Right. I’m more interested in building a pitching-centric dynasty that can thrive and renew itself from the wellspring of home-grown arms as they move up through the system.

Halladay for Joba or Halladay for Hughes is counter to that philosophy.

And philosophically speaking, I’m not particularly interested in an entire rotation of imported 30-somethings. We already have Burnett – and CC, who fortunately is only 28.

The gestalt of the Cashman era – since he successfully freed himself from the vice-like grip of Tampa – is that we are invested in producing arms and position players.

That is now as much a part of our current identity as power lefties depositing pitches into the right-field seats has been to our history.

And although we have other high-end arms in the system, we don’t have any starters in the wings at the level of Joba and Hughes.

The likes of Marshall, DJ Mitchell, Betances, Brackman, Banuelos, Heredia, Vizcaino – aren’t even close to being able to step into a major league rotation. (The guy that was closest in terms of stuff, command and mindset – Garcia – has hit the DL yet again).

That they are not even close is significant – but even if they were: dealing Joba or Hughes would be a sellout.

They are too good, and too young, and they are too symbiotically linked to Cashman’s restoration of a debilitated farm system, to allow them to go elsewhere and realize their abilities. To suggest we could re-sign them in a few years, to me, is perverse.

Symbolically – to say nothing of competitively – dealing either would be a betrayal and any sort of short-term payoff would be, for me – and many fans I know who have been utterly re-energized by the harvest of young talent we have popping up at all levels – ultimately hollow.

As a fan, I admit openly that I am emotionally invested in Joba and Hughes succeeding HERE.

They mean something ineffable to me as a Yankee fan: I want to win, but I want to win WITH THEM.

Uhh… Did you guys see Joba’s first 8 or so starts last year?

Throwing 100 MPH to JD drew on his last pitch of the game in Fenway?

You want to trade THAT for a good, but 32 yr old Halladay?

For that 8 game stretch, Joba was better than Halladay. Factor in the $100+ million extension and I wouldn’t even consider it
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Kevin,

Emphatically, no.

I never said that I think Halladay would pick Philly over NY. The fact is, he is on the trade market, not the free agent market. While Halladay does have the final say, he can’t force Ricciardi to go make a trade happen with NY.

If Ricciardi comes up with a deal with Philly and tells Halladay do you really think Halladay would say “Nope, go get a deal with NY or I won’t waive my no-trade clause”

He would probably jump at the chance to join a big market team and probably make another hundred million dollars.

Even if Halladay said “No, I want the Yankees.” JP could easily tell him “Too bad, I’m not trading you within our division, it’s Philly or nothing”

Also, I’m agreeing with Wave about the payroll thing.

The only way I’d want Halladay is if he were a free agent signing with us OR we could get him in a great deal. I don’t consider giving up Joba/Hughes a great deal.

The point is the risk is higher because at the back half of those contracts they’ll all be in riskier territory, production wise. They may be all fine through their whole contract, but IMO that’s pretty chancey.

I’d rather go with Joba and Hughes even if neither turns into Halliday, and who knows one of them might.

http://yankeesvoice.mlblogs.com/

and the Yankees passed on him…SAD.

We had this same discussion about Tex and how did that work out?”

Yes, because we had Hughes and Joba. Swap one of those guys out for Halliday and a CC-like contract and its a different story.

CC and Tex arent even 30 yet. So in your scenario there would be a 2 or 3 year stagger in the aging of those players.

Given that it’s his first year back from TJ surgery, I’m not concerned.