RIP
Pat Dobson. I knew the name only, as part of the quartet of Baltimore Orioles pitchers who each won 20 games in 1971. At age 64, he died too young.
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Pat Dobson. I knew the name only, as part of the quartet of Baltimore Orioles pitchers who each won 20 games in 1971. At age 64, he died too young.
I've always referred to Gary Matthews Jr. as "Sarge Jr." because his father Garry Matthews was Sarge. Today, I learn that GMJ is referred to as "Little Sarge." I like mine better.
Predictably, there was major fallout in today's news following Derek Jeter's second-place finish in the A.L. MVP balloting. The N.Y. Post blamed it on anti-New-York bias, with the headline Jeeted. Mike Lupica agrees that Jeter was probably the right choice, but didn't blame it on any bias against New York. In the meantime, Chicago Sun Times writer Joe Cowley is taking serious heat for placing Jeter sixth on the ballot. I think Lupica has it right and that Cowley has no right voting for the MVP.
Jeter wasn't robbed and didn't lose because of a bias against New York. Hideki Matsui lost the A.L. Rookie of the Year balloting because of a bias against the Yankees big spending ways. All of a sudden, writers made up this rule that the best rookie had to be a true rookie, even though Ichiro won both the Rookie of the Year and MVP awards in his first season. But A-Rod won the MVP last year even though he was a Yankee. You can't blame this one on pure Yankee hating.
Jeter lost because of the misperception that he was surrounded by more good players than Hugh Hefner is surrounded by hot babes, making him less valuable than a one-man wrecking crew like Frank Thomas, and because a number two hitter is less sexy than a slugger like Morneau. The first argument is trotted out by Cowley, who left Carlos Delgado and Vernon Wells off his 2003 ballot and was suspended as a result, and is specious. Three Twins finished in the top seven of the balloting. No other Yankee finished that high. A-Rod was the next best Yankee in 13th place.
Based on the results, Morneau was indisputably surrounded by better talent than Jeter. Writers who favor Morneau point out that the Twins took off when he took off. Not quite true. The Twins made a number of roster changes right before they got hot, including adding Francisco Liriano to the starting rotation. By comparison, the Yankees lost three key players to injury for much of the season and had two other key players - A-Rod and Giambi - have off seasons. The starting pitching was spotty, too.
Jeter had arguably his finest season and was clearly the MVP on his team, something that you can't necessarily say about Morneau. For all the numbers he put up, finding a good first baseman is easier than finding someone like Joe Mauer, a catcher who led the league in hitting.
Yes, I am biased as a Yankees fan, and no, it's not the end of the world that Morneau won. He had an outstanding season. Still, I feel Jeter should have won.
Cross posted on Plum Crazy.
Glad to hear that the Moose will be back. He's still got some juice left in the tank. More moves are necessary to flesh out the rotation or at least give the Yanks some depth. Who knows whether Johnson can give anything after back surgery or what Pavano can provide. Though I'm not nuts about some of the names being tossed around. Miguel Batista. Ted Lilly. I'd rather see Humberto Sanchez get a shot along with Jeff Karstens and Daryl Rasner. Maybe even more so I'm intrigued by the prospect of seeing Proctor in the rotation. In Brian Bruney and Chris Britton, the Yanks have a couple of arms who could fill in ably for Proctor.
A-Rod can opt of his bombshell contract at the end of next season. He will have two years left on the contract at that point and will have minimum another 5 good years left in him. Do you think he and Scott Boras aren't paying attention to the mad money being thrown around this off-season - see Alfonsio Soriano, Juan Pierre, Sarge Jr. - and aren't drooling at what he will fetch? Sure, he won't snag the same $25 million per, but he's looking at another long-term deal. Six years is my guess at $20 million per. No way he doesn't opt out or negotiate an extension with the Yankees.
Thy name is Sarge Jr.
$10 million a year for 5 years for a journeyman who's had but one decent season in his career. Who is 32 and will be 37 when the contract is up. Tori Hunter dough for a guy who's not even in the same hemisphere as Hunter as a player.
The Angels will rue the day, probably starting next season.
I am both disappointed and puzzled by the news that Derek Jeter finished second in this year's AL MVP voting. I had assumed all along it would be Jeter. He was the best player on the best team in baseball. He's been outstanding for so long that you think writers would have given him the award partially as a lifetime achievement award rather than given the award to a relative newcomer on some obscure team in the hinterlands. The NY tabloids will rip the results to shreds, claiming bias against NY. As much as I'd like to use that argument, it falls short because A-Rod took home the trophy last year. I guess it's just that Jeter doesn't put up prototypical MVP numbers. Still, does that make him less valuable than a slugger like Morneau? Jeter is captain clutch, actually I believe the most clutch player in baseball this year. He carried the Yankees through the absences of three cornerstone players. Should have won it. Probably never will.
Cross posted on Plum Crazy.
The Boston Red Sox have spent $50 million not to sign a player, but just to buy the rights to sign a player, that player being Japanese stud right-hander Daisuke Matsuzaka. Set aside the fact that no one has a clue whether Matsuzaka can even pitch in the Major Leagues, much less America. A mere triviality when you consider the obscene amount of money the Red Sox propose to fork over if they can reach a deal with him. Let's look instead at what $50 million can buy you.
In baseball terms, $50 million is enough to buy Johnny Damon for four years. It's enough to pay Alex Rodriguez for two years. It's enough to field Derek Jeter, Jason Giambi, and Mariano Rivera for one season. It's enough to fund the talented young Florida Marlins for three plus seasons. All for a player who has never thrown a pitch for a professional team in the U.S.
In real life terms, $50 million can buy a lot. In Africa, it's enough to provide food aid for 125,000 thousand families for I assume a year. Here in the U.S., it's enough to buy $5000 worth of groceries for one year ($100 a week) for 10,000 families. There are 1200 public schools in New York City serving over 1 million students. You could buy each of them a text book for $50 million. You could give each school $40,000 in aid for one year. You could give a one-time stipend of $355 to each of the 140,000 active and retired NYC school teachers.
Instead, the Boston Red Sox choose to lavish this outlandish sum of money on one player. Not to sign him, mind you, but simply for the right to sign him. Wasted money if you ask me. They should be embarrassed.
Yanks are set to pull off the same move with Jaret Wright as they did with Sheff. They've got a deal in the works to exercise his option, pick up $4 million of his salary, and ship him off to Baltimore. Remains to be seen what they can get, but the Yankees may be on the cutting edge of a new trend in baseball.
The Mets have sold the naming rights to their new ballpark to Citigroup. The stadium will be know as Citifield. What a slap in the face to Bill Shea, who had Shea Stadium named after him because of his role in bringing N.L. baseball back to New York. This deal makes me quite nervous about the name of the new Yankee Stadium. Yankee Stadium is an iconic name. There is no way the Yankees should sell the naming rights. It would be a travesty.
ESPN reporter Buster Olney is reporting that the Boston Red Sox have posted the top bid for Japanese stud right-hander Daisuke Matsuzaka, in the range of $38-$45 million. The Seibu Lions have until Tuesday to accept or reject the bid, though I can't see why the would reject. Now, I was never fired up about the Yankees getting this guy - his price tag at a $45 million posting fee could be $120 million for five years, a $24 million annual bill that rivals A-Rod's pact - and I have visions of Hideki "The Toad" Irabu, aka Hideki I Rob You. Still, if this guy's the real deal, the Yanks have lost out on two fronts. A) They don't have him, and B) the Red Sox might, depending on whether they can reach a deal. There's the possibility that the Red Sox are merely trying to keep Matsuzaka away from the Yanks and will make a half-hearted attempt to sign him. In a bit of good news, though, the Yanks did land a top pitching prospect, Humberto Sanchez, in the Gary Sheffield trade, someone who might be able to front the rotation for them capably, if not as well as Matsuzaka. Curious to see what other plays the Yanks might make this off-season. Can they woo the hard-tossing, 33-year-old right Jason Schmidt away from the West Coast, for example. Time will tell, but the Hot Stove league is heating up.
The theory went that the Yankees would be able to get middle-level players for Gary Sheffield. Perhaps some prospects, but no one special. The reality is that the Yankees did very well in trading Sheffield yesterday to the Detroit Tigers. They received three pitching prospects, two of whom I know nothing about, save that they look like hard throwers based on their strikeout numbers, but one of whom I had heard of. He's Humberto Sanchez, who first came to my attention when he pitched in the Futures Game this past summer. He threw one scoreless inning, but the more important data is that he was touted as one of the Tigers' top pitching prospects, if not the top, and that he had put up some impressive numbers at Double A. There was talk that he could join the Tigers later in the season. He didn't, but he got a call up to Triple A, where he got off to a good start before tailing off and suffering an arm problem. The arm problem bit gets me nervous, but it sounds like the Yankees got exactly what they needed. A young hard-throwing pitcher who's Major League ready. Expect to see Sanchez in the rotation this season. Hope that he becomes a solid member of the staff, joining Wang and eventually Philip Hughes in a triumvirate of young studs who can front the rotation for a long time.
Cross-posted on Plum Crazy.
In today's news, the Yanks are expected to pick up Sheffield's option and are working on a two-year deal to bring back the Moose. Granted, the Sheff story is not breaking news, as it's been reported for a while, but there are six teams said to be interested in him. It doesn't look like the Yankees will be able to get A-list talent for him, but hopefully, they can get a solid chip or two in return to plug some minor gaps on the team. Moose is still a solid pitcher coming off a solid season and can still help the Yankees. Two years seems the right length, though the reported price of $12 million per year is a bit steep for a graying pitcher. Still, that's the going rate these days for someone of his caliber, and it should be a good investment. If Johnson is healthy, the signing would give the Yankees three strong pitchers. Hopefully, they can land a top young talent, such as Matsuzaka, to front the rotation and turn the fifth slot over to someone like Daryl Rasner or Jeff Karstens, both of whom impressed in brief stints this past season.
The Rocket is undecided about pitching in 2007. Now there's breaking news for you.
Buster Olney has given the Baltimore Orioles or any ill-minded team a great idea. Say you don't want a rival to sign ace-in-waiting Daisuke Matsuzaka. All you have to do is bid some obscene amount of money to get exclusive negotiating rights, make a low-ball offer that's sure to be rejected, and send Matsuzaka back to Japan out of the harmful clutches of your rival. Why wouldn't you do this if you were the Baltimore Orioles?