Yankees free agents

The Yankees have a total of 14 players hitting free agency, with the key free agents being Russel Martin,  Nick Swisher, Hiroki Kuroda and depending on the status of Mariano Rivera, Rafael Soriano. The last three of these guys will receive a qualifying offer, but the only one with any chance of accepting the $13.3 million dollar qualifying offer would be Hiroki Kuroda, as Soriano and and Swisher will receive large muti year deals. The Yankees seem likely to move away from Swisher, despite him being the best Right Field option for the Yankees and as I said before the Yankees will only look to retain Soriano if Mariano Rivera retires and even then he may be looking for a deal bigger than the Yankees are willing to provide, considering they have several internal closer options.
Russel Martin is an extremly critical retention for the Yankees and he will likely get a multi year deal from them, because he and and AJ Pierzynski are the only everyday catchers on the market. The Yankees have also expressed intrest in brining back Ichiro Suzuki and Raul Ibanez on short term deals, but I don't know how much playing time Ibanez would get due to the rotating DH for the veteran Yankees. Some people really want Ichiro to return, but he should be the Yankees B or C options due to his age.
Andy Pettitte joins Mariano Rivera as someone who is going to either sign with the Yankees or retire and it remains to be seen what either will do at this point.
There is also a chance that the Yankees will retain Eric Chavez and Jayson Nix, but after that none of the Yankees free agents are likely to be retained on anything more than minor league deals and i personally doubt that Nix or Chavez will return. If the Yankees do not retain any of their free agents then there will be a number of holes to fill, that will require a venture into free agency as they will not be able to fill them internally.

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 Catching dilemma

In Spring Training Russel Martin was going to be the starter and we were all wondering if Austin Romine would be able to get the backup job from Francisco Cervelli, but Romine injured his back almost immediately and it seemed certain that Cervelli would be the backup. Of course then the Yankees traded George Kontos for  Chris Stewart and Stewart became the backup Catcher because he was out of minor league options and Cervelli was sent to AAA. Stewart has had some timely hits but he was brought in for his defense and five passed balls is not the way to stick if Defense is your reason to be in the majors. Remember Montero was supposed to take over behind the plate but the Yankees did not trust him behind the plate last season and then traded him to Seattle because he did not fit in well unless he was a catcher. I think we would all prefer Cervelli to be with the big league club but until Austin Romine comes back then the Yankees are going to stick with Stewart and it looks like Romine will be out until July. If Romine had been able to have a full year in Triple A they could have potentially platooned Romine and Cervelli but now his injury means he is not guaranteed to start next year with the Yankees as they may want him to have a full year in Triple A. The Yankees are full of good catching prospects but right now with Romine injured the Yankees are lacking at high level catching depth. This is also an extremly odd time for us as Yankee fans as Jorge Posada has been a staple behind the plate for over a decade and replacing a player like Posada is nearly impossible. The other big downside with the loss of Romine for the first half of the season is that the Yankees are going to need to resign Russel Martin because they have nobody who could start next year behind the plate except for Martin. I also really do not want to risk letting Martin go either because Gary Sanchez is a long way away from the Majors and Romine has a grand total of 35 PA above Double A.

Swisher vs. Martin

One of the biggest storyline's this spring training has been Hal Steinbrenner reasserting that the Yankees will try and be under the luxury tax when it rises to $189 million in 2014. This has been met with some skepticism since the Yankees have Mark Teixeira, CC Sabathia and Alex Rodriguez all making $20 million a year until at least 2016 and Robinson Cano may soon join them. This has led to some speculation about this seasons soon to be free agents of Nick Swisher and Russel Martin. The problem for the Yankees is that these guys are going to be looking for long term deals as well as their first and likely only large free agent payday.
Swisher is going to be the best power hitting outfielder available on the market with the possible exception of B.J Upton. Swisher has been a good supporting piece for the Yankees since they got him from the White Sox and his personality has been loved in New York, but he has been criticized for struggling in the postseason and some fans wanted to see the Yankees dump him and sign Carlos Beltran. Swisher is making $10.5 million this season and will be looking at making more money with this new deal. The problem facing the Yankees is that they really have no good internal options for the Outfield options that will be ready by next season and a platoon would be most likely.
Russel Martin is a more recent example and both he and the Yankees expressed interest in signing a long term deal but a deal was never completed. Martin had a good season offensively and defensively last year and good catchers are a luxury that Yadier Molinas $75 Million deal shows. However the Yankees do have a plethora of Young cathcing and unlike Swisher, Martin could be replaced by Austin Romine. The question though is whether or not Romine could be a productive player in the majors and that's a big risk to take.
The Yankees could retain both of these players but more likely they will have to pick one and its hard to gauge who the Yankees will try and retain, but both players will be looking at 3-4 year deals with a definite possibility that Swisher could try for a fifth year on the free agent market. Both Martin and Swisher are nice complimentary pieces who have hit in the bottom third of the lineup and while I think the Yankess may wish to retain Swisher more than Martin, the market may end up pricing Swisher out of the Yankees range. Do not forget Jayson Werth received a huge deal last offseason and Swisher could get a team to overpay him like the Nationals did with Werth. There also exists the possibility that the Yankees will retain neither player and opt to trade or sign a cheaper Swisher and Martin solution or simply go with their current internal options. If I had to pick a player for them to retain it would be Swisher, but I think it is more likely that they will retain Russel Martin as I expect that Swisher will become too expensive for the Yankees to put in their new plans and a team like the Dodgers, who will have new ownership, may look to add one one of the biggest bats on the market.

Boone Logan is last Yankee to settle on arbitration

Boone Logan and the Yankees avoided arbitration by signing Logan to a $1.875 million deal for 2012. By doing this the Yankees settled with their last arbitration eligible player and paid a grand total of $16.775 to their six arbitration eligible players. The list is as follows:

Boone Logan- $1.875
Logan was the Yankees only lefty out of the pen last season and while a solid arm he was inconsistent at times and could be the only lefty in the pen again this year. He did have some very good outing against the Sox in particular last season.

David Robertson- $1.6 million
This was Robertson's first arbitration year and its a nice pay increase from the league minimum salary that he was making the last 3 years. If he does what he did last year again he will get a good raise next year.

Joba Chamberlain- $1.675 million
While it may seem odd that Joba got payed more than Robertson considering that Joba only pitched 28 innings last year because of his injury. But arbitration is also largely based on service time and it was his second year of arbitration. He got a lot less than he might have.

Phil Hughes- $3.2 million
perfect example of how its based on service time. After his 2010 Phil Hughes got $2.7 million and with less than half the innings he pitched the year before he got a raise. Hughes however only has one year of arbitration left and so 2012 will need to be good for him.

Russel Martin- $7.5 million
After being non tendered by the Dodgers last season Martin had a good year with the Yankees and received almost double the $4 million he was paid last year. The Yankees had been talking about a two year deal with Martin before deciding on roughly the midpoint of Martins proposed $8.2 million and the Yankees $7 million. Hopefully the Yankees get another solid season from Martin in 2012.

Brett Gardner- $2.8
Like Robertson Gardner had his first year of arbitration and got a nice pay raise after making the league minimum the last three years. Gardner will look at find some offensive consistency this year in hope of signing a multi-year deal with the Yankees, while continuing to provide excellent defense.

All of these guys will be arbitration eligible again next year, except for Russel Martin who will be a free agent. Francisco Cervelli will also be arbitration eligible next season so he will have to try and stay healthy this year.

The first "I know its April but Jesus Montero" article

Well the Yankees are getting set for game two against the Twins with CC taking the mound and Russel Martin behind the plate. In his limited action as a Yankee Martin has been pretty good offensively and defensively, but again the sample size is too small to make any real assessment of him overall. The question I really want to pose is, If Russel Martin is able to return to his old 2007 form and become a real offensive force as well as a very good defensive catcher would the Yankees decide that he will be their starting catcher of the future and what would that mean for Jesus Montero?
If Martin does return to his old form then then the Yankees have several options of what they could do with him
A) They could keep him as their starting catcher. After all he is only 28 and is much better defensively than Montero or Cervelli.
B) The Yankees could trade him midway through the season for a starting pitcher.
C) They could let him go after the year and if he gets class A free agency then they would get a draft pick.

Those options are all assuming that he does return to his old form and doesn't flop in the Bronx, because if he does flop then he will be backing up Jesus Montero before you can say oh' Canada.
Jesus Montero is the Yankees top prospect and probable the must hyped prospect since Derek Jeter, but Montero's key chip is his bat because his defense behind the plate is poor despite his strong arm and most scouts do not think that he will be able to stay behind the plate. Would the Yankees trade Montero or would they move him somewhere else? Unfortunately the most likely place to move him would be 1st base or right field and both those places are currently taken by Mark Teixiera and Nick Swisher and I doubt that the Yankees would cut either loose even for a prospect like Montero. Montero has been a big trade chip that teams have asked the Yankees for and he was almost traded for Cliff Lee last season and despite loosing out on the backup spot this spring his status as the systems top prospect remains intact. If the Yankees did decide to trade Montero who would they trade him for? I can't see them trading him for anything but a starting pitcher but who? Obviously if the Mariners made Felix available the Yankees would trade Montero for him but other than that who else would they be willing to part with Montero for?

I think that these pitchers are the only ones that the Yankees would be willing to trade Montero for:

• Clayton Kershaw (23, lefty and has a sub 3 ERA and over 200 innings pitched)
• Trevor Cahil (same as Kershaw but a righty and just under 200 innings pitched)
• Josh Johnson ( had a 2.30 ERA last year in the NL east with 28 starts)

Other than Felix those are the only pitchers that I can think of that I would trade Montero for and the teams could have some possible interest in a trade with the Yankees. I'd love to trade for Matt Cain but the Giants don't need a catcher, 1st baseman or right fielder and the Phillies aren't going to do a trade and the Yankees wouldn't deal Montero to the Rays or Sox. Do you have any other pitchers that you would trade Montero for and would you do any of these trades?