2012 MLB Winter Meetings and Offseason

[sheffield]

Ya Pena deserves blame for taking that meeting, but seriously what organization does that? Playoff teams are usually not poached until they are out of the playoffs. A senior guy on the staff doing it is bad. Doing it for Boston is worse.

On the inevitable rebuild which is going to be through traditional means not a checkbook, assuming the owners are to be believed, do you think the Yankees should get rid of A-Rod by any means possible? They are likely going to have to pay a significant chunk of his salary to dump him on a team like the Marlins or Astros.

no.. nobody will take that albatross contract w/ all those HR perks.. if in fact he does hit them.. and if we have to pay a chunk of it, id rather just play the guy.. pretty sure he has a full NTC and is protected from the minors, so, unless he wants to leave.. him and his contract are going nowhere

i have a feeling the bats will come alive tonight.. not giving up hope just yet

EDIT: okay, after a little more thought and not seeing A-Rod in the starting lineup again, I have a feeling this is just not related to baseball anymore.. I think you may be right conscript.. i think they will try and unload this guy.. if his contract were a little more friendly, it would be no brainer.... but it just being so god awful.. it's just a matter of finding someone desperate enough.. i dunno if there will be any takers..

why bench him and emasculate him like this if you plan on having on the team for the next 5 years.. i don't see it happening now

i wouldn't be surprised if they pull off something totally out of no where like firing Girardi.. which i wouldn't mind see happening

[koodledrum]

Arod has full no trade protection, that's a given as he's 10-5 however he's not likely to hang around if he's told the intention is to bat him way down the order OR he'll be benched against RHP which is likely, Arod had the impression he was going to be hitting cleanup for the Yankees at DH by the time this deal expired but given the recent injury history & declining ability that's not going to happen.

The only thing ropey about Arod's contract (besides the obvious length & salary) is the HR bonuses, but lets be honest, he's not getting the back end of those bonuses (major bonuses for 763, 762, 715) he's only likely to get the next bonus which is for passing Willie Mays - but there's a caveat! Given his admission of PED usage, it would NOT be outwith the realms of possibility the Yankees may elect to challenge that clause given it puts significant doubt over his career numbers - he's hit the homers, but he's also admitted juicing, that severely reduces the impact of the feat, it would not surprise me to see it challenged.

He's currently sitting at 647 & over the last 2 years he's only hit 16 & 18, his days of hitting 30 dingers in a year are behind him, he only needs 13 more to tie Mays, he should get that, but it's doubtful he'll still be playing long enough to get 762 as that would at this point in time require 115 homers over 5 years, 23 a year.

But I'm starting to think it's no longer a case of "would they try to trade Arod?" and more a case of when they're going to try & how much of that $118m he's "owed" they're gonna have to swallow along with just where would Arod approve a trade to! Cashman's already scotched the Miami rumour today, but that's got legs to it, wait & see how it plays out! As for his benching, wouldn't be a shock to hear it's down to performance but also something to do with unprofessional conduct - not only where there the allegations of trying to pull some women in the crowd, but lets not forget he went to the media to state his displeasure at being benched, that's not exactly going to sit well with top brass either!

[sheffield]

game 4 rained out

[conscript]

Well maybe A-Rod will be back in the lineup tomorrow since there is almost no way they are playing tonight unless they start at midnight. I live two hours west of Detroit and it has been pouring here moving that way.

[sheffield]

Well maybe A-Rod will be back in the lineup tomorrow since there is almost no way they are playing tonight unless they start at midnight. I live two hours west of Detroit and it has been pouring here moving that way.

RHP = no ARod.. seems Girardi is pretty adament about it..

everyone can sit and stew about trading A-Rod tonight instead

[mrbadxampl]

I have a question about Fox's coverage of the NLCS; is it just my tv, or possibly my new cable box, or is there a lot of flickering, old-timey movie style?

in any event, what's with all the rain delays today? I took the day off (not in order to watch the games, just a nice side-effect) and now the weather decides the entire Midwest needs rain?!?

[conscript]

I have a question about Fox's coverage of the NLCS; is it just my tv, or possibly my new cable box, or is there a lot of flickering, old-timey movie style?

in any event, what's with all the rain delays today? I took the day off (not in order to watch the games, just a nice side-effect) and now the weather decides the entire Midwest needs rain?!?

Thats what happens when your season extends into late October because they have to have 162 games but refuse to play double headers enough to shorten the season significantly or just flat reduce the number of games.

[Elbren]

On the inevitable rebuild which is going to be through traditional means not a checkbook, assuming the owners are to be believed, do you think the Yankees should get rid of A-Rod by any means possible? They are likely going to have to pay a significant chunk of his salary to dump him on a team like the Marlins or Astros.

That seems like an almost impassable stumbling block in my opinion.

Unless he's dealt to a free-spending team like the Dodgers (not too many teams in this category), the Yankee's would have to eat a significant part of that contract. MLB has to approve any trades that involve that kind of money. Does Selig approve any deal where the Yankee's are essentially paying the highest-paid player in MLB to play for another team?

The only other option would be for ARod to rework his contract. Any type of reworked deal would surely see him losing significant money. Does the Players Union ok this? The Union stepped in and killed the deal to Boston the last time ARod tried to rework his deal. I can't see them approving this when they wouldn't approve of him losing (reportedly) $12 Mil.

This is without even considering his NTC.

[koodledrum]

Selig would approve any deal which means the Yankees are paying Arod, theres already form (Texas were still paying Arod I believe until last year) and Selig would love nothing more than to make an example of the Yankees by saying "well, you dish out bad contracts, that's what you're gonna get"! Any rework would be impossible due to the nature of Rodriguez which also rules out his retirement before the end of the deal, the man doesn't have the same sense of shame as the rest of us which means even if he's batting .100 in 5 games a season he'll still want paid, believing that he's one swing away from returning to Arod '07. You've seen that all the way through his career & the last week has been dramatically increased with crap like trying to score chicks from the stands & telling the media he's disappointed about not being in the lineup - dunno about you guys, but if I stunk the joint out that bad I wouldn't be talking to the media!

[belfpala]

I can't watch the game right now, but what happened to Sabathia?

[koodledrum]

I'll catch shit for it, but I'd suggest overused in his 2 postseason starts thus far & just coughed it up - who can blame him, he might as well blow up given the complete lack of offense in this series it was about time the pitchers went to hell in a handbasket! It's been painful to watch us this postseason and well, mercifully it appears that tonight's the night they'll finally put us out of our misery, just hope they do what they need to this offseason to fix the problems.

[conscript]

World series!

[koodledrum]

Congratulations, I'm far too much of a sore loser to say more than that right now.

[Skippy88]

Watched innings 4 to 6 at Boston Pizza before heading out to do some shopping. Cashman is going to have a fun off season. You have a team that won 95 games during the season but in the playoffs the pitching was fairly good but the bats were dead. Even worse there just wasn't any life in them and you can see it on their faces. I think if Girardi could he would have thrown in the towel and called it.

It's kind of surreal to think both New York and Boston are in rebuilding modes currently.

[Vaylkor]

Eat em up Tigers, Eat em up! World Series bound! woot!

World series!

Jonesville, That's not to far from where I live. Played high school sports against Jonesville.

[belfpala]

Detroit could pitch Verlander 3 times if need be... that's kind of frightening.

[Rukentuts]

I can't watch the game right now, but what happened to Sabathia?

The dude got absolutely shelled and it was awesome.

[conscript]

Jonesville, That's not to far from where I live. Played high school sports against Jonesville.

And we are/were pretty terrible in everything except for basketball one season lol.

Zito got San Fran back home for the last two games of the series. Should be a great finish between them and the Cards.

[Elbren]

Yahoo Sports Link

Red Sox trade UTI Alex Aviles to Toronto for 1B Adam Lind and ... John Farrell?

Farrell is expected to be named the Red Sox next manager.

[koodledrum]

Worst kept secret in baseball, which is another reason why I was so pissed with both the Red Sox & Tony Pena for the interview during our playoff series, bush league at best but nothing more than I'd expect from that organisation.

Zito was immense it's gotta be said, pitched his ass off the other night in that game, conscript's gotta be loving the fact this one's looking good to head to the full series while the Tigers are taking BP off their instructional league guys!