Off Season is approaching

If your a big baseball fan you have to love the Hot Stove season. Which is approaching fast and hopefully will be following a 28th World Series Championship. Many names have already been linked to the Yanks including Cliff Lee and Carl Crawford. But where would they fit in?

According to Cots Contracts the Yankees will have cut about 65m off there payroll entering the off season. This is after a few players annual salaries such as Swisher, Granderson, Cano all raise.

While a few players such as Berkman, Kearns, Johnson and Vazquez wont be back with the club next year. You have to assume Pettitte, Jeter, Rivera all will be. Re-signings of Wood and Thames are also Possible.

After Another great year has been added to the resumes of Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera you have to figure that they will get very similar salaries as there previous deals which were 11.75 and 15m Respectfully. SO lets go ahead and say they resign for 12 mil each. Suddenly we are down to 41m.

Then there is the case of Derek Jeter. Having his worst season in the Majors right before a contract year. This season he made 21m in the final year of his 10 year $189 million contract. Since he is Derek Jeter Yankees will most likely respect him and offer him way more than market value which is believed to be about 4m a year. I say a 3 year deal worth about 15 million annually is going to be what gets it done. So our free money drops again to 26m.

Two less prominent names approaching free agency are Marcus Thames and Kerry Wood. Thames is having a very good year off the bench and I assume that he will get a new contract worth 1-2 Mil. Then there is Mr. Wood who has been great since coming over here. Apparently he didn't get the memo that veteran relievers cant play for the Yankees after failed tries with Park, Hawkins, Farnsworth and on and on. I don't Expect the Yankees to pick up his 11 Mil. Option but I think he will be resigned in the 5-6 Mil range. Rounding up like I always do we will say 8 mil for them 2. leaving us with 18m.

Then you have Arbitration eligible players Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes, Dustin Mosely, Boone Logan, Sergio Mitre, Chad Gaudin. I expect that Gaudin, Mitre and Mosely will be non tendered. Freeing up about another 2m. Hughes will probably nad between 3-4m while Joba and Logan also get raises. We will say about 5 mil added payroll through Arbitration. Leaving us with 13m.

Cliff Lee will probably demand around 18m and Crawford about 15-16m. Of the 2 the only one we really need is Lee. To get this done our payroll would have to increase at least 5m next year.

This would give us a team of...
C Cervelli
1B Teixeira
2B Cano
3B Rodriguez
SS Jeter
LF Gardner
CF Granderson
RF Swisher
DH Posada

BCH Pena
BCH Thames
BCH Golsen
BCH Miranda

SP Sabathia
SP Lee
SP Pettitte
SP Hughes
SP Burnett

RP Rivera
RP Chamberlain
RP Wood
RP Robertson
RP Logan
RP Marte
RP Nova

I would like to see a stronger bench this is what I think would be best to happen though very unlikely.
First trade away Marte. Logan really stepped up and Marte is not needed.
Second Trade away Burnett. He is to inconsistent but could thrive in the NL. That could free up about 20m.
Sign John Buck to a 1 year deal worth about 5m.
Sign Jerry Hairston to a 1 year deal worth about 3m.
Sign Joaquin Benoit to a 1 year deal worth about 5m with option. Proven RP in AL East.

This would leave our payroll about the same as last years. Allowing us to make any deadline deals if necessary. The team would look like this.

C Buck
1B Teixeira
2B Cano
3B Rodriguez
SS Jeter
LF Gardner
CF Granderson
RF Swisher
DH Posada

BCH Cervelli
BCH Thames
BCH Hairston
BCH Miranda

SP Sabathia
SP Lee
SP Pettitte
SP Hughes
SP Nova

RP Rivera
RP Chamberlain
RP Wood
RP Robertson
RP Logan
RP Benoit
RP Aceves

The Wheels are turning!