24 Free Agents Offered Arbitration

Dunn and Burrell weren't offered arbitration by their respective teams and they are in the same exact position as abreu. If abreu accepts- which is pretty likely seeing as though the market for corner outfielders is saturated with players not necessitating picks (11 out of 15 not offered arb). In an offseason where the yanks are looking to add a few important free agents - a few pitchers and a 1b hopefully, having an aging corner outfielder making upwards of 16 or 17 million is not an ideal situation. Only time will tell if it was the right decision, but so far the trend is that the GM's are being very catious with adding inflated salaries to their payroll

Randy Wolf not getting offered arbitration wasn't much of a surprise. Houston is in financial trouble and they reportedly signed Mike Hampton today for less than what Wolf would have cost them had he accepted arbitration.

I assume you're referring to the brewers offer to sabathia. I think most people know that offer had no chance of ever being taken seriously and was mostly for PR purposes. Yost knew the offer would not be trumped by other teams but at least he could tell his fans that he tried and the big bad yankees swooped in and offered more money. And if cc accepts 6/100 then the brewers are gettin a hell of a deal.

Ok, Yost was the manager and was fired.

Doug Melvin offered 5/100 according to rumors, and yes he knows it won't be accepted.

I was however, refering to the Yankees and Cashman offering 40million more than anyone else, oh and thats the starting point.

Casanova, the only reason the Yankees shouldn't want to sign Abreu is because they dont want him for multiple seasons. He is looking for a 3 year deal and I know he has at least 1 more good season in him.

And his market value is not 16 million, its more like 10-11. Mark Teixeira is only earning 12.5 after his arbitration years so I cant see Abreu getting more than that.

I'm not saying it's the right or wrong decision I'm just saying the yanks are looking to make 2 or hopefully three big name acquisitions this offseason. What they don't want is to have to pay a guy 17 or 18 million when there are suitable replacements already on the roster. One can argue about the quality of those replacements all you want. I'm just sayin I think the yankees will be OK with a slight dropoff in production in RF if the payroll flexibility allows them to go out and sign some combination of sabathia, burnett, texiera sheets dunn or whatever.

Now I've only been following this arbitration system for a few years now, and I know just about all the rules involved, but I dont remember the last time a player like Abreu went through the process. If you have a good example please post it for me.

I thought that generaly the reason for that statistic was that players, like Abreu, dont go through the process of Arbitration. They just end up signing elseware. Typicaly it's younger players who go through the process.

"Is it certain that the Astros didn't offer Wolf arbitration? Their website says they'll announce their decisions on Tuesday."

The deadline has already passed.

If I were the Yankees GM I'd have strongly considered signing Abreu to a 3 year(42 deal and eating 2 mil per year of the entire salary and
1)Offered it to Towers along with Jackson and a couple other high end prospects for Peavy. That would essentially solve SD's Future OF(Headley, Jackson, __)
1)C.C, 2)Wang, 3)Peavy or Wang, Peavy, Burnett/Sheets is not a bad 1-3.

2)I hear Wayne Krivsky is looking for aging OF's(Dye) and I'd love to fleece Bailey out of him. Again, a Jackson+ Bruce OF would pretty much set Cincy's OF for a long time.

Not getting anything for Abreu is very disappointing. I don't understand why they are so afraid of bringing back .300, 100 runs, 100 RBI for 16 mil. Sure it's a lot for some teams..but its the Yankees. It's the equivalent of 13-14 mil of a middle market franchise for them. Cashman made the wrong move. He could make up for it by signing Adam Dunn(Like Abreu looks a lot more attractive now that no picks are cost) to split DH/LF duties with Matsui.

Gardner CF
Jeter SS
Nady RF
Rodriguez
Dunn DH
Cano 2B
Matsui LF
Posada C/
Swisher 1B

I would have faith that lineup with its combination of power and steady hitters would be fairly effective. I would think about Dunn if I was Ca$h.

Gleb- have you forgotten about damon?

"If I were the Yankees GM I'd have strongly considered signing Abreu to a 3 year(42 deal and eating 2 mil per year of the entire salary and
1)Offered it to Towers along with Jackson and a couple other high end prospects for Peavy. That would essentially solve SD's Future OF(Headley, Jackson, __)"
Gleb what fantasy world do you live in? SD is trying to cut payroll, so why would they take an aging OF that by your calculations will make 3M more than Peavy next year. I know Peavy will make more in the next 3 years than Abreu cuz his pay increases every year but Towers is looking for 4 to 5 prospects or young inexpensive mlb ready talent in return.

Totally off-topic, but with the death of Blue Jays owner Ted Rogers,

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/081202/national/craft_obit_rogers

How does this change the off-season plans of the Blue Jays? Would this cause them to actually start selling off parts? Rogers did not mind losing money as long as the team wins, but now that there would be a new owner, would that change their philosophy, and actually cause them to rebuild?

I have to agree with not offering Abreu arbitration for the picks only. He will get a multi year offer forthcoming and everyone knows the Yanks are hot on the tails of multiple type "A" FA's already and are set to lose the top pick coming up in this coming draft and will only get the 1 1st round pick that they lost from this past year for not signing the top pick that they couldn't sign and they need to get decent prospects in that farm system somehow, or they will never be able to trade for much, unless it is with Harrington type GM's from Pittsburgh.

Dunn was a shocker also, top bats like that could have had a market for a 1 year contract and at the least brought a bounty come the 7/31 non waiver deadline, if not by ST. Wolf should have been an easy decline, as hoped Paul Byrd would have been, but the Sox brass probably looked at him as extra starting rotation depth is all that can imagine and that Penny/Martinez/Garcia and the rest of the walking wounded were going to cost more than what they figured the risk involved was worth is all that can figure and he's a hedge against the astronomical figures being bantered about by Lowe and Burnett.

Still have memories of Darin Oliver giving up long distant moonshots over the "monster" at fenway several years ago, so that one sort of surprises me in that regard and granted, have not paid much attention to him much the last couple of years, though his stats do look good and don't see how a team is going to give up a 1st rounder for an aged LH middle reliever.

Grudzianlek is the weirdest one, reminds me of Tony Grafiano being offered arbitration by Boston a couple years ago by Boston and them getting stuck with him, only them having to eat his salary and then trade him to KC, deja vu perhaps?

I think a lot of people are missing the tea leaves here.

What this list of players not being offered arbitration tells me is that baseball executives are expecting salaries to contract this offseason. Makes sense given the economy. Arbitration is flawed in that it bases salary on what the economy and supply and demand were in previous years, not the current off season.

Teams are thinking it is better to sit back and let the market come to them. Except for elite starting pitchers, I think a lot of free agents are going to be a little disappointed, be they a closer or position player.

In fact, if the Yankees weren't so desperate for starting pitchers, I would assume the market there would also be weak- so, I am guessing that at least one higher end starting pitcher (I'm looking at you, Oliver Perez) is going to over play their hand and find themselves without a team when the music stops.

I am with Teetz on all of these.

Wood, Burrell, Dunn, Abreu are all bad decisions. Some of them are honestly embarassing. As a Cubs fan, I'm frankly embarrassed by this offseason so far.

"Varitek has to accept...doesn't he?"

you would think right? but i dont know, it would honestly be the best option for him and try to rebound on a one year deal, then hit the market and try to cash in if he does well, but Scott Boras might try to convince him to hold on for the 30 pieces of silver

*my error, arizona wouldnt do that for dunn

(The Type A guys who were not offered arbitration, I mean... sorry about that...)

"I dont get how you dont offer to atleast Dunn."

The real problem with Dunn is a market has yet to be established for him. As crazy as it sounds, have you heard of one rumor yet that says so and so is interested in Dunn? Right now he's likely the back up plan for teams shooting for Burrell, Ramirez, and Tex. Not to mention the Outfield market is really a buyers market. Despite Dunn's obvious talent and high OBP there's a definite fear surrounding him that he'll be the bust of the year despite the annual 40 hrs and 900 OPS. Ultimately the fear is a team will be forced to give him a minimum of 5yr/85M+ add to that as a type A, you have to surrender a top round pick. Take out the top pick, let a few big players sign and the market for Dunn will explode. But until then the D'Backs couldn't afford Dunn getting impatient. Too bad, personally I thought him being a Type A FA was the only reason the D'Backs traded for him.

I wonder if Abreu is more appealing to the Cubs than Ibanez now that he's not going to cost a draft pick? I agree, it's a weird move by the Yanks not to offer arb to Abreu unless they knew for a fact that he'd accept and just did not want him anymore.