The Great Debacle That is Alex Rodriguez

I'll start my article with a thank you.  Thank you, Alex Rodriguez, for your invaluable contribution the 2009 World Series championship.  Without you, there would only be 26 Series banners flying over Yankee Stadium right now.  Your place in New York's history books is written in stone.  Now that we've established that, this is the point where the congeniality ceases and the straight talk begins.  Alex Rodriguez and his steroid abusing ways is a curse on the House that Ruth built.  His homers, MVPs, and other meaningless records are a petty stain on the afore mentioned history books.

 

On Monday, Tim Elfrink of the Miami New Times reported that Alex Rodriguez is allegedly one of several Major League players to purchase performance enhancing drugs such as human growth hormone, testosterone, and anabolic steroids from Miami-based physician Anthony Bosch. Elfrink cites a spreadsheet obtained from former employees of the clinic for which Bosch worked that recorded sales transactions of performance enhancing drugs (PEDs). In addition to Rodriguez, the spreadsheet mentions Washington Nationals pitcher Gio Gonzalez, Toronto Blue Jays outfielder Melky Cabrera, Texas Rangers outfielder Nelson Cruz, and others. Through his public relation agent, Rodriguez denied the allegation, stating he had never been treated by Bosch and that the documents are not legitimate.

Man, this feels like deja vu, doesn’t it? In December 2007 Rodriguez, denied allegations by former slugger Jose Canseco that he had used PEDs. He told Katie Couric on 60 minutes that he had never used steroids, yet 14 months later when confronted with a report from Sports Illustrated of failed drug tests he offered a mea culpa. He stated he used PEDs for 3 years from 2001-2003 due to pressure he felt from signing his historic 10 year, $252 million contract with the Texas Rangers. Two months later he held a dog-and-pony-show new conference at spring training where he blamed “only himself” in that way that people do when they realize they have no other options. Considering his past denials, A-Rod will need some pretty compelling evidence this time around to prove to baseball fans that he did not juice. There is no goodwill left in the well. Yankees fans have been criticized in the past for being too harsh on their teams’ players and A-Rod is the person cited the most in those criticisms. Is it right to boo someone just because they’re in a 2-for-28 slump? No. But when that person is earning receiving $26 million…$26 million that he conned out of the team by using PEDs despite bold-faced denials to the contrary…that’s a different story.

A-Rod has five more seasons left on this monstrosity of a contract. Unfortunately for us, neither it nor A-Rod will go away any time soon. Sure, we won’t see much of him for at least the first half of his season while he recovers from hip surgery, but anyone hoping this will usher the mighty Rodriguez out the door is mistaken. And the presence of that contract is going to force Yankee brass to make some tough decisions this winter when and for the next three winters to follow. If they are serious about reducing payroll below $189 million for 2014, sacrifices will have to be made. Granderson? Almost certainly gone. There’s no conceivable way the Yankees can afford to give him the raise he can demand as a free agent this winter. And, more tragically, I think the same can be said for Robinson Cano. He who is represented by Scott Boras and feels like he’s been playing for New York at a discount these past few years will not be offering the Yankees a discount. He could have been the next Yankee great, and yet next year I think he’ll be playing for someone else. You have A-Rod’s contract to thank for that. The $26 million owed to Rodriguez in 2014 could have gone to Cano, and therein lies the real tragedy.  The cost of Rodriguez's contract is not measured by dollars and cents; it's measured by history pages that may never be written and some that we may end up regretting.

A look at the 2013 Draft

With Rafael Soriano agreeing to a deal with the Washington Nationals, the New York Yankees are in a rare position of having three draft picks, (assuming they don't sign Michael Bourn or Kyle Lohse), in the first round of this year's MLB Draft.  Yahoo!'s Howard Unger pointed out that this will be the first time in 35 years that New York has that many first round picks.  Because of the changes in draft rules implemented last year, New York's bonus budget will give them a unique amount of strength that they may never get again.  Before I talk about their potential drafting strategies, let's look at the draft in general.

It's been said that 2013 is a down year for the draft compared to last year.  Conor Glassey at Baseball America stated in a November 13th chat that this year's top two high school players, Austin Meadows and Clint Frazier, would rank behind 6 other players drafted last year: Byron Buxton, Carlos Correa, Albert Almora, Max Fried, Lucas Giolito, and David Dahl.  This gives some context to the level of talent we're looking at for this year's draft.  Frazier and Meadows are two of five people that are generating early buzz as potential number one overall picks, along with Ryne Stanek, Sean Manaea, and Mark Appel.  Naturally, this coming season will help someone separate from the pack or possibly allow someone else to enter the conversation, (Austin Wilson, perhaps?).  The Houston Astros will be picking first again this year.  I have to say I loved what they did last year; they found someone, (Carlos Correa), who agreed to take a portion of the full allotment which allowed Houston to use the remaining portion to draft other players with big bonus demands, (Lance McCullers and Rio Ruiz).  I fully expect them to do the same this year.  Is it possible that Frazier or Meadows would be willing to take less than the full allotment in order to be the first overall pick?  If they're projected to be the fifth or sixth pick, for instance, they could sign with Houston for more than what they were projected to get with the 6th pick and Houston still gets to save money for later in the draft.  That's what I call a win-win.

Because New York has three first rounders, (even if they're all near the bottom of the round), they will have quite a large bonus pool to work with.  They could go in one of two directions: try to get three players whose bonus demands are reflective of the picks used to take them, OR splurge on one player with high bonus demands and use the other two picks to sign cheaper players with little leverage to negotiate.  The good thing for New York is they can let the draft come to them, so to speak, and see what falls to them at 27.  For example, if Kohl Stewart, who will surely have high bonus demands because of his football scholarship to Texas A&M, misses the top 10 where he's projected and slides to the bottom of the first because other teams can't afford him, New York could grab him and meet those demands.

Looking at New York's farm system, I would argue that they should avoid two general positions in the first round: college outfielder and college catcher.  The presence of Slade Heathcott, Tyler Austin, and Mason Williams makes the mid-level farm system outfield especially crowded.  Same goes for Gary Sanchez and the mid-level catching position.  There's really only one player in the draft that I think could be an exception and that is Austin Wilson.  The power-hitting Wilson has an overall game that is deserving of a top 10 pick.  If he somehow gets to New York at 27, (again, due to possibly high bonus demands), it would be hard to turn him down.  I really don't see that happening, but you never know.  There are really no college catchers being projected in the first round that I have seen, so Sanchez won't have to worry about the competition just yet...

This is probably the first time in a few years that this can be said: New York's minor league pitching depth is woefully thin.  Their top three pitching prospects are Manny Banuelos, Jose Campos, and Ty Hensley.  Banuelos won't see competitive action until mid-2014 due to Tommy John surgery and Campos has been afflicted by an elbow injury that has kept him out of action since May.  It's hard to sign if and when he'll return to the diamond.  And Hensley has just 12 innings of professional ball to his credit, all of which was in rookie ball.  So, needless to say, he's a few years away from contributing in the Bronx.  With this in mind, I'd like to see New York go for a college pitcher.  As of right now, the aforementioned Stanek Manaea, and Appel will all surely be off the board, as will Florida's Jonathan Crawford and Ole Miss's Bobby Wahl.  Some more realistic options would be Karsten Whitson from Florida, Trevor Williams from Arizona State, Ryan Eades from LSU, Marco Gonzales from Gonzaga, and AJ Vanegas from Stanford.  I'm particularly interested in Whitson, who was a top 10 pick by San Diego in 2010.  His career at Florida so far has been a bit of a disappointment considering how highly he was drafted but he has still flashed the talent that the Padres saw in him three years ago.  They could also go with a high school catcher or high school pitcher as there seems to be a lot of depth at those two positions.

Whether they go for one big fish or three smaller ones, New York will be setting the foundation for their future in this draft.  Let's just hope it's rock solid.

Ok, You're Starting to Scare Me

Anyone who has read this blog knows that I am a big budget hawk.  The Yankees have the most resources in Major League Baseball, no matter what the Dodgers would have you believe.  But that doesn't mean the should spend foolishly (see: Kei Igawa) or bid against themselves (see: Alex Rodriguez).  I wrote last month about how I believe this is the right course of action for New York.  Even if it means a couple of down years are in order, it will benefit the Yankees to reign in the spending...spend smart, not hard.

Ok, so that being said, the team has really worried me over the past few weeks.  Russell Martin left the Bronx for Pittsburgh on a cheap two year deal.  Rumored Yankee bargain-bin targets Jeff Keppinger and Nate Schierholtz were ripe for the picking but instead signed with the White Sox and Cubs respectively for $ that the Steinbrenners probably have in their couch cushion.  So right now we have no C, no 3B, and no RF and instead of signing these three, Brian Cashman sits and weights.  Does he have big trades in mind for these three positions?  Maybe.  Or he could actually be doing what I recommended and is being very conservative.  It may just be a little more conservative than what I had in mind.

How does that saying go: "Be careful what you ask for..." ?

Heathcott ranked 6th in BA's Top 20 AFL Prospects

Everyone's favorite Texarkana product Slade Heathcott continues to feel the love from Baseball America with his ranking as the 6th best prospect in this year's AFL Top 20, (subscription required).  Slade's in pretty lofty company as the five guys ahead of him (Javier Baez, Jonathan Singleton, Christian Yelich, Kyle Gibson, and George Springer) are all Top 100 candidates.  Heathcott was ranked directly ahead of Mike Zunino and Nick Castellanos.  Lofty company indeed...

As much as BA loves Heathcott, they seem to have equal parts disinterest in Mark Montgomery.  Mark pitched well in the AFL (when does he not pitch well?) despite the league's notoriously hitter friendly conditions.  Hopefully Mark has no interest in making lists like this and will take comfort in knowing he is soon bound for a promising career in the majors.

Congratulations to Slade for his inclusion on yet another top prospect list!

Excellent Read: The Missing Yankees of 2007 - 2009

Sometimes when writting a blog, you have great ideas that you proudly tweet out several, several times, (see: my article on the AL MVP race).  Others, you read someone else's work and think "Damn I wish I had thought of that!"  Such is the case of Steve Goldman's article on the Pinstriped Bible called "The Missing Yankees of 2007 - 2009".  It's an astute observation of the Yankees' woeful drafting from 2007 to 2009 and how it impacts the team today.  Player development, and in particular the draft, are special interests of mine.  If you've read much of my blog, you'll know that I spend an unhealthy amount of time disecting it.  In his article, Steve correctly surmises that had the Yankees been more successful in the draft over these three years, they would be in position to promote players from withing which would make their goal of decreasing their payroll much easier to attain.

I encourage all (three) of my readers to check it out.

Projecting the 2013 Yankee Budget

The New York Yankees are coming to a major crossroads next year.  They have repeatedly expressed their intentions to reduce their 2014 payroll to $189 million in order to avoid major luxury tax ramifications.  Their actions during this offseason could be very telling which path they will take..  The Yankees have approximately $157 million committed to it's 2013 player payroll.  That includes $141 million to players I think will make the 25-man roster, $7 million for the players that will round out the 40-man roster, and $9 million to players that will not be on the roster at all yet the Yankees still have some obligation to pay: AJ Burnett and Pedro Feliciano.

So, there are $157 million committed for 2013, which would have been the third highest payroll in 2012.  The problem is it only represents 31 players, meaning New York has *NINE* positions to fill: 2 starting pitchers, 2 catchers, 1 starting right fielder, 2 reserve outfielders, a reliever and a utility infielder.  There are five free agents from last year's team that I can see New York re-signing: Rivera, Kuroda, Pettitte, Ichiro, and Russell Martin.  If you re-sign them for the same amount of money that you paid them last year (let's give Ichiro $8 million), then that's another $46 million added to the payroll with four bench positions to fill.  Let's give each of those guys $1 million and suddenly you're looking at a payroll of $207 million.  That's a steep budget for a team wanting to shed payroll and it illustrates the team only has two options: stay the course with your huge player budget or start making some big sacrifices.  Here are some options:

• Instead of re-signing the five Yankee free agents listed above, find less valuable players similar to Boston's new catcher David Ross (who signed this week for 2 yrs and $6 million).  Maybe you still want to bring back Mo and Pettitte, which is understandable.  That leaves $22.5 million and if you cut that in half you still have $11.25 million to play with but you're going to be digging through the bargain bin for your starting right-fielder and starting catcher.
• Trade some expensive pieces like Rodriguez or Granderson.  I addressed the idea of trading A-Rod a couple weeks ago and denounced the idea out-right.  Even as an advocate for budget reduction, I think there's no way New York benefits from a trade like that in any way.  Granderson is a little different.  His contract is much more tradeable, despite his poor post-season performance.  New York could probably even get a decent prospect in the trade.  If Cashman could make a shrewd move and pick up a nice package for the Grandy-man, I'd be all for it.  The Yankees could move Brett Gardner over to CF and look for an option cheaper to Granderson and save $10 million or more.
• Package their top prospects for a major league ready piece ala Michael Pineda.  Take a player like Trevor Bauer, for instance.  There has been speculation that the young pitcher is available and could possibly had for two or three of New York's top prospects.  That would be adding a cost-effective stud pitcher to the starting rotation for the price of a couple players who are likely two or three years away from the Bronx.

If I'm going to make a bold prediction for this offseason, it's going to be a trade of a player like Granderson.  I don't think the Yanks will be big players in the free agent market.  I *hope* I'm right about that.  Would a Josh Hamilton make the 2013 Yankees better?  Absolutely.  But ownership has understandably made it clear that they've reached their limit and they refuse to flush their money down the luxury tax drain.  I applaud their position and think if New York could use their resources more efficiently, they could add many more championship flags to the top of Yankee Stadium.

Baseball America Names Mason Williams Yankees' #1 Prospect

Baseball America has yet to release its Top 10 Yankees prospects list publicly, but Josh Norris of the Trentonian tweeted it out Friday.  The list looks like like this (my rankings are in parentheses):

1. Mason Williams (3)
2. Slade Heathcott (5)
3. Gary Sanchez (2)
4. Tyler Austin (1)
5. Jose Campos (13)
6. Brett Marshall (16)
7. Angelo Gumbs (18)
8. Manny Banuelos (6)
9. Ty Hensley (4)
10. Rafael de Paula (24)

There are a few notable surprises here for me.  I'll start with the top four: I understand that, in the eyes of most analysts, Williams, Sanchez, and Austin are all pretty close in terms of talent.  But Austin has unquestionably outperformed the other two thus far in his minor league career.  And this is the first time I've seen anyone include Heathcott in that group, much less put him above Sanchez and Austin.  I like Heathcott and believe he can justify his ranking here, but objective analysis says he's been outperformed by Sanchez and Austin so far.  It's probably not likely, but a Yankee outfield of Heathcott, Austin, and Williams in a few years is kind of a dream of mine.

The rest of the group is a little more surprising than the first four.  By virtue of his #5 ranking, Jose Campos is getting an incredible amount of credit for the 5 starts he made last year in Charleston, (4.01 ERA, 9.49 K/9, 1.14 WHIP).  The strikeout rate was impressive and the WHIP is above average but the ERA is obviously high.  BA is giving virtually no credence to the elbow injury that ended his season in May and he hasn't be heard from since.  Rafael de Paula's inclusion over Mark Montgomery seems like a bit of a stretch.  Montgomery is a dominant stud out of the pen and he has done it in AA while de Paula feasted on inferior talent in the Dominican Summer League.  Don't get me wrong...I HOPE de Paula is as good as his ranking suggests.  I just hesitate to give a lot of credit to his DSL stats.  If Yankee management puts him in at least high A to start 2013, this ranking could be validated.  And, I like Nik Turley over Brett Marshall.  Just my opinion there, although I feel their career performances back me up there.  Turley strikes a lot more batters out, (8.41 career K/9 compared to 7.03), gives up fewer runs, (3.06 ERA compared to 3.76), and allows fewer base runners (1.25 WHIP compared to 1.31).

Speaking of 2013, I'll update my rankings prior to the season once I see player assignments.  And there's always a good chance they'll be adding or subtracting players through trades.