Over at Fangraphs, Dave Cameron has a good post about Alex Rodriguez’s time with the Rangers:
The problem is that Rodriguez more than held up his end of the bargain, and if the Rangers front office had behaved with even moderate competency, they could have put some good teams together. The blame for the failure of the 2001 to 2003 Rangers does not lie with Alex Rodiguez’s large paychecks, but instead with the total wastes of cash that they surrounded him with. You want to know why those teams failed? Look no further than Park, Gonzalez, Everett, Oliver, and Rogers. In their attempt to surround Rodriguez with talent, they brought in a never ending series of terrible players who had name value but lacked ability. It didn’t have to be that way. They had enough resources to put good players around Rodriguez – they just failed to identify which players they should actually be giving money to.
Alex Rodriguez’s first contract was far from the worst deal in baseball history. In fact, given his performance in the years after he signed the deal, Rodriguez was actually worth the money he was paid. Unfortunately, the narrative of the deal lives on, despite all the illogical hula hoops you have to jump through in order to reach the conclusion that MacPhail suggested yesterday. Don’t believe the hype; A-Rod was not the cause of the Rangers failures, and the contract they signed him to was actually a wise investment. The problem is that was the only good investment that franchise made in those three years.
While you are there, check out Cameron’s take on the news that the Twins are open to trading Francisco Liriano:
Dealing Liriano to the Yankees is likely the big question that the Twins will have to answer. If they make Liriano available, you can be sure that Brian Cashman will pick up the phone. If the Twins see 2011 as something of a consolidation year, with World Series contention more of a hope than a legitimate reality, then you can justify sending your best pitcher to a league rival if you think you’re getting the better end of the deal long term. But if the Twins think that Justin Morneau is going to be 100 percent this year and they want to make another run at a championship while they have Jim Thome and the M&M boys in their primes, then they shouldn’t be in the business of strengthening teams they will need to beat in October.
I can see the reasoning behind considering dealing Liriano now, but it would likely require the Twins to admit that 2011 is probably not their year, and that’s a tough case to make to the rest of the team right as spring training opens up. If this was a path they wanted to pursue, it probably would have made more sense to be aggressive in dealing Liriano earlier in the winter, when they might have been able to ship him to Milwaukee or Chicago, getting quality prospects in return and getting him out of the American League. Now, faced with the choice of sending him to New York or taking an offer that is likely less impressive in return than what the Yankees would put on the table, the Twins are left with two less than palatable options. At this juncture, I think the Twins are probably best served hanging onto Liriano until the summer. By then, they may have more clarity about their own chances of making a splash in the playoffs, and there might also be an NL contender willing to get in on the bidding.
It's everyone's SOP now to charge a Yankee Tax when dealing with the Yanks; the charge expires at the trading deadline and reoccurs after the World Series. I get it, no one wants to make the Yankees stronger than they already are, but please stop acting like they are incredibly stupid for not jumping at a sucker deal while that same team plays sucker to every over team they deal with. My belief is that a vast majority of owners in the majors can afford to compete with the Yanks financially on the field, but choose not to.
[1] do they also have red sox tax when dealing w/ boston? or any other good team? or is it just the yankees?
[1] The Yanks are a billion dollar organization, not many teams can compete with them financially. However, there is more to the game than financial competition.
[2] Given reputation, it's probably just the Yankees. How much gnashing of teeth and rendering of garments were there for the Red Sox bringing in Gonzalez and Crawford?
[3] there wasn't much backlash against boston for their spending. but is that the same thing as saying that teams are willing to trade freely with them w/o considering how the newly formed boston team will impact their postseason chances? the san diego padres have a lot less reason to worry about making boston better than minny does.
i don't believe the dbacks, for example, were willing to accept some lesser package from the angels than they would have from the yankees for dan haren. and if minny trades liriano, i doubt they'd accept less from boston than they would from the yanks.