Looking for that ideal last-minute holiday gift for the sports fan in your life?  Look no further than The Best American Sportswriting of 2008, edited by Bill Nack, who is one of the finest sports writers we have.  

Nack is a first-rate reporter, a dedicated craftsman, and a true storyteller.  He came up with Newsday in the late Sixties and wrote about horse racing.  His experience in the field culminated in the seminal book, Secretariat: The Making of a Champion.  In 1979, Nack joined Sports Illustrated where he excelled at the bonus, or take-out piece, writing beautifully about Willie Shoemaker, Keith Hernandez, Rick Pitino, Bobby Fischer, Rocky Marciano, and, of course, Secretariat, to name just a few. (Nack’s best work is compiled in the stellar collection, My Turf.)  

Nack now works for ESPN.com.  Roger Ebert, who has been friends with Nack since they went to college together, wrote a wonderful essay about his friend last week.  If you love words, and care about language, you must check this out.  It could be the highlight of your week. 

I recently caught up with Bill recently to chat about The Best American Sports Writing 2008.

Bronx Banter: As a writer, how do you approach a project like this?

Bill Nack: I just look for the stuff that I liked the most. The stuff that I thought was the best written and best told stories. I read 70-80 stories that Glenn Stout sent me. I got it down to 35-40 and then it became really tough to pair it down. The last ten were very difficult.

BB: Did you work with Glenn or alone?

BN:  I did it on my own. There were a couple of pieces that I had questions about but not many. He left it up to me totally. I trusted him to give me what he thought were the 70 best and after that I felt it was up to me to find the ones that I thought were the best. And occasionally, I’d call him up and say, “What do you think of this one?” Some to me were slam dunks, in fact most of them were. Jeanne Marie Laskas, SL Price. The only problem that I had was in trying to get a mix–of traditional sports with obscure sports. And I was very conscious of the mix.

BB: Did you also want to mix-up bonus pieces and newspaper stuff?

BN: Yeah I did actually. I wanted to make sure there was an adequate representation of newspaper columns which are a dying species. And when I read Rick Telander’s piece on Doug Atkins that was a no-brainer. Same thing on Rick Reilly’s piece. The piece on Bo Jackson, by Joe Posnanski, that was kind of a column, that to me was an easy one. That raised a problem because I wondered if we should have two Bo Jackson stories in one book. And I really liked the ESPN.com piece by Michael Weinreb. I loved both of them. And what I liked about them together is that they were completely different takes on the same guy. I think I did consult with Glenn on that one. I said, “Do you mind if we have two Bo Jackson stories?” And he said, “No, no, they are both very different.”

BB:  I actually like having them back-to-back for just that reason.

BN:  The one thing that I noticed in the first batch of stories that Glenn sent me was that there was no humor. It was very serious. The poor woman who was lost in the wilderness and saved by her dog, the Terry Fox run across Canada, the world’s tallest tree, Scott Price’s piece on the poor coach who died from a foul ball.  And I looked at it and thought, “God, some of this stuff is really gloomy.” I happened to be a subscriber to Golf Digest and Dan Jenkins is a regular contributor. I started looking through my old issues and ran across Dan’s piece about trying to play golf as you grow old. I started laughing as I read it, because he’s one of the funniest writers that’s ever written about sports. I finished it and thought this has got to go in there. So that’s the one humorous piece that I found. I also liked it because I’m 67 and play golf. And there are a lot of older men who still play, so I thought it had a wider appeal. It was not just funny, which I needed, but it was something that a lot of guys could relate to. You don’t have to be 67, all you have to do is be 50.

BB: Was there a sense with the Tom Boswell column on Clemens and the Hank Aaron story that you wanted to get in pieces that were timely?

BN: Oh, definitely. I did think of that. I thought people would like Tom Boswell’s piece because it is a comment on Clemens.

BB: I thought the Aaron piece was phenomenal.

BN: I showed some of the pieces around before I made my final choices. Some people loved the Tommy Craggs thing and other people said, “You can’t put this in there. Who is this guy?” I just laughed. But they were bent out-of-shape because Craggs is criticizing the press in his piece. Who is this guy to criticize the press? I said, “I have no idea and I don’t care who he is.” I thought he had a very interesting, sharp take. And when I read it I thought, you know there is a lot of truth in this. I might not agree with everything, but I thought there was a lot of truth in it. I had friends in the piece that he criticized but I ran it anyway.

BB: The collection has some good young talent, like Wright Thompson, who has made the series several times now.

BN: I thought that was a terrific piece he did on Beijing. Really well done. Almost personal in a way. He didn’t just write a piece. He got you into it with vivid imagery. I’ve never met Wright Thompson, I’ve only read a little bit by him but I thought, this is really good. I didn’t know anything about him, but like Tommy, I liked his work and was happy to put it in this book. If you want to know the bottom line, I didn’t consider personalities, I didn’t consider names, I just put in people who contributed to making this the best possible anthology I could put together.

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Orders were flying over the counter at a deli on Water Street this morning.

“I’ll take a Western with home fries and rye toast,” someone shouted.

“Give me a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich to go,” someone else yelled.

“What kind of bread?” the man on the grill asked.

“Slap it on a well-buttered roll,” they answered. “What else would you use for a heart-attack special?”

“I’m just trying to make sure you get what you want,” the grill man said.

Everyone seems to be getting what they want these days.

The Yankees got CC Sabathia to head the rotation.

Sabathia got a record contract and a call from Derek Jeter.

“The money is nice,” the guy who ordered the Western said, “but I bet the call from Jeter didn’t hurt.”

A call to A.J. Burnett added another power arm to the pitching staff.

“The Yankees are pulling out all the stops to get everything for everyone,” the guy waiting for the heart-attack special said. “We’re getting what we want and the players are getting what they want and the media is even getting something.”

“What’s the media getting?” the Western guy asked.

The heart-attack special guy smiled and said:

“The newspaper writers can now use the old ‘hefty lefty’ tag they’ve had in storage since David Wells left town.”

The grill man wrapped the sandwich and slid it down the counter.

“One heart-attack coming right at you.”

Guess the Yankees Opening Day payroll … win a prize!  (nah …)

Here’s the news:

• Buster Olney of ESPN.com believes that just because the Yanks have committed 1/4 of a billion dollars to two pitchers, it doesn’t mean they’ve lost their minds and abandoned their supposed new ways of team-building:

Because the Yankees waited to pursue Sabathia, rather than deal for Santana, they still have Hughes and Ian Kennedy and Austin Jackson and all the players mentioned in the Santana talks, and as the pitching talent pool has increased at the major league level, there is now more time for those youngsters to develop. It actually has been more than a decade since the Yankees have had as much minor league talent stacked up as they do now. Yes, they will sacrifice draft picks in landing Sabathia and Burnett. But keep in mind that the Yankees will have picks in the first and second round of the draft in 2009 because of players unsigned in 2008; it’s not as if they are being shut down.

• Over at the Boston Globe, Nick Cafardo wonders if the Yanks acquisition of Sabathia and Burnett will make people think of them as prohibitive favorites in the same vein as the Tigers were supposed to be after acquiring Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis last year.  Nonetheless, one N.L. executive offered this opinion:

“The one difference is that the Yankees are loading up on pitching while the Tigers did get Dontrelle, [but] there were still questions about their bullpen and their starting rotation,” said one National League executive. “If the Yankees get another guy [Burnett], re-sign Andy Pettitte on top of Sabathia, I’ll take my chance that they might be the best team in the American League.”

• If not Tex, then who?: Lyle Spencer at MLB.com writes of the Yanks interest in Mark Teixeira, but has some ideas on what they might do if they don’t sign him, but DO sign Manny:

If the Yankees pass on Teixeira — leaving first to Swisher — and move on Ramirez, they could shop outfielder Xavier Nady, who made $3.35 million in 2008. Nady, who can play first as well as the corner outfield spots, is eligible for free agency after the 2009 season, and would be an appealing fit for all the clubs who lose out on Teixeira and Ramirez.

• Hank is psyched, and wants the world to know it: Newsday’s Kat O’Brien goes over the Yanks successes at the Winter Meetings, and includes this deliciously-grandiose quote from Hank Steinbrenner:

“I can sense the excitement and the confidence that’s spreading around the entire organization about what we’re getting done and what we may get done still. A rising tide lifts all boats, and the confidence and the excitement right now among the team and the organization is contagious.”

• (more…)

Enough is never enough.

According to George King in today’s New York Post:

According to several baseball officials, the YankeesNew York Yankees remain in the Mark Teixeira hunt. But the same connected voices insist if the Yankees don’t land the switch-hitting first baseman, they will turn their money toward controversial slugger Manny Ramirez.

“If they can’t get Teixeira, they are right there on Manny,” an official with knowledge of the Yankees’ plan said yesterday.

…Only fools count out the Yankees when it comes to free agents.

A curveball is hard to find and easy to lose and it usually goes flat somewhere along the way. There was an old man on the 2 train this morning with a theory on why Ian Kennedy seems to have found his curveball with the Indios de Mayaguez in Puerto Rico.

“They have the best baseball weather this time of year,” the old man explained. “I grew up in Mayaguez and wish I was spending the winter there, too. It’s the perfect place for Kennedy to polish his curveball and get his confidence back.”

Kennedy carries a 2-2 record and a 1.56 ERA into today’s game against the Lobos de Arecibo.

“I’ve heard he looks great,” the old man said. “I believe in the kid and still think he’s going to be a good Major League starter.”

The old man crumpled his coffee cup and gripped it like a curveball.

“I used to do some pitching myself,” the old man said. “I could drop curveballs in for strikes all day.”

The old man smiled because he knows that the best curveballs come from memories.

“It’s a lot easier to talk about ‘em than it was to throw ‘em,” he admitted. “Good curveballs have a way of getting lost.”

Kennedy lost his sometime last year and got knocked around by big-league hitters.

“They were sitting on his fastball and changeup,” the old man said. “He needs to have a third pitch working. Maybe now he’s found the curveball I lost all those years ago.”

Another smile tugged at the edges of the old man’s mouth.

“I know he didn’t really find mine,” the old man said. “He found his own curveball and that’s going to make all the difference.”

$243.5 million worth of pitching acquired in the last two days … kinda takes your breath away, huh kids?  Here’s the news:

• Over at ESPN.com, Keith Law doesn’t have a major problem with the signing of Burnett:

I’ve seen Burnett compared to Carl Pavano by fans, but the comparison doesn’t hold. Pavano was more injury-prone at the time he signed with the Yankees than Burnett has been; Pavano had had shoulder or elbow trouble in just about every season of his career until he rattled off two straight healthy years with Florida. Pavano also had nowhere near Burnett’s raw stuff, nor his ability to induce strikeouts or ground balls. It is, of course, possible that Burnett’s tenure with the Yankees will resemble Pavano’s; pitchers do get hurt, and Burnett has some affinity for the trainer’s room. But Burnett brings an upside to the table that Pavano never did — that of a shutdown No. 1 starter who, in the Yankees’ rotation, will always be pitching in the spot of a No. 2 or 3 starter.

• Ken Davidoff of Newsday thinks the Yanks should tell Andy Pettitte to just move on, but … :

Call Andy Pettitte, and tell him sorry, but his time is up. Keep in touch, keep in shape. Maybe he can do a Roger Clemens-esque return close to the All-Star break — at the $16-million salary he wants, moreover, just prorated.

With A.J. Burnett coming aboard Friday, the Yankees have four high-end starting pitchers in CC Sabathia, Burnett, Chien-Ming Wang and Joba Chamberlain. That’s your October starting rotation right there, and it’s superb.

So don’t give up entirely on the youth movement. Allow Alfredo Aceves, Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy a chance to contribute from that fifth starter’s role, rather than overspending on the fading Pettitte. Maybe Phil Coke and even Andrew Brackman can get into the mix.

One veteran official from an American League club wisely noted, “It’s not the five spot that’s been the Yankees’ problem.”

• At the Post, Joba Chamberlain approves of the signings:

“The way our front office did things today was fantastic,” he said. “They went about their business and got things done, and it is very exciting.” …

“I feel less stress because you have all these guys around to be leaders for you,” Chamberlain said. “It takes a little pressure off of everybody.”

• Also at the Post, Johnny Damon likes the moves:

“All of us saw how he dominated us,” Damon said of the right-hander, who was 5-3 with a 2.39 ERA and held Yankee hitters to a .213 batting average and fanned 72 batters in 71 2/3 innings. “We always said if we had this guy we would have won the past three years.”

Burnett, who forfeited $24 million across two years in Toronto when he opted out of his contract, is one of the elite AL hurlers when right. However, injuries have plagued him.

Still, Damon is wild about teaming Burnett with CC Sabathia and Chien-Ming Wang. Chien-Ming Wang

“On most teams, Sabathia, Burnett and Wang would be No. 1 starters,” Damon said. “We have three No. 1 guys.”

(more…)

I will start with a confession: I now love A.J. Burnett. I love his sizzling fastball and knee-buckling curveball and disappearing changeup. I love his sneer and his stare and his cocky glare.

I used to hate all of it when he handled my team – one, two, three – spit and walked off the mound like he owned the world. A guy like Burnett is easy to hate when he’s on the other side, but I find him irresistible now that he’s with us.

I officially fell for him last night in a bar. The music was loud, but the shouts were even louder when the news rolled across the screen: “ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick reports that the New York Yankees and free agent A.J. Burnett have reached a preliminary agreement on a five-year, $82.5 million contract.”

The barroom cheered and cheered and cheered again.

But some people were not cheering. Those people look at Burnett and see everything that can go wrong. They see his past injuries and the length and size of his contract and some other things that I can’t even understand right now because I’m in love with a talented pitcher who can get batters out.

That’s why I look at Burnett and see everything that can go right. I see the blazers and the benders and the Bugs Bunny changes. I see the frustrated Sox and Rays and Jays and O’s who will now hate Burnett as much as I used to.

I see a beautiful baseball summer with A.J. in a rotation with CC and Chien-Ming and Joba and maybe Andy, too.

And then I remember the true love this game can bring when you believe in the promise of the future and not just some possibilities drawn from the past.

What is it with ex-Florida Marlin pitchers that makes Cashman offer them expensive free agent contracts?  Anyhow, here’s the news:

• The Yanks continue their accumulation of starting pitchers with initials for their “first name”, as ESPN reports that A.J. Burnett will be signing on for five years and $82.5 million.
• Mark Bowman of MLB.com points out that the Yankees may have had a geographical edge over the Braves in signing Burnett:

“All I will say is that we made a very competitive offer,” said Braves general manager Frank Wren, while only confirming that Burnett wouldn’t be coming to Atlanta. “I would say geography was a primary factor.”

When Wren returned from the Winter Meetings late Thursday night, Burnett’s agent, Darek Braunecker, informed him that Burnett was having difficulty with his decision and needed more time.

One thing the Braves couldn’t offer was a geographical overhaul that might have made Atlanta more appealing to Burnett’s wife, Karen, who chooses not to fly.

Now she’ll have the opportunity to take a three-hour train ride from their Baltimore-area home to see her husband in New York.

“We knew we couldn’t move Maryland closer to Atlanta,” Wren said. “We were swimming upstream all along.”

• Will eight be enough for Teixeira? During the Winter Meetings, the Angels apparently presented their FA first baseman with an eight-year offer of unspecified dollar value (but rumored to be at least $160 million but more likely upwards of $180 million).
• The Cabrera for Cameron deal has apparently been put on temporary hold as the Yanks focused on getting Burnett.
• To make room for C.C. and A.J., the Yanks non-tendered P Chris Britton and OF Justin Christian (MLB.com).
• MLB.com notes that if the Yankees are still interested in FA Ben Sheets, they should know that the Rangers are also on the radar, and Sheets is from Louisiana with a house in Dallas.
• Following up on a story yesterday, Yahoo!Sports reports Bernie Williams will be joining the Carolina Giants (Winter League), as a step towards making the Puerto Rican WBC team.
• The signing of Sabathia has improved the World Series odds for the Bombers from 6-1 to 3-1, reports the Times.
• You can pre-order your authentic Sabathia jersey from the MLB shop.
• Over at BP.com, tucked into an article on the costs of new stadia, is an amusing little CC Sabathia nickname from Neil DeMause: mL Sabathia (yes, I’m a math/science geek … and I approve of this humor).
• Jeff Robinson turns 48 today. The Yanks got him from the Pirates (along with Willie Smith) after the ’89 season for (D)on Slaught.
• Dale Berra turns 52 today.  Like Robinson, Berra was also acquired from the Pirates, along with Jay Buhner (!) and Alfonso Pulido for Steve Kemp, Tim Foli and cash afther the ’84 season.  Berra amassed 217 ABs with the Bombers in his two season with them.  Buhner of course was notoriously dealt for Ken Phelps (grumble grumble … sigh) in 1988.
• Happy 73rd birthday to Lindy McDaniel.  Lindy pitched 111.7 innings of relief (in only 62 games) in 1970, amassing 29 saves along the way.  More importantly perhaps, he was traded to the Royals after 1973 for Ken Wright and a guy named Lou Piniella.
• On this date in 1961, after his amazing 54-homer campaign, Mickey Mantle signs a one-year contract for $82,000.
• On this date in 2001, the Bombers sign Jason Giambi to a seven-year deal worth $120 million. The 2000 MVP and 2001 runner-up drove in 120 runs, hit 38 home runs, and had a .342 batting average for the wild card Oakland A’s.
• On this date in 2003, Kevin Brown is obtained from the Dodgers for Jeff Weaver, Yhency Brazoban, Brandon Weeden (minors), and cash.

Check out my take on the Yankees in the wake of the A.J. Burnett deal over at SI.com.

It’s safe to say in all the time that I’ve known Cliff, I’ve never seen him so emotional.  I’ve seen him livid about specific plays and games–heck, he was furious (and rightfully so) when the Yankees didn’t sign Carlos Beltran in favor of Pavano, Wright and Womack.  But never anything that approaches his disgust over the AJ Burnett deal.

During the course of the season, Cliff and I will chat during a game and I’m the emotional one, flying off the handle, shouting at the top of my lungs when Alex Rodriguez just misses his pitch and fouls the ball off.  And Cliff is always collected, rational, measured.  Not a vulcan, just not easily led by his gut.

Now, I’ve savaged AJ Burnett for the past few years.  But my initial reaction here is to look for the positives.  Maybe I’m just reacting to Cliff’s reaction, and I want to keep the balance in the Bronx Banter universe (we can’t both be raving mad men at the same time, can we?), but maybe Burnett will produce.  One thing for sure–the Yankees now have a starting staff with STUFF.  Throw CC, AJ, Joba and Wang at you?  That’s STUFF, man.  When’s the last time you could say that?

My feeling is that this is Cashman pushing his chips into the middle of the table and saying, “All In.”  He’s got CC for three years, which will coincide with the end of the careers of Mariano and Posada and maybe even Jeter.  This is all about the Yankees winning now. 

Same as it ever was.  I’m not defending this deal–I think five years is crazy too–and I’m not saying that I’ve ever rooted for Burnett, but I’m open to jumping on the bandwagon.  What’s the alternative?  That he’ll be the lovechild of Kyle Farnsworth and Carl Pavano?  I already suspect that.  All I can do is be pleasantly surprised. 

And Burnett really does have STUFF.

Over at SI.com, our pal Jay Jaffe thinks the deal could come back to haunt the Yanks, still he does point to some bright spots:

Burnett’s combination of fragility and perceived squeamishness calls to mind the darkest chapter of Yankee GM Brian Cashman’s tenure, the two deals he inked at the 2004 winter meetings with a pair of injury-riddled pitchers coming off rare healthy, effective seasons, Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright. The Yankees just cleared the former’s four-year, $39.95 million deal from the books this fall. A teammate of Burnett’s with the Marlins from 2002 through ’04, Pavano signed with the Yankees in December ’04 after a season in which he’d gone 18-8 with a 3.00 ERA in 222 1/3 innings — figures that were all career bests, but representing just the second time the pitcher had been healthy and effective over a full season. Pavano made just 19 starts in his four years in the Bronx, and his litany of injuries reached such an absurd level that his initials came to stand for “Can’t Pitch.” Wright was coming off his first healthy and effective season since 1998; he managed just 43 starts over the next three years (the last one in Baltimore) and was rarely effective. Suffice it to say that the Yankees’ recent record of banking on pitchers with sketchy track records isn’t a good one.

To be fair, Burnett is a good pitcher when healthy. Though he had never won more than 12 games prior to last season — a function of his lack of availability and the occasionally meager offensive support he had received — his ERAs have been 13 percent better than the park-adjusted league average over the past four years, which ranks 16th among pitchers with at least 700 innings in that span. His 4.07 ERA this past year was inflated by about half a run thanks to his .318 Batting Average on Balls In Play, 18 points above league average.

Burnett’s strikeout rate over those four years, 8.89 per nine innings, is even better, ranking third among that group behind Cy Young winners Jake Peavy and Johan Santana. As noted in discussing Sabathia, strikeout rate is the key indicator of a pitcher’s future success because it provides the window into his ability to fool hitters with his offerings. A pitcher’s strikeout rate generally declines as he ages, but a high strikeout rate gives him more headroom before he does so. To the extent that the Yankees must look five years into the future on Burnett’s deal, his strikeout rate offers some assurance of future effectiveness — if not availability.

Steven Goldman thinks that buying AJ is about as safe as bet as buying GM.

Anyhow, while we roll this all over, here’s a couple of You Tube delights to give you a smile.

Hey, what do you think of the AJ contract, Babs?

What about you, Joe?

C’mon now, let’s just dance it off:

There are so many things to dislike about A.J. Burnett and his new Yankee contract that I don’t know where to start. I suppose I’ll start with in the cheapest, easiest place, with a comparison of Burnett and Carl Pavano at the moments at which they signed their big Yankee contracts:

There’s no question that A.J. Burnett has better stuff that Carl Pavano. There’s also no question that Carl Pavano’s contract was a smarter, better investment at the time it was signed than Burnett’s is today. None. Pavano arrived in New York off not one, but two consecutive 200-inning seasons (Burnett managed just 165 2/3 innings in 2007), was three years younger, signed for one year less (making him a whopping four years younger in the final year of his deal), and the average annual salary of Pavano’s deal was 40 percent lower than that of Burnett’s.

Oh, and here’s another little nugget, the two pitchers’ career K/BB rates entering their Yankee contracts:

Pavano: 2.28
Burnett: 2.25

One could argue that the comparison between these two pitchers isn’t entirely fair. Pavano’s performance (or lack thereof) during the length of his contract was an extreme case that is extremely unlikely to be repeated, even by a pitcher with Burnett’s sketchy history. At the same time, the Pavano contract was widely panned upon it’s signing, long before anyone knew just how badly things would go, and I think it’s clear that this Burnett contract is an even worse move. It may not be entirely fair, but it is extremely informative, if for no other reason than it’s illustration of the fact that Brian Cashman, a general manager I have long defended in this space, did not learn from one of the biggest mistakes of his career.

ESPN is reporting that the Yankees have signed A.J. Burnett to a five-year deal worth $82.5 million dollars. I cannot help but react emotionally to this signing. It is an inexplicably awful, irresponsible, wrong-headed move. I hate hate hate it. It makes me physically sick. Combined with the New Stadium, it is enough for me to question my allegiance to this team. I cannot be consoled. I assume many of you feel the same way. Consider the comments of this post group therapy . . .

The signing of CC Sabathia brings to mind the issue of large—shall we say heavyset?— pitchers. While few doubt that the 28-year-old Sabathia will help the Yankees immensely in the first two to three years of his contract, there are questions about his long-term staying power. How exactly have plus-sized pitchers aged over baseball history?

My immediate thoughts turn to two hefty lefties, Mickey Lolich and Wilbur Wood, who were dominant in their twenties, but pretty much past their prime by the time they reached their early thirties. Wood wasn’t helped by a freakish injury that occurred when a Ron LeFlore line drive nailed him in the kneecap, but the knuckeballer had already started to fade by that point. Already huge by his peak, “Wilbah” really took on grandiose proportions as a member of the White Sox in the early 1970s, once allegedly tipping the scale at about 280 pounds. By the age of 33, Wood was no longer effective. By 36, he was out of baseball and headed toward fulltime life on the farm.

Lolich never became as large as Wood did at his peak, but conditioning remained a problem throughout his career. By age 33, Lolich’s body had started to show signs of wear and tear. Though still adequate, he had clearly left his prime years behind. By 36, he was injury prone. Two years later, he was finished.  

Then there is the case of Sid Fernandez, another left-hander with a bad body who compounded his problems with a painful delivery. Fernandez enjoyed even less longevity than Wood and Lolich. El Sid started to experience serious arm problems by the age of 30, and soon lost his effectiveness. By age 34, Fernandez was headed to retirement.

(more…)

R.I.P. to one hot Betty.

While everyone was talking about CC, AJ, Melky and Mike yesterday, the Yankees lost four players in the Rule 5 draft, the most of any organization (the Angels lost three pitchers, the Rockies were the only other team to lose more than one player in the major league portion of the draft). To me this is evidence of how well stocked the Yankees farm system is, at least in terms of pitching.

Remember, the Yankees traded away Jose Tabata and three pitchers (Ross Ohlendorf, Jeff Karstens, and Daniel McCutchen) at the trading deadline (Tabata, Karstens, and Ohlendorf are all on Pittsburgh’s 40-man roster; McCutchen is not yet Rule 5 eligible). They traded two more pitchers in the Nick Swisher deal (Jeff Marquez and Jhonny Nuñez, both now on the White Sox’s 40-man, with Nuñez being replaced in the Yankees’ system by the non-Rule 5 eligible Kanekoa Texeira), let Darrell Rasner head off to Japan, cleared out another eight spots on the 40-man roster via free agency (some of which were filled by players activated from the 60-day DL), filled the remaining empty spots on the 40-man, and still had enough talent in their system to be the most targeted organization in the Rule 5 draft. That’s impressive.

Since I didn’t address them at the time, here’s a quick look at the six men added to the 40-man roster this offseason as well as the four men taken in the major league portion of the Rule 5 draft yesterday and, for yucks, the two taken in the Triple-A portion of the draft.

First the 40-man additions listed in rough approximation of their proximity to the major leagues:

Steven Jackson – RHP

The last remaining player from the deal that sent Randy Johnson back to Arizona after the 2006 season, Jackson utilized an improved split-finger fastball to have a break out season in relief for Triple-A Scranton this year. After the All-Star break, Jackson posted a 0.87 ERA while striking out 26 in 20 2/3 innings against just eight walks and no homers. On the season, he struck out 91 in 79 2/3 innings while allowing just four homers. A big righty who will turn 27 in March, Jackson could be part of the fungible minimum-wage portion of the Yankees bullpen in 2009.

(more…)

I’m wearing a “My web browser went to the Winter Meetings and all I got was this lousy t-shirt” … umm … t-shirt, and I bring you this news:

• BP.com’s (and new BBWAA member) Christina Kahrl analyzes the Sabathia signing:

Which brings us back to the simple fact that having Sabathia set for three seasons is a great bet, and an absolutely worthwhile risk to take on if you want to win in baseball’s best division, regardless of whether the deal’s segmented or not. Is it a gamble? Of course it is, but if the Yankees get seven years of good work, or even three or four of great work and some less so, it will have been worth it. With Wang lined up as an extremely different kind of rotation regular, and with the gaggle of young talent lined up behind them, they’ve got a good front end on a staff already operating with the benefit of better depth in the pen. If the bet was on Sabathia’s being a unique talent who might make all the difference over Mark Teixeira being a great first baseman over seven years (for the sake of argument), I’ll take the pitcher in this instance, acknowledging that finding a first baseman who can help you score runs is easier than the Yankees have made it for themselves in recent seasons.

• Staying with BP.com, here’s an interesting Q&A from a chat with BP’s John Perrotto:

Dante (NY): With the Yankees signing CC and most likely add Burnett or Sheets, is Phil Hughes still as untouchable as ever, even with their huge need for a young/solid catcher?

John Perrotto: They are willing to trade Phil Hughes, who other teams are starting to see as really nothing more than a No. 3 or No. 4 starter.

• Mark Feinsand of the News reports that the Yanks are still leaving the door open for Andy Pettitte, but that the door will be closing if they secure one or two more FA pitchers.  Also in the article is this little tidbit on a potential new revenue source for the team:

One of those may come in the press box at the new Yankee Stadium, where a source said the club is considering charging media members for wireless Internet access at every home game.

A Yankees official said the idea has been thrown around, although it is unclear whether it will happen or how much the team plans to charge if it decided to go ahead with the plan.

• Newsday’s Ken Davidoff wraps up his coverage of the Meetings with an analysis of the Yankee moves:

Yes, it was obnoxious that the Yankees had to bid against themselves and offer $61 million more than the next offer to convince Sabathia to come to New York. But look, if we had said a month ago that the Yankees would sign Sabathia to a three-year, $69-million deal, wouldn’t Bud Selig have said, “Where do I sign up?”

While this technically is a seven-year, $161-million deal, it’s spiritually three years for $69 million. Is there any doubt Sabathia will use that opt-out after 2011? In signing this deal, he has sent a telegram to the Giants: “You have three years to get your house in order for my arrival! See you then!”

Burnett, though? People love his stuff, which he displayed in fine form by leading the American League with 231 strikeouts this past season. But he just doesn’t take the mound enough, most industry people agree, to justify five years and $80 million.

“We know him better than anyone,” a Blue Jays official said Thursday on the condition of anonymity, “and we wouldn’t give him five years.”

• The Post’s Joel Sherman points out why the Yanks may be targeting certain pitchers over others this off-season:

If you want to know what is so alluring to the Yankees about Sabathia and Burnett, take a look at the strikeouts-per-nine-innings leaders in the majors: Burnett was third (9.39) and Sabathia was fifth (8.93).

Yankees starters have finished in the bottom half of the AL in strikeouts per nine innings each of the past three years, which has put more balls in play to expose a poor defense. But the Yankees also are thinking about more than just getting back to the playoffs with a swing-and-miss brigade. They believe power arms win in October, and they envision lining up Sabathia, Burnett, Joba Chamberlain a Joba Chamberlain nd maybe even Ben Sheets and blowing away playoff opponents.

That is why they agreed to pay a pitching record $161 million to secure Sabathia. And that is why they seem to favor Burnett over Derek Lowe, although Burnett is an annual injury risk and Lowe is one of the best bets for 30-plus starts and 12-plus wins around …

But their organizational philosophy has become, it is the job of the manager, pitching coach and training staff to get the talented players on the field. One Yankees official recently said, “Darrell Rasner is a great guy, but I can’t teach him to miss a bat.”

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Need a center fielder?

According to Pete Abraham, the Yankees may complete a trade that would send Melky Cabrera to the Brewers for Mike Cameron as soon as tomorrow.  I’ve always liked Cameron.  He seems like a good egg, an appealing guy.  Maybe not exactly the same clubhouse stature as Tony Clark, but close.  Alex Rodriguez and CC Sabathia speak highly of him I know.  He’s getting on in age but he’s a good bet to hit 20-25 homers, whiff 264 times, throw guys out and cover a lot of ground in center field.  

I would not especially miss Melky Cabrera.

Okay, so the Yankees have landed the big fish, with CC Sabathia agreeing to a seven-year deal worth roughly $161 million. Now what? The rumor mill has had them going hard after first Derek Lowe, then A.J. Burnett, with Ben Sheets and Andy Pettitte serving as backup options who could be had with shorter term contracts.

This prompts two questions: Exactly how much money to they have left to spend? and What about the offense?

With regards to the first, let’s do the math on the money coming off last year’s payroll and how much of that has already been spent:

all costs in millions of dollars; *estimated prorated portion of 2008 salary

In addition to the above, the Yankees have four arbitration eligible players. Three of whom had poor 2008 seasons and thus are unlikely to have much negative effect on the bottom line. Those three are Chien-Ming Wang, Brian Bruney, and Melky Cabrera. The last is Xavier Nady. The Yankees paid Nady roughly $1.12 million of his $3.35 million salary last year. Nady would cost the Yankees an extra $2.23 million even without getting a raise and is coming off a career year. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect his salary to exceed $5 million in 2009. To make things simple, I’ll just round down the Yankees net savings in the chart above to $40 million.

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What’s the over/under on the number of words dedicated to Sabathia today?  Anyway, here’s the news:

• Buster Olney of ESPN examines the concerns for C.C. Sabathia as he approaches this new challenge:

Sabathia will get the largest contract ever for a pitcher, Joel Sherman reports, and he is embracing the pressure of going into New York as a savior. That challenge eventually destroyed Chuck Knoblauch and confounded Roger Clemens for most of two seasons. It’s a challenge that still seems to gnaw at Alex Rodriguez.

… Sabathia’s personal puzzle will be to find a way to block out the external pressure and not allow it to compound the internal pressure that he already places on himself, and that pressure is as large as he is. He has been at his worst in the past when he has pushed himself too much — examples include after Bartolo Colon left the Indians and Sabathia wanted to become the ace, and perhaps at the outset of the 2008 season, as he began his free-agent year. The worst thing Sabathia can do is to try harder. But he will be remarkably accountable, owning up to his mistakes quickly and adjusting, and I’d bet that he’ll figure out the emotional puzzle and pitch effectively for the Yankees.

• BP.com’s Jay Jaffe has a thorough (and somewhat sobering) analysis of the Sabathia signing, which ends with this:

The Sabathia signing won’t put the Yankees over the top by itself, particularly given that it now makes Boston the favorite to sign Teixeira to upgrade a more potent offense than the Yanks can muster and that the young and already stocked Rays have frontline starter David Price and even more top prospects still on the way. Sabathia can’t be expected to match the dominance he showed in his Milwaukee stint because the American League, and the AL East in particular—statistically the toughest five-team division of the Wild Card Era—is a more difficult place to pitch; at the very least one can expect his strikeout rate to drop, since he’ll face designated hitters instead of pitchers. His Cleveland numbers are a better guide to his future performance than his Milwaukee ones.

In all, the move makes a splash in New York by putting most of the Yankees’ eggs into one very big basket and by compensating for the type of deal Cashman apparently wishes he’d done last winter. While it may pay off in the short term, it may prevent them from addressing other big needs, and could very well net them bigger headaches down the road.

• Also at BP.com, Joe Sheehan voices a similar concern on the signing and how it impacts the structure of the team:

Despite the perception around the Yankees that pitching was a problem last year, this contract gilds a reasonably attractive lily, making the rotation strong and decreasing the pressure on the bullpen due to Sabathia’s tendency to work deep into games. On the other hand, signing Sabathia puts $23 million a year in a place other than the offense, which was the team’s real problem in ’08 and projects to be something less than dominant in 2009. The Yankees needed a big bat more than they needed a big arm, and while the two aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive for a team with the Yankees’ money, if signing Sabathia makes it even slightly less likely that the Yankees sign Mark Teixeria, it was probably the wrong move for them.

• Yahoo!Sports is reporting that the Sabathia contract has an opt-out clause after three years.  The Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel reports that Sabathia’s agent was pushing for an opt-out clause regardless of where C.C. signed.

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