Jan
11
Straight from the horse’s mouth
ByAs the Andy Pettitte stalemate continues, YanksBlog.com checks in with a damning quote from the lefty. In a Sept. 10 Times article, Pettitte had some interesting things to say about his then-impending free agency. “Obviously anyone else would say, ‘I’ll go wherever I want to,’ because people want to try to get the most money,” Pettitte said to Tyler Kepner. “But, I mean, I’m not going anywhere, you know what I’m saying? The Yankees know me enough, it’s not like I’m going to hold out. I guess if I had spent all my money or whatever, it might be different. But it’s not about that, really, anymore.” Those words and his actions this winter speak for themselves.
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ugh.. disgusting… so stingy – guess 108 mill aint enough now-a-days
“I never used performance enhancing drugs. I’m a clean man…”
*months later*
“I’m here today to apologize to my family, my team, the fans, for my actions…”
(paraphrasing
still waiting to hear who made that 3 year, $36M offer….
the guy in his dream the night before
Ben,
Thanks for pulling this one up. In one of the previous threads I brought this up but couldn’t find the article. Andy is so full of it. I guess god is telling him to do this.
I would still like to see Andy in pinstripes in 2009.
LOL at the advertisement, “Get the full story on Clemens McCready Affair scandal now!”
Andy, it’s always about the money. Just man up and admit it…
Unless he really, y’know, did spend all of his money. Which is another story entirely.
Hes a family man, I would doubt it but you never know, we are talking about the same guy I thought would never take an illegal PED.
Cut him some slack. His strong Christian moral compass is broken.
PEDs, dishonesty, greed… pffft… clearly it’s all the devil’s fault.
al he has to do is say some hail mary’s and whine to giod and all is forgiven.
I still think he’ll sign w/ NYY. Eventually, he’s gotta come to his senses. Hopefully, at least.
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/s.....om-Rangers
Young wants to be traded, you think its a good time to trade cano, move Jeter to second and put young at short? Just throwing it out there for discussion’s sake.
Ew no.
I’ll elaborate later if you want but for no, ew no.
Seconded. Young should not be a target for us at all.
thirded
fourthed
5th’d.
sixthed
Seventhd.
Both Jeter and Cano are easily better than Young, and Texas would jizz in their pants if we offered up Cano for him.
if the Rangers put Young on waivers, and anyone could have him and all they would have to do is pay the rest of his contract, i don’t think anyone would take him.
well they can pull him back and work out a trade
The point was that no one would take him for free, nevermind having to give up anything for him. Unless the Rangers paid a bunch of his salary, he’s unwanted.
yeah, didn’t really think of the context…what I dont get is why now, I get Andrus did well in AA, but the Rangers can take their time
At that insane salary, no team would pick up Young. Can anybody explain the power outage Young’s endured these past 2 seasons?? Its not like he’s been hurt … ahem…
Don’t go there…..
Michael Young has never played in New York, therefore has never, ever used PED’s. Just ask George Mitchell.
I had Young on one of my fantasy teams this year, so I actually do have a clue. At some point in the second half, he got plunked on the hand and fractured a finger. He played through it, but his power dropped. He eventually got hit on the same finger again, after which he just sucked.
God, I always link comments when I don’t mean to. My bad.
Jeter > Young at short. No lie.
Sad but true.
i’m fine if he signs w/ NYY, but i do have some concerns about his off-season training.
the word last season was that all his PED testimonial stuff interfered w/ his training (or he was stressed by it and didn’t train like normal) and thus he was behind schedule for spring training…perhaps this contributed to his second half swoon?
if he does sign and pitch for the Yanks, i hope he’s been keeping in good shape…
He should have never gasped those words and given his agents a job to do… I’m sure he didn’t expect an offer that he felt would be low. We always seem to pay and overpay.
In the end he hopefully will sign if he truly does want to pitch in the new stadium. I hope that is the case. If not then we move on.
Well said.
Exactly. I think he felt the Yankees would throw out something similar to what he had been making. That quote was given right around when he had the first MRI on his shoulder, so by that point the team definitely knew he was pitching through pain and wanted him to continue doing it. He probably figured the team would write off his decline to the injury and give him a bye on it.
Of course, the Yankees heard his quote and are playing hardball with him because of it, which he didn’t expect. If he kept his mouth shut he probably would’ve gotten a better offer and this would be done with.
The fact that he said all this and now seems to be holding out over money certainly does not reflect well on him, but the Yankees are holding out over money too. Everyone expects and accepts that the teams will nickel and dime. It’s the players who are always supposed to be noble and care about more than just money. That is not fair.
Until I am in the position to be making decisions about whether or not a difference of two-four million dollars in my salary matters to me (and oh, how I hope that day is coming soon), I’m not going to tell anyone else how to behave in these situations.
Give credit where credit is due. This originated on NoMaas.Org. . .
Actually, it originated in The New York Times. Had I seen it on NoMaas, I would have given them the credit, but I saw it when it popped up on YanksBlog in Google Reader. Tell NoMaas to have a full RSS feed and real permalinks, and I’ll give ‘em some hat-tip love!
Well the quotes were from Sept. 10. I’m sure that Andy wasn’t anticipating a reduction of $6 million in salary when he said that.
On Sept. 10, the Dow was at 11268. Those were the days, huh?
I understand that he probably didn’t expect a drastic paycut, but considering where the market is for pitching right now and what contracts teams are doling out, wouldn’t this quote of his be even more valid now that $16 million is significantly above market?
It’s not above markey for the team he wants to play for though. I’m just playing Devil’s Advocate. I don’t think that at this stage in Andy’s career that he is worth $16 million, but then again I didn’t think that Mussina was going to be worth the $13 million that he got last year. $13 million seems to be a lucky number for the Yankees, maybe they should split the difference with Andy and get the deal done.
I don’t like the Mussina/Pettitte comparisons simply because it feeds this belief that Pettitte can “pull a Mussina.” What Moose did in 2008 is far from the norm, and we shouldn’t start expecting all 37 year old pitchers to do better after a poor season just because Mussina did it. Pettitte could improve because his numbers showed he suffered from some bad luck, but he also had a shoulder problem and lost velocity last year. It could go either way.
Anyway, I agree with you: Split the difference. But I do think $16 million is above market, Yankees or not.
I don’t think that Andy can replicate what Moose did last year. Mussina totally reinvented himself last year on the fly. I do think that Andy can put up solid numbers and solid innings though.
Moose made $11M last year.
Ahahaha! Well said.
Like I said, maybe he really did spend all of the money…
Does anyone think Boras is waiting for the Yankees to enter the Lowe bidding? The Yanks might clear some payroll (i.e. a Nady or Swish trade). And the Pettitte non-signing is dragging out.
Since Derek Lowe isn’t going to sign a one-year contract, I don’t think anyone in baseball expects the Yanks to jump in on that bidding.
Why wouldn’t the Yanks do a 3 year $45 million deal?
Lowe would be the most tested playoff pitcher in the rotation if he signed. That’s never a bad thing.
Probably because they imagine that both Hughes and Joba will be in the rotation by then.
With the signing of Tex and blocking Posada and Jeter at 1b, doesn’t that mean the powers at be are more interested in winning no. Joba is already in the rotation.
Yes and No, they want to win all the time but, they don’t want to be as locked into contracts that hinder any moves they may do later. Also, they want to get younger not older…again.
I guess what I’m saying is, there isn’t much to look at in the way of FA next year. Why not take advantage and move all in this year.?
“With the signing of Tex and blocking Posada and Jeter at 1b, doesn’t that mean the powers at be are more interested in winning no.”
Tex doesn’t “block” Posada and Jeter at 1B, because they were never going to play there. The only positions Posada and Jeter will ever conceivably play (other than catcher and shortstop) are designated hitter and the outfield, respectively.
Using reasoning like this as the analytical underpinnings of your Derek Lowe argument casts doubt on its validity.
Because we have some low cost guys that need to be in the rotation or traded. Phil, Aceves, IPK and maybe even Coke and (the long shot)Giese, they are as close as anyone can possibly be.
Same argument for me. Win now with proven players. If you can afford it, why not?
I like the development of players and homegrown players have always been my favorites, but why not sign one more Type A in this bumber crop for a 4th round pick. Next year’s FA crop doesn’t look good (the best of ‘em might not make FA).
I would rather give Hughes or Aceves a shot, but they might get a shot anyway because of injuries.
Because “win now with proven players” is usually very ineffective. When grouped selectively, promising, unproven players are likely to outperform players in their mid-to-late thirties, a couple of years away from their best seasons.
Some teams can’t afford to have any high-priced veteran that is underperforming his unproven alternative. The Yankees can afford a couple, but even then, when you have a Giambi on your roster, you can miss out on the possibility of signing Ortiz, or giving Pena playing time.
Ideally, we shouldn’t sign any pitcher (for now) for more then one year. We have a few guys at the door…trying to break it down. If we don’t sign anyone at all, I’d live with it and open it up for competition in ST. Hell, I believe one of them could do as well as Andy will this year…he will not be able to reinvent himself. We may need two pitchers to make Andys’ and Jobas’ innings up but, it can be done.
Thanks for the mention, Ben!
You’re a happy employee going up for review. You say how much you love your job and how much you don’t want to go anywhere. As a reward they cut your salary by 37% – how happy would any of you be who are using the “it’s not the money” soundbite?
I would be if it was 10 million to play baseball for 6 months.
How about if you are that same employee and you have been paid much more money than you have been worth the last 2 years for the work you have done. Wouldn’t you be happy with that? Wouldn’t you be happy if you are the same employee and are still being offered a market value contract in an awful economy?
How about if you are that same employee and you have been paid much more money than you have been worth the last 2 years for the work you have done.
Whether you’re making 20k a year or 20M a year, nobody ever really thinks like this. No man or woman ever thinks to his/herself “Wow, I’m totally overpaid and don’t deserve this salary; I’m cool with my employer lowering my salary going forward if they so choose.”
This fictional dialogue you’re putting in Andy’s head is nonsensical.
Really? So you think a banker that just got laid off of wall street that used to make $500k a year wouldn’t take a job for $300k now?
Get real.
Or furthermore, a banker that didn’t get laid off and is looking for a new job and his firm isn’t going to give him 500k anymore. Do you really think someone like that because the conditions of the market wouldn’t take the other offer?
Andy has been one of favorite yankees but he an absolute idiot for not realizing his value in the market and is coming off like an extremely greedy person after getting paid well more than he deserved the last 2 years.
None of the scenarios in those comments have anything to do with the statement you made, where you implied that Andy admitted to himself that he was overpaid and that he’d be HAPPY taking less, since he was overpaid in the past.
Your banker who got laid off would take 300k instead of 500k, yes. BUT HE WOULDN’T BE HAPPY ABOUT IT. You’re implying Andy should be thrilled to take 10M because he was overpaid in the past, and that’s frankly just ridiculous. He may take the 10M, he may take 8M, he may take 12M. He’s not going to be HAPPY about taking a pay cut. Nobody ever is, no matter how “overpaid” you, I, or they ever think they may have been.
He’s way out of line here. He was bad last year, a .500 pitcher isn’t worth 16 million.
He should look at Wangs contract and do the math.
His selfishness, or foolish pride (call it what you like) should leave him somewhat questioned by his always faithful fans. Let’s not forget, the man had the worst season of his career after proven to have used PED’s.
Look it up, he allowed the most earned runs of his career for one season and also had the worst W/L record of his career.
Maybe he wasn’t so strong in the second half without help from his “dad’s” prescription.
I hope the Cuban defectorate gets the money originally intended for good ol’ Andy.
Wang is a bad arguement. He is under team control.
And Wang doesn’t have 14 accumulated years of ML service time.
Yea I know wanger wasn’t a free agent i just think Andy really needs to take a step back and look at his production. I know he eat’s innings which is great for a 4/5 starter. But 4/5 starteers aren’t worth 16 mil.
I feel vindicated for arguing that Pettitte is a whiner. I guess I should’ve just let Pettitte’s own words argue for me.
Of course, I was giving him too much credit–if he were just a whiner, he would’ve grudgingly accepted the offer, said a few inappropriate things, and moved on. This is a little bit worse. The man’s epidermis is showing.
[...] Straight from the horse’s mouth River Ave. Blues ,January 12, 2009 As the Andy Pettitte stalemate continues, YanksBlog.com checks in with a damning quote from the lefty. In a Sept. 10 Times article, Pettitte had some … [...]