The Yanks and Sox compete all season long on the field. Come winter, it’s the GMs and the agents and the owners on center stage. The Yanks got Teixeira, the Sox were patient and countered with Gonzalez. Sox get Carl Crawford, Yanks all in for Cliff Lee. Sox want Russell Martin, Yanks want Russell Martin.
Boys, boys. Man, the Yanks-Sox the biggest circle jerk in baseball or what? Do these guys ever sleep?
Because, as Brian Cashman told reporters at the Winter Meetings yesterday, “this is what he always does,” I’ve half-assumed that Andy Pettitte would come back for another year. And if I had to put money down, I’d still guess that he will… but I also sort of conveniently forgot that he was now 38 years old and coming off a groin injury. Anyway, that Cashman line prompted my to look up the excellent Sports Illustrated lunch conversation between Tom Verducci and Musketeers Pettitte, Jeter, Posada and Rivera from just before spring training last season:
SI: How about when the season ends? You talk? Text?
Pettitte: We text.
Posada: We stay in touch. We try to get Andy to come back. ‘Andy, please come back. Please come back.’
SI: You guys took a picture together after the last game at Yankee Stadium in 2008. Do you guys do that every year?
Posada: Yeah, it’s Andy’s idea.
Rivera: Yeah, and it’s great because you don’t know how long we’re going to be together.
Jeter: We’ve done it other years because we did it when Bernie [Williams…] was there, too, right?
Posada: We’ve done it since ’03 because Andy’s been retiring since ’03.
Yesterday Andy Pettitte made a very Andy Pettitte-like call to Brian Cashman, and Chad Jennings at LoHud has the rather heartwarming details:
Andy Pettitte called Brian Cashman today. The message was vague and uncertain, but the purpose was direct and to the point. Pettitte still hasn’t decided whether he’s going to retire, but he had to make sure his indecision wasn’t negatively affecting the Yankees offseason.
“If I had to bet at some point, I think he’ll play,” Cashman said. “But he’s telling me right now he’s leaning the other way. He just doesn’t want to hold us up.”
Cashman said there was nothing Pettitte said that gave him reason for optimism, he simply believes — because “this is what he always does” — that Pettitte will eventually have a change of heart and decide to pitch one more year. For now, though, it’s completely up in the air.
This is a little gesture, but it’s one that a lot of players wouldn’t bother to make, and it’s things like this that give Pettitte his aw-shucks good guy reputation. When he finally does retire he will be hugely missed, and as always I just hope it isn’t this year. Aside from the fact that, especially in light of recent Red Sox developments, the Yanks could really, REALLY use a solid lefty this season, I want Pettitte to come back so that the fans can get a chance to say a proper goodbye. I remember someone pointing out, in Pettitte’s final 2010 playoff appearance, that it could be his last time in a Yankee uniform, but he hadn’t said anything yet, and the moment went almost entirely unacknowledged.
I have never really cried over baseball, but the closest I came was probably the 2001 World Series – those miraculous comebacks and, especially, the crowd chanting Paul O’Neill’s name. Of course the fall of 2001 was highly emotional for other, much more significant reasons, but that moment really got to me — and to O’Neill, who got awkward and embarrassed and teared up himself. It was Yankee fans at their best (the Bombers were losing at the time, after all), and the old Stadium at its most alive. That particular moment won’t ever be recreated, but Andy Pettitte deserves his own sendoff. He started, and won, the very first game I ever attended at Yankee Stadium – in 1995; I was 13 – and I would very much like to be there for his last. When all’s said and done I suppose you have to evaluate Andy Pettitte as a very good pitcher rather than, on the whole, a truly great one, but he had so many great and big and gutty games over the course of his career, and no player features in more of my Yankee memories.
Cliff Lee is the object of the Yankees’ desire and Brian Cashman has not minced words in swooning over the star pitcher. Now that the Red Sox have signed Carl Crawford to a crazy deal the pressure is on for the Yanks to keep pace. I’ve gotten used to Lee as a nemesis and wonder if he’ll end up back with the Rangers or even the Angels though I certainly wouldn’t be surprised if he comes to the Bronx either.
The Yanks sound desperate to get him. The latest has them going to seven years. Is that knuts, a wild pitch, or just the price of doing business?
Speaking of wild pitch, dig this great marathon MC Serch and OC freestyle from the old Stretch Armstrong Show:
And if that’s not your speed, how about this:
Or, for those of you who speak Spanish:
Update: Chad Jennings with some Rule 5 fun.
Update: Over at Newsday, Ken Dawidoff breaks down Derek Jeter’s new contract.
Update: Joel Sherman has the details on several contract offers the Yanks have made to Cliff Lee.
Let’s take a quick break from Waiting for Godot with some good old meat and potatoes rock n roll:
Some fans love to play armchair manager or, especially these days, armchair GM. I like to play armchair shrink, not because I have any training as a social worker or as a doctor but because in an era where athletes are over-exposed and yet distant and sheltered, I find it amusing. It floats my boat, being a yenta. And when you get right down to it, so much of sports coverage these days is about being a yenta. The truth of it is we don’t know anything about these guys. Derek Jeter, Jim Thome, name a “good guy.” I have no idea what they are really like and I don’t know that I’d trust any writer–especially a writer–who claimed to know otherwise.
Some of my baseball pals don’t want to know anything about the players. Just keep it to the playing field. The more they know, the harder it would be to root. But it has always been complicated to separate the artist from his or her work. What do you think of when you watch Charlie Chaplin? Or Woody Allen? Can you watch a Roman Polanski movie and not think about the man behind the camera? What about Elia Kazan? My wife won’t watch any movie with Mel Gibson anymore. Can you watch Alex Rodriguez and still enjoy him? Can you enjoy sports and art without being a moralist? I can, but sometimes it is easier than others.
So I enjoyed the show of emotion from Derek Jeter yesterday and had fun reading into it. Helps keep me warm as the weather gets colder.
Today is the third day of the winter meetings. Still nothing doing on Cliff Lee though the tweets and posts keep a coming.
We’ll keep ya posted…
Update: Yanks getting ready to show Cliff Lee their money-maker?
Growing old in baseball means growing up and that is never easy. Just ask Derek Jeter, the greatest Yankee of our time. In a press conference this afternoon, Jeter said he was angry with the free agency process and how negotiations have been portrayed. He didn’t like hearing the words “greedy,” “ego,” and “arrogance,” associated with his name, the brand he’s worked so hard to cultivate.
Jeter is so much more than a player. He’s a great star, a great New York star. “He’s a bi-racial angel”–the best line in Will Ferrell’s latest movie, featuring a cameo by Jeter. From his rookie season, it was clear that Jeter was mature and poised. He was the kind of kid grown-ups liked, the good son, team player, head down, plays hurt gamer. He learned from Darryl Strawberry and Reggie Jackson and maintained control over his image, with only a few minor bumps, in his brilliant 16 year year career. Jeter doesn’t want to talk bout the end even if it is on everyone else’s mind. But he finally got into a situation that he could not control and it pissed him off.
I don’t blame him for being mad. If I’d worked so hard to do everything right, been so careful, so deliberate, I wouldn’t like the loss of control either. This is a hard lesson that Jeter will unfortunately have to learn, at least partially, in the public eye, whether he likes it or not. Beneath his cool exterior, longtime Yankee followers know that Jeter has a lot of heat in him–remember Ken Huckaby?–but he rarely shows that side to us like he did today. He didn’t lose his temper but he looked vulnerable, like a sheltered kid. I enjoyed it, like I enjoy almost everything about watching Derek Jeter on and off the field. Watch enough post-game interviews and you can see that Jeter has a sharp sense of humor; his eyes are always alert. I hope he’s so pissed that he hits .300 next year.
There was a press conference in Boston yesterday to introduce Adrian Gonzalez as the newest member of the Red Sox.
“I’m very excited that everything was able to be worked out,” Gonzalez said, “and I’m very excited to be here in Boston, and ready to beat the Yanks.”
That was cute, trying to fit in on the first day. It just about sums up the difference between the Yankees and the Sox. You’ll never hear a star player in New York mention the Red Sox in his debut press conference (okay, maybe Johnny Damon did, but that’s different). Gonzalez is a load as a player and I’m sure he’ll cause some real agita next year. But this was cute.
All eyes remain on Cliff Lee. He’s been such a good nemesis for the Yanks the past few years now I’m starting to feel that he’s going to foil them again, leaving us with uncertain thoughts about A.J. Burnett to keep us warm this winter. If the Yanks lose out on Lee and Andy Pettitte retires, we’ll have something to chew on, won’t we?
Update: The Nats are hungry to be Money Boss Players.
Update: Cause for celebration: Jay Jaffe has been elected to the BBWAA.
I went to the winter meetings once, back in 2003. I shared a room with Jay who was the first blogger I ever met (lunch at Christine’s polish diner on 1st Avenue, February, 2003). I am thrilled by this news. Few are more deserving than Jay. Raise a glass with me!
Update: Nah, it’s not the Nats who supposedly have a 7 year offer out there for Lee. But it is someone, according to Jon Heyman.
Being a broadcaster has been a dream of mine going back to childhood. Perhaps I’ve mentioned it here and there in four years’ worth of columns here at the Banter. From hosting a college football audio chat show with Terry Bowden — now, this would be equivalent to a podcast — to doing web-specific video and actual TV fill-in work for Chris Shearn while at YES, to doing guest spots here on Bronx Banter TV and other SNY blog bits, I’ve been fortunate to have had a wide range of on-air experience, even though being on the air wasn’t the sole focus of any job I’ve had. It was a nice diversion.
Back in college, I did play-by-play, color commentary, anchoring and reporting for about a dozen Ithaca College and Cornell sports for Ithaca College television and radio. The best experience, though, was the five months I spent in Los Angeles as public address announcer for UCLA Baseball. I was lucky enough to announce every home at-bat for Chase Utley and Garrett Atkins that season, as well as visiting at-bats from Mark Teixeira (Georgia Tech), Xavier Nady (Cal), Eric Munson (USC), David Parrish (Michigan), and Joe Borchard (Stanford); and pitchers Justin Wayne and Jeremy Guthrie (Stanford), Kirk Saarloos (Cal State Fullerton) and the inimitable Barry Zito (USC). All the while, I had Bob Sheppard on my mind as the singular person to emulate for doing public address for baseball.
SHAMELESS BOOK PLUG ALERT: It’s probably worth noting that my entry in the Lasting Yankee Stadium Memories compilation is about a chance meeting with Sheppard.
On Dec. 2, I was awarded another break on the announcing front. I’ve been doing corporate voiceover work at my current job, which also provides a connection to the New York Islanders, perhaps my favorite team of all the teams for whom I hold an allegiance. I attended games for years as a kid while my uncle had season tickets in Section 310, Row O. I still have the ticket stub and promo giveaway from January 2, 1986, when Denis Potvin was honored for breaking Bobby Orr’s record for points by a defenseman. That night, Mike Bossy scored his 500th goal. I was there the night Bossy’s number 22 was retired. April 24, 2002, Game 4 versus the Maple Leafs, the night of the Shawn Bates game-winning penalty shot goal, was one of the first dates for my wife and I.
I auditioned for the backup public address gig earlier this year and am on standby for any of the 41 home games this season. My debut came this past Thursday against perhaps the team I hate the most as a fan on any level, in any sport: the New York Rangers.
I was nervous. I was excited. I was afraid I would unload a “The Rangers Suck” over an open microphone when the organist played “The Chicken Dance” and Islander fans at the arena invariably launch that chant during the break in the music. Sitting rinkside among the off-ice officials, being credentialed, I had to put my fandom away for an evening, as I had to do for so many years covering the Yankees.
Hockey is much different than baseball, and it has nothing to do with the differences in the playing surfaces. The pace of the game is much faster. The regular-season affair was way faster than the intrasquad scrimmage I worked 2 1/2 months ago for my audition. More than anything, though, the role itself is different. The PA Announcer doesn’t effect a hockey game like he does a baseball game. For example, player changes happen on the fly. It’s not as if the coach needs to wait for the PA Announcer to announce a player into the game in order to make a strategic move. The role is more of an MC, an in-arena host. You’re the voice of the arena, and as part of the Game Event staff, responsible for providing the atmosphere that shapes the fan’s experience at the venue.
With that said, there are similarities to the role between sports: There’s no margin for error with the reading. You can’t operate under the assumption that people can’t hear you or worse, aren’t listening. The timing has to be spot-on. There’s a game event rundown and an outline of what’s happening and when — all stuff within the flow of the game that doesn’t happen on the field or the ice — that requires precise execution. Communication between the Game Operations staff and the PA Announcer, which like a television production takes place via closed-circuit headset/intercom, has to be frequent, clear and concise. If you can’t compartmentalize, you’re doomed.
The stuff within the game, that’s actually the easiest part. There’s no time to think. It’s action-reaction. You have to pay attention at all times. In fact, the part I was least worried about heading into the Islander-Ranger whirlwind was the game itself: announcing goals, penalties, times of each, video replays, timeouts, etc. Having watched hockey since I was 5, I’m comfortable with the French-Canadian, Russian and European names that pervade NHL rosters.
There wasn’t room to create my own style for the first gig. Referring back to my baseball experience, I couldn’t draw on the subdued style of Sheppard. I couldn’t draw on John Condon from Madison Square Garden or John Mason, who has made “Deeeee-troit Baaaas-ket-ball” a household piece to the experience at the Palace of Auburn Hills. I drew mostly from the current PA Announcer, Roger Luce. He’s got a deeper, richer voice than me, but his delivery isn’t that much different from what he does every morning on WBAB here on Long Island. He’s just a solid pro. I wasn’t out to copy anyone, but to just be myself. I wanted to bring enthusiasm to the game, feeding off the energy that only a Rangers-Islanders game can provide.
The one thing that was said to me prior to the game — in a sarcastic tone, but dead serious — was “Don’t screw it up.” Did I make mistakes? Yes. But they weren’t glaring. After 25 years of training, I’m rarely uncomfortable behind a microphone. I validated myself, which above all else, was my goal. After watching a recording of the game, I know exactly where I need to improve if given the opportunity to do it again. I’ve already worked on some templates to standardize a few things to help my in-game performance.
The road probably wasn’t easy for Sheppard, Condon, Mason, or Luce, either. Sheppard was a linguistics teacher. Condon, in addition to his PA duties for the Knicks, was the boxing publicist at the Garden before becoming president of boxing at MSG in 1979. Mason and Luce are radio personalities, with distinctive and familiar voices to their fans. Like Condon, I’m fortunate to work in a place that provides a direct line into the organization. It’s a great diversion that keeps up my broadcasting chops, much like writing this column allows me a forum to maintain my writing chops. I can only thank the gentlemen mentioned in this column for giving me a canvas.
Thursday, Dec. 2 was a tremendous escape. More than anything, it was an opportunity to be a part of my favorite team. And it was a blast.
First night of the Meetings. Nothing big to report for the Yanks yet.
Dandy Don Meredith passed away today and we lost a guy who used to make us laugh. The Jets and Pats play a Monday Night football game tonight that actually means something, a throwback to Meredith’s day. It is a big, over-hyped game and I’m eager to see it though I will feel no pain at the outcome–ah, the pleasures of being a slave to just one team! That said, Let’s Go Jets.
Otherwise, if I hear anything on the baseball front I’ll let you know and vice versa.
Update: Here’s a nice wrap-up of today’s Yankee doings from Chad Jennings.
[detail of painting by Fred Garbers]
I read three very different takes on the Derek Jeter deal on Sunday. For a contract that seemed relatively uncontroversial to me at first glance — the Yankees overpaid for Jeter like you knew they would, but not insanely — it’s inspired a remarkably wide variety of opinions, and illuminated the strikingly different points of view that make up baseball commentary these days.
The first one I read is from Mike Lupica (I know, I know), and is headlined “Shame on Yankees for dropping ball and insulting Derek Jeter during heated contract talks.” Lupica comes down firmly on the side of the Jeter camp:
…[The Yankees] wanted it to look, in the more heated parts of this, as though Jeter was the greedy one. They were twitchy to get out there what they said Jeter wanted, were delighted to get in the papers that Jeter wanted $23 million or $24 million a year, whatever the Yankees said he was asking for. Not just delighted. Thrilled.
They thought it made them look good. But you know who has always made them look good? Jeter has…
…Now they think they protect that brand by giving him this kind of hard time, taking this kind of hard line. I talked to one respected baseball guy in the middle of this, watching this all play out, and asked if Jeter will ever forget the way this all played out, being told in public to go find a better offer if he thought he could.
There was a pause at the other end of the phone and then the guy said, “Never.”
Lupica concludes, “You can’t be a better Yankee than Jeter has been. It is the Yankees who will someday wish they had done things better on this.”
Then we have Mike Vaccaro of the Post weighing in with “Deal saves Derek from becoming Captain Crook.”
Derek Jeter may not realize this right now, and he probably would never admit it even if he drank a Big Gulp of truth serum, but the Yankees did him a favor by playing this modest version of hardball, by refusing to empty the vault for him and foisting a pay cut on him.
By agreeing to a three-year deal worth $17 million annually plus an option for a fourth year and incentives, the Yankees came up a little and Jeter came down a lot, and if the compromise landed closer to the Yankees’ target number than to Jeter’s, it will still benefit the Captain in ways he can’t possibly appreciate yet.
Because throughout a career that already has netted him over $200 million in salary, Jeter never once had been hounded by his wealth. How many athletes can say that? Any player, any sport, who breaks the bank, the bank always is there alongside him, shadowing every move he makes. Ask Amar’e Stoudemire. Ask Johan Santana. Ask CC Sabathia. Ask the patron saint of all of them, Alex Rodriguez.
Jeter? Until the past few weeks, the money he has earned has been almost incidental, which is just another charmed way that he has smartly led his professional life.
Finally, over at SI.com, Joe Sheehan brings us “New York Yankees paying for what Jeter has already done” (You should click over and read the whole thing):
There’s no way around it: this is a contract that pays Jeter for what he has done, rather than what he is expected to do. It is sui generis, disconnected completely from market forces. Miguel Tejada, who was a bit worse than Jeter this year at the same age, was guaranteed about 15 percent of what Jeter got. Orlando Cabrera, a year younger and about as effective as Tejada last year, might not get that. Heck, it’s not that much less than what Troy Tulowitzki, one of the best players in baseball, is guaranteed at the peak of his six-year extension. The Yankees, not wanting to deal with the backlash, not able to replace Jeter with a star, not willing — for all their bluster — to treat him like a 36-year-old shortstop coming off a career-worst year, aren’t paying Jeter; they’re paying off Jeter.
The most likely scenario is that Jeter continues to decline, if not in a straight line, in a noticeable pattern over the life of the deal. His contract may be without compare, but as a player he’s one of many aging superstars, and the ones he most resembles statistically — such as Robin Yount, Alan Trammell and Craig Biggio — were not good everyday players after 36. There are precious few examples, in baseball history, of players even able to play shortstop regularly in their late 30s, and the ones who did successfully were excellent defensive players in their prime, a label that even his most ardent defenders wouldn’t hang on Jeter.
This is a huge problem for the Yankees, who have no place else to play Jeter due to the makeup of their roster and payroll. Worse still, any further offensive decline will make moving him a moot point, as his bat won’t play anywhere but shortstop. The money is spent, and the challenge for the Yankees over the next three seasons is to do what they couldn’t do in this negotiation: evaluate their shortstop based on his contributions to what is supposed to be the sole goal of the organization: winning a championship.
So here we have the Yankees screwing Jeter; the Yankees doing him a favor by cutting his pay; and the Yankees screwing themselves by giving him far too much. And I think that both Mike Vaccaro and Joe Sheehan make good points here. As for Lupica, I have a hard time believing that he really thinks the Yankees insulted Jeter (though if it’s true that all the leaks about what Jeter was asking for came from the Yankee front office, well, that is pretty interesting). The Jeter negotiations were not “heated”; “heated” is what will happen if Joe Sheehan and Mike Lupica are ever locked in a room together. Would it have been better if negotiations had been kept out of the media a bit more? Sure. But urging Jeter to test the market is hardly unfair or cruel.
I think that, as usual, Joe Sheehan is right from a pure baseball perspective — this contract, no matter how much less it may be than what Jeter wanted, is still vastly more than any other shortstop that age would ever get, and enough that if Jeter declines as the vast majority of late-thirties shortstops do, it will put the Yanks in a very tough spot. With that said, I don’t think it’s necessarily wrong to pay someone, in part, for their past achievements. Of course they couldn’t just give him, as many fans (and apparently Mike Lupica) suggested, “whatever he wants,” but I want to see Jeter get his 3,000th hit as a Yankee; I want to see him play his last game as a Yankee. If the tradeoff is that the Yankees can’t afford to spend quite so much on other free agents over the next three years, and if that hurts their postseason chances somewhat, then I can live with that, even while I realize that Joe has probably called this one correctly, and there are headaches ahead.
I also agree with what Vaccaro had to say. I was surprised by the reports of what Jeter was said to be asking for, if only because he has generally played such a smooth PR game, and suddenly he seemed tone deaf. More than $100 million? Five or six years? That would have been a terribly unwise move for the Yankees (as opposed to the merely somewhat unwise move they eventually made), and it would have made Jeter look pretty awful. I make it a point to never get angry at players for trying to pry as much money as they can out of team owners, who are, without exception, exceedingly wealthy multimillionaires. But Jeter was asking for a truly irrational deal, and it would have changed the way fans looked at him — some nice memories on his way to retirement would not nearly justify that kind of money. Now, the way things worked out, he doesn’t have a massive contract he can’t possibly live up to shadowing his every remaining move.
Or… well, he kind of does. But it could be a lot worse.
Thoughts?
Happy Chanukah for those of you who get down like that.
Windows warshed yesterday morning at my neighborhood spot.
As the winter meetings begin, the Yanks have their sites set squarely on Cliff Lee. According to George King in the Post:
“My priority list is pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching, pitching — I’ve been focusing on pitching,” GM Brian Cashman said yesterday.
…”When you’re a free agent, we kind of have to dance to their dance card,” Cashman said. “I’ve kind of been reacting to them.
“I flew into Arkansas especially to meet with Cliff Lee and his wife and his agent. I did that very early in the process. I was the first one out of the gates there.
“So, everybody knows I got ahead of everybody else. But it’s their dance card. They’re setting the pace of this thing. I can only wait and respect the process they put themselves in. It took them a long time, they fought through a lot of different cities to get to this point. I’m hoping this will be the last city he ends up in, in New York.”
It will cost the Yanks plenty in dollars and years to secure Lee.
UPDATE: Hall of Fame disgrace continues as Marvin Miller comes up one vote shy. No shock there.
UPDATE: Really nice breakdown of the Adrian Gonzalez deal by Jay Jaffe.
The Winter Meetings opens on a busy not as the Red Sox will get Adrain Gonzalez after all.
Jayson Werth, to the Nats, for many dollars.
Hey, Now. And they’re just getting warmed up.
Cliff Lee, of course, with back-up plans aplenty.
The Winter Meeting start tomorrow, but I’m sure we’ll start getting word from Disney World by tonight.
The wife, out on the town, is ready for the holidays.
It is done. George King with the scoop.
As the Yanks and Derek Jeter inch closer to a deal–one that could be finalized before the end of the day–it appears that the Red Sox have a trade in place for Adrian Gonzalez. The San Diego front office is filthy with former Red Sox employees who are more than familiar with Boston’s farm system. Word is the Pads will receive prospects in return for Gonzalez, who the Sox have coveted for several years.
The Hot Stove is heating up just in time for the Winter Meetings. Gossip Mongers and Baseball Nerds Rejoice!
[Picture by Bags]
From Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York blog, a Bronx Banter favorite, dig this post on the New York Accent.
