I hope they sign Burnett, I just hope he is passed his injury problems. I would rather bring back Pettitte then sign Derek Lowe
Burnett would be ideal if he's past his injuries. We'd cost the Blue Jays 10 wins right there just by removing him from their rotation and sticking him in ours. He strikes out a ton of batters. He's a total bandaid though.
Burnett has injury problems, Lowe want to pitch for Boston and not NY, Peavy pitched in the NL west and Sabathia is a couple of cheeseburgers away from a bad back or bad knees. Pettitte is on the way down, Mussina is probably going to retire and Joba belongs in the BP. His inning count will be what this year, 100+? Whoever said this was a good year for starting pitching is crazy. At least as it pertains to the Yankees. At this point I wouldn't care if they spend the money to beef up the offense again. I think spending it on pitching will come back to haunt them again. The obviously should have gotten Santana last year. He would have ended up costing them less than Sabathia and the people who they would have had to trade have no place on this years team anyway. What a waste.
Well, a number of things to address (but thankfully this thread has finally come back to Yankees fans discussing the Yankees.) First, I still want Abreu back. I think his bat in the 3 hole is important. Critical if they don't plan on getting Teixeira. Decline or not, he was the most consistent hitter on the team this year. Plus, an outfield of Nady, Gardner/Melky, Damon scares the piss out of me. Not to mention, with Giambi gone, and Damon in left, that makes Matsui the full-time DH. Does anyone else see a problem here besides me? Don, enough. WTF do you want? You bitch when they pursue pitching. You bitch when they don't. You cry we have too many overpriced bats, but then you say you'd rather beef up the lineup than spend on Sabathia. Here's a newsflash: Santana had a medical anomaly last year when the Yankees were pursuing him. Whether that issue manifests into an actual problem is yet to be determined. However, I'm pretty sure the Yankees considered that carefully before giving up on clear prospects long before they had a chance to prove themselves. (Yet another topic many Yankees fans enjoy bitching about Cashman for: a weakend farm system due to trades.) On the other hand, you have CC Sabathia. A guy who has pitched a ton of innings, yet still keeps going. There's no evidence of damage to his body from the past couple years of overwork. On top of that, you only have to pay him. No lost prospects (regardless of any value tag you'd like to place on said prospects.) I agree that Burnett is a risk. Personally, I'd grab Lowe before Burnett, given the choice. At the same time, you'd be an idiot to say you didn't want to get CC Sabathia, AJ Burnett, and Derek Lowe all in the same winter. Add them to Wang and Chamberlain (who is not going back to the pen so let it go already) and you have a pretty damn good rotation. On top of that, you've still got Hughes, Kennedy, Coke, and Aceves in case any of the above can't go. You're constantly bitching about every move Cashman makes or plans to make. Even if that bitching directly contradicts an argument you previously made. It's clear that Cashman will never do right in your eyes, and that's fine. Just be honest about it. Don't look for new excuses to act like he's the worst GM in sports.
Burnett isn't really as injury prone as people make out, yes he has had some elbow problems, but the last 3 years he's put up almost as many innings as beckett with actually very similar production: Burnett: 522.2 IP, 3.84 ERA, 112 ERA+ Beckett: 579.2 IP, 4.11 ERA, 114 ERA+
What can I say? It's how I feel. Cashman has made these mistakes before and I see him making them again. 140 million for fat toad 2 is simply too much. They will regret it. Besides that, as I said before, he doesn't even pitch well against the AL east. Besides that I can probably go searching back through this very thread and find where you yourself said the Yankees didn't make the playoffs because of offense and not pitching so I'm not sure what argument you are trying to change it to now. I also don't see it as a positive that Sabathia has thrown 500 innings in the last two years while putting on more weight every week. And Mussina is officially retired so they can stop waiting on that now.
ESPN is reporting that Mike Mussina is retring....... let me be the 1st to say congratulations on a great career. While he's no Hall of Famer he certainly is a Hall of Very Good player.
He is a shoe in for the hall of fame. They just discussed it on ESPN and everybody agrees he is in. His winning percentage is about 100 points better than most people who have pitched over the past 18 years and his number of wins is more than 100 over his number of losses.
Did you say that? I saw you say he sucked in the AL last year, and that was summarily refuted. Which you ignored, apparently. But I didn't read anything about the AL East. Maybe I missed it. In any case, I'll provide some more info for you: Career ERA against the following AL East opponents: Baltimore: 2.38 (9 games) Boston: 3.91 (7 games) Yankees: 6.16 (9 games, but obviously not an issue in determining whether you want him on your team) TB: 2.44 (11 games) Toronto: 3.46 (10 games) Total career ERA vs. the AL East? 3.47. That seems pretty good to me. (Incidentally, just in case you're curious to learn what Santana's ERA against the AL East is.... it's 3.54.) Just because Ponson, Rasner, and assorted filler didn't completely shit the bed last year doesn't mean you want to repeat the experiment. They'll have Wang back. That's good. They're losing Moose. That's bad. And regardless of who lost the Yanks more games last year, pitching is undoubtedly more important than hitting, and last year's hitting seemed to be more of a fluke than anything else, between Cano's sucking and the whole team sucking with RISP... and, of course, it never helps when you lose someone like Posada for pretty much the entire season, never mind the injuries to Jeter, A-Rod, Matsui, etc. Know who else was a fat man with a rubber arm? David Wells. He did alright for the Yanks, don't you think?
Like I said Hall of Very Good regardless of what Arestes Destrada says. Only 1 20 win season, and was never at the same level of guys like Pedro, Randy Johnson, Clemens or the other elite pitchers of this generation. Then again if some undeserving reliever like Bruce Sutter can get in I guess it's possible.
Dude. You still drinking that Cashman coolaid? He pulled that BS on the Steinbrenner's last year and they are still regretting it. Once that sign that fat F... Sabathia, he is three cheeseburgers and and two chocolate cones from 300 lbs.
So wait, where exactly did I change my argument? (Unlike you.) I've been saying all along that I want Sabathia, Lowe, Burnett, Teixeira, and Abreu all signed. Moose is gone. Pettitte probably isn't going to be brought back either. We don't have Rasner as a fall-back option anymore. All of that says "We need pitching." Yet, I still maintain that I want significant bats in the lineup. When you go back through the thread, make sure you read the post where I specifically said that this year's needs are totally different than last year's, as well. I think it's a bit ridiculous that you say he's put on weight every week. Exaggerate much? Yes, he's overweight. Yet, he throws a lot of innings, regardless of a perception that he's not in good physical shape. I'll let what Cappy said about Wells make the rest of the point for me. Oh, and Joe, maybe you want to read what I actually wrote, rather than simply react because you perceived I somehow slighted your precious team. I didn't say there was an actual problem. I said there seemed to be something developing. I think Santana proved last year he's pretty far from his elbow blowing out. The point was, you judge a player the best you can with the evidence you have. There's nothing present to believe that Sabathia's weight will negatively affect him in the future.
Let me put it in a way that even you and Cappy can understand. Name one pitcher not named Mike Mussina who has ever lived up to a 6 year contract? Stumped? This slob won't either but, hell, it's not our 140 million bucks so who cares. We just pay it back in ticket prices.
At least Sutter got in because of the splitter revolutionizing power pitching. Mussina was very good throughout his career, but I don't see him as deserving. He might get in, but he shouldn't. He's been a compiler, and didn't even stick it out two more years to get to 300 wins.
WTF is that even supposed to mean? So are we to expect that a 28 year old Cy Young winning pitcher won't still be effective at 34? May as well just stop bringing pitchers in at all. And I just love the whole "We'll just pay it back in ticket prices" argument Yankee fans love to point at. Let me say this in a way even you can understand Don, ticket prices will increase next year. Even for the Royals. At least we attempt to field a winner. FTR: I can't answer your question because I never pay attention to length of contracts around the league, and most I do pay attention to, I don't recall a month later. It doesn't matter to me. You sign whoever makes your team better, for however long and for how much the market demands, and you hope that every year that player pays dividends. If you'd rather just sit around and piss and moan about every single move, why bother rooting for a team at all? So Don, let me ask you a question: If you were GM of the New York Yankees, right now, what would you attempt to do?
