Press 1 to hear your team was blown up
Posted by: Peter Abraham - Posted in Misc on Oct 28, 2007 
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Scott Boras informed Brian Cashman that Alex Rodriguez was opting out by leaving him a voice mail.
This came as a surprise. I thought at the very least that Rodriguez would listen to what the Yankees had to offer. But for Rodriguez make this decision 10 days earlier than he had to is clear evidence that he never intended to stay with the Yankees.
In retrospect, one of the reasons he had such a great season was probably that his mind was clear knowing he would leave New York.
This is what A-Rod said the night the Yankees clinched:
“This feels like home. It’s hard to believe that I played for another two organizations. So much has happened to me here – adversity, some success – that I feel like anything but New York feels weird for me now.”
Was he lying? Only he knows. But clearly Rodriguez’s legacy has been established. The Homeless Hall of Famer will join his third team in six seasons. He’ll sign a record contract and somewhere in that fine print will be another option to bail out in a few years.
The Yankees insist that will not pursue Rodriguez as a free agent. Given how he has treated the team, the Yankees would be embarrassing themselves to make him an offer.
UPDATE, 12:11 a.m.: Boras, of course, says wants the Yankees to stay in the mix.
“The lines of communication for us are open,” he said. “Our position is that we have told New York all along that we will continue discussions with them. Alex enjoyed playing in New York. He played well there. He was comfortable there.”
If he enjoyed playing in New York so much, why didn’t he at least listen to what the Yankees offered and give them 10 days to settle the situations of Pettitte, Posada and Rivera?
Whoever thinks this makes the Yanks a horrible team is a moron and thats it. Alex couldnt do nothing in the postseason so give me anyone else anyday
arod blows goat
So long sociopath…
Does the team that signs him have to give the Yankees draft picks or did Boras eliminate the compensatory picks in the contract A-Rod signed with the Rangers?
Miguel Tejada for 3B anyone? As long as it doesnt include hughes/joba/kennedy
maybe the most depressing day i can remember as a yankee fan. maybe someday arod will watch as the yankees win a championship. sigh.
One positive is not being on the hook for 30 million in his Barry Bonds/ Jason Giambi years.
pitching wins championships… but losing arod hurts. the yanks need the other guys back badly.
Whoever thinks Bora$ is a cheap scumbag and would like walk straight up to him and dump your spaghetti and meatballs on his head, press 2.
2.
maybe a-rod was being a “true yankee” by opting out tonight to steal the red sox’s thunder in tomorrow’s paper?
Miguel Tejada for 3B anyone?
As long as it doesnt include Austin Jackson, Melky Cabrera, Phil Hughes, Joba Chamberlain, Ian Kennedy for Jose Tabata, i’m game
sorry for the double post
I don’t really believe in curses, but the closest I’ve come to believing is the dearth of postseason success since A-Rod joined the Yankees (though I always supported him as a player). Now I fully believe: this curse will follow him from team to team (to team to team…) and he will never, ever make it to the WS. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
According to the NY Post, Hank’s comments about “next year being a transition year” worried A-Rod. Is this a joke? Few teams in the AL, maybe only the Red Sox, have a better core of young players.
Well this makes a bad playoffs even worse…
I am stunned. Absolutely stunned.
Dan: I hope you mean Miguel Cabrera.
It seems pretty clear that Boras wants an auction with the Yankees as one of the bidders. This move does not preclude the Yankees from making a bid; they can save face by saying that they never made an offer during the exclusivity period. Boras then gets a chance to turn to all of the others bidders and see if any team will outbid the Yanks. A-Rod allows Boras to pursue a mercenary strategy but the relationship with the Yanks is not necessarily over and I don’t think he was lying when he professed his desire to stay in New York. Why a player like A-Rod would allow his agent to define shape the way he is viewed by teams and fans is a separate question about character that is worth asking.
Ethan
October 28th, 2007 at 11:57 pm
“Does the team that signs him have to give the Yankees draft picks or did Boras eliminate the compensatory picks in the contract A-Rod signed with the Rangers?”
Ethan
I believe the Yankees will get draft picks once they offer AROD arbitration. Here’s to hoping that some idiot team with a top 10-15 pick signs AROD. San Francisco anyone?
Man, I’m shocked. I was actually stupidly thinking today that Arod could possibly tell the Yankees that he already has enough money and that winning was most important to him and to use the extra money to find a great pitcher.
He would have been a hero in NY.
Instead hes a marked man.
Exactly pitching wins championships. Thank God the A-rod curse is broken.
Dark day to be a Yankee fan.
My team was not blown up. It just got a reprieve. Alex Rodriguez, never a team player, is not worth more than Jorge Posada and the greatest closer is the history of the game are combined. Furthermore, the reasons he gives are ridiculous. Is he going to limit himself to teams which have every other position filled? Borras may have outsmarted himself this time!
Was it just me or was this World Series Boring!
Finally, The mighty A-Rod is starting to show his true colors……..What an idiot.
I hope they get draft picks, but I’m pretty sure his contract bars the Yankees from being able to offer arbitration/get draft picks. I’m sure we’ll find out in the coming days.
My source tells me Joe Crede with Betemit on reserve. Long term it should be Miguel Cabrera with Girardi his boss. The second part is pure speculation on my part but it makes sense because Cabrera enjoyed his most productive season OPS-wise under Joe Girardi.
This frees up money the Yankees will use to go after Affeldt and Herges.
What is sad here is that the Yanks and Alex together were greater than the sum of the parts. Boras calls Alex an IPN player, arguing that his value is in part due to his iconic stature. But the Yankees are iconic without him, and his iconicity takes a hit when he leaves. He’s basically like some poor nervous shlub who walks out on his fiancee thinking he might do better elsewhere. But a great marriage means the situation enhances both partners immesurably. The Yanks will indeed miss his production short term. His character has been confirmed though. We’ll recover, but don’t pretend it doesn’t hurt. Alex is going to need a tanker full of luck to find a situation that could be as mutually beneficial as this one might have been. Had he stayed, both sides would have prospered. As it stands, everyone loses.
Judas..
And so the rioting at your alma mater begins, Pete.
Mauro…YES! The most boring world series of all time .
The Yankees are allowed to offer arbitration because A-Rod voided the deal. Obviously, they will and get the draft picks. The timing of this is really interesting to me. I have to believe that it was more than coincidence that Boras delivered this news on the night the Red Sox were going for the sweep.
What about Scott Rolen if the Cardinals want some pitching?
The Yankees made some real bad management moves this past year:
1)Why did Cashman go public with this no negotiation with Arod if he opts out policy? Makes no sense. Everyone knows Arod will land where the best deal is. If it was a test of Arod’s Yankee loyalties, we see now it failed.
2)The way they handled Torre. like an amature organizatio,
The damage can all be lessened if a Yankee player (jeter) publicly trashes Arod. Let’s hope.
A-Rod is the biggest jerk in the history of the Yankees and the fact that he couldn’t come close to helping the team move on in ANY PostSeason towards the Championship he so truly wants ( TOTAL LIE ) shows that we are way better without him….really….do you think that we have a good lineup ? I’ll be we score JUST as many runs next year and with Joba and Santana in the Starting Rotation and just a 5-10 million dollar 3rd baseman….the ultimate slap in the face….2008 WS Champions NY Yankees…..finishing 3rd in the NL Central…A-Rod and the Happless Cubs……LOSER will join the ULTIMATE LOSER MLB Team and the Yankees go on a huge roll and all is right with the world….FEAR NOT FANS….we have it ALL covered !
Man, this is going to be an interesting winter.
123 days until Spring Training.
If the Yankees paid anything but some used peanuts for Crede, I’d cry. The guy had an abysmal .216/.258/.317 line in 173 at bats this year. I’d honestly rather give Betemit a full time shot than platoon him with Crede.
He’s the best player in baseball and now he’s gone. So be it. The Yankees move on. They can’t replace ARod’s production with one guy. This is true.
But he is in no way bigger than this team. He’s just not. They won nothing with him being here. Nada. The goal is to win a world championship every year. In that regards the last four year were a failure.
They failed with him. They will live without him.
They need to become a different type of team next year. That’s been long overdue.
If they make the playoffs next year I’ll take my chances with Joba, Hughes, Pettite and Wang in a short series regardless of who the third baseman is.
You can call him names all you want, if that makes you feel better.
Bottom line is that Yankees now have to replace a large hole in their line-up.
Crede in 2008 + 2009
Betemit backup
Miguel Caberera in 2010
My feelings on the subject…
http://lh3.google.com/mantlemu.....Hooker.jpg
Addition by subtraction. See ya A-Rod!
Please don’t wish Alex on the Cubbies, my favorite NL team. Let him go play in LA la land.
I can’t say I’m surprised. Boras is calling the yankees’ bluff, figuring that they need Arod more than they care about the Rangers’ $20m+ subsidy. I say let him go to the Angels, and use the money to get Santana to open the new ballpark.
I am all for Girardi as manager, but that probably means no miguel cabrera to replace the playoff choker since they hated each other in FL.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA — oh man, of course Boras wants the lines of communication to be open so he can try to use the Yankees as leverage. I couldn’t hate him more right now.
http://tinyurl.com/2xaoy4
Yeah…Crede is the answer. Good thinking.
A-Rod was a great player and definitely had some good moments as a Yankee, but it’s now time to say goodbye. Now it is time to bring in a replacement at third who is hopefully 100 percent loyal to the Yankees and committed to being here for the long haul. I appreciate the good things that he did, but I hope that he doesn’t let the door him hit in the rear on the way out. If you don’t want to be with the Yankees, then you know where the door is. The door swings in, but it also swings out.
Yanks lose in ALDS, Torre gone, A-Rod gone, Sox win the World Series…
well at least the A-Rod curse is gone and we can start thinking about winning a championship again. We know that he never will…
Not a good day to be a Yankee fan, but you gotta admit it is funny over at Yahoo front page:
Huge Headline: A-Rod Now A Free Agent (with a large pic of A-Rod.)
In tiny lettering underneath — “Red Sox win World Series”
“Addition by subtraction. See ya A-Rod!”
Well it certainly clears some payroll for some of the free agents of 2008 and 2009. Those are two amazing free agent classes. The Yankees can add Santana and Kazmir for the price of Arod and Giambi.
Can Cano switch to 3rd?
Way to go Yankees on letting Lowell out of their system. He’s the MVP you dunces.
I guess the last WS Championship I will see for the Yanks was in 2000. Cashman, you suck so bad. I wish you left and that Torre stayed. Go make a sandwich biotch!
I live out here in the Bay Area, the sport talk folks are already thinking A-rod will be Giant in 08. Probably the only thing Yank and Red Sox fans will have in common: a complete hatred for A-rod.
I see A-rod in a NL team uniform. Dodgers, Giants or Mets.
I hope the first time he has to face joba, joba buzzes one right at his dome and knocks him to the dirt. I can’t believe this. But maybe it’s for the best, being on the hook at the end of that contract could be a nightmare, especially if he develops some unforeseen health problems.
Miguel Cabrera might be nice, dudes gotta loose a bit of weight though
for all of you guys that are calling arod a jerk and saying that they will be better off without him, step back for a second and remember that without arod there would not have been a postseason this year for this team. His walk off gamewinning hits and 50+hr’s made the difference and there is no other player even close to him that can replace his productivity. The marlins are not going to give away miguel cabrera and the yankees will not trade any of their good young pitchers away for a defensive liability at third base. The best bet is to go after mike lowell.
This makes me sick. I really thought he’d stay. I really thought he wanted to go down in history in pinstripes. I guess money is more important.
…I hope we sign Mike Lowell.
Otherwise I guess Cano will be at 3B and Betemit will be at 2B.
Pete, I cannot agree with you more that he is the biggest phony of all time in all sports. And, why can’t he even speak up for himself? He has played too many mind games with us. He is in the same class as Barry Bonds. Good riddance!
Why is everyone so eager to switch Cano to 3rd?
He’s an excellent defensive second baseman – one of the best in all of baseball. Look at his zone rating.
Second baseman who can hit and field the position are exceedingly rare. Cano’s offensive production at that position is outstanding.
Creating a hole at second (both definsively and offensively) is not the answer to losing ARod.
They are not going to replace him with one player. It’s impossible because he is the best player in baseball.
Also the most classless – how could they announce this one the day the World Series is won?
He has to be bigger than the game itself. Pathetic.
Henry, Werner, Francona, all you Boston people please stop referring to yourselves as Red Sox Nation on national TV. It’s tacky and I’m seriously going to vomit! You’ve finally crossed the one quarter mark of how many championships the Yankees have. HOW CUTE!!!
Mike Lowell is WS MVP, they’re not gonna replace him with Arod.
I would have given Arod A LOT more respect if he had listened to what the Yankees were going to offer.(even if he then chose to opt out) To do it this way is so disengenuous to not only the Yankees but to fans. We all knew in the end he was going after the money but to not even listen shows he didnt want to be here to begin with, could not handle everything that went with New York, and to then have Boras use as an excuse he didnt know what was happening with the rest of the FA and on top of that to then say he will keep the lines of communication open is a complete joke. Does he think we are all morons (even though we may appear to be sometimes?)
I will lose a TON of respect for the Yankees if they go an participate in the dog and pony show that will surround this now.
I also know that the New York and probably the national media will see through this farce of a statement that Boras put out. He may win the big money for his client and Alex may be happy wherever he ends up but I think he has lost the war.
I guess this is the only way Arod could ever make news during the World Series. I enjoyed watching him play for the Yankees, but if he doesn’t want to be here then “See Yeah”!
Don’t be surprised if a deal is reached within the next 10 days.
This is all brinksmanship.
To quantify A-Rod’s effect on the Yankees, he was responsible for about 16% of their runs(runs created/NYY total runs). That’s a very high number, but far from the highest of any player(Ortiz for instance is 17.5% to the Red Sox). Simply put, this isn’t the worst loss a team could suffer, but he will be tough to replace.
As for Crede…no.
add the 16 (possibly 17 on the way) celtics Championships, the Patriots Juggernaut and the now the Sox looking like Boston Sports is the place to be – Maybe we just call it Boston Sports Nation
Good riddance? Which are you more happy to see go? 50 HRs? or 150 RBI?
You can be mad if you want. Truth is Yankees have to replace that production.
This night makes me sick. The continued development of a Red Sox dynasty coupled with the continued deterioration of a Yankee one.
Rough couple a weeks to be a Yankee fan.
If anyone was curious about Crede’s line this year, it was .216/.258/.317 in 173 at bats. That is awful. Even Betemit was vastly superior to that.
It’ll be interesting to see how he handles the pressure of returning to Yankee Stadium next season. I cWould it match a playoff-type atmosphere for him? (choke cough chokercough)
All right, guys.
We’re the better for it. We don’t have his distraction on the team. Jeter can go back to being the ‘bloid kid that everyone loves–he does it well, AND, with the exception of the 07 LDS, he comes through in the clutch.
We’ve got Jeter to lead.
We’ve got Cano and Melky to follow.
We’ve got the Holy Trinity ™ in Ian, Joba and Phil.
We’ve got the Wanger, and who knows, maybe Santana or Kazmir.
We’ve got pure spirit and brawn in Shelley.
We’ve got Damon who did have that big home run in game three and is actually a pretty good left fielder.
We’ve got Godzilla, who wants nothing more than a ring.
We’ve got all sorts of kids down on the farm.
Sure there are question marks (like that bullpen thingie), but the best teams take adversity and say, well, f— that.
The Yankees of the mid-00s, who out of the sake of propriety I shall not label, are gone.
It’s a new team.
It’s a new year.
Let the magic of 2008 begin.
PAY-ROD
Johnathan – “Red Sox dynasty”? They didn’t even make the playoffs last year.
Stop this train…. i want to get off and go home again……. 1996 bring me back lol
Is there any way to get Damon to play some first base?
Whoa
I wouldn’t be surprised. Biggest stage to leak an announcement, takes focus off the world series, and Yanks don’t lose the Texas money until the paperwork is filed. I think this is the beginning of the dance, not the end.
The main reason it isn’t a Red Sox dynasty just yet is they’re two completely different teams. Beckett, Papelbon, Youkilis, Pedroia, Lowell. None of these guys were on the 04 team and contributed so much to this year.
Let’s say for the sake of argument, there was no 94 strike and the Yankees won the WS and the course of events of 95 and 96 did not alter at all(obviously impossible). 94 and 96 would not have been able to be coupled together because of how different the two teams were.
Please please please no more crazy giveaways to get big names . . . Hoping they keep Joba, Franchise AND IPK, ditto Robbie and Leche. Why trade for someone else’s expensive maybe when you already have the goods at home? All the best to A-rod – he’s an amazing player, and it’s not going to be easy to make up that production, his recent postseason issues notwithstanding.
And what can one say about the Sox except that they delivered when they had to? It’s so ironic that the only team that regularly gets to their best pitchers and is totally unintimidated by playing in Fenway got tripped up by CC (owned), Carmona (see CC), and a pack of fleas. Bummer, dude. Pete, thanks again for the terrific work – never a dull moment . . .
We can win without A-Rod. For years this team has been filled with nothing but long ball hitters. When Matsui and Sheff went down in 2006 we lost a ton of production on paper.Truth is we actually were better without them. We made the playoffs because of guys like Melky and Cano. When Matsui and Sheff came back it all went downhill. Same can be said for A-Rod. Like someone said before this is addition by subtraction. You can look at the stats all you want. This guy can’t hit in the playoffs and he is soft.Most of his damage came when the games out of reach anyways.The dynasty years were not filled with 40 hr guys at every position. This team has alot of promise with some excellent pitching potential for years to come. Maybe if only we can dump Giambi then we can really get rid of excess waste.
I thinks its actually a great day for the Yankee organization in more ways than one. I tried as a die hard Yankee fan to warm up to A-fraud, but I never could. His wife’s T-shirt this summer said it all. I truly think that the current WS MVP will be the third baseman for the Yankees in 08. He will come much cheaper than A-Fraud. They will sign him to a Damon type contract, and the first round and supplemental first round pick in the draft that they get will be used for more good young players, look at what they got last season and this season in the draft. Last year’s draft was arguably the best in MLB and this year’s draft was ranked in the top 5. Now the other reason I think its a great day for the Yankees is that now they are being shown what it will take to win the WS next year. Great, young, starting pitching, ie, Wang or Santana (if they now use the A-fraud money to go after him), Hughes, Chamberlain (who can be a #1 starter), Kennedy and a great veteran pitcher still with a great arm, ie, Shilling, that would be Pettitte; a lights out, young bullpen, (that they need to work on, but have some good prospects), good solid veterans that aren’t past their prime, (that would be the Captain, Posada, Abreu, Matsui, (it doesn’t mean Giambi), and good young, fast, disciplined, position players, well, they need to work on that too. But they do have a great young hitter in Cano, and Tabata and Jackson are right around the corner. I am excited about the potential of Montero (but he’s 2 years away at least), and some of the other prospects. But the Yankees will live on without A-fraud. The sun will come up tomorrow and 4.5 million fans will go the ballpark in the Bronx, and it will be more of a team atmosphere without him and maybe thats what they need.
“Stop this train…. i want to get off and go home again……. 1996 bring me back lol”
I actually bought Birth of a Dynasty today to remember better times. I’m going to get to it as soon as I finish Moneyball which I recommend to everyone. It’s presentation is pompous and pretentious as anything I’ve ever read, but it’s still interesting and I think any true baseball fan should read it.
The grammar’s killing me. Its, not it’s. Sorry.
I don’t understand a lot of this Miggy (Miguel Cabrera and Tejada) talk. Both have already publicly stated something about themselves that wouldn’t land them on the Yankees. Tejada said he wouldn’t change positions for any team or anybody. He said he is still good enough and capable to play SS, and if he leaves Baltimore, he is playing SS or just not playing at all. Cabrera already stated that he DOES NOT WANT TO PLAY FOR THE YANKEES. He said we have too much rules and regulations for him to follow and he just wants to play “freely”. Our best bet is signing Lowell, if the Sox don’t, which they will. Betemit at full-time and at least giving him a shot. Or moving Cano (yes, I understand his value at 2nd base), but it is a lot easier this yr to grab someone off the market to fill in at 2nd then at 3rd. Iguchi and Castillo are the first that come to mind. Plus Cano has the arm, glove and fielding mechanics to play thirdbase, it wouldn’t be some failed operation. Crede should be crossed off of everybodys list… No way that man should be in pinstripes, ever.
“Crede should be crossed off of everybodys list… No way that man should be in pinstripes, ever.”
Yeah despite his past in the yankee organization so should Lowell. The guy is a product of Fenway and before you flame me here are the numbers :
BA: .373 Home .276 away
OBP: .418 Home .339 away
HR 14 Home 7 away
The just say no to Mike Lowell campaign starts now
time to move Jeter to 3rd and find a ss who can play defense.
The Yanks have won the WS without Ruth or Gehrig, DiMaggio or Mantle. They’ll win the WS someday without ARod….Pitching is a bigger problem than 3B.
If you look at the 1998 Yankees, in the middle of the steroids/home run era, didn’t have a single player hit 30 homers. Pitching wins championships in baseball. 1 position player as great as he is cannot win a championship in baseball.
I will bet that the Yankees win a championship before ARod does.
Pete — Has ARod actually formally opted out, or has Boras just said that he’s decided to opt out? The two are very different things, and the actual action necessary to opt out is probably spelled out in the contract itself. If he hasn’t actually opted out, could this be a poker move on Boras’s part to see if the Yankees will panic and offer something like a seven-year extension (i.e. a 10-year deal) before he actually opts out? They could still do it and everyone would be able to save face — ARod because he’d have a huge contract, the Yanks because he hadn’t actually opted out.
I would also note that the timing may have made sense to Boras/ARod from the standpoint of negotiating with the Yankees. Yesterday it looked as if the WS was over, as it turned out to be. Therefore ARod has 10 days and the clock is ticking against him. He doesn’t want to be in a position where the Yanks make him an offer and say “you have two days to accept.” He wants the Yankees’ best offer asap so he can weigh the situation and make a response that he deems best at the time most advantageous to him. So he says “I intend to opt out” and watches the fur fly . . . .
I hold no brief for ARod here — he’s a fantastic ballplayer but he’s come up short every year in the postseason. The deal to get him was nowhere near the disaster of the Giambi deal or some of the free-agent pitchers. I just wonder if the contractual hardball game is still going on between the Yanks and ARod.
Cheers. Paul.
Why doesn’t Peter proofread? For a writer, that’s not too classy.