the winning bid would have to be paid.

When the Seattle Mariners won the rights to sign Ichiro Suzuki in 2000, there were rumors they paid just $4 million of the $13 million winning bid to the Orix Blue Wave."

(from a nj.com article today... a huge link)

please tell me that ca$hman is working this angle....

59 Thanks, Bama and YFIB. Obi-Wan was one of those "Hmm!" things; hope it catches on at some point.

57 Yo, I heard that Obi-Wan Rivera's a baaaad mutha(shut yo' mouth!)

"what, officer? no... i was just bakin' for my momma..."

(he sold them the cocaine.)

that's my PSA.

They're Hall of Famers, every one (add Dave Kingman to the mix as well). But the annual trophy should be the Gary Sheffield Award.

hi.
sure, drugs seem cool on tv and in the moving pictures at your local cinema, but don't believe it.
they'll do nothing but turn you into an unbearable, rude, destitute wreck.
like bobby brown.
the singer.
not the baseball guy.
he didn't do drugs... and he's a doctor. so... he did pretty well for himself.
but really, drugs will kill you. they killed elvis, and he was a lot cooler than you'll ever be.
...especially if you use drugs.
...because you'll be dead.
so don't.
really.

or watch any "behind the music" things... which you really should avoid anyway... but yeah.

--hooker's ass?

...can i swing by for bit?

Or was "backup" a suggestion?

no further questions.

we are a classy bunch.

... or is Pete Rose really Hal Chase back from the dead?

92 And, of course, another day, another A-Rod discussion. I really liked with you said re: Jeter, JL, especially given that the Cap'n made very public statements in the press about Mr. Steroid Giambi when he was going through his troubles. I'm too tired to find a cite to such an article now. Maybe Monday. ;)

Hey, when life gives you lemons, yadda-yadda-yadda...

brown, vazquez, pavano, weaver.

not many teams survive that 0-4 run.

the one decision that cost us 2 titles was choosing vazquez over schilling.

While I do NOT want to trade ARod anyway, this is just another example of why not. Pitchers, unless you know their entire history (and even that's no guarantee) are just too damn fragile.

In July of last year, I'm sure we would have traded ARod for Liriano, straight up, if we could have. We would have lost years of super production for a hope and a prayer.

I think you HAVE to draft and raise pitching in the minors. Trying to buy it is just too expensive and speculative. There have been MANY big contract pitching busts (is Matzusaka the next?).

The Mets were once great at bringing up pitching. Its long term, but I think you have to skew your system to focus on pitching... get some inhouse experts, and raise them carefully (read: don't overuse before 24 yrs old).

Thankfully, it looks like we have some decent pitching coming in late 2007.

(I like that 'hooker's ass' thing).

a) piss off scott boras, the man with a ton of big name/talented players under his spell.

b) it would make int'l players less likely to want to deal with you in the future, your reputation would be tarnished in these circles.

3) you'd only be delaying matsuzaka's arrival by one year. if he's a free agent in '08, he'll be able to choose where he goes. if i were him, i'd go to the nearest divisional competitor of the team that screwed me over.

anybody else have any thoughts?