The smart thing for H&H to do would be to pay Cash big money on a 2-year deal to continue the player development/rebuild and to mentor 2-3 up-and-coming asst GMs. That gives you the possibility of some continuity when he moves on.

Right now, if Cash leaves the BEST case is he takes a year off and only a few player development guys move on, WORST case is he goes to another team and takes the best & brightest with him to build the new org…. leaving Yankees baseball ops with only (1) whoever the new GM brings in (who’d have little to no organizational knowledge) and (2) those remaining toadies whose best skill is sucking up to Tampa. That means rebuilding player development all over again.

If the Yanks do things the latter way it could be a few years before they return to the playoffs.

i don’t think with the kids they are as far off as it might look.

they could and did buy crazy contracts and it didn’t work either so by you saying they might be a few years off i disagree because they still might not make the playoffs for a while even if they sign every free agent.

they just need to be smart and have a solid plan going forward.

make a list of players they wan’t in center field,first base and go out and get one,the same with pitchers.sign moose and now you have wang,mussina,joba.go from there.

try to get sabathia,trade for billingsley if possible.

with a rotation of sabathia,wang,billingsley,mussina,joba i like our chances.

do you trade hughes and cano for billingsley? that’s a tough one,i might do cano and kennedy/aceves/coke.

whatever they do signing tex would be a huge mistake.they need a more cost controlled younger first baseman like votto.

they should target pitching and a first baseman through fa and trades and go with gardner,ajax,melky in center.

you do not win several more games by signing santanna or sabathia.you win by building a good team and pitching staff.

anywho the yankees will still have tons of money.they should go out and get a few decent pitchers,take a look at sabathia,if he want’s too much take a pass.

the yankees do well with just 5 solid not too great pitchers as long as they have 5 and a little debth they should be fine..

see what cano,hughes,aceves,coke might bring back in trades.if they net you a billingsley or players like that they should think about some trades or they could just buy a bunch of pitchers and a first baseman and be done with it.

i am not sure what the answer is.i am sure both ways can work but waiting for the kids is trying.

i think they should get a few fa pitchers at the very minimum,see if a trade exists for a center fielder and or a first baseman.

i think gardner will do ok until ajax or someone else comes along.if that is the route they take they should get a first baseman and play miranda a little against righties and a few solid pitchers like dempster,mussina for a year and see if they can trade for a young solid pitcher.

Since I don’t know much about Melvin’s Front Office acumen, why would Olney & Gammons both be so high on him? Any insight would be appreciated.

this line of thought is silly.

hopefully this is Pete projecting onto Cashman. Because if Cashman really feels that way, Cashman should go get a crappy job such as working at Walmart w/2 kids and no health insurance. that’s pressure and hassle.

Picking up the Bat Phone and having to hear George or Hank rant, having to put up w/the inane media – yeah, that’s not pleasant, but there are billions of people who’d make that tradeoff. suck it up Brian.

I agree with your assessment …

there seems to be a lot of revisionist history going on with the fans about Santana … I remember one post after another applauding the Yankees for showing restraint and not jumping at trading whatever package of prospects were needed to get Santana AND paying 7 years/140 million dollars.

I also maintain that if the Yankees were ever at a point where they were in serious discussions to get Santana, the Twins would have gone back to the Red Sox to see if they could get a better deal … it always looked to me like Boston was in it simply to scare the Yankees into “trading the farm” for him. If you recall, it was supposedly a “done deal” that Santana was going to Boston at the Winter Meeting – i.e. medical records were being exchanged, etc. ... and then all of a sudden, nothing happened. Why? Because I believe the Red Sox were playing Chicken with the Yankees and they didnt blink. When Minnesota realized that Boston was not a landing spot and the Yankees were not going to pay thru the nose to get Santana, the price for him plummeted. That is why,based on the package the Mets got for Santana, it was basically a glorified free agent signing … Carlos Gomez doesnt exactly set the world on fire.

Besides, you cant judge a trade (or in the Yankees case, a non-trade) soley on the first year.

Hughes may still yet prove that the Yankees faith in him was justified … nobody knows for sure that he won’t … unless they have purchased a time machine and know what the future will be.

And no one knows how much Santana will depreciate in value over the course of his contract with the Mets … as good as he was this year, let’s also keep in mind that it is very noticeable that his fastball is slowly losing velocity … he typically hits about 92mph whereas in years past with the Twins he was easily in the mid-90’s start after start.