Nobody wants him at the astronomical price Boras is trying to get for him, in these financial times. I can count on 1 hand the teams that haven't looked into signing him.
i think its more that they dont want the 140 million dollar price tag. Who wouldnt want a guy who won an al cy young and then went to the nl and carried a team on his back to the playoffs?
Uh...what other offers have you heard that he has? I hear he has none. Sure everybody would like him for 70 million. Even I would. That's not even the point. He doesn't want to play for NY and we are wasting our time waiting around for him. I'll tell you one thing, if we lose out on him we may end up with none of the three. We apparently have soured on Burnette and I'm not sure we have that much real interest in Lowe either. If Boston gets Teixiera and we end up with nothing I'll give up baseball for the next few years much to the delight of most people here.
Don, I have no problem with you as a poster, but you must have some quota on uninformed posts you need to hit each day. The only reason CC doesn't have 30 offers to choose from right this moment is because the Yankees priced out everyone else 10 minutes into free agency. It is the point that everyone would like to offer him a 4-year 70M contract. It's impossible at this point though, just because the Yankees made sure those offers would be laughed off out of the gate. Sure, there are other places he wants to play. Mostly on the West Coast. That's home for him. Big deal. Saying no to $160 is borderline mentally ill. He'll eventually say yes, if for no other reason than no one else will be able to make a competitive offer. And that's why no one has to this point. As for him, why should he say yes yet? He hasn't even heard what a team like the Dodgers would consider reasonable. He's in the driver's seat, and if I were him, I wouldn't say anything either. We're not wasting time on him though. The Yankees are approaching everyone else the same way they would regardless of whether CC was even a free agent right now. The money they offered him is considered spent, and they'll continue spending as though they simply chalked that cash up to operating loss. They look to be debating whether to pick Burnett OR Lowe at this point. Andy is almost surely coming back. Word is, it's only a matter of how much at this point. I don't want to see you give up baseball. I would like you to be a little bit reasonable once in while, but there's no reason to give up fandom based on a single player signing or not, or even an entire free agency period. Seriously, did you watch the Yankees in the 80s, or were you a 96er?
See, now I don't know what to root for. And I'm still waiting for you to tell me that Pedro Martinez's six-year contract wasn't worth it.
Maybe you are blind. I told you they didn't get their money's worth at least three times. He did not stay healthy for the length of the contract. Here is something you can root for. I also said three times that nobody but Mussina has. "The Angels of Anaheim appeared to be the probable winners of the Mark Teixeira sweepstakes early on when it seemed to decide to focus its attentions on him rather than C.C. Sabathia. But now the pendulum seems to be swinging the other way because the Angels don't want to give Tex a 10-year deal. Anaheim appears to be OK with signing the Gold Glove first baseman for seven years but no more. Word is that now Anaheim will offer Sabathia a $137.5 million, six-year deal. (Los Angeles Times)" PRAY he takes it. http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/20607408/
Why would anyone but you pray he takes it? You're probably the single Yankees fan who is dead-set against getting CC Sabathia, and for absolutely no reason other than you think he might be unhealthy. This news does make me happy though. It increases the chances that both Sabathia and Teixeira could be wearing pinstripes in 2009!
I know, but I wanted you to explicitly say, "Pedro Martinez's contract wasn't worth it." So you ARE basing this on nothing but health. I point to my Ed Whitson example again. This might be the craziest thing I've ever heard. Seriously. I'm not saying that to be snarky, just being honest. I don't know if I could find anyone in the entire world who would make that claim that Pedro's contract wasn't worth it and that Moose's was a better deal. Pedro Martinez signed a six-year, $75 million contract before 1999. He won the Cy Young twice, finished second and third in the voting in two other years, pitched to an ERA+ over 200 four times. Over 200, dude! That's insane! Pedro's WORST year with the Red Sox was better than Mussina's career average, and better than three of Moose's years with the Yanks. Pedro's opponent OPS was only over .600 once (in the final year of the contract), and is still a respectable number. Moose's was never under .600 in his entire time with the Yanks. Please... do it yourself. Go back and look at Pedro's stats. Look at Moose's. And don't get me wrong. I like Mussina. He's one of my all-time favorites, and I think that he was worth his contract, as well. But Pedro outperformed Moose over the length of his contract by leaps and bounds, even given any injuries he might have had (which wasn't as much as you thought, although you conveniently ignored that in the previous post). This absolutely baffles me. I'm astounded that the cognitive dissonance hasn't made your head explode already.
I think you're right about the Yankees pricing everyone out. But then, I also think the Santana deal last year has turned the market sideways a bit this year. Or, maybe it just put everyone a little on their heels. The Twins tried to do something that had been done to death in recent prior years - pump up the market by playing the Red Sox and Yankees against each other. Then the unthinkable happened - the Yankees and Red Sox stopped playing along. Pretty much at the same time, leaving the Twins out in the cold. I think what the Yankees have done is say, "Here's our competitive offer. It's our only offer. Don't dick around with us." If that's the plan, it's a good thing for the Yankees AND the Red Sox. Every ridiculous contract just begets more ridiculous contracts. Not that $140 million is chump change, but a bidding war could easily enough turn that into $150 million. The Angels, for their part, seem to be playing the "west coast" angle. So good for them. Pussies.
You still can't seem to understand. I don't know how to make it any clearer but I will try one more time. What I said originally and what I continue to say is that no pitcher other than Mussina has lived up to a 6 year contract. I also said that doesn't mean Martinez didn't have good years, of course he did. He didn't have 6 complete years and only a fool would try to argue that he did. As far as Boston was concerned he was through and his experience in NY would indicate they were right. It really isn't difficult. You try to hang on to him as your saviour to my argument and it just doesn't hold water. Give it up.
So now, Pettitte looks like he may be headed to the Dodgers. Not sure that matters but it's just another perfect example of Cashman's incompetence.
And if you needed any further evidence to support this statement, I present to you: Wow Don. You've lost all sense of rational thought at this point. Seriously. He totally ripped your argument to shreds in the post that this one responded to. You're wrong. And not just wrong, but utterly and completely incorrect. I'm actually going to expand upon this a bit, because I think you make a very good point, and it also allows me to address another issue you previously brought up that I didn't respond to yet. I think you might be right about the Yankees position being "Here's what we're offering, take it or leave it." And I think you're right that a lot of it has to do with Santana, but I think there's more to it than that. Last year was the perfect storm to end the Yankees/Sox ends-against-the-middle thing. First, you had a Red Sox team that had zero need for Santana. More than that, it would have cost them players they weren't fond of parting with. They were in the game for the sole reason that they want to prevent the Yankees from grabbing him. (Obviously no team would be unhappy to have Santana, but still, there was no overwhelming need for him.) The Yankees were in it half to get a top-tier pitcher, and half to prevent Boston from getting him. When both sides realized they were being played against each other, it was only a matter of time before both determined that young potential outweighed a massive salary and loss of said talent to be too much risk/reward. Then, you add in ARod to last year's mix. The Yankees knew they were opening a big can of worms by bringing back ARod after that fiasco. But in that case, the reward/risk was greater. I doubt the Yankees have any desire to be burned like that again. Boston has a lot of talent, so they can afford to not be played as well. Plus, you add in Tampa Bay to the divisional mix, and there's no reason for the Yankees and Sox to solely concentrate on each other anymore. Good for both of us! -------------- Now as for the other point I wanted to address, it is regarding Hal Steinbrenner. Obviously he made the "fire under your ass" comment about Sabathia's offer not being there forever. It prompted you to wax nostalgic for Ol' George, and you showed regret for Hal's assumption to the throne, rather than Hank. Well, I'm here to tell you not to worry. They're still "both" in charge. Hal's just the money-mind. He's got the far better business sense, and that's why he has the reigns. Hank's still going to be firing off at the mouth though, so don't worry. Basically, what you have is the end result of George's former son-in-law being too stupid to know a good thing when he had it. He was the right mix of brains and brawn to run the organization upon George's last ride. Unfortunately for him, but obviously not to anyone who enjoys Steinbrenner-style drama, he broke Daddy's Little Girl's heart. So rest easy my friend. Hank will be making headlines for quite a while around here. EDIT: Oh yeah, I agree, the Angels are pussies. :beer:
Dear Lord. You're kidding, right? You have to be. I mean, what, in your mind, does it mean to "live up to a contract"? Is it just making 30 starts every year? And what does a team's assessment of what a player will do after the current contract have to do with a player's performance during the current contract? Boston thought Pedro was done after his six-year contract? Okay... so what? That has ZERO bearing on what they think of his performance during that contract. How can you not see this? I want you to do something else now. I want you to explicitly state that you are only using a pitcher's health to determine the success of a contract, and I want you to tell everyone that Ed Whitson "lived up to his contract."
I remember how crazy that was, and it's still annoying to think about. Both teams should keep a framed copy of their last offer for Santana on the wall as a reminder. Next time they may not be so lucky to have a dude as stoopid as Bill Smith on the other side. Imagine you're the Red Sox and Yankees and you've offered what you each have been rumored to have offered, and Smith calls and asks for your "best and final offer." If Hal wasn't the one putting his goddamn foot down on this madness early in this off-season, I would have hoped and expected that Theo would have. On the matter of Boston's interest in Santana, remember at that time none of us knew that Lester would be the Lester of 2008. There were lingering questions. On the other hand, more was expected from Clay Buchholz in 2008, and that didn't pan out. I'm glad the Red Sox smartened up and, strange as it may sound, I'm just as glad the Yankees did also. From your lips. . . . I grew to love Hank so quickly, it was a crushing blow to think that he would be stolen from me after only one full season. Consider the plight of the Angels of 2008. They're cruising along at a pretty good clip. They trade for Teixeira to lock the thing away. Finish the season winning 100 games. Then, they get bounced from the playoffs in four games by the same damn team that always seems to stick it to you. HAH! If they don't overspend in free agency times-five, what hope can there ever be for that sorry team?! Pussies. Scioscia the genius. Bah.
Can Alio and SundayJack keep their responses down to like 4 or 5 lines???? They must think they are Mike Lupica or Buster Olney and we really care what they have to say.
Honestly, I almost always read every line of Alio and Sunday text. JoeJet? Fuck, not sure if I even recall reading 1 period.
