Monthly Archives: January 2009

Shortly after the Mark Teixeira signing I was chatting with Was Watching’s Steve Lombardi about the nifty first base tradition that has developed since Don Mattingly retired.  Then, a few days ago I was over at No Maas and saw this dope image they created on that note.  

Cool stuff from the No Maas crew. It’ll be interesting to see where Teix ranks with Mattingly, Tino and Giambi.

By the way, apropos of nothing, my wife calls Teixeira “the white Barry Bonds,” because she thinks they look an awful lot alike, puffy face and all.

The sun is poking out from behind a mass of dark greyish-blue clouds in the Bronx this morning.  The sounds of snow shovels dragging along the pavement echoe around the neighbhorhood as New Yorkers prepare themselves for a big-time football game this afternoon at 1 pm. 

Giants vs. Eagles. A nice little rivalry, right?

I’ve never been a Giants fan, though I don’t have anything against them.  But thinking about them this morning brought to mind L.T.–the original L.T., Lawrence Taylor–who was certainly the greatest defensive football player of his era:

Here’s hoping for a couple of good games today.  Something good to eat, some smashmouth football.  Sounds about right, huh?

The wife and I were down in the village this afternoon when it started to snow.  I told her about an e-mail I got this morning from my friend Rich out in Long Beach, California.  He pointed out that it would be 80 degrees there today, 30 in New York.  Then he quoted Randy Newman’s “I Love L.A.”  I replied, taking the bait as I always do, and questioned his manhood.  But as the wife and I walked west into the wind,  I cursed him again, thinking 80 degrees didn’t sound so bad after all.

We stopped by the Chelsea Market.  I hadn’t been there in years.  I got a baguette from Amy’s Bread and went to Buon Italia, one of the most comprehensive Italian markets in the city.  It can be pricey, but it is worth it. 

We puttered around, looked at the expensive cheese and chocolate.  Got a can of La Valle tomatoes, my favorite brand.

I browsed the jams and the wife said, “What is a Quince, Alex?”  Rosie Perez, her best movie impression.  So I picked out a jar of Quince jam.  Then we got some nice buccatini pasta, the hollow spaghetti that the wife loves.   

Then we stood in front of a case of cured pork products.  The wife looked at the rolls of pancetta and sides of ham and frowned.  “That is so gross.”

“It is heaven,” I said. 

“Funny how two people can look at the same thing and have such opposite reactions,” she said.  I repeated the line back to her twenty minutes later when we passed a parked car with a pug sitting in the passenger’s seat. 

When we got back to the Bronx, the snow was covering the cars and three garbage trucks were rolling up Riverdale avenue plowing the street.

Then we were upstairs, warm and dry.  NFL playoffs, a cup of tea, and some butter and quince jam on a baguette.  Kittens.  Wife.  A perfect way to beat the cold.

In the wake of the Mark Teixeira signing (and press conference), the Yankees have made both Xavier Nady and Nick Swisher available in trade talks. They may end up dealing one of the two, depending on which one can bring the better package in return. I’m still not convinced that’s the right thing to do, unless the return equates to a competent center fielder or a high-grade backup catcher. But there’s no harm in at least exploring the market, which includes teams like the Mariners, Reds, and Giants, and possibly the Dodgers if they don’t re-sign Manny Ramirez. The Reds appear to be one of the most interested parties, but they may not have the right parts to offer. They have no spare center fielders of any real value, and only a moderately tempting backup catcher in Ryan Hanigan. Perhaps the Yankees would have interest in Homer Bailey, who was once rumored to be heading to the White Sox for Jermaine Dye. At one time hailed as the game’s best pitching prospect, Bailey has fallen on hard times in the major leagues and may not have the stuff to succeed as a high-end starter. All in all, he’s a risky proposition who looks too much like the next Charles Hudson to me.

The Giants might be a better match. They can offer either Aaron Rowand or Randy Winn in a deal for Swisher or Nady. At one time, Rowand was a Gold Glove caliber center fielder, but followers of the Giants say his defensive play fell off considerably in 2008. And Winn isn’t really an everyday center fielder, but rather a corner outfielder who can play the middle for short stretches. Unless the Giants can pad their offer to include a pitcher or a catcher, I might have to take a pass on a potential trade with Frisco.

Then there are the Mariners, who need offense in the worst way. They’d prefer Hideki Matsui to either Swisher or Nady, largely because of the Japanese marketing possibilities. But who would the Mariners offer in return for “Godzilla?” They have an unwanted catcher in Kenji Johjima, who was simply dreadful in 2008. They have a shopworn pitcher in Erik Bedard, but his health, attitude, and general contempt of the media would be a bad fit in New York. Once again, the potential return in a trade looks so questionable that Brian Cashman should be very careful before he commits himself to dealing one of his extra outfielder/DH types…

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Powered by Moe Green, here’s the news:

• Let’s start with a good trivia question, courtesy of Jayson Stark … now that the John Smoltz-Chipper Jones tag team has been busted up after 16 years together, which pair of active teammates has played together the longest? (Answer at the end of this post)
• Newsday’s Ken Davidoff gives the reasons the Yanks would prefer to keep Swisher over Nady:

1) Swisher’s versatility. He can play both corner outfield positions and first base as well as centerfield (his weakest position). Nady plays only the corner outfield positions.

2) As a switch hitter, Swisher gives Joe Girardi more flexibility.

3) Swisher is signed through 2011 for $21 million. Nady can become a free agent after this season, and with Scott Boras as his agent, he indeed will file for free agency.

4) Although the Yankees like Nady perfectly well, they think Swisher’s upbeat, fiery personality could be an added asset.

• Over at BP.com, Shawn Hoffman details why a salary cap might actually harm lower-revenue/lower-payroll teams:

Let’s say, in some far-off universe, MLB owners and players actually did agree on a salary cap. With it would come the normal provisions: a salary floor at around 75-85 percent of the cap, and a guaranteed percentage of total industry revenues for the players. Since the players have been taking in about 45 percent of revenues the past few years, we’ll keep it at that figure …

Using 2008 as an example, the thirty teams took in about $6 billion … for an average of $200 million per team. Forty-five percent of that (the players’ share) is $90 million, which we’ll use as the midpoint between our floor and cap. If we want to make the floor 75 percent of the cap …  we can use $77 million and $103 million, respectively.

With a $103 million cap, nine teams would have been affected last year, and a total of about $286 million would have had to be skimmed off the top. Since total salaries have to remain at existing levels, the bottom twenty-one teams would have had to take on this burden, which had previously been placed on the Yankees, Red Sox, et al. On the other end, fourteen teams would have been under the payroll floor, by a total of $251 million. Even discounting the Marlins‘ $22 million payroll, the other thirteen teams would have had to spend an average of $15 million more just to meet the minimum. Some of those teams might be able to afford it; most wouldn’t.

Imagine being Frank Coonelly in this situation. Coonelly, the Pirates‘ team president, has publicly supported a cap. Had our fictional cap/floor arrangement been instituted last year, the Pirates would have needed to increase their Opening Day payroll by $28 million. Not only would the team have taken a big loss, but Neal Huntington’s long-term strategy would have been sabotaged, since the team would have had to sign a number of veterans just to meet the minimum payroll.

Now fast forward to 2009. Let’s say the Pirates’ sales staff runs into major headwinds, with the team struggling and the economy sinking. The team’s top line takes a hit, falling $10 million from 2008. The Mets and Yankees, meanwhile, open their new ballparks, and each team increases its local revenue by $50 million. If the twenty-seven other teams are flat, total industry revenues rise by $90 million (not including any appreciation in national media revenue). Forty-five percent of that, of course, goes to the players. So even as the Pirates’ purchasing power decreases, the payroll floor actually rises.

In other words, without a more egalitarian distribution of income, the system crumbles.

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Are the Boston Red Sox filling out their roster or casting a Celebrity Rehab spin-off focused on sports injuries?
. . .
It could be that they’re just being smart. Those four players are each signed to incentive-laden one-year contracts that will cost the Red Sox a base total of $12.2 million, or $4.25 million less than the Yankees will pay the injury-prone A.J. Burnett in the first year of his five-year contract (or, to turn the tables on Boston, just $200,000 more than they’ll pay the rapidly-aging Mike Lowell in the second year of his three-year contract).

Read the rest of my take on the Sox recent spate of roster moves (as well as the Trevor Hoffman-to-Milwaukee deal) on SI.com.

Finally Friday …. here’s the news:

• Ken Davidoff of Newsday writes that Andy Pettitte may be thinking of heading back to the Astros, given the lack of progress with the Yanks.  He lists three factors:

1. Pettitte believes that the Yankees should display more appreciation for all that he has done for them.

2. While the Yankees are asking that Pettitte take a pay cut, the team clearly is not hurting financially, given its large investments in Teixeira, CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett.

3. Pettitte thinks that his 2008 season wasn’t as bad as the Yankees are making it out to be.

• PeteAbe of LoHud has an opinion on the Yankees’ need for Pettitte, and also offers this late note on the Astros’ rumblings:

Via MLB Trade Rumors, here is what Houston GM Ed Wade said about Pettitte: “We haven’t had any discussion with Andy or his representatives and we don’t see a scenario where he would fit into our payroll scenario at this time.”

• MLB.com notes that Xavier Nady may be the odd man out in the outfield shuffle, while Nick Swisher should be safe.
• The Times’ Tyler Kepner examines the outfield depth, and thinks the Yankees shouldn’t trade any of them:

What about this? Keep them all. As Rob Neyer points out at ESPN.com, the Red Sox now have a spare outfielder who’s a very good player — Rocco Baldelli — so the Yankees might want to keep theirs, too. They will probably need the injury protection at some point, and the depth would allow Manager Joe Girardi to rest Damon regularly to keep his legs fresh.

The Yankees also could keep their depth in case someone gets hurt in spring training and presents them with a hole they don’t have now. The rotation and the bullpen look good enough. There’s no need to rush into anything in January — if at all.

• The News reports that more than 1/4 of the new tax-exempt funding requested by the Yanks is for things like giant video screens and upgraded luxury suites.

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“Rickey Henderson’s strike zone is smaller than Hitler’s heart.”  Jim Murray

“If you could split him in two, you’d have two Hall of Famers.”   Bill James

I know the Baseball Hall of Fame is sometimes hard to take seriously.  Forget some of the less-than-deserving players in there, that’s bound to happen in any museum, but Tom Yawkey has a plaque.  When I was last there, it was placed directly above Bob Gibson’s plaque, an unintentional joke that reminded me of In the Heat of the Night.  At the same time, talking about the Baseball Hall of Fame is a lot of fun, even something to take seriously. 

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On Jan. 1, the much-ballyhooed launch of the MLB Network took place, with Don Larsen’s perfect game in Game 5 of the 1956 World Series as its flagship program. The game, which had never before been seen anywhere, was a kinescope film of the telecast, with Hall of Famers Mel Allen and Vin Scully on the mike, and more Gillette commercials than anyone has seen, anywhere. This was, for me, a chance to watch history — as the game took place long before I was born — as well as an opportunity to do a three-hour cultural study (male fans in attendance wearing suits and hats, for example), and review how far we’ve come in terms of broadcasting baseball on television.

The program interweaved Bob Costas’s hosting of a Q&A with Yogi Berra and Don Larsen in front of a live audience in MLB Network’s Studio 42 and the game itself. When Costas wasn’t ignoring spoiler alerts and telling us what to watch for in the program (as if we couldn’t figure it out for ourselves), he was playing to his greatest strength — allowing his interview subject to tell the story. The highlight, in my opinion, was the discussion session that followed the final out. Larsen admitted that he knew he pitched a no-hitter but didn’t know it was a perfect game; he didn’t even know what a perfect game was. (I was instantly reminded how when the Astros no-hit the Yankees with six pitchers in 2003, that Jeff Kent didn’t know why his team was celebrating so vigorously until he looked at the scoreboard.) Perhaps Larsen’s most prescient comment, though, came in that same segment. Costas mentioned that 15 Hall of Famers played in that game, and that for Babe Pinelli, the home plate umpire, Game 5 was the last game for which he called balls and strikes. Following that, Larsen said he thinks about the perfect game every day, the Hall of Famers, and that so many of them — especially on the Brooklyn side — are not around now for him to thank them for being part of it also.

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Powered by WKRP’s  “Turkeys Away“, containing perhaps the funniest single scene in sitcoms in the last 30 years, here’s the news:

• Chad Finn of the Boston Globe recaps a Peter Gammon radio interview which contained some interesting nuggets on the BoSox, Boras and Teixeira, including this:

On why Teixeira chose the Yankees over the Red Sox when the conventional wisdom was that he would sign with Boston:

Gammons: As we saw over the time line, once Cashman went to his house — first Terry Francona and Theo {Epstein] went there — five or six days later Cashman went, and that was decided that the Red Sox were the stalking horse and the Red Sox would go to a number and then the Yankees will sign him. And the Yankees did a very good job of saying, ‘We’re not in it, we’re not in it’ . . . all along, that’s where he was going. Not because his father was a [high school] teammate of Bucky Dent, but he made it very clear watching it yesterday [and wading] through the baloney . . . Teixeira is Scott Boras’s ultimate client, and he’s very well-programmed . . . The Red Sox didn’t know it, and in the end there was nothing they could do about it. He wanted to go to the Yankees, his wife doesn’t like Boston — apparently she doesn’t like the stores on Newbury Street or something — and in the end that’s the way it goes.

On whether — or when — John Henry realized Teixeira was ticketed for New York:

Gammons: They didn’t know it. They were waiting on the day that he signed . . . they thought that they were going to get him. They tried to close the deal on Monday night [Dec. 21], and Scott [Boras] said, ‘Well, the Teixeiras are flying, and they haven’t quite done this, and they haven’t quite done that,” and he kept putting it off an all along it was to just finish the language with the Yankees. That’s the way it goes. The Yankees cut their $180 million and they got an extraordinary player. It’s going to be interesting. As you probably remember, there was a lot of testiness between Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira when they played in Texas together . . . and I don’t think Alex really cares about communicating with other players, we know [that] from Derek Jeter. Also, we haven’t really seen Teixeira in a situation where the expectations are really that high, and he’s going to have to deal with them in New York. It will be very interesting to see how it goes with the Yankees.

• Kevin Kernan of Fox Sports (via the Post) gives a glowing portrait of Teixeira:

The look is pure pinstripes. As Mark Teixeira stood on the field of the new Yankee Stadium with the glistening facade in the background, a smile flashed across his face. He seemed like a player from another era, a throwback.

Quite simply, Teixeira was born to be a Yankee.

“He’s got that All-American look,” Brian Cashman said at yesterday’s press conference, introducing Teixeira to New York. “He’s Paul Bunyan, he’s well educated, he’s the All-American high performer and he’s not a loud personality. He’s very disciplined, structured, a hard worker that’s got exceptional ability. It kind of fits our clubhouse.”

When suggested Teixeira carries himself a lot like Derek Jeter, in that Captain kind of way, Cashman agreed, adding, “He kind of has those qualities.”

• At Newsday, Wallace Matthews draws comparisons between the signing of Teixeira and the Yanks’ last FA first baseman, Jason Giambi:

Giambi came to symbolize everything that was wrong about the post-millennium Yankees — overpaid, overrated, overpumped and underachieving. Never did he duplicate the kind of numbers that won him the 2000 MVP in Oakland and never during his tenure did the Yankees come close to fulfilling the burgeoning expectations that went along with the club’s ballooning payroll.

Now comes Mark Teixeira, as squeaky clean as Giambi was sweaty, as likably sincere as Giambi was ingratiatingly smarmy, and every bit as eye-popping, on paper and in person, as Giambi was on that December day in 2001. …

His transition to the Bronx should be smoother than Giambi’s for the simple fact that he is not replacing a Yankees legend but a legendary Yankees disappointment. Even if he gets off to one of his typical slow starts — Teixeira’s career average in April, .256, is nearly 40 points lower than his overall average — the fans at the new Yankee Stadium are not likely to indoctrinate him with that uniquely New York rite of passage, the rude welcome, that they gave to Giambi at the 2002 home opener when he had the nerve to take the collar in a 4-0 win over the Devil Rays.

Besides, at the new Stadium, the fans will have to be nearly as wealthy as the players. Less class resentment breeds more genteel behavior. …

… Since the Giambi signing kicked off the Drunken Sailor period of Yankees history, their free-agent contracts have been a worse investment than subprime mortgages. In fact, not since Reggie Jackson has a big-ticket free agent paid off for the Yankees.

[My take: Matthews is a bit harsh on Giambi, whose offensive production, while not at his 2000 season level, was still quite good for the first three years of the contract.  As for Reggie being the last big-ticket free agent to pay off for the Bombers, I offer up Mike Mussina.  Is it Moose’s fault the Yanks didn’t win a Series while he was in pinstripes?]

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Our great friend and Bronx Banter colleague Todd Drew is still in the hospital recovering from surgery.  He’s a trooper, a strong man, but still has a way to go before he can return home. 

If anyone cares to send Todd a message, please send it to:  shadowgames@earthlink.net and his wife will be sure to read it to Todd once he’s alert.

Thanks, y’all.

I don’t go out to eat much these days. My wife is more of a homebody that I am and she’s no foodie. I think about food constantly and love cooking. I enjoy restaurants but I don’t go often. When I do, to a nice place, it is a real treat. Which is why the most delicious present ever is the gift that keeps giving.

Last night I went to The Spotted Pig for the Sheep’s Milk Ricotta Gnudi (which are a bigger version of gnocci). 

They were terrific, as was every other thing we had, including a special appetizer with fried pig’s ear. By the time we left, around 8:30, the joint was packed with pretty people. I saw four guys, in their mid-twenties I’d guess, standing around, talking loudly, looking nervous, checking their cell phones again and again, waiting for something to happen, or just soaking up being in a hip spot. I remembered being that age, spending time in cool places around cool people, where the lights are low and everyone has a drink, and recalled how unhappy it made me.

After we ate, my friend and I took a slow walk around the west village. If there is anything I miss about Manhattan it is walking after a meal, enjoying the company of a great pal.  Digesting, taking our time.  Is there anything as civilized?

Here’s some video from SNY:

Our new kitten, Moe Green in a rare quiet moment.  Dude is a complete madman.  He’s just three months old–we’ve had him for three weeks now–but he’s already King of our Castle.  We’re just lucky he lets us pay rent and feed him.

99 days to go till Opening Day at the Stadium … here’s some news to tide you over:

• Mark Teixeira was introduced to the New York media at a press conference yesterday.  Here’s a couple of quotes from the newly-pinstriped slugger:

“The first time I went to Yankee Stadium, I was in awe,” Teixeira said. “The chance to play here my first six years in the big leagues, I always loved coming here. Seeing Mattingly when he was a coach here and going out to Monument Park was very special for me.

“I’m going to get a chance to be the first first baseman the Yankees have in the new stadium. That’s going to be pretty sweet. The fans here in New York will be pumped.”

Discussing the long free-agent process that ultimately landed him in New York, Teixeira gave much of the credit to his wife, Leigh, who helped seal the deal in a Dec. 12 conversation over dinner at a Texas country club.

“I said to Leigh, ‘Everything’s equal. Where would you want to play?'” Teixeira said. “Finally, she broke down and said, ‘I want you to be a Yankee.’ That’s what did it for me.”

• Jon Lane of the YES Network covered the press conference, and gives us a pleasing Tex quote:

Seconds into his formal introduction, Teixeira, looking completely relaxed and at ease, showed off perhaps his greatest attribute. He smiled and told the notoriously tough New York media to fire away, taking questions about accepting responsibility and playing up to expectations that will never be higher.

“I look at myself as a leader,” Teixeira said. “First and foremost, I try to do things the right way on the field and you can carry that over to the locker room and earn the respect of your teammates.”

He explained later to writers he was negotiating with five different teams, the Yankees, Red Sox, Nationals, Angels and Orioles, and how the Yankees were atop the pecking order. At first, his wife Leigh told him she just wanted him to be happy. On December 12, during their weekly Friday night dinner at their country club in Texas, Teixeira asked his wife if all things were equal, where you want me to play. Her answer was New York, the Yankees and everything that comes with it.

“I might have been a little more hesitant if I hadn’t played in so many different cities the last three years,” Teixeira said. “I went to Atlanta, where Braves baseball is huge. That was some pressure. It was the first time in a long time I was nervous to play a baseball game. The same going to Anaheim. They were the kings of the AL West. The media is tougher there and the fans are into it, so I think I’ve gotten a taste of a little bit of everything and I enjoyed being a part of it.”

• The Post has more yummy quotes from Teixeira.
• Bryan Hoch at MLB.com runs down how the Yanks acquired Tex.
• More “much ado about nothing” regarding Andy Pettitte.  Here’s a couple of quotes from the Yankees:

“There’s still dialogue going on,” Yankees co-chairman Hal Steinbrenner said. “They were not happy with our offer; we were not happy with what they wanted. There’s been no agreement.”

Cashman would not confirm a New York Times report that New York has pulled its offer to the 36-year-old Pettitte, but said in reference to his level of interest: “Things are more complicated now.”

• The Post reports that if the offer to Pettitte is still alive, it is most likely lower than the original $10 million figure.
• The City has bowed to public scrutiny and criticism, and is giving up the luxury box it negotiated for itself in dealing with the funding for the new stadium.

[My take: I’m sure members of the Bloomberg administration will have no problem scoring a couple of free passes or luxury box invites regardless of this turn of events.]

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Do the Yankees need Andy Pettitte?

Don’t look now, but the Rays have done an excellent job of restocking on the cheap for another run in 2009. As I write in my new piece over on SI.com on the Milton Bradley and Pat Burrell deals:

[w]ith Price, Burrell and the Joyce/Perez platoon representing significant upgrades on Jackson, Floyd, Gross and assorted fill-ins, the Rays could very well repeat or even improve on their surprising 2008 showing, much the way the 1992 Braves surpassed their worst-to-first showing the previous year.

Indeed, with Upton, 24, having regained his home run stroke in the postseason following a year in which his power had been sapped by a torn labrum, Longoria entering his first full season after being named AL Rookie of the Year and Crawford looking to bounce back entering his walk year, the Rays could experience a significant increase in their run scoring in 2009, while a strong rookie season from Price, 23, would help balance out any regression experienced by the other starters. Meanwhile, having the right-handed Burrell in a lineup with fellow righty sluggers Upton and Longoria makes the Rays well-prepared for their impending AL East showdowns with lefty aces CC Sabathia of the Yankees and Jon Lester of the Red Sox following a season in which Tampa Bay struggled against lefty starters. Thus, in part due to their sizeable head-start, the Rays have kept pace with the Yankees’ $423.5 million spending spree at the low, low cost of $16 million.

Dipping back into the SI.Vault, here is Jimmy Breslin on the early Mets, aka, the Worst Baseball Team Ever:

It was long after midnight. The bartender was falling asleep, and the only sound in the hotel was the whine of a vacuum cleaner in the lobby. Casey Stengel banged his last empty glass of the evening on the red-tiled bar top and then walked out of this place that the Chase Hotel in St. Louis calls the Lido Room.

In the lobby, the guy working the vacuum cleaner was on his big job—the rug leading into a ballroom—when Mr. Stengel stopped to light a cigarette and reflect on life. For Stengel this summer, life consists of managing a team called the New York Mets, which is not very good at playing baseball.

“I’m shell-shocked,” Casey addressed the cleaner. “I’m not used to gettin’ any of these shocks at all, and now they come every three innings. How do you like that?” The cleaner had no answer. “This is a disaster,” Stengel continued. “Do you know who my player of the year is? My player of the year is Choo Choo Coleman, and I have him for only two days.

If you’ve never read Breslin’s book on the Mets, it’s certainly worth picking up.

I want Les Nessman to read this post aloud … but I’ll settle for you reading it to yourself:

• ESPN.com has its baseball writers making early predictions for 2009, and some Yankees figure prominently, like CC Sabathia:

As he neared signing with the Yankees, Sabathia got a message from Red Sox GM Theo Epstein telling him how much Epstein respected him for putting aside free agency to try to bring Milwaukee a championship. Some look at what Sabathia has done the past two seasons — from Opening Day to the playoffs: 36 wins, 513 innings pitched, 69 starts — and worry about what that means to his long-term career. The Yankees look at him and see what they most need: the model of reliability.

• Also as part of those predictions, Tim Kurkjian states that the Yanks will be “must-see TV”:

“It will be fun to watch,” one baseball executive said. “All the Yankee lovers will love them even more because they’re really good. The Yankee haters will hate them even more for just buying all the best players. I’d have done the same thing if I were them. We’ll see if it works.”

• In an MLB.com article, Brian Cashman lets us know what he thinks of the starting rotation right now:

“It’s a long season and we’re in the American League East, which is by far the toughest division in the game,” Cashman said. “I think if we can add one more piece to that rotation, it would be beneficial. But it doesn’t absolutely have to go that way.”

• Over at the Times, Tyler Kepner votes for Joba Chamberlain to be in the starting rotation:

… the Yankees already have a lights-out setup man: Brian Bruney. In 31 games from the bullpen last season, Bruney’s earned run average was 1.95, and opponents hit .153. In 30 games from the bullpen last season, Chamberlain’s E.R.A. was 2.31, and opponents hit .211. So, Bruney was actually better. Besides, if the Yankees make the playoffs, Chamberlain will probably have thrown so many innings as a starter that he’ll have to be a reliever in October, anyway. Chamberlain has the stuff to be an elite starter, and Bruney has the stuff to be an elite setup man …

• Kepner also details the on-going saga of Andy Pettitte and the $10 million offer for 2009, which Andy has supposedly rejected:

At 36 and a father of four, Pettitte has taken a year-to-year approach to his career. The Yankees let him take his time in deciding whether to exercise a one-year option after the 2007 season, and he waited until early December, just before the release of the Mitchell report.

Pettitte did not tell the Yankees that he might be included in the report, which said he had used human growth hormone. Pettitte admitted his use and the Yankees supported him publicly. But his performance suffered in the second half of the season, when he usually gets stronger, and he admitted his distracting off-season might have been a factor.

• Mark Teixeira will indeed be introduced to the New York media at a press conference Tuesday.  Newsday reports that Tex won’t be getting uni number 23.
• USA Today assembled an All-Star roster for 2009 with the proviso that the total salary couldn’t be higher than the median team salary in 2008.  There were enough “pre-arbitration” bargains on the roster to allow for the deserved choice of Mariano Rivera as cl0ser.
• Jason Giambi appears to be headed towards a return to the A’s, likely signing a one-year deal later this week.
• The Rays made their first significant free agent move in defending their A.L. crown, signing Pat Burrell to a two year, $16 million deal.

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I’ve gotten some memorable gifts over the years–the Roberto Clemente jersey that a bunch of high school friends got me when I turned 25, the soul mix cd that my friend Alan made me for my 30th birthday, comprised of songs that were released in 1971, the year I was born.  The jersey and the mix were wonderful, but mostly what made the gifts so special was that they came as a surprise. 

Well, a few weeks ago I got another surprise, this time from my cousin Ben who works in the food business here in New York.  First off, he gave me a 20-year old bottle of aged balsamic vinegar and an even fancier bottle of olive oil from Sicily.  Alone, they made a lavish gift, but that was just the start. 

Ben handed me six small manilla envelopes, each filled with cash.  On each envelope was the name of a specific dish and the restaurant where to said dish. 

Here’s the list:

Classic Vietnamese Sandwich at Nicky’s (150 East 2nd street, between Avenue A and B):

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