Tagged: Jason Giambi

A-Rod Does The Right Thing


 Alex Rodriguez learned from the mistakes of Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, and Roger Clemens and came clean right away. 

He could have followed suit and denied it right into his social grave.  He could have let the media rip his heart out and diminish his sense of pride to the point where he barely left his house like Mark McGwire has become.  He could have.  But that isn’t exactly an ideal option for someone entering the prime of their career while in the second year of a record setting ten-year 275 million dollar contract.

Andy Pettitte and Gary Sheffield went through this before him and he saw what being truthful can do.  He has now kept the hearts of his loyal fans and saved himself from being tabloided more than Paris Hilton, though he probably already is anyway.

All in all the good news is we hopefully will not have to listen to nearly as much of this because of his honesty.  I think that even more former players should do the same and come clean before they exposed because chances are they will be and it will look a lot better if they do this on their own now before they become scapegoats for an entire generation.

 
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State of the Empire

The New York Yankees have certainly not had a quiet offseason by any means, dropping a near half billion dollars (441 million) in the winter months.  What has now been established is a declaration that last year’s failure to make the play-offs will not be repeated.  A huge splash was obviously not a surprise but no one knew it would be to quite this extent.  After being handcuffed for years by busts and overpaid-underperformers such as Carl Pavano and Jason Giambi, the near 90 million dollars freed up from expiring contracts was obviously going to be spent somewhere.  History may be repeating itself however.  The three major signings–
Yankees_logo.jpgBurnett, Sabathia, Teixeira– all look good now but what will we be saying in five years?  You would have to be a complete moron if you can’t admit the Yankees will be a strong team with all the talent they have, but if these deals don’t work out, the Bronx Bombers could be in trouble for years to come.

Starting Rotation Questions

In his eight years since becoming a major league regular back in 2001, A.J. Burnett has made 30 starts only twice, coincidently both during contract seasons.  Five-year contracts are a rarity for pitchers, especially one who has as many trips to the DL as he does major league seasons (10).  He is clearly a dominant pitcher as he led the AL in strikeouts with 231 last season but the real question will be can he stay healthy over the length of the contract. 

C.C. Sabathia got an even longer deal at seven years.  Though he only has two brief stints on the DL over his career, you have to wonder how much stress an arm that has thrown 513 innings the past two seasons can take.  He has a lot of guaranteed money coming for a long time and it will be scary to think what could happen if he has a major injury early on.

Chien-Ming Wang is another ace in himself as well and has proven himself to be a reliable pitcher but he too is coming off a major injury.  The foot injury was a freak thing that happened while running the bases, but when opening day rolls around he will be nearly ten months removed from throwing a pitch in a major league game.  In addition, Andy Pettitte will be 37 years old this year and Joba Chamberlain had arm issues last year as well.

A scary thought: If there is an injury, next in line is Phil Hughes, Alfredo Aceves and Ian Kennedy; all of whom are unproven.  We’ve seen what 20-plus starts over a season from the likes of Sidney Ponson and Darrell Rasner can do and it certainly won’t be pretty if that were to happen this season.

Backup (Starting) Catcher

 After Jorge Posada injured his right shoulder last season, he threw out only 3 of 35 runners before finally throwing in the towel and surrendering to surgery.  Though he is supposed to be ready for opening day, it will remain a question as to weather he can still be an adequate major league catcher at 36 years old.  Jose Molina is one of the elite defensive catchers in the game, throwing out more than 40% of runners last season, but that comes along with a .576 OPS.  With the Yankees budget, it may be worth it to explore all options here or it could get there could be problems at an essential position..

Centerfield

.641, .582: What are these two numbers? They are the OPS’s of Melky Cabrera and Brett Gardner.  Manny Ramirez had a 1.232 by himself last year and these two couldn’t do that combined.  Speaking of which there is no chance Manny will come home to New York with either team.  Derek Jeter’s been rumored to be moving out there but we all know that there’s more of a chance of us hearing kanYe West say “Barack Obama doesn’t care about black people” at the next hurricane benefit.  Mike Cameron was nearly swapped for Melky but it fell through.  I think a position battle is likely in spring training with Gardner winning the majority of the playing time due to the fact there’s nothing Melky can do that he can’t.  Plus he has a .389 career OBP in the minors and is equipped with an 80 speed on the 20-80 scouting scale.  A quick fix is all that is needed however with highly touted prospect Austin Jackson just one year away.

-This was my first blog post, comment me and let me know how I did.