Roxanne Geyer, a web producer at WCBS AM, sent us this video she shot in Monument Park this week as the Yanks prepped the historic monuments for their new home across the street. Jason Zillo, the Yanks’ director of press relations, talked about the process. Check it out. It’s a great video.
Stadium notes: how suite it isn’t
Via The Biz of Baseball comes a story about new Yankee Stadium and the current national financial situation. Due to the slowing U.S. economy, the Yankees still have some unsold suites and have yet to wrap up their stadium sponsorship deal with the Bank of America.
The AP has more:
Seven luxury boxes down the foul lines priced at $600,000 remain available for the 2009 season, the first at the new Yankee Stadium. The team still had seven available in August, too.
“There’s no getting away from the fact that the world is different than it was, so traffic slows,” chief operating officer Lonn Trost said Tuesday. “So you don’t have 10 people banging on the door. You may only have two people.”
Trost said in August that 44 of 51 suites priced at $600,000 to $850,000 had been committed, and that the $650,000 and $850,000 suites had sold out.
Basically, it sounds like the big-ticket buyers — the ones who opt for the premium suites — have made the decision that the investment will cover itself. The Yankees are having trouble finding buyers for the mid-range suites that won’t take up primo real estate and would sell to mid-level firms. I’m sure when push comes to the shove, the suites at the new stadium will be at 100 percent occupancy in April.
The AP report has a few more tidbits about the new stadium:
- Construction is 12.5 days ahead of schedule. Even if New York has a particularly brutal winter, the new stadium will still be completed well in advance of Opening Day. So much for those early season rumors about the stadium’s being behind schedule.
- The new Metro-North stop will open in the middle of May.
- While Shea Stadium is mid-demolition, old Yankee Stadium won’t face the wrecking ball until next summer when the dismantling will be on full view for every fan to see. The Yankees have yet to announce their plans to sell off stadium memorabilia.
- Old Stadium tours have been extended through Nov. 23. At this point, Monument Park is gone, but you can still walk on the field, check out the press box and enjoy the view from the dugout. Registration is available here.
Edinson Volquez named AL and NL Manager of the Year
Just kidding. Your Managers of the Year are Joe Maddon and Lou Piniella. Considering how utterly poor a job Piniella did with the Cubs in October, I’m amused by this award. Perhaps Major League Baseball should consider handing out the hardware earlier in the fall. It’s not like the Hot Stove League is wanting for news. Anyway, it looks like the voters managed to pick only managers this time around as well with Dale Sveum, whose team went 7-5 in the 12 games he managed, pulling down a third-place vote.
Leiter to split duties between MLB Network, YES
Via Shysterball (you should read Craig if you’re not already), we learn that Al Leiter will no longer be in the YES booth. He’s been hired to work at the MLB Network as a studio analyst. He’ll work alongside former Padres commentator Matt Vasgersian and former ESPN analyst Harold Reynolds. I thought Leiter was one of the better guys on the commentary team. If this means more David Cone, I’m okay with it. If it means more John Flaherty, well, that wouldn’t be a good thing.
Update by Ben 1:38 p.m.: According to an article in this morning’s Times, Leiter will actually be splitting broadcast duties between YES and the new MLB Network. We’re not quite ready to wave him good bye yet.
Taking advantage of a fire sale
It might not be a full-blown, tear it down and rebuild the whole thing kind of firesale, but it’s obvious the Florida Marlins are again moving higher priced players for younger, cheaper alternatives. While in previous years they moved megastars like Josh Beckett & Miguel Cabrera before they cashed in during free agency, this year they dealt Mike Jacobs, Josh Willingham & Scott Olsen before they received raises in arbitration, a somewhat disturbing development.
After Monday night’s move that sent the Marlins’ longest tenured hitter & pitcher north to DC, speculation mounted that the team’s remaining arbitration eligible players – namely Dan Uggla, Kevin Gregg and Jeremy Hermida – could be the next to go. Gregg is readily available and could be had by any team offering a decent return, but GM Larry Beinfest responded to the speculation surrounding Uggla & Hermida by saying that he’s prepared to go into 2009 with them in the lineup. Even so, I imagine he’d entertain offers for both players, and that’s where the Bombers come in.
The Yanks are desperate to get younger and more athletic, and Hermida offers both those attributes while bringing strong upside. Still just 24, he has over 1,270 big league at-bats under his belt, hitting .267-.342-.436 (103 OPS+) in the process. He’s flashed some of the potential that made him the 11th overall pick in 2002, hitting .350-.407-.574 during the final two months of 2007 (singlehandedly saving my fantasy team) before going .309-.351-.488 in the first month of 2008. Hermida was rumored to be heading to Pittsburgh during the Manny Ramirez Trade Deadline Saga, indicating that other clubs still like his potential.
Rated the fourth best prospect in the game by Baseball America prior to the 2006 season, Hermida made history by becoming only the second player (and first in 107 years) to hit a grand slam in his first big league plate appearance. Armed with a sweet lefthanded swing and military style plate disipline (he placed 12nd in the league last year with 4.11 P/PA), getting out of cavernous Dolphins Stadium (where he’s hit .248-.320-.404 in his career) and into lefty-friendly Yankee Stadium (he’s a career .284-.363-.467 hitter on the road) might just be the jump start he needs.
With just nine games of centerfield experience to his credit (all coming in the first half of 2006), Hermida wouldn’t be option for the Yanks at that spot. Despite this limitation, he still offers some flexibility because he can hold his own against lefties, play both outfield corners, and still has options left, meaning he could be sent to the minors as needed. And as far as that report by an anonymous scout saying he has “no passion for the game,” I’ll just defer to ex-Marlins’ manager Joe Girardi, and assume Cash will talk to him before attempting to acquire Hermida.
I’m not going to throw out trade ideas, because I have no idea what Florida is looking for. Keep in mind that while the Marlins’ last few trades were made for essentially pennies on the dollar, Jacobs is a limited player entering his age 28 season, Willingham has a bad back and is entering his age 30 season, and Olsen has a reputation as a punk. Their rotation is pretty much set with Ricky Nolasco, Josh Johnson, Anibal Sanchez, Chris Volstad & Andrew Miller, and they have plenty of backup in Rick VandenHurk, Ryan Tucker, Dan Meyer, Eulogio DeLaCruz and Burke Badenhop, so Ian Kennedy might not entice them. Melky Cabrera’s trade value is nil, and the Yanks have no other young position players to offer up.
Signing big name free agents is fun, but they almost always fail to deliver, and frankly it’s the easy way out. Be bold and take a chance on a guy who still has something to prove rather than playing through the nose for a player who’s already played his best baseball for someone else. It’s not often you get a chance to buy-low on a player with Hermida’s talent and upside, and much like Nick Swisher, I hope the tires are at least kicked on this one.
Confirmed: Yanks sign Marte for three years, $12 mil
Via Tim, we learn that the Yankees have signed reliever Damaso Marte to a three year deal worth $12 million. The story comes from Impacto Deportivo, a Spanish-language site. I believe they also broke the Luis Castillo signing last year. We’ll monitor this for further confirmation. If true, it seems like a decent deal for the Yanks. At least we won’t have to hear pundits scream in the Spring about the Yankees bringing in a lefty reliever just for the sake of it.
Update: It’s official.
MLB scaring rooks straight on DUI
Maybe Joba should have attended this: a scared straight program for MLB draft picks and rookies. The article only mentions Brewers rooks going in for the program, though I guess (and hope) that all 30 teams will educate their players in such a manner.
It’s a neat idea. They toured a jail so that the players could get a feel for the inmate life. It kind of reminds me of a video they made us watch in high school.