One way they could do it is by hoping Teixeira has a good first half and then trade him for little talent in return for payroll relief.
Staying Under $189M: The Impossible Dream
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Cutting benefits might be a smart move. Does a team full of old men with fake dentures really need a dental plan?
Oh my god, that is one delicious slice of deep dish schadenfreude.OilCanMDS said:
The thing that struck me is that the yankees were outscored by 21 runs last season. I didn't realize that. Holy crap, they should have won 79 games not 85.
Finally, a media person does the math. Passan says:
Edit: This matches up with my earlier post, more or less. I'd guess the difference is in the benefits number calculation.
Edit #2:
Passan adds:
Edit: This matches up with my earlier post, more or less. I'd guess the difference is in the benefits number calculation.
Edit #2:
Passan adds:
Apparently Sherman was tweeting saying that the reason for these low cost moves like Roberts and Thornton is that NY is gearing up for a run at Tanaka. Can someone please explain to me why they would let Cano walk, sign a bunch of garbage, and then still not get under the cap because they sign Tanaka?
Apparently Sherman was tweeting saying that the reason for these low cost moves like Roberts and Thornton is that NY is gearing up for a run at Tanaka. Can someone please explain to me why they would let Cano walk, sign a bunch of garbage, and then still not get under the cap because they sign Tanaka?
Cano was a length thing and if I'm being totally honest, I think they just didn't love his personality as the face of this team. They didn't "let him go." They made a modest offer and were only beaten by one team.
Cano was a length thing and if I'm being totally honest, I think they just didn't love his personality as the face of this team. They didn't "let him go." They made a modest offer and were only beaten by one team.
crow216 said:
First, they made an offer that they knew Cano would never accept. I don't know why they ditch Cano over personality when that has never seemed to be an issue for them in the past. Second, they still signed a bunch of garbage. Even if they get Tanaka, are you happy with this team going into 2014?
First, they made an offer that they knew Cano would never accept. I don't know why they ditch Cano over personality when that has never seemed to be an issue for them in the past. Second, they still signed a bunch of garbage. Even if they get Tanaka, are you happy with this team going into 2014?
No, but we're beating a dead horse now. I don't think they're going to be as bad as everyone on here expects but I certainly have no high hopes either.
The Ellsbury signing grew on me, I like the McCann signing, and I don't like the Beltran signing. I like letting Cano go if it was going to cost 10 years. I don't know one single Yankee fan worried about the future of the team just because of Cano. Regarding these little $2m moves, I'm not sure why anyone cares one way or the other. Low cost, more options, and unlikely upside.
I keep saying it but there isn't much left on the board for them to drastically improve their chances next year. They were prepared to have both Ellsbury and Cano on the team if Cano accepted. Basically, the more this offseason goes on, the more I believe it when ownership says "it's a goal but not a mandate" to stay under $189.
No, but we're beating a dead horse now. I don't think they're going to be as bad as everyone on here expects but I certainly have no high hopes either.
The Ellsbury signing grew on me, I like the McCann signing, and I don't like the Beltran signing. I like letting Cano go if it was going to cost 10 years. I don't know one single Yankee fan worried about the future of the team just because of Cano. Regarding these little $2m moves, I'm not sure why anyone cares one way or the other. Low cost, more options, and unlikely upside.
I keep saying it but there isn't much left on the board for them to drastically improve their chances next year. They were prepared to have both Ellsbury and Cano on the team if Cano accepted. Basically, the more this offseason goes on, the more I believe it when ownership says "it's a goal but not a mandate" to stay under $189.
Re: Cano
My two scents, the Ys thought they might be his only bidder, and they low-balled him. IMO they would have maybe gone to 8/200, (from 7/175) but once Seattle's interest was made known, and word first came out about a 8/225, it was too late. The Ys weren't going there.
McCann made sense,
Ells was marketing and make-up sex for season ticket holders..
My two scents, the Ys thought they might be his only bidder, and they low-balled him. IMO they would have maybe gone to 8/200, (from 7/175) but once Seattle's interest was made known, and word first came out about a 8/225, it was too late. The Ys weren't going there.
McCann made sense,
Ells was marketing and make-up sex for season ticket holders..
Rudy Pemberton said:
Oh, they'd have to send money along, but if he comes back playing good defense and putting up a .350 / .470 for an 820 OPS then they can probably get away with paying about half. That's basically Napoli, who reportedly got an offer of 3-$39 from someone despite a hip that might break at any moment. Granted, the trendlines are all in the wrong direction, he's typically a slow starter, and he's coming off a serious injury, but hey, this is the Yankees we're talking about -- all they've got is hope. HA!
jon abbey said:
Was that Senior Yankee Official aware that the Yankees made as much money off the Ichiro jersey when it said "Mariners" on the front?
MLB licensing fees on tchotchkes and apparel get split 30 ways.
And why should the any team's front office give a second thought to the effect of any player on the local hotel/restaurant business?
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Edit: added "And why should"
That article addresses that, dunno if it's right or wrong, but:
"The national and international revenue from merchandise sales and television viewership, however, is shared amongst the 30 major league teams... But the Yankees do profit directly from local merchandise sales and from in-stadium television advertising."
"The national and international revenue from merchandise sales and television viewership, however, is shared amongst the 30 major league teams... But the Yankees do profit directly from local merchandise sales and from in-stadium television advertising."
Yeah, like the M's pocket the retail markup for an item sold in their own team store.
But that's not a business that allows you to sit in a comfortable chair and collect profit off your own logo--you have to actually get the customer to walk into your store and take out his wallet before he leaves.
But that's not a business that allows you to sit in a comfortable chair and collect profit off your own logo--you have to actually get the customer to walk into your store and take out his wallet before he leaves.
jon abbey said:
By my calculations they could be a contender by adding Drew, Tanaka (if posted) and a top bullpen arm (Benoit or Rodney are the only guys left). That puts them at a payroll at about 220 million w/o Arod for 100 games and 15 million tax, a savings of about 30 million on payroll and tax from last year. Easy.
Spending almost 300 million on free agents and losing 3 draft pick just to go from a 75 W team to an 85 W team makes even less sense. Their only path is to keep spending, and they are fortunate they have the revenues to do it. Why they apparently seem so reluctant to do so is a puzzle that one can only speculate on.
Jon Heyman @JonHeymanCBS3m
Yanks last couple signings suggest serious intention to get below $189M. a surprise arod arb win would hurt.
Yanks last couple signings suggest serious intention to get below $189M. a surprise arod arb win would hurt.
HriniakPosterChild said:
Right, in house Japanese tourists/ticket buyers, the same group I was talking about above. I've only been to a couple of games in recent seasons, but my casual observation is that there are quite a few of these there, many in the high-priced seats.
Sampo Gida said:
So the rotation then would be Tanaka, a 300 pound question mark in CC, a 39 year old question mark in Kuroda, Ivan Nova who looked great in the final 2/3 of the season but was bad enough before then to be sent to AAA, and one of Pineda/Phelps/etc.
I don't think that's a contending rotation, but I have very little faith in CC at this point (and not much more in Kuroda after he was terrible down the stretch), maybe I'm wrong.
Well here's where some of the money went that might have been used to improve the Yankee farm system:
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/apnewsbreak-yankees-hit-28m-luxury-214412105--mlb.html
Maybe it's shortchanging Yankee fans (at least in the long run) by going over $189M, not under.
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/apnewsbreak-yankees-hit-28m-luxury-214412105--mlb.html
Maybe it's shortchanging Yankee fans (at least in the long run) by going over $189M, not under.
They had the "one run victory" luck that the Orioles had a couple years ago. Of course Mo closing didn't hurt. Yeah, I enjoyed the article immensely. Until I got to the bottom and there was a listing of other recent articles by Rany Jazayerli including "Why The Cardinals Will Win The World Series". How did that work out for you there Rany?Rough Carrigan said:
jon abbey said:
They don't just buy tickets and merchandise, they buy whole tourist packages. How much $ it all adds up to, who knows?
I am back to pointing out post #2 in this thread. Even if Rodriguez is suspended for all of 2014, wouldn't the Yanks still have on the payroll an installment of his signing bonus for something like $1 million (signing bonus of $10 million for a ten-year contract)?
jon abbey said:
It may not be a world championship rotation but it could be enough to get them in the playoffs. I mean, they won 85 games with the same rotation less Hughes and Pettitte and no offense and this will be replaced by Tanaka and Phelps or Pineda and a slightly better offense. I don't expect much of CC as I think he is toast, but Nova and Kuroda could possibly have better or more consistent years, and Tanaka may or may not be the 2nd coming (or he could be another Igawa).
The team will still have some uncertainty, but so did the Red Sox before 2013. Lackey coming off TJ Surgery, Lester coming off a lousy year, Doubront coming off a year he fell apart in at the end, and Dempster who was thought by many as being unable to pitch in the AL East. Papi was coming off a serious achilles injury, Napoli with a bad hip. Drew off an ankle injury at SS and Victorino after an awful year. Lot of things went right for them, and they had some luck as well.
No guarantees things work out if they add the extra pieces, but not trying to compete guarantees failure.
Brickowski said:
You really think the Yankees were so strapped for cash they did not spend what they needed on the farm system? With a new stadium and revenues that have them in another universe? The problem with the Yankees farm system is partly bad luck, partly bad management, and scouts more interested in kickbacks. Its not money.
What calculations are those? I'm familiar with models like Marcels, ZiPS and PECOTA. What's your model?Sampo Gida said:
jon abbey said:
The young players were not a huge part of the Red Sox 2013 success, sure they helped, but that team was going to the playoffs without them. It was about older players, many of them free agents who met or exceeded projections.
The Yankees farm system actually had some arms to contribute last year when the bullpen was falling apart yet Joe would not use them, one guy, whats his name comes to mind. Betances yeah. They also have some decent C prospects who could help if McCann gets injured or could use to trade for holes as they develop.
Like they say, you go to War with the army you have (or can have), not necessarily the one you wish you had but can't have. The Yankees weapon is money, they should use it.
It may not be a world championship rotation but it could be enough to get them in the playoffs. I mean, they won 85 games with the same rotation less Hughes and Pettitte and no offense and this will be replaced by Tanaka and Phelps or Pineda and a slightly better offense. I don't expect much of CC as I think he is toast, but Nova and Kuroda could possibly have better or more consistent years, and Tanaka may or may not be the 2nd coming (or he could be another Igawa).
The team will still have some uncertainty, but so did the Red Sox before 2013. Lackey coming off TJ Surgery, Lester coming off a lousy year, Doubront coming off a year he fell apart in at the end, and Dempster who was thought by many as being unable to pitch in the AL East. Papi was coming off a serious achilles injury, Napoli with a bad hip. Drew off an ankle injury at SS and Victorino after an awful year. Lot of things went right for them, and they had some luck as well.
No guarantees things work out if they add the extra pieces, but not trying to compete guarantees failure.
Did you read the article that talks about how they were really a below .500 team that had a decent amount of luck? They weren't simply a few tweaks away from the playoffs, and that's before they lost Cano, Pettitte and Rivera.
EvilEmpire said:
Not sure there was anything controversial here requiring more than back of the envelope calculations.
But fair enough, my calcs assume the Yankees are an 85 W team now, assuming they were a 80 W team last year which was closer to their pythag. Using steamer projections or actual fWAR for the retired we have the additions of a full year of Jeter (1.5 WAR), Tex (2 WAR), Ellsbury (3.8 WAR), Beltran (1.8 WAR), Johnson (1.1 WAR) and McCann (3.7 WAR) is a 1 win upgrade despite the losses (or in some case because of the loss) of Rivera (1.5 WAR), Cano (5.2 WAR), Pettitte (3.2 WAR), Hughes (1.4 WAR), Logan (0.5), Stewart {0.2 WAR) , Overbay (0.0) , Ichiro (reduced PT-0.5) and Joba (0.2). Moving Gardner to LF and Soriano to DH should give them an estimated 4 win upgrade (2 W in LF defense and 2 W in DH production from last year).
Also adding Drew (2 WAR ), Tanaka (4-5 WAR per various pundits) and Rodney (0.7 WAR ) gives the team a 7-8 win upgrade over the myriad replacement options available. Good for 92-93 W plus/minus.
Put simply, 85 W not competitive, 90+ W competitive. That 5+ wins can only come from the free agent market since there are no significant prospects. At a cost of 5-6 million per additional W, they can be playing in October, or else lose out on the post season revenue and have a lot of empty seats in the 2nd half when fans realize the team is going nowhere.
glennhoffmania said:
I covered my thinking on this above to EE. However, the luck was not all good given all the injuries, and some regression and better luck in this area could yield great dividends like it did to the Red Sox in 2013. Of course, the age of Jeter, Soriano and Beltran probably guarantees at least 1 significant injury between them. And the good luck probably was more to do with a great bullpen for much of the year before they fatigued. That's why they need an arm like Benoit or Rodney.
First and foremost, what makes you think that you will get full seasons of Jeter, Tex, Ellsbury, and McCann? All of these players have significant injury histories. Not to mention Jeter and Tex are well past their prime. I had to explain this to a buddy of mine who claimed that my mentioning of the thin pitching and horrendous infield depth was me harping on the "worst case scenario". It's actually the best case scenario, the scenario closer to reality is that Vernon Wells and Brendan Ryan get 400 at bats while Nuno and Warren combine for 35 starts due to the age of the Yankees roster.Sampo Gida said:
I see that you have already added the contributions of Drew, Tanaka, and Benoit. That seems reasonable.
That seems like a lot of unsupportable assumptions and rosy projections in my opinion. For example, you're assuming (I think) that Kuroda will repeat his almost 4 win performance. Last year Ellsbury was worth 2.6 more wins than Gardner yet you're saying his addition is worth 3.8 wins and then still counting Gardner's additional value in LF, even though Steamer only has him at 1.8 wins for the year. McCann wasn't worth 3.7 wins the last two years. Where do these two wins from Drew come from if you're giving Jeter a full year? And you seem to be assuming good health for everyone including Jeter, Beltran, Teixeira, and the rest of the old guys.
In my opinion, even if they add Drew and Tanaka they are not a playoff team.
In my opinion, even if they add Drew and Tanaka they are not a playoff team.
Obviously there is plenty of offseason left to make moves, but you are double counting a few times there Sampo (as mentioned above).
Where do you see Drew playing? You can't count Jeter at SS (or 2nd? never played there, or DH), Drew at SS (or 2nd? never played there), Johnson at 2nd (or 3rd? 16 total games al MLB level), Soriano at DH and still have the outfield full with Ells, Granderson and Beltran.
Where do you see Drew playing? You can't count Jeter at SS (or 2nd? never played there, or DH), Drew at SS (or 2nd? never played there), Johnson at 2nd (or 3rd? 16 total games al MLB level), Soriano at DH and still have the outfield full with Ells, Granderson and Beltran.
mauidano said:
To be fair, Jonah Keri got to write the corresponding "Why the Red Sox Will Win the World Series" piece, so it wasn't necessarily his idea. He probably lost the coin flip.
jon abbey said:
Yeah I don't get what Heyman is talking about here.
Cot's has them at 177 but that's not accounting for the arb costs and benefits.
These guys cited from an article on fangraphs did the math and found:
That's from Dec 10th before the 2 announced moves yesterday. Add the 5.5 from Roberts and Thornton and you are now over 189 even if A-Rod is suspended for the year.
I have to believe they are going all in on Tanaka. Makes very little sense to just barely trip over the limit with the 1 and 2 year dreck they've been signing and not give themselves a shot for 90+ wins with that payroll.
Obviously their management has not been stellar but it would be criminally stupid to not add a big piece for the rotation at this point.
Whats going to kill them is that even though a lot comes off the books in 2015 (again looking at that Cot's spreadsheet), there are gaping holes to be filled and unless MLB raises the LT threshold significantly and inflation is suspended or deflates, this thread will be reprised this time next year.
k-factory said:
I think I take the opposite view. If they were planning on blowing past 189 why sign drek like Roberts and Thornton? Why did they let Cano go without a fight? Why not sign Choo or Infante?
You have to have a plan about these things .. if the Tea Leaves give you the impression that Arod will be suspended for enough of the year to have a realistic shot then you go cheap. Otherwise you spend what you have to spend to be competitive. They have obviously (to me anyways) done the former.
BCsMightyJoeYoung said:
This is what I've been thinking all along. To them, there's really no difference between 190m and 220m. Either way they lose the revenue sharing and they can obviously afford a payroll of 220m+. So signing Roberts and Johnson instead of Cano or even Ellis, or signing Beltran instead of Choo, or signing Thornton instead of Balfour, or not going after multiple quality starters, makes zero sense to me. Unless something significant happens they're basically going to be an average team with a payroll of 190m and still not reset the luxury tax.
If their real goal was to stay under 189M, not just to sorta kinda hope they maybe could, then signing Beltran was stupid. They could have spent some of that on Ellis and Balfour, to name just two examples of ways to fill bigger holes, and still saved $$$.
Even when they try to exercise restraint and pass on the cheesecake, they can't help but gobble up the cookie and ice cream. It's pathetic, really.
Even when they try to exercise restraint and pass on the cheesecake, they can't help but gobble up the cookie and ice cream. It's pathetic, really.
I'm sure there's a guy who works for Cashman with an Excel spreadsheet that lays everything out to the penny and knows what moves will and will not put them over $189M.
It also occurs to me that even if ARod's suspension is only 50 games, that saves nearly 10 million.
It also occurs to me that even if ARod's suspension is only 50 games, that saves nearly 10 million.
Could something be happening with Carlos Beltran? Wallace Matthews asked Cashman when the deal with the free agent RF might become official and this was his response.
They could have seen something in his physical that raises red flags similar to what the Red Sox saw with Mike Napoli. Nevertheless, the more days that go by without him at a press conference the more questions will be asked.
http://espn.go.com/blog/new-york/yankees/post/_/id/67999/whats-the-holdup-with-beltran
They could have seen something in his physical that raises red flags similar to what the Red Sox saw with Mike Napoli. Nevertheless, the more days that go by without him at a press conference the more questions will be asked.
Apparently, the Yankees offered Choo 7/140 after they had signed Ellsbury and he turned it down because he wanted "Ellsbury money".
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/10-degrees--shin-soo-choo-remains-the-riddle-of-the-free-agent-market-165809610.html
The Beltran thing I'd think is just NY taking their time clearing a 40 man spot, at least that's my guess. The Choo thing is fascinating/crazy and I guess proves that NY is actually going to go over $189M? Who knows anymore.
Edit: crosspost with nattysez, there also might be an issue in waiving Vernon Wells as they really need to do.
Edit: crosspost with nattysez, there also might be an issue in waiving Vernon Wells as they really need to do.
The 40-man issue makes perfect sense. They are probably trying to actually keep Wells around as he doesn't cost them anything and are trying to trade Ichiro to the highest bidder so to speak. But yes the issue may be choosing which OF to get rid of.jon abbey said:
I don't disagree with this, but a big wild card no one has really mentioned is Sabathia. He averaged 5.7 bWAR from 08-12 and then was worth just 0.3 last year even though he made 32 starts. I know his velocity is down and he seems cooked, but so did Jon Lester.glennhoffmania said:
Maybe he'll end up needing TJ, but he was a perennial Cy candidate until very recently and isn't that old. A scenario where CC, Tanaka, PIneda and the bullpen carry an inconsistent but powerful offense to the playoffs doesn't seem insane to me.
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