Damn Yankees.

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Alex Rodriguez, quite possibly the best all-around player in baseball today, is going to be traded to the New York Yankees.

A-Rod will move to third base to fill the hole created by Aaron “What Do You Mean, ‘My Contract Won’t Let Me Play Basketball?’ ” Boone. The Yankees get A-Rod and some money from Texas (coal to Newcastle, if you ask me), while the Rangers get Alfonso Soriano, a “player to be named later” who might be Jose Contreras and might be a minor-leaguer, and some payroll flexibility at long last. The Red Sox, and the rest of the AL East, get a bad case of heartburn.

While everyone’s talking about how the Yankees will be scoring 120 runs per game, I think the offensive impact of this trade won’t be as strong as some might think. Yankee Stadium isn’t all that friendly to righthanded hitters, and A-Rod won’t be playing 81 games in the Breadbox at Arlington. That said, though, he’ll be hitting in the heart of a lineup that can legitimately be called “Murderer’s Row” once again. When the manager’s biggest problem with making out his lineup is deciding how he fits Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams, and Hideki Matsui into the 6-7-8 holes, that’s a good place to be.

They gave up a good hitter in Soriano, though. I’ve seen speculation that he’ll play centerfield for Texas, and he might do pretty well out there. In Texas, he may well hit 45 HR, or even 50, although he won’t have as much protection this year with Palmeiro and Gonzalez gone.

Defensively… well, A-Rod’s a Gold Glove shortstop, and I think he can learn to play third extremely well — I’m flashing on Cal Ripken. Also, the Yankees no longer have to deal with Soriano’s defensive oddities.

What about the money? Well, Tom Hicks has to be kicking himself over his original folly of signing the $252 million deal, and at least he’s gotten out from under some of it. I haven’t seen an exact breakdown of the financial end of it, but the stories I’ve seen imply that for at least the first year, the Yankees are doing very well. They don’t have to pay Drew Henson ($2.2M), Alfonso Soriano ($5.4M), or Aaron Boone ($5.75M), and they can defer some of A-Rod’s money ($3M out of $21M total for 2004) and Texas gives them about $4M. Net 2004 expense — about $750,000 for one of the best players in the game. Next year gets uglier, and the years after that even more so, but the Yankees under Steinbrenner don’t really seem to care about money.

Texas has an opportunity to get better. Then again, if they throw the money away on more pitching like Chan Ho Park… well, let’s just not even think about that. “Go to the happy place… the happy place, yes…”

So, the bottom line. Will the Yankees win the AL East? I still think there are a lot of questions about this team, and that their defense is shaky. I know Harley thinks their rotation is the best in the game, and that we’re just going to have to agree to disagree on that point… but I’ve got to say, they’ve definitely gotten better here, and not by a small amount, either. I still like Boston a lot, though.

My final answer… Pick ’em, they’re too close to call. It’s a crying shame that it probably won’t work out so that one gets the Wild Card and gets to face the other in the ALCS. I think whichever one does go to the playoffs will go all the way, though.

24 thoughts on “Damn Yankees.”

  1. I’d be shocked if ARod actually plays most of his games this season at third. Jeter’s defensive shortcomings have become more and more obvious, while ARod’s a legitimate Gold Glove-caliber shortstop. I’ve seen a fair amount of argument online that the Yankees should move Jeter to center field, since Bernie Williams clearly doesn’t have what it takes to play there anymore. Getting ARod might be the impetus to make that happen.

  2. If you put Jeter in center, though, Lofton has just become Chief Benchwarmer, and you still don’t have anyone to play third. I haven’t seen enough Yankee games to have an opinion, but do you think Matsui could play center? I watched Sheffield hack away at playing right last year in Atlanta, and I know he’s not up to the job of playing center.
    I’m interested to see what happens if and when King George puts his two cents worth into the situation.

  3. If Lofton’s anything other than Chief Benchwarmer, the Yankees have problems. Not that they haven’t shown the willingness to shoot themselves in the foot from time to time… As for third, the Yankees picked up Mike Lamb earlier in the offseason, and he’d be a decent stopgap there.
    Matsui did play 46 games in center last season, but I don’t recall anyone raving about his defense. He’s certainly not a long-term solution.
    And that’s going to be an issue this season. The lineup might be a flashback to Murderers’ Row. The defense, OTOH, is going to be a flashback to “Death to Flying Things”.

  4. *
    Michael,
    I think you underestimate the offensive impact of A-Rod. He’s going to have some combination of Giambi, Sheffield and Williams hitting behind him. He’ll see much better pitches than ever brfore. The second factor is that there will not be a soft spot in the lineup until you get to the number 9 spot. That will drain opposing pitchers much earlier in the game as they bear down for the entire lineup. Finally, the lefty/righty possibilities might go like this:
    Lofton-L
    Jeter-R
    Gaimbi-L
    A-Rod-R
    Williams-Switch
    Sheffield-R
    Matsui-L
    Posada-Switch
    This will absolutely ruin opposing bullpens. By the third game of each series opposing bullpens will be in rags.
    I said yesterday on Tacitus this team could score over 1100 runs.
    Defensivley they’ll be ordinary, but no worse than that.
    *This is being posted by my ghost, having stuck my head in the oven last night when the reports came in.

  5. Josh, I’m not sure that Lamb will even make the team. You’ve got Posada and Flaherty to catch, Giambi and Clark at 1B, Cairo and Wilson at 2B, Jeter at SS, A-Rod at 3B, five outfielders, and 11 pitchers. That leaves one spot on the 25-man roster, so if you take Lamb, then you go without a third catcher. I guess you could keep either Lamb or a third catcher on ice in Columbus, but that’s risky.
    spc67, they only scored 877 runs last year. Yes, there were injuries, and a dark void of suckiness in right field… but Sheffield and A-Rod won’t improve them by 225 runs, especially when you take out Soriano. I think they’ll make a stab at 1000 runs, though.
    Don’t get me wrong — I think that a really good team has just gotten even better. I just don’t think they’re quite as invincible as many seem to think they are.

  6. A-Rod is a great move by the Yankees. I will be interested in seeing how he copes with the hot corner.
    Michael N. I am disappointed with your entries so far, you are here to provide a left leaning viewpoint and baseball and speeding tickets is not what was anticipated.
    Please keep up the good work. 🙂
    oh, Go Sox!!!!!!!!

  8. Oh, and according to the New York papers, the ‘player to be named later’ will come from a pool of five minor leaguers. The Yankees managed to keep their two top prospects off the table.
    As for moving Jeter to center field, Robin Yount made the move at the same age, so who knows? Anything is possible.

  9. Oops. One more. (spc67, I’m giddy!). This is my favorite part (other than getting him fo 15 a year):
    “In exchange for the alterations, which devalue the present-day value of the contract by $5 million, Rodriguez will receive a hotel suite on road trips, have the right to link his Web site to the Yankees’ site and get a guarantee that the deferred money won’t be wiped out by a work stoppage.”
    Two questions. Who else on the team gets a suite? And what’s up with the ‘right to link his Web site to the Yankees’ site’?

  10. Two questions.
    OK, but first I hereby direct an explitive filled tirade against the Yankees and you personally which will continue for the reading of my response.
    Who else on the team gets a suite?
    I was actually surprised this wasn’t already in his contract as I thought (memory only) that Clemens, Kevin Brown and other big contracts had gotten this perk years earlier.
    And what’s up with the ‘right to link his Web site to the Yankees’ site’?
    Gotta be a way to placate the Union on A-Rod taking less present value. Linking to the Yanks will get more hits for A-Rod site against which he can sell more advertising? My thought anyway.

  11. NYT breaks down the numbers this morning. And while there may be a lot of reasons to agree with Ben Affleck on this — er, I can’t actually think of one, but… — money, believe it not, ain’t one of them.
    The Yankees dump Henson’s 4 mill. for next year. Say goodbye to Soriano’s 5.4 mill. And, more than likely, Boone’s 4.8 mill is also history.
    Factor the payouts and termination pay for Boone, subtract from A-Rod’s 15 mill, and the Damn Yankees raise their payroll by a grand sum of…?
    Less than 750 thousand bucks.

  13. That leaves one spot on the 25-man roster, so if you take Lamb, then you go without a third catcher.
    Yeah, but not many teams carry a third catcher on the 25-man roster. (Any team managed by Tony LaRussa is likely to be an exception to this rule.) I’ll be perfectly happy if the Yanks do, though, since they’ll be shooting themselves in the foot twice. Watching Jeter try to play short has gotten more and more amusing for a non-Yankees fan over the years. (While simultaneously being incredibly aggravating, since most announcers seem to think he’s the second coming of Ozzie Smith.)

  18. Josh…
    The A’s were also quite amused — until The Play, and from that day forward, the franchise hasn’t been the same.
    No other shortstop in baseball is there, catches, and flips the ball like that. IMO.
    This is only to say that Jeter’s baseball IQ is as good as any player I’ve ever seen. Another example. Bottom of the ninth, tie game against the Red Sox in Fenway. One out. Rickey Henderson on third. Shea Hillenbrand on second. The batter hits a line drive right at Bernie Williams. Henderson tags, trots on home to score the winning run. There is only one player in the ballpark who realizes that Hillenbrand took off with the hit and can now be doubled up at second before Henderson scores. That, of course, is Jeter. Who stood on second base, waving his arms for the throw, and watched Bernie loft a limp one to the plate. Game over.
    Again, this isn’t to pretend his range isn’t everything the stat geeks say it is. In truth, Jeter is the best thing that ever happened to them, if only becuz, like geeks in any medium, they can claim omniscience due to superior data. Which is the holy grail of geekdom.
    Having said all of this, I wonder. With A-Rod at third, Jeter should be able to cheat a little, or maybe a lot, toward the middle. That’s always been his weakness, and now, if nothing else, he’s in a position to do something about it.

  19. The A’s were also quite amused — until The Play, and from that day forward, the franchise hasn’t been the same.
    No other shortstop in baseball is there, catches, and flips the ball like that. IMO.
    Um, I’m an A’s fan, and I’ll tell you that that play honestly doesn’t make that big of a difference to the franchise. No more than Terrence Long’s inability to catch a line drive, or Miguel Tejada and Eric Byrnes’ collective inability to touch home plate. A’s fans are more pissed at Giambi for not sliding than anything else.
    And Jeter doesn’t get so much credit for that play when you find out that the Yankees drill on it every year.

  20. Well as someone from Dallas….
    We had Juan Gonzalez, Pudge Rodriguez, Rafael Palmeiro, and Alex Rodriguez. We lost a bunch of fun games.
    Now we have the hope that our brilliant talent scouts can find the same four twenty win starters, two good middleman, and two closers that twenty other pro baseball teams are looking for. And have been looking for for years.
    I am thrilled beyond measure.

  21. What will major league baseball look like in 5 years?
    Almost ALL midwestern teams have no ability to keep up with New York’s spending. Who will the Yankees play other than Boston and the Mets?
    Either major reform is coming or seccession.
    Big spenders league will sue to maintain the MLB brand but the new league (medium to small markets) will probably have more competition and more teams.
    I hope Steinbrenner can afford that!

  22. All baseball needs is the equal sharing of TV revenues, which will happen before the league is broken up.

  23. First off, Steinbrenner won’t live forever. There will always be an enormous revenue stream for a good team in New York, but the current spending practices are entirely a product of King George’s “win at any cost” philosophy. New ownership is much more likely to start pocketing more of the money instead of just plowing it right back into ever-huger contracts.
    Second, the era of the truly huge contracts is over and done with, as evidenced by the Tejada (6 years, $54M) and Guerrero (5 years, $70M) signings. There are many factors bringing the enormous contracts back down, but the refusal of insurers to cover more than three years is critical in making it harder to sign those blockbuster deals.
    MLB has expanded to too many sub-premium markets — Milwaukee? Tampa Bay? Eventually, some of the newer teams will be forced to relocate, or just fold up shop. I think the Expos are just the forefront of the problem, and I expect to see some other troubled franchises make some radical changes. There’s going to be regression to the mean, although there will always be differences in how much support specific markets give their teams.

  24. I’m a Yankees fan (probably because my brother is a Red Sox fan) but this buying frenzy is annoying. I was looking forward to seeing some of the young guys (Soriano, Nick J, various minor leaguers) mature and improve, I’ll miss Pettitte’s cap-shaded stare, and now Jeter’s got to play beside a guy who’s a better shortstop (but also a better third baseman).
    So anyway, I’ve read that A-Rod’s $0.25 billion contract made economic sense to the Rangers’ owner because he was able to swing a hefty tv contract based on the signing. Anyone know what happens to that deal?

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