Dave Eiland, Kevin Mmahat, Al Leiter among others got the call.

FWIW, I was including the dynasty years as well.

FA is but one way to acquire a player, and collusion didn’t stop Steinbrenner from acquiring Jack Clark. And even if Langston didn’t want to come to NY, they still wound up with Pascual Perez joining Hawkins and LaPoint who were acquired the offseason prior. Tim Leary was brought in as well.

the most viable option was to develop a farm system to supply a sufficient number of quality pitchers that would have enabled them to have the best chance to win championships because quality free agents options were so limited

Looking at the Yankees pitching staffs from 89 on it’s not unreasonable to say that a majority of the arms came from outside the organization either through FA or trade.

Shoot, not sure why that happened. Let us know if the problem continues…

Sorry about that.

…. Ted Lilly, a #3/#4 was looking for $10m/yr.
So in comparison, what’s Phil worth?
So in comparison, what’s Joba worth?

…. A decent hitting OFer costs what? $10m? Well above average? $14m? A stud, about $16-$20m? (think Jason Bay)
So in comparison, what’s AJax worth?

… An .850 – .900 OPS guy at any position….$15m?
So in comparison, what’s Montero worth?

Again, this is all if,if,if,if… but… just sayin’.
So if taking on Well’s contract saves 2 of these guys, it’s not as expensive as one might think. Plus with Wells, you can get some value by trading Brett/Melky.

Like Hoss, I’m not sating I’m for it, just examining the ramifications.

Aha, I found the problem–I left a tag open.

I agree with you, at for the start of his career. Despite what the naysayers say (which would be, presumably, “nay”), the Yankees have an enormous interest in keeping him at C. If he shows even minimal competence at the position (i.e., PIazza quality), they’ll leave him back there, at least for the time being.

Alex or Cliff or someone, my last two comments appear to have disappeared after I hit “submit.”

Maybe that’s for the best?

Law is wrong a lot, but trading Montero for a 32 year old pitcher (as opposed to say, a 25 year old Hanley Ramirez) might be the one of the most idiotic things this franchise has ever done.

I still think Montero will be a catcher.

You continue to make the same point, which doesn’t comport with the events as they transpired in the ’80s.

During a decade in which MLB owners engaged in collusion, which forced even a free spending owner like George to forbear on making an offer to Jack Morris as a FA at a time when he might have put the Yankees over the top, and even after that period of collusion, when Mark Langston turned down the Yankees because he didn’t want to play in NY, the most viable option was to develop a farm system to supply a sufficient number of quality pitchers that would have enabled them to have the best chance to win championships because quality free agents options were so limited and because as a consequence of collusion, salaries were held down, which reduced the number of top tier pitchers that small revenue teams needed to trade in order to contain their budgets.

The primary source of the Yankees’ pitching deficit was that there were very few quality mLs being produced, in part because they only executed two first round draft picks from 1980-89.

Granted, they didn’t get nearly enough back when they traded the few good prospects they developed like McGee, DeShaies, and McGriff (they didn’t draft Drabek or Buhner) but if George had prioritized mL development, even if he didn’t want to keep his young players, he would have had many more chips to trade, thereby increasing the chances that some of the trades would have yielded a greater return, but more importantly, it would have also increased the chances that some prospects would have been able to succeed on the truncated timetable that was required in order to satisfy George’s win now attitude, the way Mattingly did.

Consequently, contrary to your claim, they didn’t have very much help on the farm, which caused them to make trades with very little leverage, and the not unforeseeable result was that many of them were bad. If they had more help on the farm, and if the economics of the ’80s would have been different, their decision making calculus would have likely been formed under a very different set of assumptions.

Did it really go away, though? Even though the team crashed and burned in 90, they were still active on the FA market the offseason prior, retaining their players and bringing in Pascual Perez. They traded for Tim Leary. Bucky Dent was fired early in the season. Winfield was traded, but I don’t think that was a “rebuild” type trade. They gave younger guys playing time (Kevin Maas, Deion Sanders, Bam Bam Meulens), but the bulk of playing time went veterans

1991 Tim Leary and Mike Witt was re-signed, Scott Sanderson, Steve Farr & Steve Howe were bought in. Pat Kelly & Bernie were worked into the lineup. Same thing, the bulk of playing time went to veterans

1992 Danny Tartabull and Mike Gallego were bought in. Steve Sax was traded to the White Sox, making way for Pat Kelly @ 2b. Bernie was eventually worked into the lineup, as crowded as it was with Roberto Kelly, Mell Hall, Jesse Barfield and Danny Tartabull. Stump Merril canned after 1-1/2 years as manager. Once again, the bulk of playing time went to veterans.

I remember they were hot after Maddux in the 92 offseason, I remember they were interested in Bonds, but he named some ridiculous price to play in NY (which to me meant he wasn’t interested). I don’t remember if they showed any interest in Cone, but he eventually signed with the Royals (I remember a $9m bonus being offered).

1993 had O’Neill, Jim Abbott, Wade Boggs, Jimmy Key, Spike Owen acquired via trade & free agency. That was the year Steinbrenner returned.

There may have been a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes, that obviously I’m not privy to, but it seemed that the MO was similar; upgrade via trade & FA. Sometimes it works, sometimes it didn’t.

Will see what else I can find during my lunch hour.

NO one wants Wells’ contract, that’s the POINT. It is an obscene, Blue Jay destroying deal. It is so far beyond Lowell’s there is no real analogy. To get the Jays out from under that over next 5 1/2 years would – I remain convinced – get anyone the deal for ONE major leaguer and 2 lesser minor leaguers.

But I am not arguing for doing it, as my post (I thought) made clear. Only quoting someone who said to do it. I think (as I said) that even the Yankees lose a ton of flexibility with 20 million a year added to Arod/CC/Teix/&co (even if Jeter gets less soon). It is pointless to discuss if we LIKE Vernon … no one does at that money, Diane. Next to no one does at all these days. Taking him is a way of shoveling cash at Toronto, dodging league rules about that! He becomes the heavy rock tied to Doc’s neck, or something.

If Phillies or St Louis pay the farm for Doc, are they stupid? Not sure, really. Is the name of the game to have a ‘competitive ballclub’ which we have had for all these non-WS years, or is it to push for a championship? I’m among those who do NOT regard the last years as failures, I like having meaningful games to play in autumn, and I regard the playoffs as a close-to-random crapshoot among eight (well, usually 4-5) good teams. But others here, and in Yankeeland have differed – as we all know – claiming the team is a failure, A Rod is a loser, Torre became a bum, because they haven’t won it all in a bit.

Wherever he goes this month, if he goes, Halladay is the biggest difference-maker of the year.

Part I: “Montero showed big power in batting practice with a tightly wound swing that he unleashes on the ball with good bat speed, and he’s got a great idea of the strike zone for any hitter, much less one as young as he is. His arm is fine behind the plate, but he’s big and slow for a catcher, and it is optimistic to think he’ll stay there long-term. Fortunately, that bat will play anywhere.”

Part II: “I wrote about Montero on Sunday, but after looking over his batting practice video, I noticed that he glides pretty severely during his swing, so he’s hitting off his front foot by the time he makes contact. I don’t think it means anything at this point — he’s so strong that he’s hitting for power despite it — but it’s something to keep in mind if his power production down the line is a little less than expected. For what it’s worth, the comparison that came to mind as I watched the video frame by frame was Frank Thomas, who hit 521 home runs with his weight on his front foot.”

To echo what I thought when I first read Petey’s trade “analysis” piece yesterday, yeah, DH’s are a dime-a-dozen, but a real impact bat at DH (Thomas, Edgar, Ortiz) is still very special and you’d be kicking yourself for a long time if you gave one up.

1975? Had to be sometime during the beginning of the Steinbrenner era.

Cliff, I think your grades are pretty spot on, though I would have given the defense a B, maybe even a B+. 3rd in the AL in Defensive Efficiency, but also 3rd in the AL in PADE (park-adjusted def-eff) is superb. Of course, the PADE score may be skewed by the newness of YS2.0, but even if we throw it out, 3rd in DE is great.