Everything Can Change

Johnny Carson once said that a New York Minute was the time between a traffic light turning greeen and the cabbie behind you honking his horn. Tonight, however, a New York Minute is the time it takes for Alex Rodriguez to negotiate a ten year, $275 million contract with the Yankees. This is a deal that's shocking on many levels.

Let's start with the fact that A-Rod and the Yankees were actually talking. A-Rod, after all, had rebuffed calls from Brian Cashman, the Steinbrenners three, and a number of his former teammates both before and after deciding to opt out of his contract. Meanwhile, the Yankees had repeatedly and emphatically stated that there would be absolutely no negotiations with Alex Rodriguez as a free agent.

Then there's the fact that the negotiations were made between the Yankees and A-Rod. For whatever reason, Rodriguez decided to bypass Scott Boras and sit down with the Yankees on his own (or, more accurately, with only his wife by his side).

Plus, let's not forget about the size of the contract. Reports have the total ranging from $275 to $290 million, but whatever it ends up being it won't be very different from what he makes now, and it's a lot less than the $350 million that Boras was looking for.

I'm honestly not sure whether or not I like this deal. This is partly because my head has been spinning too much for me to form a coherent opinion, but it's mostly because, since the deal isn't official yet, we don't know what the fine print says. A-Rod's last contract, after all, showed us that the devil's in the details.

Hip Hip!

Well, Brian Cashman can cross the first thing off his to-do list, as Jorge Posada signs a four-year, $52.4 million contract. While I'm happy that Cashman was able to get this done quickly, the deal shows exactly how big of a mistake he made when he declined to offer Posada an extension before the season started. By all accounts, Posada would have been willing to sign a three year extension for something around $30 million, which would be much better for the Yankees. Granted, there was no way to know that Posada would have a season like he did, but I still don't understand how Cashman could have looked at this offseason and thought there would be any better options.

Of course, just because Posada signed doesn't mean Cashman should stop looking for someone to replace him. This contract will last until Posada is 40 years old. Here is the list of players who have caught regularly and remained productive at that age:

1. Carlton Fisk

Fisk was a freak of nature, and while Posada is a better candidate than anyone to replicate that kind of success, the Yankees shouldn't count on that. Getting a capable backup for the short term is imperative, and in the long term the Yankees should be prepared to move Posada to the DH spot after Giambi's contract is up next season.

However, those are concerns for another day. For now, I'm just going to enjoy the fact that we'll get to see Jorge finish his great career while still wearing pinstripes.

The 2008 Replacement Level Yankees

In Sabermetrics, there's a concept called the Replacement Level. It's a way to look at a player's value to a team by comparing him to the player who would replace him if he wasn't there. Usually one would use a hypothetical replacement based on the kind of talent that's freely available. However, when you're looking at off-season moves for one team, you can move from the hypothetical to the real. So, I present to you the 2008 Replacement Level Yankees:

Position	Player	Salary
C	Omir Santos	$0.41
1b	Shelley Duncan	$0.41
2b	Robinson Cano	$32
3b	Wilson Betemit	$12
SS	Derek Jeter	$20
RF	Melky Cabrera	$0.41
CF	Johnny Damon	$13
LF	Hideki Matsui	$13
DH	Jason Giambi	$21
BN	Andy Philips	$0.41
BN	Alberto Gonzalez	$0.41
BN	Bronson Sardinha	$0.41
BN	Juan Miranda	$0.41
SP	Chien-Ming Wang	$32
SP	Mike Mussina	$11
SP	Phil Hughes	$0.41
SP	Joba Chamberlain	$0.41
SP	Ian Kennedy	$0.41
RP	Kyle Farnsworth	$5.5
RP	Kei Igawa	$4
RP	Chris Britton	$0.41
RP	Jose Veras	$0.41
RP	Ross Ohlendorf	$0.41
RP	Darrel Rasner	$0.41
RP	Jeff Karstens	$0.41

This is the team that the Yankees would field if they made absolutely no moves before opening day based, with one exception, on their 40 man roster. The exception is Omir Santos, who I put on the team because the Yankees have no catchers on their 40 man roster. Santos was the catcher for the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees, so I went with him. You could make an argument for their other catcher Raul Chavez, and you can argue with my bullpen choices considering how many pitchers are on the 40 man roster, but those are little details that miss the point of this exercise.

Obviously, I don't think this is the lineup that will take the field come spring training, let alone opening day. It's just a tool to help look at the team's needs, and to evaluate what they do to fill them. For example, it lets us see all the ramifications of the decision to exercise Bobby Abreu's option. Having Abreu on the team creates the same "problem," as last season; too many good players for too few positions. You can move Giambi to first and use Matsui to DH, but that's a huge defensive downgrade at first and Giambi is almost guaranteed to be injured in the process. You could bench Melky Cabrera and move Damon to center field, which would only be a small defensive downgrade, but you might overtax Damon's problematic back and legs. No matter how you slice it, the overall effect of this move is a small upgrade for a lot of money.

Of course, the Yankees have enough money to be able to afford these kind of moves, but I think there's a trade they can make that can make this move much better. All they need to do is make a trade with Rawlings for a couple of first baseman's gloves for Damon and Matsui. Ideally, the Yankees would just have to give them Carl Pavano, but cash would be fine. Both Damon and Matsui are athletes with good fundamental baseball skills, and it's reasonable to think that they could be better fielders than Jason Giambi by the end of spring training. It is, after all, a pretty low bar to clear. Additionally, taking time off from the outfield would help them avoid aggravating their chronic injuries. In other words, there'd be decent defense, better hitting and fewer injuries. That's a move worth $14 million³.

¹Estimated salary based on Major League minimum.
²These players are arbitration eligible, so I've just made educated guesses as to what their salary will end up being.
³The option was worth $16 million, but declining it would have required a $2 million buyout, so it effectively cost them $14 million to exercise it.

Options

It's been a dull week in Yankee land, with only a few small stories worth mentioning. The biggest news was the team's exercising their $16 million option to bring Bobby Abreu back for another season. Of course, this wasn't news at all, since Brian Cashman has for weeks implied that that was what he was going to do. Normally, I'd say that that $16 million would be better spent on something other than an aging right fielder whose production has been declining for the past few years. However, with A-Rod gone the Yankees have the money to spare, and the alternatives aren't that good. Without Abreu, the Yankees would either have to use Shelley Duncan, who's a good platoon player but not good enough to play every day, or downgrade their defense by moving Melky Cabrera to right and Johnny Damon to center. Of course the team could go the free agent route, but the pickings are pretty slim. The only possible free agent who I think would be a better choice than Abreu is Kosuke Fukudome.

Fukudome (whose name is pronounced Koh-skay Foo-koo-DOH-may), is the star right fielder for the Chunichi Dragons of the Japanese League. He's a patient hitter, with doubles power, posting a career line of .305/.397/.543 (AVG/OBP/SLG), and .329/.435/.600 over the past three seasons. Defensively, he's reported to be excellent. His speed and instincts are both above average, which makes for great range, and his arm is both strong and accurate. American fans may remember him from the World Baseball Classic last year, where he proved himself to be a clutch performer by hitting pivotal late inning home runs in both the semi-finals and finals.

Looking at how Japanese hitters have performed in the majors, I think Fukodome would perform significantly better than the declining Abreu, and would do so for less money (he's expected to cost around $12 million a year for three or four years and, as an unrestricted free agent, there would be no posting fee). That said, there's no guarantee that the Yankees would be able to sign him, and I can't fault Cashman for taking the sure thing. Plus, he now has the option of trading Abreu if he does try to sign Fukudome, much as he did with Gary Sheffield (though I'm not entirely sure if Abreu's no-trade clause is still in effect after he waived it last year).

In other option news, Andy Pettitte has declined his $16 million option for next season. According to his agent, he did so because the deadline came up and he needed more time to consider his future. However, he also said that his future consists of only two options; the Yankees or retirement, and he's not looking for more money. While the A-Rod circus might make you cynical about a player being honest in these situations, Pettitte's a stand up guy, and there's no reason to think that he doesn't mean what he's saying. It'd be better for the Yankees to know whether he'll be in their rotation, but you have to respect Pettitte's need to weigh his decision. I really do hope he comes back, but either way I wish him the best.