Bernie Williams has never officially retired. Now 40 years old and with a burgeoning music career, the former center fielder hasn’t been able to quite call it quits. Perhaps, he hasn’t filed out those retirement papers yet because he wants to play for Puerto Rico during the upcoming World Baseball Classic tournament. It would be a nice gesture if Bernie’s last baseball appearance could come during the WBC. Now all he has to do is convince the team to take him.
It must be good to throw 99
No matter how maddeningly ineffective and inconsistent his is, someone will always be happy to pay Kyle Farnsworth over $4 million a year to pitch. This time, the Royals have emerged as the winners of the dubious Kyle Farnsworth Sweeptstakes. They get Krazy Kyle for the not-so-discount price of $9.25 million over two seasons. As you can imagine, Royals fans are not so thrilled about the news. Have fun with that, guys.
Manny being ridiculous
Oh, Manny, Manny, Manny. What ever will baseball do with you?
At age 36, Manny Ramirez had a season for the ages. Spending time in Boston and Los Angeles, Manny hit a combined .332/.430/.601 with 37 HR and 121 RBI. Despite racking up just 229 NL plate appearances, he finished fourth in the league’s MVP voting, and the writers wouldn’t have been wrong had they given him the award.
With free agency looming, he seemed to be playing inspired baseball, and clearly, he was hoping for a big pay day. Well, the Winter Meetings have come and gone, and Manny is still unemployed. The Dodgers have offered him a two-year deal, and the team is prepared to wait him out. In other words, if Manny realizes that nothing will top that offer, the Dodgers will tack on a third year and call it a deal.
For his part, though, Manny will have none of it. In fact, the Manny Ramirez camp has unleashed the retirement “threat” on the baseball world. According to Ken Davidoff, sources close to Manny say the slugger would retire if no team were to offer a deal to his liking. In a line straight out of the Dugout, Manny supposedly spends his days working out, watching cartoons and playing video games.
Now, clearly, Manny isn’t going to retire. He seems rather focused on some personal milestones. Both 600 HR and 3000 hits are within his reach. But these are the antics that lead teams to stay away from Manny Ramirez. Personally, I’d love to stick Manny’s bat into the middle of the lineup. Bat him fourth of fifth behind A-Rod, and the Yanks would pummel opposing pitchers.
Then, I realize that we’d have to deal with Manny’s mood swings too. We’d have to deal with his tendency to remove himself from games at key points, his tendency to threaten retirement, his tendency to do the whole Manny being Manny thing. Is it worth it? Probably. But it’s not a shock that teams aren’t rushing to sign Manny Ramirez when his camp starts dropping the r-word as though Manny’s retirement is a threat to anyone other than Manny.
Evening rumors: Cameron deal back on
As the Yanks near a deal with A.J. Burnett, the trade talks for Mike Cameron are back on, according to multiple reports. This is almost as fun as the now-dead Jake Peavy-to-the-Cubs deal. Anyway, use this as a blanket open thread as sorts. If nothing else happens tonight, you won’t be hearing from me for a few hours.
Cashman may issue an ultimatum to Andy Pettitte
Numerous reports, all of them relying on the same Post article, contend that Brian Cashman left the Winter Meetings today bound for Andy Pettitte’s home. According to the reports, the Yanks feel confident enough in their efforts at landing A.J. Burnett that Cashman is going to issue a “take it or leave it” ultimatum to Andy Pettitte. The Yanks will play Pettitte $10 million to take the fifth spot in the rotation or they will move to some combination of Derek Lowe, Ben Sheets and Phil Hughes. While we can’t be sure of the veracity of this report, I think it’s a perfectly reasonable move to make at this stage in the winter.
Afternoon updates: Winding down the meetings
As I study for my contracts final and Joe and Mike get ready to come back to rainy New York, the winter meetings are officially winding down. While it’s unlikely that any major deals will get done before the GMs make it back home tonight, we’ve got rumors galore to share.
- Forget Nick Punto. MLB Trade Rumors notes that the Twins have resigned Punto to a two-year, $8.5-million deal with an option for 2011. Punto has a career OPS+ of 74 and is going to make $4 million a year. I’m in the wrong line of work.
- Tyler Kepner sums up the Cameron stituation. The Yanks and Brewers are haggling over money and extra players. Kepner notes that perhaps Kei Igawa could be shipped off to Milwaukee. He’d be the perfect replacement for CC Sabathia. Not.
- Dan Graziano says the Cameron deal might not happen because the Yankees hurt the Brewers’ feelings. By asking for money a day after giving CC Sabathia the largest pitching contract ever, the Yanks have supposedly insulted the Brewers. Somewhere, the world’s smallest violin player is playing for Doug Melvin.
A big RAB thank you
With the Winter Meetings wrapping up today, I just wanted to take a minute to thank everyone who has stopped by over the last days. On Monday, we set a new RAB record with a hair under 30,000 page views; on Tuesday, we topped that record and hit 34,000; on Wednesday, we blew past Tuesday’s total to end the day with over 42,000 page views. In other words, with Mike and Joe in Vegas covering the meetings and my running the wires in New York, we’ve pulled in over 108,000 page views in three days.
On a similar vein, Rob Neyer penned an interesting piece on his acceptance into the BBWAA. He’s certainly a bit ambivalent about inclusion, and one of his passages strikes a chord:
when I was hired to write for ESPN’s Web site in 1996, nobody told me to respect my elders. So I didn’t. If I thought Tracy Ringolsby was writing foolishly, I said so. If I thought Tom Verducci had crossed the line from intelligent analysis (of which he’s highly capable) into subjective dim-wittedness, I said so. And usually not with any surplus of grace. I believed then (and believe now) that my job, my responsibility, is to entertain and to educate, and that “not ruffling feathers” falls way, way down on the list somewhere.
That gets at the root of what we do. Yes, we’re fans covering our favorite team. But at the same time, we don’t give the Yanks and the papers that cover them a free pass. I cover the stadium issue quasi-fanatically because there’s been an utter lack of skeptical and accurate reporting. Joe takes issue with the New York Post because they more than push that line Neyer mentions. Mike delves into the minors because few others do. We like to hope that we bring something new and unique to the table, and I guess we’re doing something right.
So thank you to the regulars and thank you to the new folks who have stopped by. We’ll be here all winter and into the season as well. Make sure you come back.