Wang? Wang has never been hurt from pitching. He probably never will be with what he throws. They will just keep him off the bases this year.
It will decrease. They have set a target of 180 million..down from 206. Right now they are probably still about 25 million under that.
But right now they still need to add at least one more pitcher, so they're definitely going to be over their target. I imagine that was a very soft target for them, in any case. They're around $195M if they sign Pettitte at $12M. Add Cameron and that goes up another $9-10M. Right at last year's payroll. Add anything else, and they're over. Which is fine by me. I don't really give a shit what people say about the payroll. If you have the money, spend it, as long as you're not screwing yourself in the long term.
But it was ONLY money. That's very important. Also important, Burnett and Sabathia have both shown they can pitch in the AL. Sabathia won the AL Cy Young in 2007. Burnett spent three years pitching in the AL East. They are both far more of a known commodity than Peavy would be. I've said it before, but I'll say it again: Peavy is one of my favorite pitchers. A keeper in two of my fantasy leagues. BUT... he pitches half of his games in the best pitcher's park in baseball, and pitches in the NL, with a disproportionate number of those games against weak NL West teams (all of whom are near the bottom of the league in offense). Top this off by adding in his elbow problems last year and a few years ago. Add it all together, and I think giving up a big package of talent AND shelling out money to bring him to the AL East is a far riskier move than anything else the Yanks have done this offseason. At the very least, right now, if something goes wrong with Sabathia or Burnett during the life of their contracts, at least they'll have (hopefully) semi-competent replacements for them in the pipeline. Trade them away, and you're far less protected should something go wrong.
So, it's not just a couple of us here who see the problem with the offense. "The signing of CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett helps the Yankee rotation quite a bit, but what of the lineup? In recent seasons they've been known for their offensive prowess, but the Yankees attack is trending downward. Last season, the Yanks ranked a middling seventh in the 14-team American League in runs scored and they did so with the oldest gaggle of hitters in the league. Now, Jason Giambi, who had a productive 2008, is gone. Jorge Posada is an uncertainty after coming off shoulder surgery and stalwarts like Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter, and Hideki Matsui are well into their decline phases. Oh yeah, Xavier Nady and Johnny Damon figure to regress in 2008. The Yanks badly need an impact bat in the outfield, but even that won't solve their offensive problems." http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/8933096/What-about-Peavy,-Fuentes,-and-others? Even Rosenthal alludes to it. http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/8938060/Yanks-shedding-salaries-to-go-after-more-players
Yes, but Rosenthal is a complete and utter moron. Finding out that he agreed with me would make me less confident about the validity of my opinion, not more. He just throws these ideas out there without backing them up in any way. Alex Rodriguez is "well into his decline phase"? Really? What does that even mean? And what is it based on? The fact that last year's OPS+ was above his career average? Matsui has had knee problems (hopefully fixed), but - when healthy - is still a 120 OPS+ guy. He hardly played last year... adding his bat, even if it IS declining, will still be an improvement over not having it there. You can't really talk about his decline hurting the Yanks comparing last year vs. next year, because he was hardly a part of last year. I'll say this... Rosenthal does a great job of taking the worst-case scenarios for the Yankee offense and assuming they all happen. I can see why that would appeal to a pessimist. However, even if the Yanks' offense falls off of last year's pace, those runs should be more than offset by the improvement of the pitching staff.
I was against giving 7 years to CC, and didn't really want Burnett (neither did these guys), but this article is definitely worth a read. http://riveraveblues.com/2008/12/olney-cc-burnett-good-fits-for-yanks-6304/
Nice the Yankees are going to throw Igawa in on that Cameron deal to even out the numbers. LOL the Brewers suck!
After next year. Rick Ankiel STL Jason Bay BOS Marlon Byrd TEX Frank Catalanotto TEX Endy Chavez SEA Coco Crisp * KC Carl Crawford * TB David Dellucci CLE Jermaine Dye * CWS Ryan Freel BAL Brian Giles SD Vladimir Guerrero LAA Matt Holliday OAK Geoff Jenkins * PHI Reed Johnson CHC Andruw Jones LAD Austin Kearns * WAS Jason Michaels CLE Magglio Ordonez * DET Dave Roberts SF Gary Sheffield DET Jason Werth PHI Randy Winn SF * denotes club option for 2010 I bolded some of the more interesting ones.
Depends on how much you think is specific to Coors as opposed to someone who prefers playing "at home." His career .803 road OPS is nothing to sneeze at. (That'd be good for a career OPS+ of 109 in the AL. I could see Holliday being a 120-130 OPS+ guy in the AL, easily.
Nothing too special, sure. I don't think anyone is saying he's a Hall of Famer. But he's a hell of a lot better than Melky. Cameron was the fourth best defensive CF in the majors last year, and swings an above average bat. For a one-year stopgap? You can't ask for much more.
