Yankees advance to the ALCS after CC goes into Beast Mode

(Elsa/Getty)

CC Sabathia threw a complete game to defeat the Baltimore Orioles and the only hiccup was the 8th inning when CC allowed a run and had the bases loaded with one out but he struck out McLouth on four pitches, the slider that McLouth struck out on was nasty all night and the Orioles were flailing at it all night. Yankees escaped the jam one batter later as J.J. Hardy hit a soft hopper to Jeter that Hardy was unable to beat out and just like that the Inning was over. I was a little surprised that Girardi elected to stick with Sabathia for another inning, and he fired off a perfect ninth inning for the complete game, the first of his postseason career. The final line — 9 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 9 K —  doesn't do CC justice since he labored in exactly one inning. Outside of that eighth inning, the Orioles had two baserunners. Two. Sabathia buried hitters with his offspeed stuff, throwing just 62 four-seam fastballs out of 121 pitches, but that is how he has pitched lately. It was the first postseason complete game by a Yankee since Rodger Clemens in 2000. I fully expect that he will pitch in game three on short rest against Verlander, but that also will require Kuroda to pitch on short rest in Game Two. CC also set an ALDS record with 17.2 innings pitched beating the previous record of 16 innings, the previous record was 16, held by Justin Verlander (2012) and Cliff Lee (2010). The previous Yankees record was 15.2 by David Cone in the 1995 ALDS, Cone just so happend to throw out the ceremonial first pitch before the game.

The Play of this Series was Raul Ibanez's Home Run in game three, I really don't know which one I would call bigger but one of them. After that it has to be Mark Teixeira stealing second in the fifth, nobody thought that was gonna happen not with Weiters behind the plate. Granted the Orioles helped out as they weren't holding Tex on because they assumed the guy who doesn't have great speed wouldn't try and steal with a bad calf. They were wrong and it really cost them as Raul singled in Tex to give the Yankees a lead that they would never give up. The Yankees added two more runs on Granderson's solo home run and Ichiro's double off the wall that let Jeter score from first.

Now the Yankees face off against the Tigers in the ALCS and because of the stupid scheduling by the MLB that means Today. The Yankees who are the #1 seed get no break between the ALDS and the ALCS, but the Tigers who are the #3 get one that doesn't make much sense and now David Phelps might need to start game two because the Yankees need to play five in a row.  Tonight's match up will be Andy Pettitte and Doug Fister. Also the Yankees dropped Eduardo Nunez from the playoff roster in favor of Cody Epply. The Yankees won't likely need Nunez because of how right handed heavy the Tigers are and they probably wanted the extra pitcher because they do not know what will happen in game two.

Sabathia, Martin defeat the Orioles in the 9th.

Everyone knew it was gone (Rob Carr/Getty)

Despite the final score of 7-2 this was a nail bitter for 8 innings and I don't think anybody thought that the Yankees were gonna hang 5 runs on Jim Johnson, but they did. If it had gone to extras you know they never would have shut up about the Orioles record in extra innings.
CC Sabathia was ridiculous last night and was so close to a Complete game but it probably was responsible of Girardi to take him out after Ford's hit because he was at 120 pitches. Either way CC pitched a fantastic game, got the win and preserved the bullpen. His stuff was nasty all night with the exception of the bad slider he threw to Nate McClouth that scored two runs. After last nights game CC owns a 3.36 ERA in 69.2 innings in the postseason as a Yankee. The Yankees have also won nine of his eleven playoff starts now, with the two exceptions being Game One of the 2009 World Series (offense got Cliff Lee’d) and Game Three of the 2011 ALDS, in which he left in a tie game. As good as he was he does owe alot to his Catcher, Russel Martin who not only hit the go ahead home run but had a great game behind the plate in terms of blocking pitches and pitch framing. He made a great play in the fifth to get the out at first on Lew Ford and look at how good he was at pitch framing last night:

Speaking of Russel Martin, how subdued were the TBS announcing crew on Russel Martins home run? I knew it was going out, so did McClouth and everybody in that park and they act like there is nothing interesting about the flyball whatsoever. I know the crew featured Cal Ripken jr, but seriously at least try to pretend your not rooting for the Orioles.

The Yankees did not have the best four innings on the base paths as Ichiro for some reason decided to try and steal third and got gunned down by Matt Wieters. Then Mark Teixeira got thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double against Chris Davis, you shouldn't do that he has a cannon. But despite missing some great opportunities the offense made up for it by saving the best for last and sucking the life out of Camden Yards in the 9th. Now the Yankees need to win the game tonight as they send out Andy Pettitte to take on the gassed Wei-Yin Chen before heading to the Bronx.

Yankees will face the Orioles in the ALDS

This happened in 1996, apparently nobody in Baltimore has had anything better to think about

Baseball is an amazing thing as that bizarre Cardinals v. Braves game happened Well the Texas Rangers officially choked away their season on Friday and lost to the Baltimore Orioles. Now the Yankees will face off against the Orioles in games one and two in Baltimore and stop this "miracle team" in its tracks. Game One will start 6:15pm ET on Sunday while Game Two will begin at 8:07pm ET on Monday. Games Three though Five (in necessary) will be played Wednesday through Friday of next week with start times yet to be announced. The number of times that Jeffery Maier is going to be mentioned is absurd as is the number of times they mention the Orioles record in one run games and extra inning games. Also infield fly rule, its gonna happen.

not the infield

The six-man umpiring crew will include Brian Gorman, Mark Carlson, Fieldin Culbreth, Mike Everitt, Angel Hernandez, and Tony Randazzo. Games Three though Five (in necessary) will be played Wednesday through Friday of next week with start times yet to be announced. 
Today enjoy the A's-Tigers match up as it is  Parker vs Verlander and Cueto vs Cain in the Reds-Giants game.

Yankees clinch Playoff berth

The Yankees clinched a playoff berth with a win today and an Angels loss, as did the Rangers and Orioles. It looked like the Yankees would be doomed to 2nd place as they trailed by four runs after five innings, but the Yankees showed grit and rallied to split the series in Toronto. The Orioles and Yankees remain tied for the division lead with the last series remaining and the Yankees have the clear advantage in facing the Red Sox in the Bronx, while the Orioles face the Rays at Tropicana field. Hopefully the games swing the right way and they will not have to use Hiroki Kuroda in Wednesdays game, otherwise he would have to pitch on three days rest in game two. The end result though is that the Yankees need to win these games so that they can avoid the one game playoff and on a side note, congratulations to the Baltimore Orioles fan base on your first playoff berth in 15 years.

Jerry Meals and thoughts on the Baltimore series

Jerry Meals is blind

The Yankees split the series against the Orioles when they won 13-3 Sunday behind a offensive surge and a great performance from the bullpen. But the thought on every Yankees fans mind is that the Yankees were cost a game because of Jerry Meals horrendous call at first base when he called Mark Teixeira out when he clearly beat the throw. In my mind, which is probably biased, its one of the worst calls of the last three years behind only the Armado Galarraga call and the Jerry Meals 19th inning call. Apparently after Saturdays game Joe Girardi and Joel Sherman, the Yankees writer from the New York Post, got into a screaming match over something, we don't know what. But in the Sunday edition of the Post, Sherman wrote a scathing critique of the Yankees entitled "Blaming umps is loser talk". Yes the Yankees offense let them down, as did their Ace CC Sabathia but it doesn't change the fact that the Yankees did rally and tie it but were cost the tying run on a call that ended the game. Blaming the ump is loser talk, but their comes a certain point when you have the right to be frustrated by a terrible call and this was one of them; good teams take that frustration and put it out on the diamond and lets all hope that its exactly what the Yankees did today by blowing out the the Orioles. Overall I think the Yankees played really well this series, their offense stepped up but their pitching let them down in two of the games.

The Yankees had tied the game on Thursday and David Robertson of all people gave up the lead. Does this mean that Robertson is now not one of the the best relievers in the game? No it does not, Robertson for some reason wasn't throwing his curve ball and I think its because he was trying to cut down on his walks by throwing a cutter and its not as good of a pitch. He looks like he is going back to the curve after he used it more on Friday so looks like it wasn't an injury but only time will tell. The other story is one that certain people have been piping is that CC is not and never has been an ace. This story upsets me because its a sign of how short-term fans memories are, CC is struggling right now because he isn't getting the swings and misses that he should and I guarantee it is because of his arm problems this year. I do not know if this is a long term problem but we all need to hope it is not. Saying that CC is not the Yankees ace though is wrong and every pitcher struggles, Felix Hernandez gave up 6 runs the other day is he not an ace?

Also Mark Teixeira's injury sucks the Yankees really needed him back and if he is out for awhile then he may miss the beginning of the playoffs. The ideal scenario is that he is only out for a week and the Yankees can build that lead back up in the division. Next up comes the Red Sox who just got swept by the equally terrible Blue Jays and have won 1 of their last 10.

The rest of the AL East at the Trade Deadline

The All star break generally marks the unofficial halfway point of the MLB season with all teams having played more than 81 games. as of right now the standings are thus:

AL East	W	L	Pct.	GB	Home	Road
New York Yankees	52	33	.612	—	25–16	27–17
Baltimore Orioles	45	40	.529	7	22–20	23–20
Tampa Bay Rays	45	41	.523	7½	24–19	21–22
Boston Red Sox	43	43	.500	9½	22–24	21–19
Toronto Blue Jays	43	43	.500	9½	23–19	20–24

The Yankees are a full 7 games up on the Orioles but the rest of the division is very close to one another and they all suffer from a lot of problems and only the Yankees have been over .500 the last 10 games. I talked about the Yankees necessary moves earlier.

Baltimore Orioles
The Fighting Showalters came out of the gate on top and their pitching had been decent which is a big step up from absolutely horrible which had been the norm. Their bullpen ERA still ranks as the second best in baseball but their starter ERA now ranks 26th with no starter being particularly good with Chen and Hammel having fallen back down to earth. Their offense hasn't fared much better as of late as they have fallen down to 19th. They traded for Jim Thome and have been linked to Zach Greinke, but quite frankly buying big pieces would be a bad idea for Baltimore. The Fighting Showalters have played way above their heads and their -36  run differential shows that. Dan Duquette has the right idea with investing in pitching but the team isnt one pitcher away they are three pitchers away from contending. The crap the Orioles throw out there for 3 out of five games is awful, Brian Matusz was the best of the three before being demoted and his ERA was 5.42! Their pitching is almost as bad as Boston and Toronto's and their offense is worse than Tampa Bays, you cannot win with that and I doubt it will get better. The Orioles should give every opportunity to their young players and maybe try and swing a deal for a starter who is under team control such as Matt Garza or Wandy Rodriguez. I'd love to see the Orioles make the playoffs but I think they finish .500 at best.

Toronto Blue Jays
I did not realize how good the Jays offense was this year until I looked it up which shows just how bad their pitching has been. The Jays are in the top three and Bautista and Encarnacion are both crushing the ball as is the rest of the lineup but that pitching staff has been devastated by injury and they relied too much on their internal pitching. The Jays have a real shot of making the postseason if they can assemble a decent pitching staff but like the Orioles they do not need one pitcher as much as they need three fifths of a rotation. Toronto is really close but I think what they need to try and do is extend Encarnacion and possibly Johnson and if they cannot then trade them. The Blue Jays have some really good pieces in Morrow, Romero and Alvarez but they need some solid inning eaters and should target some team controlled pitchers. Garza is a really good fit for Toronto as he has experience in the AL east and is a solid pitcher who eats innings and is a top of the rotation pitcher. Jason Vargas is another possibility and Alex Anthopoulos loves making trades.

Tampa Bay Rays
Unfortunately for the Rays they came into the year with a lot of expectations and alot has been going wrong for them. Pena has been mediocre, Longoria has been hurt, the signings of Luke Scott and Hideki Matsui have not worked well and to top it all off they are 29th in attendance which is just wrong. Sorry Tampa Bay, I know your stadium is crap and that it is actually in St.Petersburg but you have made the playoffs three of the last four years and if you don't go then you don't deserve an MLB team. The Rays are considering selling but they also have arguably the best rotation in the MLB and are still definitely in contention. Even on a down year the Rays could get a ton for James Shields but thst might also kill their chances of winning this year. The Rays need offense and they really can't solve that problem through free agency with their lack of fans. If the Rays want to win this season then they should try getting interesting with some trades, try getting the Cubs to pick up almost everything of Alfonso Soriano's contract for prospects or trade BJ Upton for a shortstop or catcher. Unfortunately for the Rays the team they match up with the best is probably the Toronto Blue Jays as they have both Catcher and Shortstop to spare and desperately need a solid starting pitcher who can eat innings and is under team control, which is James Shields to a T. Even without any moves the Rays should be in the thick of the playoff race.

Boston Red Sox
The thing that people in New York have the biggest trouble understanding is that in Connecticut we have non pink haters here who still think that the Red Sox are this gritty underdogs. The fact is that the Red Sox are a top-5 big market team and have the same pressure from their fan base to always win that the Yankees do. The Red Sox are in a situation right now where they do not have the money to pursue what they need which is a good starting pitcher and do not have the balls to make a big move. They made bad moves in signing Lackey and Crawford and now they are totally handcuffed by these moves. The biggest problem for the Sox is that they have a bunch of mediocre starting pitchers who are getting paid a lot of money and have no real depth behind them, just to point out Felix Doubront is their best starter with an ERA of 4.41. That being said this team is not hopeless but they do rank 27th in terms of starter ERA and have honestly been facing a lot of crappy teams. Fans seem to want to blow the team up and you could definitely get a big haul if you blow it up, but you need to improve that rotation and get some good bullpen pieces as that bullpen is not as good as it appears.  I seriously doubt that the Sox have the balls to make any big trades that shake things up, I mean it took them how long to trade their declining, soon to be free agent third baseman despite already having his replacement?

The end result is that every team in the AL East except the Yankees have giant holes that they need to fill with anyone of them being possible buyers or sellers at the deadline.

The Orioles sign Luis Ayala

The Orioles have agreed to a major league deal with Luis Ayala. The former Yankees gets $825,000 this year with a million dollar team option for 2012 and a $100,000 buyout, so $925,000 guaranteed. Just like last year Ayala pitched in Mexico to try and get a better deal and he definitely did get a good payday.
To make room for Ayala on the 40-man roster, the Orioles designated outfielder Matt Angle for assignment. Angle, 26, played in 31 games for the Orioles in 2011, hitting .177 and stealing 11 bases in 12 attempts. Ayala was ultimately deciding between the Orioles and Los Angeles Angels and his holding out is what probably got him the option year. Its really good for Ayala and it could be a good deal for the Orioles, but before last year Ayala hadn't had a good year since 2007 but the deal isn't a lot of guaranteed money and the Orioles always need pitching.
The Orioles also signed Nick Johnson to a minor league deal with an invite to spring training.

Yankees trying to trade Burnett

The Yankees are trying to move AJ Burnett and the only team that has been reported to have any interest is the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Pirates have been trying all offseason to get a pitcher and they really have had no luck in attracting any free agents. They offered Edwin Jackson a three year $30 million deal and he turned it down for a one year deal in Washington, Roy Oswalt has also told them that he has no interest in signing with them. This is really the only reason they are looking at Burnett as his ability to eat innings would be very useful for the team and they would probably hope that a move to an easier league would make him pitch better. The Yankees are willing to pay a substantial part of the $33 million that Burnett is owed over the next two years, but they want a player in return and reportedly asked the Pirates for Garret Jones. Jones would fill the Yankees need at lefty smashing DH and can still play 1^st base and the corner outfield. Even though Jones is going to be turning 31 in June he still has three years of team control after 2012 and is one of the Pirates few decent bats so it seems unlikely that they will acquire him. However the Yankees and Pirates are still negotiating and a deal can still get done, I think the Yankees will keep trying for Jones but if they can not get him they will probably ask for a player like Brad Lincoln who can either start or relive and who the Yankees almost acquired for Francisco Cervelli last season.

Other than the Pirates Burnett has not been linked to anyone, but the Orioles are a possibility even though he probably would be worse with them than he has been with the Yankees. However some of Dan Duquette’s moves this offseason have been questionable and he could pull out a trade like this.

A.J Burnett for Mark Reynolds: In idea that will never happen but I will write about anyway

Without AJ Burnett the Yankees never would have won the world series in 2009 but he has been beyond bad the last two years and he still has two years left on his contract. The Yankees have better options in their rotation than him and they have been hoping to dump him on somebody else all off season, especially now that the Yankees have a logjam for the 5th starter. The idea is that the Yankees will try and trade Hughes or Burnett for a DH type who can platoon with Andruw Jones. River ave blues had a list of possible trade candidates and one that I thought might warrant some consideration is Mark Reynolds.
Now to be clear this deal is very unlikely to happen but the Orioles are faced with the issue of having two first baseman and one of them they are paying $7.5 million and the other isn't arbitration eligible for another year. The Orioles have no shot of contending and they wanted to have Reynolds play 3rd but his defense was so bad that he had to be moved to 1st. Reynolds was traded to Baltimore last offseason and has led the league in strike outs the last four seasons. He can however mash the ball and has hit 158 home runs in his five seasons including 37 last year. He is a right handed bat but he hits right handers a bit better than left handers. Reynolds would be good to have for the DH spot especially since he is a free agent after this year. The problem though is that the only way the Yankees would add Reynolds is if they traded AJ Burnett and unfortunately its very doubtful that he will get traded this season especially not to the Orioles who have enough mediocre pitching. Its also the fact that the Orioles don't like trading in the division and it doesn't make any sense for them to trade Reynolds and take on all of Burnett's salary especially since they won't be contending this season. Its a nice idea but it wont happen.

Best Moves for the AL East!

The AL east is the best division in baseball and it has possibly the three best teams in all of baseball. In the last ten years an AL East team has won six American league pennants and three world series. With the exception of the Orioles all the teams are competitive and if the last four years prove anything its that any of these teams could wind up winners.

Baltimore Orioles
The Orioles are really bad and they are years away from competing again. They have not posted a winning record since 1997 and it seems all of their top prospects have fallen short or been injury riddled. The Orioles office and fanbase must be distressed to see the success of the Tampa Bay Rays who have fewer resources but have been competitive due to building on excellent player development. The Orioles really could use a complete reboot, but the organization is such a mess that multiple people have turned down the job to be the GM of the Orioles. They now are going to be moving forward with Dan Duquette as the GM, who last was the GM for Boston from 1994-2001. The Orioles will be futile for the next few years and the better move for them would be to try and build on undervalued pieces much like the Rays did in the beginning and focus on drafting and player development because their current system has not worked for them. The Orioles will however again overpay for a DH like Vlad Guerrero or Johnny Damon and could target a big name free agent, which is not what they should be doing right now. Blowing it up could be an option but I doubt that will help, because the issue seems to be player development, not a lack of talent. The best move may be to try and trade for some pitchers who can eat innings like they did with Tommy Hunter. A good pitcher for them to target would probably be Wandy Rodriguez as he pitches a lot of innings and does so with a sub four ERA in the last four years. That's a much better idea for the Orioles than trying to sign Prince Fielder. This is a long term project, which is unfortunate considering their lack of winning in the last 15 years.

Toronto Blue Jays
 The Jays have a nice crop of young players in the majors and in the minors and they currently posses an above average offense that will be boosted with the additions of Colby Rasmus and Brett Lawrie over a full year. The Jays seem like a middle market team but they are actually a big market team on par with the potential to be on par with Boston and New York. The reason the Jays aren't contending right now is that they are not quite ready for prime time as their pitching staff after Romero is still developing despite a plethora of young talented pitchers. There has been a lot of talk about the Jays trading for Votto and while it is very enticing for the Blue Jays to have a pair of talented young Canadian players at the infield corners, I think that trading for Votto will be more of an option next off season. The Blue Jays could be a breakout team for this season but I think 2013 is a much more likely possibility for them, as this year should be focused on developing their starters and figuring out what they will do at Shortstop, Second base and Left Field. The Jays currently have Yunel Escobar at Shortstop, but they have Adeiny Hechavarria who is number nine on the top ten shortstops prospects in baseball. For this reason the Jays will likely try and resign Kelly Johnson to a one year deal before transitioning Hechavarria or Escobar to second. Some people think that the Jays will pursue David Ortiz but they are much more likely to stick with Edwin Encarnacion at DH due to Encarnacion being under contract for 2012 for just $3.5 million and Ortiz's production likely to decline in the next few years. The Blue Jays could be in the market for a mid level starter and left fielder like David Dejesus or Edwin Jackson, but the only big name free agent I see them pursing is a top flight closer like K-Rod or Ryan Madson, but they could end trying for a bounce back closer like Joe Nathan or Jonathon Broxton. If the Jays spend big it could very well be for a Japanese import and they very well could be the best suitor for Yu Darvish as they have the monetary resources and less pressure to succeed immediately as he would in New York. The Jays will likely be active on the trade market as they have been part of three big trades the last two seasons and their plethora of prospects haven't been diminished through any of them. The Jays have a protected draft pick due to failing to sign their 1st round draft pick and so signing a type A free agent is a possibility but its more likely they develop their prospects for a serious run in the next few years.


Boston Red Sox
The Red Sox were the ultimate chokers last year as they completely fell apart in every aspect in September. On top of that their rotation is now full of question marks as is the bullpen who just lost Jonathon Papelbon to the Phillies before they even had time to make an offer. Even if they move Aceves to the rotation then they open up another hole in their bullpen and still need to add another starter. They also are reportedly pursing Carlos Beltran and while this isnt a good move it may be the best option for them. Signing Beltran would be risky and they may be better suited to putting Josh Reddick in Right Field, but I think they will feel the need to make a big splash and signing Beltran could be that move. Reddick could very likely prove to be a valuable trade piece especially since the Boston farm system was proven to be not nearly as good as Boston had been claiming. The idea of Reddick for Wandy Rodriguez has come up and it could be a very good one for Boston to make as Wandy has pitched at least 190 innings for three years and the Astros are looking to move him. The good news for Boston is that they do not need to pursue top of the rotation arms, but they need to find a pair of back of the rotation arms and build depth because they have zero depth options in AAA as last seasons collapse proved. The Red Sox AAA depth is so bad that if D.J Mitchell had been with them he would have been the best rotation candidate by far and its possible that he will not even have a rotation spot at the Yankees AAA this coming season. The Sox will be looking for a bounce back year from Carl Crawford and a healthy year from Kevin Youkillis but will need good depth because neither is guaranteed to happen and Youkillis's health is even more in doubt. The Red Sox will likely have Jed Lowrie and Marco Scutaro for Shortstop and infield bench help, so the focus will be almost entirely on their pitching. While the Sox could try and sign the top free agent pitches, it would probably be better for them to invest in several low risk High reward pitchers like the Yankees did with Colon and Garcia.The Red Sox will also need to hope that Buchholz and Becket can stay healthy because they really can not afford anymore losses to their rotation and they both had trouble staying healthy. The Red Sox will want to have a good year and make the playoffs or else they will be looked at the number three team in the division behind the Yankees and Rays.

Tampa Bay Rays
 The Rays have been able to build a consistent contender with a limited payroll, no fan support and a bad stadium. The Rays actually have too much pitching depth and will likely trade one or more starters to try and boost their offense. The Rays could sign a veteran DH like they did with Johnny Damon but a better option may be for them to trade for options offense rather than sign it. The best fit is probably the Kansas City Royals who have 1st/DH prospect Clint Robinson who really should be in the majors but there is nowhere for him with Eric Hosmer and Billy Butler blocking him. A trade of Wade Davis or Jeff Niemann for Clint Robinson would seem to be ideal to me as he would provide the team with six years of a cheap DH rather than spending $5 million a year on older players. Also as good as B.J Upton is the team will probably look to move him for prospects and the team that will likely be the most interested is the Washington Nationals who could prove especially enticing if the team does not resign Casey Kotchman as they can trade prospect Chris Marrero who would also be a young cheap player under team control for several more years. The Rays could try and lock up Kotchman but that would depend on their beleif that this was a breakout year for Kotchman and that he can hit for the average that he did this season over the course of the deal. It may be better for the Rays to take the money they would give to Kotchman and a free agent DH and instead focusing on trying to extend David Price and Matt Joyce. The one problem for the Rays if they do trade B.J Upton then they will need to decide if they trust Brandon Guyer as the everyday left fielder because otherwise they will be having Sam Fuld take a lot more AB then he should. If the Rays can improve their offense then they could easily be the division favorites with the best rotation in the AL East. The biggest concern for the Rays however will continue to be how to get people through the door as consistent contention and three playoff appearances in the last four years hasn't been able to do it.

New York Yankees
The Yankees won the division despite the nearly universal assumption that the Red Sox would win. The good news for the Yankees is that they have no real holes and instead will be focusing on upgrading their rotation and possibly finding a LOOGY. Several options have been raised for the Yankees rotation but the two best are probably signing Yu Darvish and/ or trading for John Danks. The Yankees have a plethora of back of the rotation arms and they should definitely let Noesi, Warren and Phelps compete with Burnett and Hughes for their spots in the rotation. The Yankees want a top of the rotation arm and either could be that option but neither is guaranteed. People tend to bash Asian pitchers but just because Kei Igawa and Dice-K failed does not mean you should forget about players like Hiroki Kuroda who has been great since coming over. Its also entirely possible that the Yankees could retain Freddy Garcia and stop there but that would be a little surprising for them to skip out on the top pitchers two years in a row. The Yankees also have a lot of trade pieces that they will likely try to move as they are starting to create a logjam behind the plate and in the AAA rotation. The Yankees will almost definitely try and move Austin Romine or Francisco Cervelli this off season and will have to either move somebody to the bullpen or trade them. They could end up trading for prospects, bench or bullpen help or make a big deal for Starter or a Right Fielder. The best move for the Yankees after adding a starter would probably be to put Burnett on a short leash and if he starts to consistently struggle to move him to the bullpen and give one of the prospects a shot in the rotation, it sucks but the Yankees shouldn't be putting out a bad pitcher every five games if they have a better option. I would also recommend letting Joba try starting again as he comes back from Tommy John surgery because the worst case scenario is he doesn't seem to have it and you move him back to the bullpen while he rehabs, but I do not expect the Yankees will do this.

There is no clear favorite for the AL East this season and as we saw last year being the favorite means nothing. That being said how much better will the Sox and Yankees be if Carl Crawford, Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira can have better years? And how good will the Rays be with Matt Moore, James Shields, Jeremy Hellickson and David Price all in the rotation?

The Rest of the Division

Lets take a look at the rest of the American league East and how they did this off-season and how they hope to fair in 2011. Every team in the division made some big moves and signing this off-season and it looks like the east could become more and more competitive as time goes on.

Baltimore Orioles: Key additions- Derrek Lee, J.J. Hardy, Mark Reynolds, Vladimir Guerrero, Kevin Gregg, Jeremy Accardo, and resigned Koji Uehar.
Key Losses- Ty Wigginton, Kevin Millwood

With the late signing of Vlad Guerrero as well as the additions of Derrek Lee and Mark Reynolds the Orioles offense has made up for their loss of Ty Wigginton and added some real pop to the middle of their lineup. They have also improved their pitching with the addition of Kevin Gregg and Justin Duchscherer. Buck Showalter has really turned the Orioles around and while at best they will be contending for third place in the AL East, Showalter has been able to maximize production from the Orioles and he could do a great job developing the team  for the next few years until they are hopefully able to contend in the division. There are some negatives for the Orioles and the main one has to be that while the team improved its pitching and offense, they are still likely the worst team in the east in every category. Also by signing Vlad they take Luke scott out the DH role and so he will be competing with Pie and Winn for the left field spot and it seems to me that it should be more important for the young orioles to get as much playing time as possible than for them to sign Vlad, because the Orioles need to build a team that will compete in the future and signing Vlad for a year doesn't really seem to help them do that.


Tampa Bay Rays: Key additions- Manny Ramirez, Johnny Damon, Kyle Farnsworth and Joel Peralta and a lot of other small pieces
Key Losses- Grant Balfour, Jason Bartlett, Randy Choate, Joaquin Benoit, Carl Crawford, Matt Garza, Dioner Navarro, Chad Qualls, Carlos Pena, Dan Wheeler, Rafael Soriano


The Rays lost a lot of players and traded away Bartlett and Garza, but this team made some good pic ups and some very surprising ones by adding old superstars Manny Ramirez and Johnny Damon to go along with their current superstars Evan Longoria and David Price. Some have said that the Rays will be able to contend this year and that remains a remote possibility, but the signing of Manny and Damon should show people what the rays are trying to do. The Rays new coming into this year that it would be very hard for them to compete this year if they did well or awful, I actually remarked to my friend (a sox fan) that the Rays would likely lose all their free agents and trade a starting pitcher no matter how they finished the year. The Rays picked up Manny and Damon in order to keep people in the stands and let their prospects develop more in the Rays fantastic farm system. The Rays have showed in the past that when everything is clicking they are one of the best teams in baseball, but when one part of their team struggles the team runs into trouble as a whole, keep in mind this team has been no hit three times since July of 09 and two of those were perfect games. The Rays don't have the payroll to keep their big time free agents and unlike the Royals they know that when they are building they need to keep their fans interested and that is what the Rays are trying to do this year as you can note with incentives in Damons deal.


Toronto Blue Jays: Key Additions- Frank Francisco, Rajai Davis, Octavio Dotal, Jon Rauch
Key Losses- Vernon Wells, John Buck, Scott Downs, Kevin Gregg, Shaun Marcum

The biggest note from the Blue Jays was their dumping of Vernon Wells massive contract that had crippled them since 06. They got Juan Rivera and Mike Napoli from the angels and they promptly traded Napoli to the rangers and are looking to trade Rivera. They also traded last years opening day starter Shaun Marcum to the brewers for infield prospect Brett Lawrie. The Jays acquired Rajai Davis to take over in Center field and the rest of their additions are to try and keep their bullpen at the same level it was last year despite not having a true closer. Unfortunately they missed on Russel Martin and as a result lack an established starting Catcher, but they do poses J. P. Arencibia who is the top Cathcing prospect for the Jays and they failed to get a Starting 3rd Baseman so that they could move Jose Bautista to Right Field. With Vernon Wells Mega contract gone the Jays now have some financial flexibility and they showed that when they signed Bautista to a 5 year $65 million deal, which if he produces like last year will prove to be very team friendly. The Jays will be unlikely to be in the playoff race this year and at the trade deadline they could be looking to buy some cheap pieces to fill the holes. The first thing that the Jays are gonna want to do is get fans to the game which despite Bautista's 54 HR the average attendance actually fell by about 3,000 from 2009. Go to the game people of Toronto at the very least the Jays will hit a lot of Home Runs and its a lot more entertaing than watching the Maple Leafs suck year after year.

Boston Red Sox: Key Additions- Carl Crawford, Bobby Jenks, Adrian Gonzalez, Dan Wheeler
Key Loses- Mike Lowell, Victor Martinez, Adrian Beltre, Bill Hall

Many Red Sox fans still think that they are underdogs to the Yankees which is laughable and all you Connecticut Yankees/non-Sox fans know especially well that Sox fans will forever operate under this delusion that they they believe themselves the constant underdogs no matter their payroll. The Red Sox failed to make the post season and their ratings dropped 36%, so ownership knew that they need to win to keep current sox fans happy. My friend the Sox fan has been trying to justify to me how the Sox are still the underdogs despite their $142 million 7 year deal for crawford. The Sox have put a lot of faith into Crawford being able to keep his speed until his mid 30's and only time will tell if that faith is justified. The other big deal that the Sox had was their Trade for Adrian Gonzalez, the Sox have put off signing Gonzalez to an extension to avoid more luxury tax, but they will have to and they will have to hope that he comes back 100% from his shoulder surgery and if he does he will be a monster in Fenway. The Sox also appear to have accepted that Papelbon will have another shaky year and so they acquired Dan wheeler and Bobby Jenks to assist Daniel Bard (who could have been a Yankee) in moving on from him. Despite the claims that this will be the best Red Sox team ever they have to hope that a lot of things go right. Last offseason the Sox signed Lackey for 5 years $86 million and extended  Becket for 4 years $68 million. Neither of these guys pitched well, Becket due to Injury and Lackey due to being overrated and sucking, but the Sox seem to think that both these guys will bounce back and be fine, but he never looked good after his May injury last year and face it Lackey was overrated. Dice K only had 153 inning pitched and posted an ERA worse than Ivan Nova's and he also has a history of Injury problems and so the Red Sox are looking at John Lester and Clay Buckholtz to repat their great 2010 seasons. I'm not saying that the Red Sox pitching staff is bad I'm just saying that Dice-K, Beckett and Lackey will sink the Red Sox but its a lot to say that they will just miraculously be better. The Red Sox offense also has a lot riding on speculation, Yes if Gonzalez comes back 100% he will be fantastic, but their is also the concern about Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis, Ellsbury all staying healthy and Ortiz being productive and Saltalamacchia and Ellsbury hitting above .200. If the Red Sox stay healthy then they could run away with the division but 162 games is a long time and if the injury bug strikes again they could find themselves playing golf again in October.

To top it all off not a single spring training game has been played and anything can happen during a season let alone before it even beings.

MLB Offseason Update

Well no sooner did I wright my article yesterday about the remaining top free agents that two more signed a deal today. The Rays signed both Johnny Damon and Manny Ramirez making them teammates again since their days together on the Red Sox from 2002 to 2005. Damon's deal is worth $5.25MM plus a potential $750K in bonus money based on attendance; Damon lives in Orlando and would have to make a difference at the gate. He would get $150,000 each for every 10K people after 1.75 MM, in home attendance.  Ramirez's deal is worth $2MM and he will undoubtedly be the DH while Damon will be the starting left fielder, after posting a .298/.409/.460 slash line in 320 plate appearances in 2010 Ramirez will definitely earn that $2MM if he puts up similar numbers. Damon's incentives will be hard to earn as he would have to keep attendance the same from last year to earn even the first level of his attendance bonus and his $5.25 base salary essentially offsets the salary they saved in trading Garza and while his offense is much better than Ben Zobrist's .230 his defense is very questionable. Both of these deals are pending physicals and have yet to be announced.
Vlad Guerrero is also apparently nearing a deal with the Orioles for a "humbling" 1 year deal. This would be a sure bargain for the O's after  Vlad hit .300 last year with 29 HR's and 115 RBI's and he would undoubtedly be the O's DH. No exacts on the amount but i would say probably between $2.5MM and $4MM. I have to question whether this deal is true or not as yesterday a similar story came out and was soon declared false.

In other MLB news The Blue Jays traded Vernon Wells for Juan Rivera and Mike Napoli, Wells still has four years left on his massive $126MM deal. The deal has earned praise for Blue Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos and left many Angels fans scratching their heads and personally I don't understand the deal either. There really doesn't seem to be any upside to this deal for the Angels as they add a lot of salary for another old declining outfielder and they lose their starting catcher who hit 26 HR's last year and right now are looking at Jeff Mathis as their starting catcher when he IS the worst backup in the game. This deal could affects two of the three Molina's as it would seem that Jose Molina is out of the back up job unless Napoli is viewed as a first baseman by the Jays.  Don't feel to bad for Jose because he or his brother Bengie or even Chad Moeller are all better options at starting catcher than Mathis. The Angels have also said that they could still be in the market for a lead-off hitter but I doubt they will replace Peter Bourjos in the outfield and I don't see where they can add another player. The one positive of this trade for the Angels is that it makes the Angels outfield arguably the best defensive outfield in baseball and the best in a very good AL West. 
I would not be surprised to see Scott Podsednik sign with the Jays soon as he was an option for lead-off for the Jays and they now have a glaring hole in center that either he or Fred Lewis could fill.

Nothing new from the Yankees but they are still looking for another starter who could still end up being Andy Pettitte. I will be writing soon about the Yankees options for a fifth starter and their options for a fifth Outfielder. It is only 23 days until Pitchers and catcher report.