Yankees Daily

Every time I sit in the car with my father, he always has WFAN on and all I hear are Met fans complaining about how their team isn’t doing anything. Well it looks like they did something today by signing Jason Bay.  It’s good to see the cross town rivals do something.

I would of liked to see the Mets get John Lackey but they signed Kelvim Escobar who has shoulder problems. He should actually pitch pretty well because he’ll be in the National League and he was pretty effective for the Angels.

Is it good that Bay won’t be in the same division as the Yankees? He owned the Yankees with a .392 batting average. The Yankees will play the Mets six times in the first half of the season and the Red Sox eight times. The Yankees will see the Red Sox 10 times after the all star break and will not see the Mets.

If you take a look at Dave Cameron’s post at fangraphs.com, he thinks the Yankees will be very good in 2010.  I agree that they will be very good but I don’t think they’ll be as good. They had all the breaks go their way. Johnny Damon hit big in the post season and Hideki Matsui was a god in the playoffs. The Yankees will probably have a great regular season record again but I’m not sure they’ll be as succesful as the 2009 post season. Nick Johnson is not Hideki Matsui and their current left fielders are not Johnny Damon.

The Yankees probably wouldn’t of been as good in 2009 “with” Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsui on the roster for 2010 because of age and injuries. You can say it’s a wash if you look at what they gained and what they lost but what they really lost was veterans who won’t perform at the level they performed at. 

I feel that Brian Cashman did a great job with the current roster. Do I trust Javier Vazquez in the playoffs if he has to start. No. I trust him in the regular season but when the playoffs come, I don’t just because of his past history in the A.L.

We do know however that the Yankees won’t lose focus because of veterans like Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera on the team.

Remaining Free Agents List as of December 29th, 2009

AMERICAN LEAGUE

BALTIMORE (4) — Danys Baez, rhp; Mark Hendrickson, lhp; Chad Moeller; c; Melvin Mora, 3b.

BOSTON (4) — Rocco Baldelli, of; Jason Bay, of; Paul Byrd, rhp; Chris Woodward, 3b.

CHICAGO (4) — Ramon Castro, c; Octavio Dotel, rhp; Jermaine Dye, of; Scott Podsednik of.

CLEVELAND (1) — Tomo Ohka, rhp.

DETROIT (2) — Aubrey Huff, 1b; Jarrod Washburn, lhp.

KANSAS CITY (3) — Bruce Chen, lhp; Miguel Olivo, c; Jamey Wright, rhp.

LOS ANGELES (3) — Kelvim Escobar, rhp; Vladimir Guerrero, dh; Robb Quinlan, of.

MINNESOTA (4) — Orlando Cabrera, ss; Joe Crede, 3b; Ron Mahay, lhp; Mike Redmond, c.

NEW YORK (5) — Johnny Damon, of; Jerry Hairston Jr., inf-of; Eric Hinske, of; Jose Molina, c; Xavier Nady, of.

OAKLAND (4) — Justin Duchscherer, rhp; Nomar Garciaparra, dh; Adam Kennedy, 3b; Brett Tomko, rhp.

SEATTLE (6) — Miguel Batista, rhp; Erik Bedard, lhp; Adrian Beltre, 3b; Russell Branyan, 1b; Endy Chavez, of; Mike Sweeney, dh.

TAMPA BAY (5) — Chad Bradford, rhp; Jason Isringhausen, rhp; Troy Percival, rhp; Brian Shouse, lhp; Russ Springer, rhp.

TEXAS (3) — Joaquin Benoit, rhp; Hank Blalock, 1b; Marlon Byrd, of.

TORONTO (2) — Rod Barajas, c; Kevin Millar, 1b.

NATIONAL LEAGUE

ARIZONA (3) — Doug Davis, lhp; Scott Schoeneweis, lhp; Chad Tracy, 1b.

ATLANTA (3) — Garret Anderson, of; Adam LaRoche, 1b; Greg Norton, 1b.

CHICAGO (3) — Chad Fox, rhp; Kevin Gregg, rhp; Reed Johnson, of.

CINCINNATI (1) — Kip Wells, rhp.

COLORADO (8) — Joe Beimel, lhp; Jose Contreras, rhp; Alan Embree, lhp; Josh Fogg, rhp; Jason Giambi, 1b; Matt Herges, rhp; Juan Rincon, rhp; Yorvit Torrealba, c.

FLORIDA (2) — Kiko Calero, rhp; Brendan Donnelly, rhp.

HOUSTON (6) — Aaron Boone, 1b; Doug Brocail, rhp; Darin Erstad, of; Mike Hampton, lhp; Miguel Tejada, ss; Jose Valverde, rhp.

LOS ANGELES (12) — Brad Ausmus, c; Ronnie Belliard, 2b; Jon Garland, rhp; Orlando Hudson, 2b; Mark Loretta, 3b; Guillermo Mota, rhp; Eric Milton, lhp; Will Ohman, lhp; Vicente Padilla, rhp; Jason Schmidt, rhp; Jim Thome, 1b; Jeff Weaver, rhp.

MILWAUKEE (5) — Frank Catalanotto, of; Braden Looper, rhp; Felipe Lopez, 2b; Corey Patterson, of; David Weathers, rhp.

NEW YORK (4) — Carlos Delgado, 1b; Ramon Martinez, ss; Gary Sheffield, of; Fernando Tatis, 1b.

PHILADELPHIA (7) — Paul Bako, c; Miguel Cairo, 2b; Scott Eyre, lhp; Pedro Martinez, rhp; Brett Myers, rhp; Chan Ho Park, rhp; Matt Stairs, of.

ST. LOUIS (8) — Rick Ankiel, of; Mark De Rosa, 3b; Troy Glaus, 3b; Khalil Greene, ss; Matt Holliday, of; Joel Pineiro, rhp; John Smoltz, rhp; Todd Wellemeyer, rhp.

SAN DIEGO (1) — Brian Giles, of.

SAN FRANCISCO (6) — Rich Aurilia, 1b; Bobby Howry, rhp; Randy Johnson, lhp; Bengie Molina, c; Juan Uribe, 2b; Randy Winn, of.

WASHINGTON (5) — Josh Bard, c; Livan Hernandez, rhp; Austin Kearns, of; Ron Villone, lhp; Dmitri Young, 1b.

Well, the inevitable happened. Mark DeRosa signed with the Giants. Not that us Yankee fans are heart broken and we were dying to have him on our team.

It looks as though Mark DeRosa is not coming to the Yankees after all. According to Buster Olney’s twitter account, he’s close to a deal signing with the Giants.

Also, the Yankees aren’t interested in Jermaine Dye according to Jon Heyman’s twitter account.

It seems the Yankees aren’t looking to spend money on a left-fielder. If they don’t spend money on a left-fielder, no one good is going to come.

The Yankees are said to be disappointed if DeRosa doesn’t sign with them. If they’re that disappointed, they’ll do the Tom Cruise movie and show him the money.

Where is Damon going? He still hasn’t signed with anyone. Hmmm. Matt Holiday is still on the market. He still hasn’t signed with anyone.

I might be grasping for straws here but I’m not home so I’m kind of handcuffed in what I can do.

MLB trade Rumors says the New York Yankees made one of the best signings in the free agent period because Nick Johnson is an on base machine and his contract was under six million dollars and it was for only one year.

• Best And Worst Signings So Far - Tim Dierkes – Mlb Trade Rumors

According to the NY Post’s Joel Sherman two days ago, the New York Yankees were talking regularly to the representatives for Reed Johnson of the Chicago Cubs. He’ll be 32 at the start of the year.

Reed Johnson Scouting report..

Assets:
Hits well with runners in scoring position and makes a lot of contact. Another big asset is that he hustles. Has great career numbers against left-handed pitchers batting .313 with a .378 on-base percentage and a .463 slugging percentage. In 2009 it was better. He batted .324/.403/.500. He can play all three outfield positions.

Negatives:
Does not hit right-handed pitching well and struggles against finesse pitchers. Does not have a good strikeout/walk ratio.

Outlook:
Johnson hits better when batting 7th in the order at a .385 clip. If the Yankees do sign him, he’ll be a good 4rth outfielder for them.

Now it’s time to look towards the new year.

Personally for me, I’m going to do the same thing I’ve been trying to do these past two months which is take it easy and relax. I have no New Years Resolution. It’s funny because by the time the new year comes around, I don’t know any one that says, “My promise not to do this or that because of my new year’s resolution from the start of the year is coming to fruition!”

It’s hot stove season now and it’s hard to look for people to interview because I’m only one person. I’m looking for some one to interview right now. That’s why there hasn’t been any interviews because I don’t have anyone to interview. Tomorrow morning I’m going to look around. I have an idea of one person I want to get in touch with.

I’ll be doing more of the prospect profiles and I’m happy I stopped because some of them got traded. I’ll continue them real soon.

Thank god for the support of facebook or this website wouldn’t be doing as good as it’s doing. It’s not doing great, just better.

I’ll be going on a cruise in the summer and I really look forward to it. I went last year and it was the best thing I ever did.

As a Yankee fan, I feel better and I don’t feel any anxiousness of who the Yankees are going to get or not get. They won. We have until April to feel great about it.

My brother Rick will be launching his newer version of the NFL Draft Bible soon.  Maybe I should sue him for profits since I’m the one that came up with the name.  I was in his room in East Hanover one day and told him he should call his magazine, the “NFL Draft Bible.” It’s now a website. I’m joking however. I would never sue any one in my family.

The New York Yankees in 2010.