A.J. Burnett Rumors: Thursday

I wouldn't mind A.J. Burnett signing with the Yankees.He cannot be any less injury prone than the rest of the rotation and cannot be any more injury prone than Carl Pavano.

well i agree wit his health issues but hey every year us yankee fans are left wit that same sayin its the pitching and now there gunna make a diffeernce commin of the worst division standin sisnce the 76 86 seasons we need this guy and i would take him over lowe

Let the braves have him, even if he doesn't get injured and he does excel we don't need to worry about facing him since he's going to the NL. We have a better chance of solving our problems if we sign Sheets for 2yrs, Pettite for 1 & then we go after Texiera. As insurance, we could go after Manny if Tex goes somewhere else.

For the love of God NOOOOOOOOOOOO

I am really hoping that the braves do something about this, but who knows? it might be a Great signing by the Yankees. I am sick & tired of reading crap about how guys will end up being injured a lot. There is no way for us to know, so stop acting like Doctors who have read their Medical Charts. Plus if it happens, its time for us to use Hughes.

so does this mean IF he signs with the Yanks, they are out of the Lowe deal?

Burnett will be foolish to choose the Braves over the Yankees. The only advantage which IMHO could be key is the fact that Burnett will be the ACE of the Braves whereas if he goes to NYY he may be a #2 or #3 behind CC, Wang.

I wonder who is calling up AJ besides Bruney...

If im him i would go to the yanks too, if im the braves i wouldnt even look at lowe. he's not an ace by any means. Gonna just have to take a losing season even with all this money freed up. save it for players for next year because the mets got better wit jj and krod and the phils are still going to be the phillies. so even if we added burnett it owuldnt change us fighting for 3rd place.

Or if they were smart they would "lose" on AJ on purpose and get Sheets... Thats what the doctor says ._.

I am a professional... I know my stuff.

I bet, with your Crystal ball in hand. You are never wrong... LOL

Ron Edwards, you forget that Hudson is out until at least after the ASB in 2009, if not the whole season. Smoltz is something like 45, Jurrjens is super young - the Braves definitely need someone else.

Adam Adcock, I just want to gain a little perspective here from you and where your coming from.

Essentially, what your saying is that it is ridiculous for a baseball team, who has an excessive surplus of money mind you, to go out and use it to better the team, instead of keeping it to themselves? I mean that’s what a free agent market is about. Teams use it to fill the needs on their team.

Explain to me what is wrong with the Yankees identifying their weakness and knowing they have the resources to fix that weakness, actually go out and do it.

Also, just wanted to compliment you on your rhetorical abilities in your previous post, especially the repeated use of "Screw You".

exactly how is wishing CC to get hurt not hating?

This is bad for baseball

Of course the yankees are going to get him. They can get anyone they want with the money they have. Next year, lets just let the yankees buy who they want, and whatever is left of the scrap the rest of the teams will fight over. That would save Tim a lot of time. In reality that's what happens.

Ok, so the Yanks and Braves offer the same amount the money and AJ decides to sign with the Yanks. Who is to blame? the Yanks? Its the player's decision.

I think most people project their frustration onto the wrong icon when it comes to the baseball market.

What people have to realize is that when a player signs a contract, he got paid exactly what he was worth at that moment in time. The whole concept of "over paying" is pointless ideology. If a team can afford a player and the player feels he’s being paid his worth then that’s that.

What most of you are upset about is that the market for ball players has shot up to a ridiculous level. Why is that? Because this is a free trade economy and you can’t just set a limit on how much a person can make because you they’re “not worth it”. There will never be a salary cap in MLB because it is just plain unconstitutional. If you want your team to be able to spend more money then go out, recruit more fans, by more jerseys, whatever, but to be angry with the Yankees or any big market club for being successful is just plain ridiculous. If you people realized how much money most ball clubs made versus how much they spend, I think you would find it interesting.

It is just as much the players fault for holding out for more money, as it is the Teams fault for paying them.

I love all the complaints from Braves fans. The same Braves fans that couldnt fill their stadium during the playoffs.

How'd the Yanks do filling there stadium this post season? $200 million payroll and yall were right where we were...

I want Burnett, but 80+ mil is crazy!! But hey it aint my money...get it done Wren

The shots about Braves fans not going to playoff games are getting tiresome. Especially here - any Braves fans that post here, or any team's fans, are most likely those that attend playoff games. Or maybe some of us don't actually live in Atlanta, but have watched them since, say, 1982?

"How'd the Yanks do filling there stadium this post season? $200 million payroll and yall were right where we were..."

Very weak...
I will take all the WS games and parades I have been to at the cost of missing the playoffs last season.

And the shots about Braves fans not going to playoffs are in direct response to shots at the Yankees spending money they have to spend. They have it to spend because they fill their stadium and they have a large enough fanbase to be able to command a lot of money from advertisers on their networks.

The only problem with the Braves losing out on AJ and trying to get Sheets is that the Yankees have already said they would go after Sheets if they got AJ.

Right, because the ~5,000 upper deck seats that weren't getting sold out in the in the 1-3 NLDS games at Turner Field each year were the difference between the Braves being able to afford big time players. Seriously, there's no way that's even a million dollars in lost revenue.

Using that Rays argument is Dumb. You expect the Yankees to do what the rays did? & that is? Stay in the Bottom of the AL East for Decades then collect money & High draft picks because they were so awful each year? This is why I only respect the Red Sox as rivals, at least I know that they are going to do whatever it takes to make their team Compete each year, even if it takes a lot of cash to do so.

Yankeegirl, keep your thoughts in one post please. And you have to actually make the playoffs yourself to talk about our playoff attendance.

nix..

I dont want to take shots here, but when shots get fired, I fire back.

I understand how a few unsold seats dont mean much in terms of $$ but it does in terms of the big picture.

The Yankees make the most money, in turn that allows them to spend the most. They play by the rules, the rules put in place specifically for them. They pay their taxes and revenue sharing, helping other teams be able to spend more. Some choose not to, which is also by the rules. But seriously, from a business perspective, what do you, as a fan of another team, expect them to do? Do you expect them to sit pat, when they have the money to imnprove, and do nothing? If you owned the team would you do that? Of course not, no one would. I understand the "hate" and the reasoning of the fans of other teams, but that hate is directed in the wrong direction. Direct the hate to the union that wont allow a cap, direct the hate at the owners that have the money but chose not to spend AND direct the hate to fans that dont support "their" team. MBL allows the Yanks to do what they do, and anyone would do the same if they had the resources the Yanks do, just as any fan would love for their team to be able to do the same, even if they say now that it ruins baseball.

"Yankeegirl, keep your thoughts in one post please. And you have to actually make the playoffs yourself to talk about our playoff attendance."

Um, yea ok, whatever you say.

And another weak response. Ive seen more WS wins in my life than any fan of another team. Please dont tell me about making playoffs.

Nix..I know very well what Im talking about. Yes the cabel companies pay, as they do for many other channels. However the bulk of the YES revenue is from advertising.
As for cable, I pay plenty for other channels I have no interest in having. Thats a whole other issue with a la carte pricing the cable companies refuse to provide.

"They pay their taxes and revenue sharing, helping other teams be able to spend more. Some choose not to, which is also by the rules. But seriously, from a business perspective, what do you, as a fan of another team, expect them to do? Do you expect them to sit pat, when they have the money to imnprove, and do nothing? If you owned the team would you do that? Of course not, no one would. I understand the "hate" and the reasoning of the fans of other teams, but that hate is directed in the wrong direction. Direct the hate to the union that wont allow a cap, direct the hate at the owners that have the money but chose not to spend AND direct the hate to fans that dont support "their" team. MBL allows the Yanks to do what they do, and anyone would do the same if they had the resources the Yanks do, just as any fan would love for their team to be able to do the same, even if they say now that it ruins baseball."

By the way, as a Padres fan, I agree with most of this. I don't blame NY for taking advantage of the system. I blame MLB, who is years behind the NFL as far as levelling the playing field for all teams.

tomfromsd,

Right, because you know exactly what went on the negotiations right? You look just as bad as all the idiot Braves fans who were calling Towers an idiot when it looked like the market of Peavy collapsed. You also still have no idea whether or not the Cubs will cave on the Peavy deal or what the Padres would get if the deal happens. You still don't have any problem talking smack though do you?

If Towers was still insisting on Jurrjens or Hanson as part of any deal after a month of negotiating (which some articles certainly suggested) then clearly he is an idiot and is the reason no deal happened.

If Wren held up the deal because he didn't want to replace Boyer with Locke or Rohrbough then he looks bad unless those guys pan out.

this to all braves fan on this board..... i understand the frustration but this has been the yankees since there last world series title. I live in NY and MOST yankee fans seem to believe anything short of a world series is a failure and MOST yankee fans arent real fans they prob couldnt even tell you where marte and nady came from or knew that nady was a met or could just name the home grown yankees from the late 90s. This is not a dis towards real fans out there but come on the real yankee fans know what i mean when there are just people that say i support the yanks cause they are NY and better than the mets. thats why they go out and pay these top notch players its because thats how its viewed upon. yankees haven't won since 2000 and for as someone else said if u know u cant buy championships then why complain? As a philly fan said on here, why are we hell bent on paying burnett 5 years 80+? when u home grown the talent lock em up like the brewers did. And to those taking shots at the braves not filling seats for the playoffs, its just about that for every sport in ATL. gettin of a topic a bit but the knicks have sucked for years but ticket prices are still high as hell compared to other teams. why? cause its NY. the braves need to use that money to get a outfield bat and try not to trade any more prospects.

I'm sure population differences have nothing to do with attendance...It would take 10% of Atlanta's population to fill the stadium, where it would only take .6% of NY's, no?

And Geneseo, let's not get into the bandwagon fan argument - every team has them, especially NY.

After their 1st Championship, then what happened next? They never made the Playoffs, so what did they do to Correct that Mistake? They made better trades & they went out to get Matsuzaka, in other words. They went out spending to fill their holes.

daslied, I know the Yankees have the most bandwagon fans, well at least HAD, the most band wagon fans of any team. That is how you meassure a teams success versus another.

Its the fact that were sucessfull enough to have people who dont know di*k about the game go and through cash at the organization.

And ive been to Atlanta and im pretty sure that given your stadium size and the surrounding area, in a playoff appearance your team should fill the seats regarless.

"Right, because you know exactly what went on the negotiations right? You look just as bad as all the idiot Braves fans who were calling Towers an idiot when it looked like the market of Peavy collapsed. You also still have no idea whether or not the Cubs will cave on the Peavy deal or what the Padres would get if the deal happens. You still don't have any problem talking smack though do you?

If Towers was still insisting on Jurrjens or Hanson as part of any deal after a month of negotiating (which some articles certainly suggested) then clearly he is an idiot and is the reason no deal happened.

If Wren held up the deal because he didn't want to replace Boyer with Locke or Rohrbough then he looks bad unless those guys pan out."

To each his own I guess. I'm not trying to talk smack, I'm just pointing this out. It's only fair after what's been said about Towers. The guy has done a good job overall, and I said numerous times Towers should be judged when the deal is done.

As far as including Jurrjens or Hanson, that should have been the starting point of any deal IMO. Neither of them are the pitcher Peavy is, and most likely never will be (Hanson projects as a 3, maybe a 2, and that's IF he pans out. Jurrjens has shown potential, but Cy Young potential? Debatable. Peavy has already won a Cy Young, 2 K titles and 2 ERA titles).

But my real point was not the deal itself, as value is subjective anyways. It's the fact that Wren clearly disregarded the context of the deal. He thought he could be aggressive because he had other options. Look at the market now. What happens if you guys miss out on all the FA's? In that context, given that you need pitching bad, Wren should have been willing to overpay some because the alternative isn't attractive. That's all I was saying.

"If there is a cap there must be a floor. As long as there are both, then the playing field is level.
If you are going to force the Yanks to not spend, you have to force teams to at least spend what they get in revenue sharing...which not all do."

That would be fair. But I guess that most GM's would gladly do with extra funds to improve their team. Spending shouldn't be a problem.

GeneseoMC20,

You may have been to Atlanta, but its kind of hard to speak about the situation without understanding the dynamics of the city. The vast majority of people who can afford to go to Braves fans don't live anywhere near the stadium. The stadium is downtown, while most of the people who can afford tickets live 10-30 minutes north of the city without traffic. Throw in the fact that access to public transportation isn't great in those areas and that Atlanta has some of the worst traffic in the country and maybe you'll begin to understand why middle of the week playoff games aren't especially popular. Especially after you've made the playoffs for well over a decade in a row.

The city of Atlanta really isn't that big. It has a huge suburban/metro area surrounding it that has some of the fastest population growth of any area in the country, but most of these areas are a long commute from the city, don't have public transportation access to the city, and include many transplants from other areas of the country.

Trying to compare NYC to Atlanta is just asinine.

"YOU CANT PUT A SALLARY CAP ON BASEBALL, IT WONT HAPPEN!

The players union would never stand for a move like that, all it does is decreases the money of the players make. Football got away with it but they did it early before the unions had as much control as they do now."

Sorry to say this, but that's a very narrow-minded way to look at things. What are players going to do? Go on strike? How long would that last before they came begging back for paychecks?

You know, sports isn't the only industry where "workers" are unionized. Everywhere else, the unions only have so much leverage. There's no reason players should be able to bully organizations around.

Trying to compare NYC to Atlanta is just asinine.

Posted by: nixa37 | December 11, 2008 at 10:23 AM

^ exactly especialyl since NY and Cali are the most expensive places to live. I use to live in college park, GA and hardly ever got to see them but here in NY i can take a train etc to go see them play the mets : )

Talking about traffic to New Yorkers as if we don't understand is also asinine. Yes, we do have the public transportation, but a very large portion of the people who go to the games live outside the public transportation access and further than 10-30 minutes away and STIL go to the games.

And the Yanks made the playoffs for over a decade as well and the games are as popular as ever.

Yes, its a different mindset and a different lifestyle and you cant compare the 2, but you are making it seem like every person that goes to the Yankee games walk a few blocks or hop on the subway and that is not the case.

tomfromsd,

If you think Hanson or Jurrjens should have been a starting point for any deal, than you're just as ridiculous as Towers. Who in the Cubs deal even comes close to either of those two in terms of value? Jurrjens just posted easily the best season of any rookie SP in the NL (in case people don't realize Volquez wasn't a rookie) and a very comparable rookie season to Peavy's. He is a fairly established guy now with good peripherals and he's only slated to earn maybe 20 million or so over the next 5 seasons as opposed to 81 million for Peavy. He may not be as good as Peavy, but he's already a solid #2/#3 guy at 22, he should get better, and he is as cheap as can be over the next 5 seasons. I wouldn't trade him straight up for Peavy.

As for Hanson, who in the world convinced you the guy projects as a 3, at best a 2, and that's if he pans out? Hanson is clearly one of the top 5 or so pitching prospects in baseball right now and I've yet to see any scouting report that projects his ceiling to be anything less than a 2 at the big league level. Most of those #2 ceiling reports were also before Hanson put up the most dominating performance ever for a pitcher in the AFL. I think its fair to assume that probably upped his stock just a bit.

"You know, sports isn't the only industry where "workers" are unionized. Everywhere else, the unions only have so much leverage. There's no reason players should be able to bully organizations around."

Except in most other industries you can train replacement workers, management, new hires, in a relatively short time frame. Not so in sports.
If MLB locks out the players because they want a cap, and the union stands its ground, baseball will be done. Yea, we'd see the replacement players like we did years ago, but as a whole baseball as we know it would be over.

yankeegirl,

I've lived in NYC and I've lived in Atlanta and I don't think you can even begin to comprehend the difference in the public transportation systems. You can basically take a train from any somewhat populated city in the surrounding area into NYC and then take the subway to the game. There isn't a system anything like that in Atlanta. There are essentially 4 subway lines and the only way to get to the subway is by bus or car.

You also apparently missed the part where I mentioned that most people live 10-30 minutes outside the city without traffic. With traffic that can easily be 45 minutes to 1 1/2 or maybe even 2 hours. You guys have easily the best public transportation system in country. Atlanta has one of the worst for a major city.

Oh, and then there's the fact that the Yankees have like 10 times the population to draw fans from. In Atlanta, a significant portion of the city's population needs to show up to sell out a game. As a NY fan, you simply just can't understand that.

"(in case people don't realize Volquez wasn't a rookie)"

Yes... but he got a couple of ROY votes which was absolutely hilarious.

"Instead of just pocketing the Money & blaming the Yankees for signing every FA available."

What you do have to remember it's an uneven playing field. The yankees have a built in market, unlike say Florida. Granted I'm not complaining since I'm a Red Sox fan, but my point is teams like New York, Boston, Chicago, etc are teams that can natural spend more money due to the fact they've been around 100 years and have a committed fan base and furthermore are in major cities thus increasing the market. While a lot of these owners are pocketing profits, for poorer teams that are competing, you have to remember it is impossible for these teams to match any kind of offer larger market teams offer.

im going to repost my previous remark made to the gripes of people complaining about spending. When I posted it no one rebutted it and now hours later there are new people making the same argument. Here it is:

Essentially, what your saying is that it is ridiculous for a baseball team, who has an excessive surplus of money mind you, to go out and use it to better the team, instead of keeping it to themselves? I mean that’s what a free agent market is about. Teams use it to fill the needs on their team.

Explain to me what is wrong with the Yankees identifying their weakness and knowing they have the resources to fix that weakness, actually go out and do it.

"I wouldn't trade him straight up for Peavy."

Then all I can say is that it's probably not a bad thing for Atlanta that you're not calling the shots. I'm sorry, I don't want to make this a personal insult but ask almost any baseball fan if they'd rather have Peavy or Jurrjens, and you can expect a landslide.

As for Hanson, he may turn out to be very good, or he may be a bust. That the dezal about being a prospect. You just don't know. Peavy is proven.

Running an organization on potential rather than proven value is crazy.

If you want to look at salary, what is Sabathia earning in the next 5 years? Compare that to a similar pitcher in Peavy (only younger), and you have to agree that Peavy is a much cheaper alternative. You can't compare Peavy to Jurrjens, because Jurrjens isn't the pitcher Peavy is.

"This frustrates me so much. I just dont understand how you can wear a Yankee hat with pride."

You would if you got a check for 85M