Frayed Knot

About as much analysis as one can squeeze out of a 5-game sample from the folks at The Hardball Times as they delve into Pedro's 2007 mini-season

Valadius wrote: Easley gets a one-year deal for $950,000. I reckon that means they're optomistic about his ankle.

Valadius wrote: What shocks me more than anything is that Mattingly would leave the Yankees. The only reason I can see for him joining the Dodgers is that his son is currently in their farm system. Or that he truly wants to manage some day and the best way to achieve that is to keep your hand in the game. Having a star status with one team was enough to get him his first dugout job after following his playing career with a decade or more out on his farm in Indiana. But now that they've taken the job he wanted and given a 3-year contract to someone a baseball generation younger than him it's not like anyone else is going to chase after him unless he's a working baseball guy.

... but Easley, Green, Marlon Anderson, Castillo, plus the two catchers all filed for free agency on the first day of the filing period.

Citing David 'Golly Gee-Wiilickers' Wright's off-hand remark about being willing to change positions in order to accomadate Sir Alex of Rodrigia as some sort of meaningful statement is a waste of time. Does anyone who knows young David even a little bit expect that he would answer 'No way Man!' to a question like that?

smg58 wrote: Elvis Andrus is in the Rangers organization now, thanks to the Teixeira deal. Brent Lillibridge might get a chance to make the roster out of Spring Training, though. That's right, I forgot Andrus was dealt away. Lillibridge - who came over from Pittsburgh in the Gonzalez/LaRoche deal - has been getting some good ink too.

Do I want him? ... Sure -- even though he does have a habit of making himself a pain in the ass every now and then. It's like he's not sure whether he wants to try and make himself into the best-liked boy in the school ... something he's failing miserably at, or whether he doesn't care in the least if all the world thinks he's a jerk ... that one he's pulling off more successfully. Having said all that I don't buy the part about 'clubhouse cancer' or that his presence on the roster is the reason his teams haven't won. Not likable doesn't mean teh team gets worse on account of it. So I went with choice #4: only if it's for less than $30 million per and fewer than ten years - but even then it's got to be for a whole lot less than $30mil. Maybe I'm totally off here (wouldn't be the first time) but I'm having a hard time buying the notion that simply because his last contract ended with him making some $27/per that that needs to be the starting off point for the new negotiations. The team that signed him to that deal wanted out from under it almost immediately and paid lots of money to make it go away. And then the team that picked him up made it clear that they wanted no part of such a deal unless they could continue to get it at a generous discount. In the meantime, no one else in MLB is making more than $20 on a per/year basis and today's deals are actually a bit further away from the one he just opted out on as compared to when he signed it. One would think that Boras knows better than I do but I find it hard to see some team paying him more than 50% higher than the next highest players and doing so on a long term basis and just as he's heading into the decline years. I can't see anything like that as being a good deal for the team.

Actually I was thinking about Elvis Andrus (they're cornering the market on best first names) but he's probably not ready yet and Escobar was impressive last season while Renteria was shelved. Good deal for Detroit. I guess Guillen becomes more or less a full-time 1B next year. Wither Sean Casey?

metirish wrote: When can the two or three teams line up to bid on him? Same rules apply to him as with all FAs. The Yanx are still the only ones who can negotiate with him until the 10th of November or thereabouts. All the opt out does is effectively cancel the remaining 3 years of the deal he signed 7 years ago. That the Yanx announced they have no intention of doing so doesn't change anything. He'll be in a holding pattern until then, able to contact to other teams in the interim but not (cough, cough) discuss contract terms.

Wow! Can't say that Schurholz (or now successor) have ever been afraid to make the big trade. I saw that Jurrjens guy briefly this year and he's got real good stuff. He's also one of Andruw's homeboys (from the Dutch West Indies island of Curacao) so it's obvious the Braves have some kind of quota going on here. Since they'll probably lose Andruw they were forced by the quota system to snag Jurrjens. As I recall the Braves have a good SS in their system who they probably think is just about ready - and knowing how things usually go he'll come up and out-play Renteria from opening day onward.

Mattingly: 'Extremely disappointed ... will not accept a position w/the Yanx during 2008 ... will take time to consider future options' Might he wind up as a Dodger coach if Torre winds up there (and where his son is a minor leguer)?

Hank Steinbrenner has gone virtually "unquoted" - at least in the baseball arena - for half a century now, from his birth until just about a week ago. The last week however has raised the probability that some real stupid shit is going to be regular fare under his regime. And I'm loving it.

The whole post-season had a total of 28 games, barely more than the 24 game minimum and well below the 41 game possible max. Aside from the Bost-Cleve semis going the distance, the seriously, I just used a racist word when I really meant "Guardians" losing a game to the Yanx in round 1 was the only other non-sweep.

Yancy Street Gang wrote: Perhaps Perez is unaware that Beltran was the Schaefer Mets Player of the Month in September. Well if that's the case then he has no business being on national television.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Not that I care but who's the MVP? They keep showing Manny No obvious choice. I could make a case for Ellsbury.

Frayed Knot wrote: Without a major slowdown they may even get this one in prior to midnight. Guess not.

I always get sad at the last day of baseball for the season. Whether it be the last day of Met baseball (although anger/frustration was more the emotion of the day this year) or of the overall season. Let's see if the Rox can extend it just one more day.

metsguyinmichigan wrote: Typical MFY activity, trying to steal the thunder from the Red Sox on what should be their night. Well the team had nothing to do with this one. In fact, they have to be horrified. They've been getting the best player in baseball for approx 70 cents on the dollar (and would continue to for the next 3 seasons) and now they're being told that not only is that discount out the window but that any new deal is going to cost even more than the one you were getting a discount on. This is not a good day in Yanqui-land. The only person in NY sports happy about this story breaking tonight is Chad Pennington.

Disappointing series over all. I didn't think Colorado was going to win but I thought they'd make a better showing of it. This Ellsbury kid looks good but he's also getting every conceivable break on the planet. Everytime he puts his bat on the ball it's falling just out of the reach of someone.

metsguyinmichigan wrote: OK, this is one time when the truth got me! I saw the thread title and assumed it was a joke referring to ARod not showing up for his Hank Aaron Award tonight. I would never do soemthing like that for one very good reason .... I'm not clever enough to have thought of it. If I was, of course, I would have done it in a heartbeat.

"Alex Rodriguez notified the Yankees on Sunday that he's opting out of his record $252 million contract, SI.com has learned. Rodriguez's agent Scott Boras said he sent word of the opt-out in writing Sunday and left phone and text messages for Yankees general manager Brian Cashman. According to team president Randy Levine, the Yankees were unaware of Rodriguez's decision. This comes after the Yanx had been trying to arrange a meeting but Bor-Rod had been putting them off and are now officially blowing them off. According to what the Yanx have been saying all along, this ends any chance that he'll be with their club next year. I'm suprised they bailed without even hearing what the Yanx were going to offer (reported recently as 4 to 5 extra years and $25-30/per). Boras must either think (know?) that he has a fish on the line that's willing to blow past those numbers or that ARod was so unhappy in Yanqui-land that he'l take a similar or lesser deal just to get outta Dodge.

6 innings in the book in [u:1b8b6e55a0]under two hours[/u:1b8b6e55a0] !! (about 45 minutes shorter than game 3 to this same point) Without a major slowdown they may even get this one in prior to midnight.

4:19 ... sheesh! Obviously all the runs scored slowed things up a bit but that was really only a small part of the problem. Matsuzaka does the ball rubbing up thing after every pitch (perhaps because of the cold) and winds up throwing about 2 pitches per minute as a result. Manny simply takes forever just to get into the box and then takes a stroll after most pitches before beginning the same routine all over again. So does Helton although not quite as bad. So much for the pre-season mandate about batters keeping one foot in at all times. You knew that one was never going to stick but couldn't they at least pretend to adhere to the spirit of it every once in a while?

]Dan Quisenberry Sparky Lyle Tom Henke Roy Face Tug McGraw Jeff Reardon John Wetteland Dave Righetti No, no, no, no, no, no, no, and no. ]Rich Gossage (who should be elected next year) Lee Smith John Franco Trevor Hoffman Mariano Rivera Billy Wagner Maybe, no, no, eventually, Yes, and no. P.S. I wouldn't have put Sutter in either.

Julio Lugo had a sub-.300 OBA this season and the Rox walked him twice tonight - both times either starting, or continuing to, major rallies.