http://www.syracuse.com/poliquin/index.ssf/2010/11/as_warned_the_derek_jeter_matt.html
As warned, the Derek Jeter matter in New York is getting "messy" . . . which is, well, beyond stupid
Published: Thursday, November 04, 2010, 8:25 AM Updated: Thursday, November 04, 2010, 8:44 AM
Bud Poliquin / The Post-Standard
Syracuse, N.Y. -- We’re barely into baseball’s free-agent season and already we’ve seen that The Stupid Meter is about to blow inside the blustery world of the New York Yankees.
It’s Yankee brass vs. Jeter sass . . . and the foolishness is, frankly, stunning.
Now, I know and you know -- and if George Steinbrenner could sit up and talk, he’d tell you that he knows -- that Derek Jeter will be a Yankee until he draws his last baseball breath. The Statue of Liberty will be moved to Moose Jaw before Jeter slips into some other team’s togs.
Fact No. 1: Nobody needs/wants Jeter the way the Yankees need/want Jeter.
Fact No. 2: Nobody needs/wants the Yankees the way Jeter needs/wants the Yankees.
So the verbal parrying is so much wasted oxygen. And yet, verbal parrying we have.
Hal Steinbrenner and Brian Cashman, New York’s front-office powers, have decided that now is the time for an organizational embrace of prudent spending, which is like Lady Gaga suddenly stumping for overalls. Meanwhile, Casey Close, Jeter’s agent, has chosen to present his client as more product than player, more asset than athlete, more commodity than classicist.
And in so doing, each of those swells (Jeter excluded) has diminished himself.
First of all, the Yankees -- who paid Alex Rodriguez and A.J. Burnett a combined salary of just under $50 million this past season -- sweat the bottom line the way Andy Reid frets calories (and more evidence of this will be offered during New York's pursuit of Cliff Lee and others). They have a payroll that exceeds $200 million and could expand beyond $300 million at the drop of a hat . . . or of a fly ball by Nick Swisher in right field.
And now, they’re telling people that Derek Jeter is becoming a sticky financial wicket? Absurd.
Meanwhile, Close is hinting that the 36-year-old Jeter, whose batting average dipped precipitously this past season -- or at precisely the same time that his range has eroded and what power he had fades -- remains a delicious middle-infielder catch for other ball clubs.
And that makes Close a long lost relative of the emperor with no clothes.
Posturing. That’s what all of this is. Gamesmanship. And if we’re talking about, oh, Kevin Brown or Gary Sheffield or Jason Giambi or other such Hessians (hello, A.J.) . . . fine. Let the sabers rattle. But the subject here is Derek Jeter, a baseball museum piece who can still go from first to third. Which means that any public negotiating/threatening smears those who traffick in it.
Still, each side has opted to fire a needless shot over the other’s bow.
Cashman, with an eye towards Jeter’s looming 3,000th hit, insists that the Yankees don’t pay for milestones, but that is exactly what they’re contracted to do at numerous stops along A-Rod’s stained way to 700 home runs and beyond. Close, who has referenced the pricelessness of an icon such as Jeter, has indicated that he’s nevertheless prepared to affix a pricetag.
Ridiculous, all of it. And so, so unnecessary.
Look, Jeter is going to remain a Yankee . . . at shortstop . . . and in the “1” or “2” hole in the batting order. And he’s not going to make a whole lot more or a whole lot less than the $20 million or so per year to which he has become accustomed. The only discussion should be -- and ultimately, will be -- about the length of the contract.
But . . . sigh. Things have already gotten a bit “messy” as Hal Steinbrenner, a prophet (among other things), had warned. Which means that sometimes there’s just no accounting for stupid.
As warned, the Derek Jeter matter in New York is getting "messy" . . . which is, well, beyond stupid
Published: Thursday, November 04, 2010, 8:25 AM Updated: Thursday, November 04, 2010, 8:44 AM
Bud Poliquin / The Post-Standard Syracuse, N.Y. -- We’re barely into baseball’s free-agent season and already we’ve seen that The Stupid Meter is about to blow inside the blustery world of the New York Yankees.
It’s Yankee brass vs. Jeter sass . . . and the foolishness is, frankly, stunning.
Now, I know and you know -- and if George Steinbrenner could sit up and talk, he’d tell you that he knows -- that Derek Jeter will be a Yankee until he draws his last baseball breath. The Statue of Liberty will be moved to Moose Jaw before Jeter slips into some other team’s togs.
Fact No. 1: Nobody needs/wants Jeter the way the Yankees need/want Jeter.
Fact No. 2: Nobody needs/wants the Yankees the way Jeter needs/wants the Yankees.
So the verbal parrying is so much wasted oxygen. And yet, verbal parrying we have.
Hal Steinbrenner and Brian Cashman, New York’s front-office powers, have decided that now is the time for an organizational embrace of prudent spending, which is like Lady Gaga suddenly stumping for overalls. Meanwhile, Casey Close, Jeter’s agent, has chosen to present his client as more product than player, more asset than athlete, more commodity than classicist.
And in so doing, each of those swells (Jeter excluded) has diminished himself.
First of all, the Yankees -- who paid Alex Rodriguez and A.J. Burnett a combined salary of just under $50 million this past season -- sweat the bottom line the way Andy Reid frets calories (and more evidence of this will be offered during New York's pursuit of Cliff Lee and others). They have a payroll that exceeds $200 million and could expand beyond $300 million at the drop of a hat . . . or of a fly ball by Nick Swisher in right field.
And now, they’re telling people that Derek Jeter is becoming a sticky financial wicket? Absurd.
Meanwhile, Close is hinting that the 36-year-old Jeter, whose batting average dipped precipitously this past season -- or at precisely the same time that his range has eroded and what power he had fades -- remains a delicious middle-infielder catch for other ball clubs.
And that makes Close a long lost relative of the emperor with no clothes.
Posturing. That’s what all of this is. Gamesmanship. And if we’re talking about, oh, Kevin Brown or Gary Sheffield or Jason Giambi or other such Hessians (hello, A.J.) . . . fine. Let the sabers rattle. But the subject here is Derek Jeter, a baseball museum piece who can still go from first to third. Which means that any public negotiating/threatening smears those who traffick in it.
Still, each side has opted to fire a needless shot over the other’s bow.
Cashman, with an eye towards Jeter’s looming 3,000th hit, insists that the Yankees don’t pay for milestones, but that is exactly what they’re contracted to do at numerous stops along A-Rod’s stained way to 700 home runs and beyond. Close, who has referenced the pricelessness of an icon such as Jeter, has indicated that he’s nevertheless prepared to affix a pricetag.
Ridiculous, all of it. And so, so unnecessary.
Look, Jeter is going to remain a Yankee . . . at shortstop . . . and in the “1” or “2” hole in the batting order. And he’s not going to make a whole lot more or a whole lot less than the $20 million or so per year to which he has become accustomed. The only discussion should be -- and ultimately, will be -- about the length of the contract.
But . . . sigh. Things have already gotten a bit “messy” as Hal Steinbrenner, a prophet (among other things), had warned. Which means that sometimes there’s just no accounting for stupid.
