Comments on: Another Bernie ‘What If?’ scenario

By: Geno

Geno — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:30:39 +0000

Huh?

By: eric from morrisania

eric from morrisania — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 00:31:38 +0000

But, the Yankees never really got too involved with the Ichiro posting because we already had a CF named Bernie Williams, who we’d just given 90 million dollars to. My speculation is that things might have been different if we didn’t have that.

You can take the Bernie/Belle discussion out of it, and sub this: suppose things happened exactly as they did, we gave Bernie 7yrs/90M, but he’s the one who had a degenerative hip? We write off Bernie’s contract to insurance… we still may go hard after Ichiro in that scenario too. The point of the hypothesis is what may have happened to the Yankees if in 2000, the superstar outfielder we had just signed (whether it was Bernie or Belle) is suddenly a non-factor and a sunk-cost, what might have been? And to say that, ultimately, we may have benefited by not committing a long contract to Bernie because his play declined at the end of his contract, while better options came along during that interim that we didn’t consider because we had x-number of future dollars pledged to an outfielder past his prime…

By: dan

dan — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 23:14:57 +0000

This post is very interesting, and I think I commented on it originally in the comments section a few posts back, but forgot this detail: Ichiro wasn’t a free agent.

The Mariners used the posting system (first player ever to be posted), and paid $13million to negotiate. I’m not sure the Yankees would have taken a chance like that on the first Japanese hitter in the US, considering it was the first time a blind bid had ever been made on a player. While they might have gotten Manny, Ichiro was far from a foregone conclusion.

http://money.cnn.com/2002/01/2.....sportsbiz/

By: dan

dan — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 23:06:52 +0000

Except that Belle woulda been gone in two years anyway. And in this scenario, we don’t win the world series with Belle, so it doesn’t really matter how bad he is in the clubhouse.

By: Barry

Barry — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 22:10:58 +0000

I would of taken Manny or Ichiro.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 21:58:08 +0000

You never give up rings. Bernie. ftw.

By: Travis G.

Travis G. — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 21:53:13 +0000

i just cant give up a ring, especially against the Mets.

By: Chip

Chip — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 19:01:22 +0000

The problem is that it’s all speculation. Maybe the Yankees get Manny and he blows out his knee in the first week so the Yankees trade some A-ball kid named Robinson Cano for a stopgap? Maybe we don’t get Vazquez but end up needing but decide we need Mark Mulder and Beane only wants this underrated pitcher named Wang? The possibilities are endless when you go back a full ten years.

By: Jamal G

Jamal G — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 17:35:12 +0000

To be honest the decision to drop Bernie and have Ichiro or Manny in the lineup makes much more sense IMO it’s just that I’ve always been a big believer in “that something special”. I know that senetnce is usually rserved for the casual baseball fan or the old-timers who don’t give two craps about OBP or VORP but to be championship teams are special in all sports. You have to have the right mix and obviously Bernie was that right mix and everything worked together perfectly. So I would have stuck with Bernie just as the Yanks did.

I have another “What If” for you guys. What if the Yanks did let go Bernie and did sign Manny Ramirez, then I’m sure Cashman & Co. would have envisioned an eventual move to the DH position so they would have most likely (or George would have most likely) laid off from signing Jason Giambi who everybody knew his future was at DH. So does that mean that we see a couple more years from Tino Martinez to allow Nick Johnson to graduate to the everyday Yankees 1B or do we sign a stopgap for those couple of years until Johnson comes up? Then if we do let Johnson become the everyday 1B with no Jason Giambi on the roster then it would make no sense to trade him to the Expos so does that mean we never get our hands on Javier Vazquez? Then in turn does that mean no Big Unit since Vazquez was the key component in that deal and also since Randy Johnson’s salary isn’t on the books does that mean we are able to sign Carlos Beltran in 2005? LoL, this is pretty fun. But seriously you think all of those decisions I just listed could have been affected if the Yankees let Bernie walk in 1998?

By: Ben K.

Ben K. — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 14:54:35 +0000

I’d gladly take Manny’s offense in exchange for his subpar defense. It’s not like the Yanks’ outfielders are winning too many Gold Gloves these days anyway.