They were saying "Lou."

"Just when you think Alex Rodriguez has figured out how to turn around this public relations' nightmare, he does something ridiculous."

Everyone in the country stand up.

If you thought Alex Rodriguez had figured out how to turn around this PR nightmare, you can sit down.

That's what I thought.

What did Alex Rodriguez do in the past ... oh, the past ten years ... that made anybody think he had figured out how to turn around this PR nightmare?


"After Rodriguez won over some of the crowd and said all the right things during an interview session, he climbed into a burgundy SUV."

He sounded like an idiot.

I truly think ARod may be mentally deficient. He looks sharp and polished and I think that's why it doesn't fit.

Like, I heard him say the other day that he was comfortable batting fourth because he'd batted fourth for the past five years in New York. That's untrue. I don't mean the playoffs where he batted 8th. I mean 2004, when Torre batted him second.


"As A-Rod approached the vehicle the passenger side window went down and Yuri Sucart was the man behind the wheel."

Nice.


"His first time at the plate the boos were 60-40, 50-50 second time and by the third time more fans were cheering than jeering.

But after this dimwitted Rodriguez move, who knows what the reaction will be tomorrow."

Oh, for crying out loud.

George A. King III is actually attempting to count the number of boos in the stands.

If ARod had only had ten more at-bats, then about 150% of the fans in the stands would have been cheering for him.

I promise you, George A. King III, nobody's perception of Alex Rodriguez has changed because he got into a minivan with his cousin.

I know precisely what the reaction will be tomorrow. Half boos and half cheers.

I hope that shirt is officially licensed merchandise.

Wouldn't want the FBI to track you down:

"Rodriguez walked in his first at-bat, and after he popped up a ball into foul territory on a 2-1 pitch in the fourth, a fan shouted, 'That was a steroid-induced foul ball!' "

Good one!

"A-Rod wasn't fazed by the fan, as he crushed the next pitch over the wall in left-center for his first home run of the spring."

Maybe ARod was fazed by the fan. He was clearly unfazed by the next pitch by the Spring Training Pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays.


Villains generate more revenue than heroes.

When is the last time anybody paid attention to a NYY/Toronto Spring Training game?

Breaking News.

Alex Rodriguez hit a homerun in a Spring Training game.

Breaking News.

Alex Rodriguez walked in a Spring Training game.

I really think most baseball writers simply don't like baseball.

"The next great baseball moment probably will come late in the 2013 season, when Alex Rodriguez hits home run No. 763 and is greeted at home plate, one cheater to another, by Barry Bonds."

The next great baseball moment will come Opening Day.

Not because it's Opening Day, crack of the bat, rebirth of Spring, green grass, blah blah blah.

But simply because there will be a situation with a tie game, two on, two out, seventh inning, 2-2 pitch. What pitch does the pitcher throw, Wallace Matthews? The #3 batter is on deck and the guy at the plate is 0-for-2 with a walk. What pitch does the pitcher throw? The tension is overwhelming. The entire game is probably decided on the outcome of this at-bat and the outcome of this at-bat is decided on the next pitch.

Or maybe somebody turns a sweet 3-6-3 dp.

Great, great baseball moment.


"Best of all, probably, would be if Bonds had to witness A-Rod's historic moment on a special closed-circuit hookup in his jail cell as he serves his stretch for perjury."

That would be best for everyone.

The DJIA fell another two-fitty today and nobody knows where Osama bin Laden is, but we should spend $500k to put Barry Bonds in jail.

Worst of all, Wallace Matthews is so fixated on homeruns, that he doesn't even care about MLB's other perjurers.


"In the week since I spoke with Bud Selig, I have thought long and hard about what the Omissioner can do to right the dreadful wrong he, his players and the players association have committed upon baseball.

After much contemplation, I came up with the answer.

Nothing."

Wow. That seriously required much contemplation? Are you mentally deficient?


I got a riddle for the asterisk crowd.

Let's say Clemens (on steroids) gave up a HR to Chipper Jones (assuming Chipper was on steroids): Does the HR count? Who gets the asterisk? Chipper for hitting the HR? Or does Clemens then get an asterisk if he strikes out Chipper in the next at-bat?

What about singles, doubles, triples, sac flies, and walks?

Why is it that only HRs get asterisks?

I don't mean to mock Matthews's pain, but it's quite clear that Bonds's .600+ on-base% in 2004 was aided by steroids. Where's the love for Ted Williams's single-season on-base% record? Nobody wants an asterisk next to 232 bases on balls?

I mean, you all claim to be Guardians of the Game and whatnot, but you only seem to know about 61, 714, and 755.

Matthews is going to miss a lot of entertaining baseball between now and 2013. But I don't think he enjoys baseball, anyway.

No mention of human growth hormone.

"Pettitte says no, he has no problem with Randy Hendricks and no problem with his deal. He was determined to get the $12 million he thought he was worth, and in the end maybe he paid a price for playing his hand too boldly, but he insists it was worth it for the chance to prove the ugly finish to last season doesn't mean he's one step from being washed up."

Greedy.


" 'Hey, around July last year I thought I was going to win 20 games,' Pettitte was saying Saturday. 'I felt that good. So don't tell me that based on my last 11 or 12 starts I'm done. I had a shoulder problem.' "

Hey, based on the last 11 or 12 starts without the aid of human growth hormone, you're done.

Hey, y'all.

"It's unclear how much more the Yankees would have been willing to guarantee at the end, after Pettitte turned down the $10 million and the Bombers signed Mark Teixeira for $180 million, but the veteran lefty says he opted for the incentives.

'To me, there was principle involved,' Pettitte said."

Naturally.

You're probably the most principled greedy, lying, disloyal cheater on the whole team.

I'll bet John Harper votes Andy Pettitte into the Hall of Fame. Not ARod, though, as we all know.

It's not the most ridiculous idea based on Pettitte's stats (215 wins, .629 winning%, 4 rings, 117 ERA+), but Pettitte's supposed incompetence is now used as an excuse for the public's general disinterest in his cheating.

I've got a few questions for hard-hitting sports journalist John Harper:

How much money should Andy Pettitte give back?

Shouldn't those performance incentives be donated to charity?

Shouldn't Elijah Cummings be knocking down Pettitte's door?

Seriously, what's the deal, John Harper? Are you just in love with Andy Pettitte, or something? You love Andy Pettitte so much that you're willing to ruin your own credibility?

Curt Schilling can say anything he wants.

I am surprised that Curt Schlling's blog is actually quite insightful, forthright, and well-written (now that he's cleaned up his grammar).

I'm late with this post, but it's a good one:

"But now this man is going to act as if he was a ‘victim’ of the same thing we all were? Worse yet, so many of these writers and media members are standing on the tallest mountain shouting to anyone who will listen how wrong all of this is, how bad all of it is, and how dare we players sat by idly and did nothing.

These men were privy to the same scenes we were on a daily basis. They saw us dress, and undress, they rolled their eyes the very same way many players did at the guy who ‘worked his ass off’ when he’d really ‘worked his ass on’ and put on astronomical muscle mass in 4 short months.

They saw hitters go from 18 to 40 home runs, pitchers go from 88 to 90mph, to 95-97mph yet we’re the ones who put our heads in the sand? Weren’t these the men and women with the power of the pen?

(For a player it’s far harder than many think to conclude that guy used PEDs. Not every player who increased his velocity by 5mph or hits 20 more HRs cheats. It’s hard, it’s a challenge, but it can be done, some players have and will continue to do that and they’ll do that clean.)

Hell, Pedro said that he KNEW players who did it for a fact. That makes him 100% more informed about users than I am, or ever was. I suspected, I certainly had my own ideas, but I never knew for a fact that ANYONE used steroids or HGH unless they came out since and admitted it.

What makes Pedro, or any member of the media that was so intent on heaping glory and praise on all things Bonds, McGwire, Sosa and others for ’saving the game’ of baseball in 1997 and 1998, any less culpable?"

The writers, fans, coaches, managers, owners, GMs, commissioner are, in fact, less culpable. Even if they turned a blind eye, they didn't necessarily do the crime.

It's also a bit silly to condemn the reporters whle absolving the teammates who refused to blow the whistle.

But Schlling can condemn ARod all he wants. If Schilling played the game clean during the steroids era, he has at least earned that. A lot of the people who are complaining are the same people who fed their kids with steroid money.

Also, I find this post very interesting because it demonstrates the antagonism between the players and the press. We all subtly know this, but the press warps the truth. They pump up the friendly players and tear down the unfriendly players.

Seriously, is ARod really less forthright than Derek Jeter or Michael Jordan?

Bobby Abreu is the worst-fielding outfielder I've ever seen on a day-by-day basis. He is a joke in the outfield.

Why am I bringing it up?

Because the press seems to have "decided" that Abreu is an adequate outfielder. The same press that has "decided" that ARod is struggling at third base.

In five years at 3b with the Yankees, ARod had a tough three- or four- game stretch where he made five or six errors, including three in one game. The rest of the time, he has often approached Gold Glove caliber.

Last year, Abreu probably gave back 25 runs in the field. So, as far as I'm concerned, he was a $16M corner outfielder who drove in 75 runs.

Stick a mic into Abreu's face every day. Follow him around with cameras. Ask him why his parents named him "Bob" and his nickname is "Bobby" and if this is why he's such a mental wreck who is afraid of walls in the outfield.

What's the "truth" about Abreu? What's the "truth" about ARod?

The "truth" is that the writers dislike ARod and like Abreu. That's it.

Which is why so many fans don't care about the Pedro Gomezes of the world. To us, ARod is neither likeable nor unlikeable. He's .300/40/120 with 20 stolen bases thrown in.

I don't need to spend time in the sweaty locker room watching them, ahem, "dress and undress."

You don't speak for the fans.

You think you speak for the fans, but you really don't:

"We like to think we do everything bigger and better here, especially in sports."

You are making that up.


"But lately it seems as if the only place we've cornered the market in sports is with the biggest pinheads."

I don't know, it's kind of funny. I just saw Barkley praised to high heaven for his sincere apology. He was driving drunk. But it's okay because he seemed sincere while apologizing.

Get a Congressional investigation and a parade of parents whose children were killed by drunk drivers.


"Yankee fans still want the Yankees to be Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera and Jorge Posada. Yankee fans just want to root for their team the way they did when Joe Torre was the manager and the Yankees won the World Series every year."

(Cheater/Liar Andy Pettitte conspicuously missing from the list.)

True, some Yankee fans live in the past. But not nearly as much as the sportswriters who still bring up 1998 on a daily basis.

Actually, forget about 1998. They bring up freakin' Babe Ruth on a daily basis.


Most Yankee fans I know are distressed by ARod's steroid use, but more concerned about the health of Joba and Wang and whether or not Gardner can hit well enough to handle CF.

Also, I'd like to point out that the Torre-era Yankee teams had steroid cheats. So, Lupica's point seems to be, "Fans would rather bury their heads in the sand and root for cheaters, as long as they don't know about it."

Kind of like a fool who'd write a book about the 1998 HR race.


"But now Rodriguez keeps getting in the way. To root for their team, Yankee fans have to root for A-Rod, who doesn't just admit to using steroids but then answers questions about that as well as he hits in the playoffs."

ARod answered more questions about steroids than any baseball player ever, except Jose Canseco.

As for his playoff hitting, it's not as bad as you think.


"Rodriguez is supposed to hit 800 home runs in the big leagues before he is through, hit more than Babe Ruth or Henry Aaron or Barry Bonds, and guess what?"

Babe Ruth. Nice.


"The Yankees would have to pick up half his salary, or more, to get rid of him."

That, I doubt.

This fury will settle down as long as he hits well.

The Yankees might miss the playoffs with ARod, but they'd almost certainly miss the playoffs without ARod. The guy has always been worth the investment, and still is.


"The truly amazing thing is that guys like A-Rod expect people to go back to rooting for them no matter what they've done or how pathetically they've explained themselves - or even how much they've lied - as long as they produce."

You miss the point entirely, don't you?

If ARod didn't produce, you wouldn't care. If ARod didn't produce, you wouldn't write stories about him every week. If ARod didn't produce, you wouldn't know his name.

I mean, you can win an MVP in this league and admit to taking steroids and nobody even pays attention because they're so focused on ARod.

You can win two MVPs in this league while taking steroids and nobody even pays attention to you because they're so focused on ARod.

Why?

One reason: ARod is a better player.


Kei Igawa has never lied to you and he's never appeared on any steroid list. As far as I know, Kei Igawa is a strong family man.

Of course, I don't care. Because he can't play baseball too well.

So, where's the Lupica article about Kei Igawa?


Go write a retrospective on the greatest Family Men in New York baseball. How's Craig Wilson's son doing? Did he graduate college yet? Awww, that's sweet. You seem like a nice guy. But you can't play for us anymore because you hit .212. Sorry!

I challenge anybody to tell me if Jose Molina is married or to describe his latest hairstyle. That's the Yankee starting catcher from last year. Bet you don't know anything about him, and you don't care.


ARod, you have permission to lie to me all you want. In fact, you don't have to ever speak to me again. You can frost your hair and divorce your wife and say contradictory things to Joel Sherman.

But if you hit .240 this year with 18 HRs, you're dead to me.

I'll take that bet.

Wallace Matthews thinks the Yankees won't win the World Series one time in the next nine years:

"Like every other team that has employed A-Rod, the Yankees have yet to win a thing with him, and it is hard to believe they ever will."

ARod has been in the playoffs seven times, four times with the Yankees. So, while he has not won a World Series ring, he has helped his teams win.

I guarantee Matthews said the same thing about Clemens.


"For everything he adds to a team, he takes away that much more ..."

Wrong.


"Understand, this is not a media-created frenzy. It is solely an A-Rod Production, starting with his decision in 2001 to puncture his legacy with a syringe right up to his disingenuous and dishonest news conference Tuesday at which he promised to lay this all to rest."

So, the ARod obsession started when you learned about steroids? It has been a two-week problem?

I think it's quite obvious that the media has been obsessed with ARod for a long time and that most of that coverage has been negative. That's why I don't think much has changed since his steroid revelations.

That's also why the outrage often sounds hollow. Tejada, Sheffield, Santiago, and about 100 other baseball players get a pass.

You always hated ARod. Everyone knows it. (Funny how Pettitte's apology sounded "sincere," or something, especially since Pettitte didn't give 1/10th the information that ARod gave.)

You were frenzied when ARod took off his shirt in Central Park. You were frenzied when ARod got a divorce. You were frenzied when ARod grounded into a double play in a playoff game.

ARod, ARod, ARod, ARod.

The level of outrage for steroid use isn't much different than the level of outrage for the World Series opt-out announcment.


"As usual, he leaves a mess behind for his GM, his manager and his teammates to clean up."

Answer some stupid questions from stupid sportswriters. Then, go out and play winning baseball. Then, answer more stupid questions from stupid sportswriters.

Like every other working human being in the world, you won't like all of your coworkers.

I don't see the problem.

ARod draws all the negative attention and Teixeira won't get booed if he hits .211 in April.

Burn it down.

"Now, there are fair and absolutely reasonable arguments to be made that a) writers shouldn't be the ones voting for the Hall of Fame; and b) that a players' character and integrity shouldn't be part of the Hall of Fame process. Those arguments still wouldn't change the fact that these are the realities of the Hall of Fame process currently, and for the foreseeable future.

So, barring any modifications to the Hall of Fame ballot language, Rodriguez finds himself in an excruciating position. Sympathizers will almost surely fall back on the 'he was a Hall of Famer before and after he cheated' excuse, but such logic is irrational. Imagine a high school student, who is caught cheating on just one of the six tests he takes in a semester. The student gets a zero for that test and, even if he gets a perfect score on the other five exams, the best he can do for an overall grade is an 83. That's a B-minus."

Huh?

What does that have to do with a baseball player who hits 800 homeruns?

"In Rodriguez's case, his admitted cheating means he gets a zero on at least the integrity portion of the ballot, and all the home runs and RBI in the world can't change that. Even if you wanted to grade him perfectly on the other five categories, that zero has to be counted. And the Hall of Fame isn't a place for 83s. It isn't a place for B-minuses."

Oh, gee.

For one thing, I've know from the people in the Hall of Fame, and some of them are certainly B-minuses. I mean, Bill Mazeroski turned a super-quick double play and hit .260.

Secondly, I have an easy way to fix your imaginary grading system. Just grade on a weighted scale, where baseball-playing ability counts the highest. Since it's the baseball Hall of Fame.

Or, you could just grade on a curve. Jackie Robinson gets an A. Sammy Sosa gets an F, because he corked hit bat and took steroids. Everybody else gets a C.

The problem with the morals clause is that it's too late to start selectively enforcing it.

I know I am being redundant, but I want to show you three examples of the type of people whose plaques grace the walls of the MLB Hall of Fame:

• Ty Cobb was not only allowed in the Hall of Fame, he was a member of the inaugural class. Want to read something hilarious about Ty Cobb?: "In a May 15 game against the Highlanders, Cobb's ears were burning from the continuous insults of a fan sitting behind the dugout. When Cobb could take no more, he charged into the stands and beat the fan senseless." Many accounts claim the fan had no hands. Good stuff for the kids of America.
• Cap Anson was inducted a few years later. Few remember his batting average. However, "His contemporary influence and prestige are regarded by historians as playing a major role in establishing the racial segregation in professional baseball that persisted until the late 1940s. On several occasions, Anson refused to take the field when the opposing roster included black players."
  
• Gaylord Perry's book, "Me and the Splitter," was published in 1974. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1991.
  

It's the baseball Hall of Fame. It ain't Heaven ... and Sam Borden ain't St. Peter.

I'm glad I'm not Mike Vaccaro.

"At the end of the day, what really matters most, for now and forever, is that he can fall asleep at night, that he can look himself in the mirror, that he can say, with utmost certainty, serenity and confidence, that he was true to himself and honest to himself, regardless of whatever mistakes he may or may not have made."

At the end of the day, what really matters most, now and forever, eternally and for perpetuity, older than the mountains and the seven oceans, older than the sun in the sky, is to cram as many cliches into one run-on sentence, trying to fit as many clauses, as humanly possible, between periods, even though this approximates the stylistic efficacy one might expect from a five-year-old.


"Can he do that now, after this press conference that served as a public confessional box?"

Ummm ... I'm not sure.

What was he supposed to do, again?


"I would have a tough time. But I am not Alex Rodriguez. And the more time goes on, the more people have to be grateful thay [sic] they aren't either."

Hey, Updike, this is one time you should have used a comma, rather than start a sentence with "and."


I think a lot of people would trade their penniless, fraudulent lives for ARod's $450 million, fraudulent life.


It's quite possible that Mike Vaccaro is a better person than Alex Rodriguez. But it's also quite possible that he isn't.

Vaccaro has never made a mistake? Vaccaro has never lied? Vaccaro can sleep at night?

I hope he can sleep at night. I wouldn't wish him any ill will.

He must have an extra-large pillow to accommodate his swelled head.

Hitting.

"Ultimately he does that by hitting, not with another rehearsed performance. Hitting is the only thing that has ever made Rodriguez interesting. That doesn’t change no matter how many handlers he has. Take the bat out of his hands and he is about as much of a sparking personality as Kobe Bryant is when he isn’t shooting jump shots or dunking the ball. A-Rod could hire 100 talent agents and spokesmen and not be Tiger Woods or LeBron James."

Close.

It's the combination of hitting, fielding, and running that make ARod interesting.

But it makes me wonder why you spend so much time pondering ARod's pointless press conferences and postgame activities.


By the way, Tiger Woods is uninteresting except when he's golfing and LeBron James is uninteresting except when he's playing basketball. Unless you're a 12-year-old.

You're not fooling anyone.

"Ortiz also says he feels fine after wrist problems last season limited him to 23 homers. He says he took a few months off from swinging and felt a little strange when he started doing it again. But now he says he feels fine."

Right.

It was the wrist.

You looked a lot slimmer on the TV. Probably because of the wrist. Also, you looked a lot slimmer when you played in Minnesota. Probably because of the wrist.

It brings to mind a saying about glass houses ...

" 'He’s a young man and he has a special chance to do a lot of special things numbers-wise. But now they’re going to be tainted. People don’t forget.' "

Now, look, I don't think the Yankees have anything in particular to apologize for.

The teams they beat were (are) on 'roids and the teams that beat them were (are) on 'roids.

Clearly, the Torre-era Yankees had players on steroids and those players helped Torre win rings and, without those rings, he doesn't make the Hall of Fame.

If ARod's numbers are tainted, then so are Torre's rings.


"Torre said he was unaware of any drug use by players on his successful Yankees teams."

You are a so-called player's manager.

You noticed what kind of jeans ARod wore. You know the names of all their children and their wive's birthdays. You explained to Tom Verducci the degree to which ARod nervously fiddled with jewelry.

You were (are) conveniently unaware of any drug use by any of your players?

Yet, you're so observant, you think you're qualified to write a book about Life in the Clubhouse.


I believe, deep in my heart, that Torre truly is saddened by the revelations of ARod's steroid use. Torre is sad that his book got pushed out of the headlines.

Pete Rose interviewed by Mike Francesa.

Pete Rose on ARod: "We all make mistakes, and I'm the kind of person who is willing to forgive."


Mike Francesa: "If steroids were prevalent in your time, would a lot of players have used them?"

"Prevalent" means a lot of people are using them.

I don't do anything about it ...

... so the horse I'm climbing on can't really be too high. But this guy is probably proud of himself. Going after cheaters by cheating:

"Three federal judges reviewed the raid. One asked, incredulously, if the Fourth Amendment had been repealed. Another, Susan Illston, who has presided over the BALCO trials, called Novitzky's actions a 'callous disregard' for constitutional rights. All three instructed him to return the records. Instead, Novitzky kept the evidence, reviewed the results and received clearance from an appeals court to pursue 103 MLB players who, those records revealed, had tested positive for steroids. (That investigation is pending another appeals court decision, expected this fall.)

...

Now the Novitzky era reaches a climax with the March 2 trial. Whatever the verdict, Bonds' reputation has been ruined. And since U.S. attorney general Eric Holder and President Obama have said leagues—not governments—should police steroids, Novitzky's crusade will likely end. And that leaves a question for the rest of us to ask: Was it really worth it?"

Posnanski hits a grand slam.

Posnanski nailed the ARod "confession," referring to is as an "infomercial."

This is probably the wisest thing I've ever seen written by a sportswriter:

"Meanwhile, the Hall of Fame is filled with people who admitted to using drugs (Paul Molitor, Ferguson Jenkins, etc.), who willingly cheated (Gaylord Perry threw spitballs, Don Sutton and Whitey Ford cut baseballs, players undoubtedly corked bats), who enthusiastically used illegal performance-enhancers (that would be anyone who ever popped an amphetamine to get a boost, and it's likely that represents a high percentage of Hall of Famers) and so on.

...

Point is: It's the Baseball Hall of Fame. That's all. Are people coming to visit the Baseball Hall of Fame without some of the greatest players of the last 20 years? Will people still view it seriously? I sort of doubt it. Baseball has been a messy game for more than 100 years. In the years before Jackie Robinson, there were no black players. Players caroused and gambled and boozed. Many cheated to get ahead. Many took drugs. There have been beanballs and stolen signals and thrown bats. There have been thugs and racists and liars and everything else. And, yes, there have been steroid users, too.

The Hall of Fame voters can try to sort through that jumble and pull out only the sportsmen with integrity and character. We can try. But we will fail. Seems to me that sportswriters are pretty good at judging what's a hit and what's an error. Not great at it. But pretty good. Anyway, we should probably stick with that."

Carlos Delgado took steroids, too.

This is not a defense of ARod just because he's a Yankee or because I root for him. I'm not trying to blameshift. It's just a guess:

"Well, if A-Rod says it's okay to throw out his three Texas years because they were only ones in which he was doing bad things to inflate his numbers, that means we can erase 156 homers from his record. Bogus as Bonds' all-time record of 762 homers may be, it's the one in the books."

That is an impossible thing to say. ARod has to adjust his stats, but Bonds does not. You're saying Bonds's HRs are bogus and then you're defending them at the same time ... in the same sentence.


"So under the new A-Rod math, it would seem he's going to need to hit an additional 156 homers on top of the 762 in order for the all-time record to be completely pure and clean again."

It will still be bogus. But it will be the one in the books.


"Just wondering: Is this the way the Yankees will try to sell it? That their man isn't satisfied with breaking the all-time record with the benefit of tainted homers and, has instead, established an even more formidable mountain to climb for himself? All in the name of integrity."

Mr. Madden, are you really wondering about that?

I'm going to go wild here and guess that will not be the way the Yankees try to sell it.


"As long as Rodriguez is conceding that his 2001-03 seasons shouldn't count, do you suppose perhaps he might want to put a call in to Carlos Delgado and offer him his 2003 Most Valuable Player award? A-Rod won it with 47 homers and 118 RBI for a last-place Texas team while Delgado, who finished second, 29 points behind, had 42 homers and a league-leading 145 RBI for the third-place Toronto Blue Jays."

So, you're that confident in Delgado?

That's kind of weird.

I'm all for innocent until proven guilty. Which is why the baseball players should not have been tested in the first place.

But I'd take even odds that Delgado took steroids.

What's the beef?

"Certainly $200 million buys a lot. Not a bullpen. The Yankees could run into the same problem as last season with this bunch of characters: Damaso Marte, Brian Bruney, Jonathan Albaladejo and Edwar Ramirez."

Bruney's ERA last year was 1.83.

Ramirez's ERA last year was 3.90 and he had 63 strikeouts in 58 innings.

Marte wasn't great, but will likely be better.

Alabadejo only threw 14 innings.

The bullpen will be Rivera, Bruney, Ramirez, Coke (0.61 ERA), Aceves (2.40 ERA), and Marte. Something like that.

It's a good bullpen.

Yankees are synonymous with ... integrity.

Integrity must be their third tenet.

I mean, look, ARod's cheating sure ain't good. But, unfortunately, it sure ain't new:

"Everybody’s All-American turned out to be a two-bit cheat whose talents were exaggerated – if not created – in a chemist’s lab."

I like that, too: "Everybody's All-American."

ARod has been the most hated player in baseball since 2001.

Over the course of two days, he's re-imagined as a shining knight who was supposed to save baseball.


"In the real world, the Yankees would do what employers always do when they discover an employee has deceived them. They’d fire Rodriguez. Fire him and fight him over the balance of the absurd wages they never should’ve given him in the first place."

Evidently, you know nothing about the real world.


If ARod's stats are solely built on 'roids a la Giambi, then O'Connor sort of has a point. The Yankees paid for 40/120 and got 22/75. It could be a major problem.

I suspect ARod will still put up massive numbers and the Yankees will sell out every game. Time will tell if the contract is worth it. Please don't act like the performance on the baseball field doesn't count. That's precisely what he's paid to do.

Giambi is a criminal because he couldn't even bat .250.


"What a crying shame. At a time of epic unemployment, a multimillionaire who deserves to lose his job will keep it."

I was thinking the same thing about a hack columnist for something called NorthJersey.com ... sans the multimillionaire part.

You're guilty of taking steroids.

"It was such a loosey-goosey ear, I'm guilty of being negligent, naive, not asking all the right questions. To be quite honest, I don't know exactly what substances I was guilty of using."

Should that read, "loosey-goosey year"? What's a loosey-goosey ear?


I'm naive.

That's not against the law.

No prescription required to be naive.

I thought I was ARod's biggest fan ...

It appears otherwise:

"In baseball, we love our numbers. And we love our heroes. And that brings us to Alex Rodriguez, a man who has committed a crime he doesn't even understand:

A crime against the once-proud history of his sport."

This history is prouder than ever. Aaron and Maris were booed by their contemporaries, but now they're more popular than ever.


"But they knew what the number 60 meant. They knew what 61 meant. They knew who Babe Ruth was. And they knew this was a phenomenon that linked Mark McGwire to the Bambino, that linked now to then, that linked this America to that America.

That's what the home run record used to mean in our land.

That's what baseball used to mean.

But not anymore.

And that's the crime here. That's the tragedy. That's what we've lost.

We've lost the opportunity for Alex Rodriguez to restore that: the meaning. The relevance. The power. The romance.

He held that opportunity in his hands. And now it's gone.

He was the one man on the planet with the chance to resuscitate the greatest record in sports. He was the one man on the planet with the chance to rebuild his sport's sacred bridge to the glory days."

What the heck is the matter with you people?

If it bothers you so much, then hitch your hopes and dreams to Albert Pujols. Or Ryan Howard. Or Evan Longoria.

Maybe Josh Hamilton will ... what is it he's going to do? ... he's going to "rebuild the sport's sacred bridge to the glory days."

If he takes enough amphetamines to help him get the competitive edge. Since steroids are illegal.

Let's suppose one of these players breaks Bonds's record and does it without steroids.

So freakin' what? What does that prove? Steroids were never used in baseball? Or we just can conveniently ignore their existence?

Contempt of court.

Should we complain about Valerie Plame, you putz?:

"Don't forget that the most important informant in American history -- W. Mark Felt, aka Deep Throat -- took down a president in part because he didn't receive the promotion he wanted. Nobody complained then, because the information he leaked was legitimate.

For the same reasons, nobody should complain now."

Deep Throat was violating a court order? I was unaware of that.


MLB players clearly use steroids and have cheated for decades. A relatively small segment of the population is wringing their hands because their preferred form of entertainment has been tainted or because they want to protect Aaron's HR record or because children have lost another role model.

It's worse when lawyers cheat. That affects all of us. Nice lesson for the kids.

Bonds, Clemens, ARod, McGwire are all unpunished in the real courts.

Unable to get the desired results, the lawyers respond by cheating, by trying their case anonymously in the Court of Public Opinion.

Somehow, when weighed about the Constitution of the United States, Aaron's precious HR record seems a bit unimportant.

I'm guessing he said the same thing about Giambi.

I'm more convinced than ever that ARod hits 40/120 this year and 6 HRs in the World Series:

"Now that A-Rod's pursuit looks as counterfeit as Bonds', they should do what's best for the organization:

Cut him loose - no matter the cost.

As difficult as it is to imagine eating $270 million, the Bombers will be making a statement, not just for the Yankee brand but for baseball as a whole.

They will be applauded for it."

They will be applauded the most by the team who picks up ARod on the cheap.

How have the Giants done since ridding themselves of Barry Bonds? The Giants won 72 games last year. The players really responded well without the distraction.


"The Yankees operate under two basic tenets: The relentless pursuit of championships and the fierce protection of their brand. If they are going to remain true to both, then they have no choice but to sever ties with Rodriguez."

Get rid of 120 RBIs because that will help you win the championship.


As for the Yankee brand, I like how ARod is the last straw, but Giambi, Pettitte, Sheffield, Clemens, Stanton, Canseco, IRod, and Matt Lawton were not.


I can't wait for ARod to win the World Series MVP.

Richard Justice makes it too easy.

Richard Justice on ARod:

"In the end, it doesn't matter how much he cheated or even when he cheated. That's the thing about cheating. When you're caught cheating one time, you're a cheat for all-time. So you say you used steroids just a couple of times? Really? Until you got caught, you said you'd never used steroids. Why should we believe anything you say now?"


Richard Justice a year ago on Pettitte:

"Andy Pettitte did the honorable thing. He didn't do it willingly, but he did do it. Good for him.

He's about to find out that he's living in a forgiving country and that fans want to move on from steroids and human growth hormone. That's going to be difficult to do as long as some players hide behind lawyers and owners play dumb.

Those who know Pettitte aren't surprised that he did what he did Saturday afternoon. He may never get all of his reputation back, but he took a small step in the right direction.

Here's hoping others are paying attention. If Pettitte had denied using performance-enhancing substances, it would have been virtually impossible not to believe him."


Richard Justice is not the decider. It's just that this sort of hypocrisy is not uncommon. If Bonds and ARod are defensive and paranoid, it's because they should be.

Lean muscle.

Maybe this explains why ARod doesn't really look like a steroid user:

"Primobolan is known by the chemical name methenolone. It is taken orally or through injection and is considered 'safe' because it has relatively few side effects. It is also considered one of the most expensive steroids. It improves strength and maintains lean muscle without developing excess bulk."

ARod's body has changed since 1996. Everybody's body has changed since 1996, especially if you're continually hitting the gym. Personally, I don't perceive any kind of freakish change.


Was ARod still using steroids in 2007 when he hit 54 HRs?

Is it possible he was still using in 2007?

I don't see how it's possible, but he already fooled me.


It's not a small point. If he completely collapses and becomes Edgardo Alfonzo or Miguel Tejada or Brady Anderson, then his career will be dismissed. If he cranks out 40/120 this year when he's (presumably) clean, then his reputation can certainly be salvaged.

My personal nightmare is not the damage to ARod's reputation or MLB's reputation. My personal nightmare is a 3B making $27.5M while hitting 14 HRs.

Jim Rice was mean to the sportswriters and claims that's why it took him so long to get into the Hall of Fame.

"If you ask me, A-Rod was probably going to have problems with a lot of the writers on the character and sportsmanship issues, but his numbers would be just too overwhelming to deny him election to the Hall."

Gee, ya think his numbers get him into the Hall of Fame?

Even though us writers really dislike ARod, I guess we'd have no choice but to put him into the Hall of Fame. Because he hit 800 homeruns. Shucks. Kind of makes us feel powerless.


"Now, however, in light of the report that he tested positive for steroids in 2003, those numbers can no longer be believed, and it comes down to the matter of integrity. Until now, only A-Rod's persona wreaked of insincerity, and that wasn't enough to deny him a place in Cooperstown. Having his record suddenly deemed invalid is something else entirely."

I'm happy to hear that his persona of insincerity wasn't quite enough to deny him a place in Cooperstown.

That's really amazing to me.

Jeter is insincere.

Ripken is insincere.

Torre is as insincere as a person can possibly be, contradicting himself four times in the course of one sentence. Writing a book with Tom Verducci and then going on a promotional tour claiming that the book was written on Opposite Day, so everything he said to Verducci was the opposite of what he really meant (that joke courtesy of Steve Somers).


Do you know how many cheaters are in the freakin' Hall of Fame?

You writers are all cowards, I'm serious.

If Nolan Ryan threw one spitball, I want his plaque taken down.


"Even if the Sports Illustrated report is not further substantiated and denied by all the parties involved in baseball, A-Rod - who already had enough character and sincerity issues - has been irrevocably tarnished for life. He can continue to amass Hall-of-Fame caliber numbers, but he's not going there anymore than McGwire, Bonds, Clemens and the rest of the cheats who stained the game are going there."

That makes no sense.

If the SI report is unsubstantiated, then ... well, use logic to figure out the new conclusion.


Look, MLB will never have its Day of Reckoning.

The writers will never get the clean break they're looking for.

Madden is claiming that ARod's baseball achievements have been "irrevocably tarnished for life" and Madden is basing this claim on anonymous sources. I don't necessarily doubt the sources, but I know for a fact that their actions were illegal and I don't know if they had any particular axe to grind.

Madden's stance is quite absurd, and it's also quite lazy.

You're a HOF voter and your responsibility is sort through the conflicting data and try to determine whether a player is worthy.

I could be completely wrong about ARod, but I truly don't believe his career is built on steroids. I'd put him into the HOF without hesitation. Of course, he'd take his rightful place among many other cheaters who were also great ballplayers.

I was surprised.

"Were you shocked? Was anybody? Rodriguez will never completely get back his clean image - he has no one to blame but himself for that - but coming clean is a good place to start."

I was surprised for three reasons:

1) His power numbers are consistent.

2) His body and face don't look particularly pumped up.

3) His body hasn't suddenly broken down like Garciaparra, Giambi, and others.


Assuming he's guilty, then contrition doesn't make him any less guilty.

I am not quite sure the Pettitte strategy would work for ARod. People don't generally like ARod and people generally like Pettitte.

If you can remember as far back as yesterday, then you should remember that his image was already shot.

(103 others.)

I'm only kidding, I'm only kidding. I know we only care about the cheaters who actually perform well on the field.

One overrated fraud sticks up for another.

"But Torre is not less a Yankee because of this book, he has not somehow diminished his own Yankee legend, he hasn't changed his status as someone who became more the face of the New York Yankees than any manager in the history of the team."

I don't know about that last part.


"There was a morning a few years ago when I sat with him in the visiting manager's office at Roger Dean Stadium in Jupiter, Fla., before a spring training game. He had been telling stories that day about Warren Spahn, and talking about a dinner he'd had the night before at a restaurant we both knew in Jupiter, called Carmine's."

Torre is a legend, this is true. A figment of the collective imagination. A myth.

The man who is still "classy" and "gentlemanly," even though the existence of this book proves otherwise. Its content also proves that he wasn't even a very good manager.

Nice Warren Spahn stories, though, I'm quite sure.

"That day the subject came back around to something people had said about Joe Torre for a long time, even after his team had stopped winning the World Series, about how he made it harder than it had ever been for people to be Yankee haters.

'I don't think it was just me,' Torre said that day. 'I think we made it harder for people to hate the Yankees.' "

Yuck.

Lots of speculation that you didn't bunt on an injured Schilling because you didn't want people to hate you. Or maybe that's why you didn't pull the team off the field when they were attacked by bugs in Cleveland.

If your opponents don't hate you, you're doing something wrong.

Maybe you lost sight of the prize.

Of course Torre belongs in the Hall of Fame because he got four rings. Does anybody really care about the manager's wing? Peter Gammons is in the sportswriter's wing and they may as well put Freddie Sez in the fan's wing.


Of course the Yankees should retire Torre's number in Monument Park. He's very popular, and that's the most important determinant.

As for Torre's importance in winning those four rings, he's far behind lots of other people: Mariano Rivera, Derek Jeter, Paul O'Neill, Bernie Williams, Scott Brosius, Tino Martinez, Andy Pettitte, Chuck Knoblauch, David Wells, David Cone, Orlando Hernandez, Jim Leyritz, and forgotten World Series MVP John Wetteland.

Basically, if you threw a pitch or hit a ball, you were actually more important than Joe Torre.

I'd retire all of their numbers.

Why not?

Monument Park is already watered down enough with Billy Martin, Reggie Jackson, Don Mattingly, Ron Guidry, Roger Maris, etc.

You've got to wonder what Graig Nettles, Roy White, Willie Randolph, Dave Winfield, Rickey Henderson, and Bob Lemon are thinking.

For the first time, I'm in favor of a salary cap in baseball.

The follow-up questions that will never be asked.

Torre: "I always tried to make Alex [Rodriguez] feel comfortable in New York."

Felz: "Then why did you bat him 8th in a playoff game?"


Torre: "I thought Bernie could have been an effective pinch-hitting presence off the bench."

Felz: "Are you aware that Bernie Williams is one of the worst pinch-hitters ever? I think he batted well under .200 as a pinch-hitter."

1996-2001.

The Yankees lost the World Series in 2001. They almost won, but they lost. Kind of like the Yankees in 2003, when the team consisted of selfish, lazy mercenaries like Giambi, Sierra, and Contreras leading the way.

When people talk about the success and toughness of the Torre-era Yankees, why is 2001 included?

Just for accuracy's sake, it should be the 1996-2000 Yankees, even though the 2001 Yankee roster included O'Neill, Tino, and Brosius.

Four Ring Club.

" 'I think his ego's gotten so big that he thinks he can do no wrong,' a Yankees source said. 'And the Dodgers winning the division was the last straw. I think he truly believed he had the Midas touch, that he could do no wrong.'

Instead, Torre may have committed the one sin the Yankees find virtually impossible to forgive.

'The same thing he was so upset with Wells and Jose Canseco about, he did himself,' the source said. 'He violated the sanctity of the organization, the sanctity of the clubhouse. He broke the trust we had in him.' "

One of the weirdest defenses of Torre's book is that everybody knew this information already. Well, if that's the case, then why write a book, and why would anybody bother buying the book?

Also, the source is everything. I can make fun of my brother, but you can't.

Also, he's currently the manager of the Dodgers.

Torre definitely has the "right" to say whatever he wants. Nobody is suing him or putting him in jail. But, just like he has the "right" to say whatever he wants, everyone else has the right to call him a fraud and a punk.

Here's a guy who likes to dish it out, but sure isn't used to taking it.

Joel Sherman takes off the gloves.

My only gripe is that this sort of negative analysis is years late.

I sort of understand why writers don't criticize their subject. They need access. But the price they pay for that access is credibility.

To be fair, it's quite possible that Sherman has mentioned this stuff in the past and it just seems more harsh because it's all concentrated in one place.

But my guess is that the writers are all pouncing on Torre now because Torre is in LA.

I'm not actually keeping score ...

... but I think Lupica is the last pro-Torre holdout.

Even Peter Abraham has joined the Winning Team:

"When the smoke clears, the supposedly gory details of The Yankee Years will prove not so gory. Book publicists are good at what they do and some reporters are only too glad to take a baited hook. It beats actually doing any work.

But Torre clearly traded some secrets for money. Nobody wanted to read another warm tale about his brother in surgery or Don Zimmer cracking jokes, so Joe and Tom Verducci threw a few players and team executives into the fire.

...

It just never ends well. Maybe it’s the money that saps them of their dignity. For others it’s the attention or the lifestyle. But our heroes so rarely walk away at the right time. They kick and scream and claw.

Don’t fool yourself into thinking it will change. It could get very ugly when Derek Jeter’s contract expires. Or if Mo decides he want to keep pitching in 2011. You want to be the guy who tells Posada he can’t catch anymore? Wear his mask when you break that news.

Torre is not the best person I ever covered. I had more pleasant one-on-one conversations with Joe Girardi in a month last season than I had with Torre in a year But Torre understood how his job related to my job better than anybody else. Readers benefited from that. Once again, he is showing how well he knows the media landscape. Torre picked a great writer and served up the details that will sell books by the truckload. The convertible he drives around in those commercials couldn’t stay on the high road."

I know it's the off-season, but shouldn't the manager of the Dodgers be doing Dodger-Managery stuff?

Talk about a phony.

Mr. Torre, I will give you $100 right now if you can name the teams in the NL West:

" 'I don't think I said anything about A-Rod that I didn't say already.' Torre is the co-author of the book, but it contains both his thoughts and independent reporting, according to Verducci.

Torre told the Times that 'knowing that my name is on it, I know I'm going to have to answer for it.'

He later told the Times: 'I'm comfortable with what I contributed to the book, even though I'm probably going to get more credit or more blame than I deserve, whichever way you want to look at it.' "

I must say, for a man who didn't throw one pitch or get one hit during the Yankees' late-'90s success, I think you know from getting more credit than you deserve.

I am not worried about Mariano Rivera's shoulder.

"The Yankees are a sure thing to win it all, the way they have been in a lot of baseball winters, unless you are worried about Jorge Posada's shoulder, Mo Rivera's shoulder, the outfield defense and no center fielder."

Hey, Mr. Snooty, the Yankees never said they were a sure thing.

Also, I'd like to point out that you have expressed concern about Mariano Rivera every single season since 1996.

Every year, I take the opposite view and every year I am right and you are wrong.

One year, you will be right.

It won't count.

Put his face on Mount Rushmore.

He's still the classiest person in the history of the world.

If "classy" means childish, petty, hypocritical, self-absorbed punk.

They ought to get Grady Sizemore.

"Playing center field for the Yankees is one of the most hallowed jobs in sports, sort of like being the tailback at USC or linebacker for the Pittsburgh Steelers."

I always think of Dave Collins and Omar Moreno. But that's just me.


"Multiple Hall of Famers, including two of the biggest names in baseball history in Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle, have roamed center in pinstripes, and All-Stars such as Bernie Williams, Bobby Murcer and Mickey Rivers once owned the position, too."

Mickey Rivers was an All Star one time. He was often replaced by Paul Blair for defensive reasons.


"But in 2009 - if team executives are to be believed - the Yankees will take a different approach. Rather than filling center with a star, Brett Gardner, an unproven rookie, and Melky Cabrera, last season’s flop, will compete for the job when spring training opens next month. "

Different approach compared to what?

Melky Cabrera has been the Yankees' starting center fielder for almost three full seasons. Last year, he was benched and replaced by Brett Gardner. Bernie Williams hasn't played a lot of CF since 2002.

So, the hallowed ground has showcased Charles Gipson, Karim Garcia, Kenny Lofton, Bubba Crosby, and my personal favorite, Tony Womack.

Put another way: Bernie Williams is certainly a worthy successor to the Yankee CF greats. Bernie is a very strong HOF candidate. But he stopped putting up HOF numbers after the 2002 season.

The Yankees have not had a premier CFer since 2002.

What exactly is different in 2009?


"And, historically, high-level talent in center has been an integral part of Yankee success.

The last time the Yankees won the World Series without a big-name player as their primary center fielder was 1943 - DiMaggio was in the Army Air Forces that year because of World War II and Roy Weatherly (68 games), Johnny Lindell (55 games) and Tuck Stainback (43 games) split the position."

Well, okay, if you insist. It sure can't hurt to have players like Mickey Mantle and Joe Dimaggio.

I adored Mick the Quick. I even twirled my wiffle bat when I hit a foul ball. But he was absolutely not a superstar CFer.


In any case, the entire argument is moot.

Let's say the Yankees really need a superstar in CF. How are they going to get a superstar CFer?

I mean, the only replacement who is even mentioned is Mike Cameron, who pretty much stinks.

Middle Infielders.

"Not sure if you saw it, but former Met great Jeff Kent retired yesterday. Now we ask, is he a Hall of Famer?

There’s a guy who works here at The Daily News who insists Kent is Cooperstown bound. No doubt about it, he says. I hear the same sentiment on radio and TV. Believe it or not, I disagree."

I don't believe it.


"Kent has 74 more homers than Ryne Sandberg, a Hall of Famer, who, until Kent broke it, held the record for HRs by a second baseman. If you judge him solely as a second baseman, he’s in, no questions asked."

He should be judged as a second baseman because never regularly played any other position. But he's hardly a definitive HOFer, "no questions asked."

This is a very odd argument.

I don't know where this is heading.


"But I say Kent cannot be looked at as a second baseman, especially in this day and age where middle infielders all over baseball are putting up numbers usually posted by outfielders and third baseman."

Thirty teams, two middle infielders per team. That's sixty middle infielders, more or less. I can think of three who put up big power numbers: Ramirez, Utley, and Uggla.

ARod doesn't play shortstop anymore. Tejada and Garciaparra used to put up big numbers.

You know how many shortstops had 100 RBIs last year? Zero.


"We have to start judging players - other than catchers - as all part of the same pool. Is Nomar Garciaparra a Hall of Famer because he put up big numbers at shortstop?"

Unbelievable. He's actually comparing Kent to Garciaparra.

The precise reason Kent is a HOFer and Garciaparra is not is because Kent did it for a long time. Kent is a second baseman who accumulated 1,500 RBIs. Garciaparra only has 920 RBIs, maybe 700 as a shortstop.


"Kent was never a great fielder. He had to hide somewhere and most teams chose to put him at second base."

That makes no sense at all. That is completely illogical and uninformed.


"Albert Belle has more homers (381) than Kent. Is he a Hall of Famer?"

I think Belle is a HOFer, but you can't compare him to Kent, because he played OF while Kent played 2B.


"Gary Sheffield has more homers (499), hits (2,615) and RBIs (1,633) than Kent. Is he a Hall of Famer?"

Yes, of course Sheffield is a HOFer. But again, you're comparing and OFer to a 2B. It's not a fair comparison and you keep saying it is and every time you do it you are wrong.


"Andres Gallarraga (399), Dale Murphy (398), Joe Carter (396), Jason Giambi (396), Vlad Guerrero (392), Graig Nettles (390), Dwight Evans (385), Harold Baines (384), Larry Walker (383) and Matt Williams (378) all have more homers than Kent. Only Guerrero has a legit shot to make it to Cooperstown."

Zero second baseman in the list.

Oh, and Larry Walker will probably make the HOF. Jeff Kent, too.

I know it was cold, but ...

"One year ago, this weekend, Eli Manning had one of the greatest performances by a quarterback I’ve ever seen, in miserable conditions in Green Bay in the NFC championship game."

21-for-40, 254 yards, 0 TD, 0 INT.

That is one of the greatest performances by a quarterback that Ralph Vacchiano has ever seen.


"The Giants are going to have little choice here. Prices go up and a year ago the Steelers made Ben Roethlisberger the seventh member of the Million Dollar Quarterback Club when they handed him an eight-year, $102 million deal with $36 million in guarantees."

I think you mean "seventh member of the Hundred Million Dollar Quarterback Club."

But it's funny that you wrote "seventh member of the Million Dollar Quarterback Club."

As if only six NFL QBs make a million dollars.


As for your NFL QB observances: I think Jim Kelly played about 300 regular season games, and if he ever went 21-for-40 for 254 yards, he would have quite football on the spot.


I remember a game where Jim Harbaugh and the Colts beat the Dolphins 41-0. I remember Harbaugh had over ten yards per attempt. It was one of the greatest physical achievements by a human being ever in the history of human achievement. Which is probably why I can remember it so well.

I just think you don't like the Yankees.

Lupica transcribes Brodsky:

"You may want a new Yankee Stadium, or you may not. But whatever side you come down on, remember that it's your money that's going to build it. The Yankees are alone in insisting that it's Yankee money. Even NYC officials now admit the truth of what we've been saying, that taxpayer dollars are tearing down The House That Ruth Built, and replacing it with The House That You Built.

Here's how they do it. The city sends the Yankees a property tax bill like everyone else gets. The Yankees write a check (about $70 million a year) to the city for that amount, just like everyone else. But next, unlike you or I, the city winks and sends that check to the Yankees' bankers to pay off the $1.4 billion mortgage, plus the $1.4 billion in interest on the new Stadium. You or I can't get that deal, but the Yankees did."

See, if you're saying the taxpayers are paying for it, and then you're saying that taxpayer is the Yankees ...

"And they got a lot more. The [sic] got an additional $575 million directly to build parking garages and sewers and other stuff for the new Stadium. They don't have to pay sales tax and mortgage recording taxes that every other taxpayer pays, and they get interest rate subsidies. That's an additional taxpayer subsidy of about $350 million."

I still don't believe that's the same thing as a subsidy.

Even though, obviously, the Yankees are asking for sweet deals from the government because the government is expecting a major return for this investment, economic and otherwise.


Like, what's an "interest rate subsidy"?

A NYC resident's tax rates are increasing because of the new Yankee Stadium? No.

The Yankees are paying taxes, just at a reduced rate.

I guess the argument is whether or not the Yankees are paying their fair share, and perhaps that's a fair argument. But this is not free money.


When I contend that this is simply another example of anti-Yankee hysteria, consider this as Exhibit A:

"The Mets’ request for $82.3 million in tax-exempt bonds to complete Citi Field was approved unanimously with little debate."

Really?

What about the straphanger and the fairness and the unwillingness to recognize the pain that New Yorkers are now undergoing?


You know what's weird? I don't recall a single demand for a salary cap when the Angels offered Teixeira $160 million.

MLB needs a salary cap.

On the same day that Circuit City closes, the Red Sox pay Kevin Youkilis almost $100 million.

Kevin Youkilis is nothing more than a monument to greed and avarice.

I am disgusted that the Red Sox can keep spending money while the rest of the world is tightening their collective belts.

My understanding of tax-exempt bonds.

The Yankees borrow money from a government entity, repay it with interest, and the interest that the investors accumulate is not subject to taxes.

These bonds are sold to public investors seeking a low-risk investment.

There's a lot more going on here in terms of politics, etc.

But tax-exempt bonds are an easy way for a government to make a little money. Not a lot of money in the scheme of government entities, but a little bit of money.

I don't know if the new Stadium is worth the cost. The Yankees will profit; the Bronx probably will not profit too much. More of a pride thing than an economic thing.

Seriously, though, what the heck is Richard Brodsky even talking about? Does he not have a basic understanding of how bonds work?

Or maybe I don't. I thought I did.

They're like stocks except they're lower risk and lower return. Lower risk because, basically, a government entity can never truly run out of money (it's exceedingly unlikely). Worse comes to worse, they'll just print more money or, you know, raise the cost of a parking ticket rather than default.

So, the bond is issued, maybe it's a 5% annual return over 10 years (I'm making that up) and, you know, your IRA has tanked 49% this calendar year, so you opt for municipal bonds instead.

This is not a subsidy. A subsidy is different. Stop calling a bond a subsidy.

Living in the past is a good way to run a baseball team.

"The Yankees can find nearly a half-billion dollars to pay three players who, as brilliant as they've performed elsewhere, have yet to do a thing for this franchise."

Hi, I think $420 million is almost $500 million.

But I'm not paid to be smart.


"After blowing their bankroll on Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Mark Teixeira, the Bankees now claim that $10 million - a pretty damn good paycheck for anyone these days but still, a $6-million pay cut for Pettitte from last season - is as high as they are willing to go for a pitcher who won some of the most important postseason games in their recent history."

1) I don't think they blew their bankroll.

2) If they really blew their bankroll, then that explains why they don't have additional funds for Andy Pettitte.

3) 2003 was the last time Andy Pettitte won a postseason game for the Yankees. That's not "recent."


"(Pettitte went 13-8 in the postseason for the Yankees, who never lost an ALCS game he started. But because they haven't been to the ALCS in quite a while, it's possible they forgot that stat.)"

Exactly. It's ancient history.


"Plus, it would be a tremendous PR coup for the Mets, who frankly have looked like jerks the past few years watching the Yankees rescue their castoffs (Gooden, Strawberry, Cone, Nady) but now have the opportunity to return the favor."

Dwight Gooden, Darryl Strawberry, and David Cone?

Gooden last pitched for the Yankees in 2000; Strawberry last played for the Yankees in 1999; Cone last pitched in 2000 for the Yankees and last pitched in 2003 for the Mets.

"The past few years" is a decade ago if you're Wallace Matthews.

Wallace Matthews is talking about the 1986 Mets. But it's 2008 and this is supposed to be a discussion about Andy Pettitte.


"And best of all, Pettitte doesn't cost you all that much, in money or years. One year at $12 million to $14 million, maybe with an option, probably gets it done, and that's perfect. No long-term entanglements with a head case like Perez, or a hospital case like Sheets. No five-innings-and-out, at best, like you'd get from Pedro.

What you get is a low-maintenance, no-drama professional who's here for one reason only: To help you win now, this year, not promise you things down the road that he will likely never deliver."

Ha ha.

Let's not mention the "no-drama" cheating or the injury history.

That's just weird.

I'd take him.

With friends like this ...

"I have voted for Rice annually on my Hall of Fame ballot. I always understood that he was a borderline candidate."

Ummm, okay.


"Believe me, I understand the demerits people want to give him about his home/road splits, the times grounding into double plays, the shortcomings as a baserunner and a fielder, and the fact that he essentially was finished as an impact player at age 34."

"Pay attention to nothing they say and everything they do."

I like how Andy Pettitte is a loyal Yankee except for the time he wasn't. Try that logic with your girlfriend:

"By the way, every time a guy like Mark Teixeira signs for more money than anybody else is offering, you can make book that there was some Yankee hero he had as a boy and that he's going to want to tell us all about it.

Or, in Jason Giambi's case, it's a dad who was a Mantle guy.

The money is always just a side issue, of course."

Funny, that's exactly what I was thinking about Andy Pettitte.

I wish I had $10 million of nickels and dimes.

Likes Eli Manning, doesn't like Yankee management:

"The Yankees aren't trying to nickel-and-dime Andy Pettitte because they think he deserves to have his 2008 salary nearly cut in half.

That is just a shell game.

The Yankees, who spent all that money on Sabathia and Burnett and Teixeira, are desperate to somehow come in at around $200 million in payroll or even under it so they can tell everybody how frugal they are.

So this isn't about what's right with an old Yankee hero like Pettitte.

It's about how things look."

I agree with one thing: Andy Pettitte is old.

My first post of 2009.

Probably sounds a lot like my first post of 2004:

"But Pettitte is not like other players, and the Yankees are not like other teams. Pettitte has pledged his loyalty to the Yankees, and the Yankees have spent lavishly this winter at a time when many clubs are scaling back."

A pledge from a disloyal cheater and liar, huh?


"A reunion seemed inevitable at the start of the off-season, but now it is uncertain."

A reunion seemed so unlikely, that I started deducting Pettitte's salary from the payroll last August.


"Pettitte might wonder why the Yankees offered a pay cut at a time when they spent a combined $243.5 million on C. C. Sabathia and A. J. Burnett. If he is, though, Pettitte has not said so. Reached by The New York Times on Dec. 3, he said he wanted to return but was leaving the matter to his agent, Randy Hendricks, who did not respond to e-mail messages Monday."

Well, I'm not sure if reporting what Pettitte might be thinking even qualifies as reporting.

Pettitte didn't return any of my emails or phone calls, either. He also hasn't accepted my friend request on Facebook.

If he did, I could easily explain why the Yankees offered a pay cut at a time when they spent a combined $243.5 million on CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett.

14 wins and 14 losses is why.

in 1996, the Yankees had the highest payroll.

In 1999, the Yankees had the highest payroll.

In 2000, the Yankees had the highest payroll:

"Most Yankee fans are tremendous, the way most New York fans are.

But always there is this loud minority thinking they have special insights into baseball that nobody else has because, well, they're Yankee fans."

Well, let me just say that I could throw a rock and hit a random person anywhere in the world and, even if that person has never watched a baseball game in their life, that person probably has more "special insights into baseball" than Mike Lupica.


Besides, who cares?: "I think Yankee fans are obnoxious." Who cares what you think about Yankee fans?

Tell us more about Johnny Damon's haircut or "One Tree Hill," you bozo.


"Ten years ago, we were privileged to watch as magnificent a Yankee team as there has been in the whole history of the Yankees.

The '98 Yankees won 114 regular season games and then won 11 more in the playoffs, those 11 in October Reggie is always talking about, which made 125 wins in all.

And you want to know what the best part is?

They didn't lead the world in payroll that year."

No, sir, that is not the best part.

The best part is that they won 125 games in all.

You are making some odd and irrelevant moral distinction between the highest payroll and the second-highest.


Also, you are demonstrating little "special insight into baseball."

Because the 1998 Yankees wouldn't stand a chance against the 1927 Yankees.

Not that anyone was asking until you brought it up.



"The Yankees didn't need to have the highest paid guys at half the positions on the field.

Here, in fact, is the team Joe Torre had on the field for the last game of the World Series that year:

Knoblauch, Jeter, O'Neill, Bernie, Tino, Brosius, Ricky Ledee, a pitcher named Andy Pettitte and a catcher named Joe Girardi."

Bernie made $8.25M in 1998 and was the highest-paid centerfielder.

Knoblauch made $6M in 1998 and was slightly behind Roberto Alomar and Craig Biggio as the highest-paid second baseman.

David Cone made $6.7M (free agent) and was the fifth-highest-paid pitcher.

David Wells made $4.7M (free agent), Andy Pettitte made $3.8M, Tino Martinez made $4.3M, O'Neill made $5.5M, and Chili Davis made $4.3M to play DH.

Through free agency and re-negotiations, a lot of these players (Jeter, Bernie) soon made EVEN MORE MONEY.


"The foundation for that team was laid by a great general manager named Gene Michael, with the help of Buck Showalter, and it really began when George Steinbrenner was out of baseball."

True.


"Michael somehow had a vision of the future that involved more than writing checks."

Also, writing checks.

Boggs, Fielder, Key, Wetteland for starters.


"And in the next decade the Yankees won four World Series in five years.

The crazy spending didn't begin until the Yankees stopped winning the Series."

Is that so?

After the 1999 season, I distinctly recall the Yankees paying Jeter a back-loaded contract which averages $20M per season. Then, I am pretty sure the Yankees won the World Series in 2000.

In 2000, David Cone was paid $12M to win 4 games. The Twins' entire payroll was under $16M.

In 2000, the Yankees paid Jose Canseco $3M to jog to the mound after the game to congratulate the other players on the team.

Because the Yankees were all about efficiency and that is how they won.


The Yankees have been very successful since the 2000 season.

Three 100-win seasons, two World Series appearances, nine playoff appearances in ten seasons, unbelievable attendance, enormous revenue, and, most importantly, a valuation of the franchise to over $1 billion.

The investment in payroll has paid off big time.

Unless you only care about winning the World Series.

Unless you're the type of fan Lupica describes thusly:

"These are the ones who think that the earth hasn't been spinning properly because the Yankees haven't won the World Series in eight years."

Lupica sounds exactly like one of these arrogant, foolish fans who expect the Yankees to win the World Series every year.

Lupica is not only a fool, he's a hypocrite.

The time value of money.

A couple of things to keep in mind as you read about the Yankees' free agent signings:

1) The Yankees didn't just write a check for $180 million and give it to Mark Teixeira. This money will be paid over 8 years. By the time the contract expires, Teixeira will be a bargain and the 50th highest-paid player in baseball. David Wright will be paid $35M in the year 2017.

Eight years ago, Albert Belle* was the highest-paid player in baseball and he got paid what Julio Lugo got paid in 2008.

* When I first wrote that, I thought I was exaggerating, but then I looked it up on baseball-reference.com and that is actually quite close to the truth. Belle was paid $12.9M in 2000 and Lugo was paid $9.25M in 2008.

2) $420 million is not really "almost" $500 million.

It's 84% of $500 million.

If 84%= 100%, then the Dow Jones Industrial Average is still at 10,000, this country is not in a recession, and Bernie Madoff's clients are not killing themselves.

If 84% = 100%, then the Yankees won 106 games last season.

Yankees cut payroll, part 2.

"For months we heard about how the Yankees are going to spend less, throw money around less, hand out fewer blank checks. We heard about how the Yankees are now on some kind of a budget. Apparently that meant an imaginary one."

They are spending less if you subtract the salaries of Giambi, Mussina, Pettitte, Abreu, and Pavano.

Since these contracts have expired, the accompanying salaries may be subtracted.

I apologize if I'm going too fast for you. Subtraction is a component of an area of personal expertise known as Advanced Calculus.


But that's hardly the point. Use your brain when Cashman says he's going to cut salary. It's a meaningless statement and it would be a foolish business decision.


"The Yankees are big business. They've been that way for the better part of three decades, ... "

For the better part of ten decades.


" ...and the notion that they would be anything but big business this year - the year a billion-dollar stadium opens, the year after they missed the playoffs for the first time since 1993, the year George Steinbrenner's sons officially took control of the team - is as ridiculous as when the Yankees say they've done everything by the book when it comes to paying for their brand-new ballpark."

Right.

So why is everybody shocked?

You spend $1 billion on a new Stadium and $160 million on payroll. You're going to spend the additional $22.5 million to help ensure you make the playoffs.

Of course, there are no guarantees. Start with injuries.

The Yankees still don't have too much depth, but the number five starter could be a combination of Hughes, Kennedy, Aceves, and Cook.

Each dollar they spend is going to have diminishing return.

But there is no reason for the Yankees to be penny wise and pound foolish.


"A year ago, the Yankees were talking about their kids. Young, cheap kids who were going to be the cornerstone of the franchise for years to come. Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy and Joba Chamberlain were the pitchers of the future, and Robinson Cano was a stud second baseman, worthy of the long-term deal the Yankees gave him even though they hardly ever buy out players who are still in their arbitration years."

Hughes, Cano, and Joba will probably pay off in the short-term and in the long-term. There is a very good chance these three players will be cornerstones of the franchise for years to come.

Of course, a year ago, these young players were surrounded by $15+ million contracts in left field, right field, shortstop, third base, first base, catcher, DH, pitcher, pitcher, and closer.


So, here's the drill since the early '70s:

1. Free agents become available.
2. Yankees (and other teams) act disinterested and claim poverty.
3. Yankees (and other teams) overpay for the free agents.
4. The populace acts outraged and shocked.

If you are outraged, that's your personal demeanor.

If you are shocked, you are a fool.

Yankees cut payroll.

"Sometimes it seems as if the Yankees inhabit some alternate reality, a bizarro universe in which the AL East race is not a competition among ballclubs but among bankbooks, one in which the recession doesn't exist, unemployment has been eradicated and depression is a word for shrinks, not sharks.

For them, it's always a bull market, money is plentiful, credit is readily available and cheap, and the World Series is not something to be played but purchased."

This "bizarro universe" has been around since before Wallace Matthews was born.

The annual fake outrage is a bit tiring.


"Obviously, they haven't noticed that unemployment is way, way up, wages are way, way down and morale among American workers is lower than Eddie Gaedel's strike zone."

I'm an American worker and my morale was just raised.

Wheee!

Go Yankees!


Timely Eddie Gaedel reference, by the way.

1951: What a year. That was right in the smack dab in the middle of the Yankees' six straight World Championships.

Yeah, Eddie Gaedel from the good ol' days. Before free agency. When the Yankees used the reserve clause and strong arm tactics to buy their Championships.


"Or that the enemy they always seem to be fighting, the Red Sox, is not the one they should fear.

...

Except that Boston is no longer the enemy and money is no longer the answer - if, in fact, it ever really was.

While the dinosaurs of the division were sleeping, the Tampa Bay Rays shot past both of them. The Rays return in 2009 a year older, a year more experienced, a year better. But not a penny more expensive. Unlike the Yankees, they win baseball games the old-fashioned way - on the field, not on the balance sheet."

What an odd thing to say.

I think the Red Sox will be competitive, probably for a longer time than the Rays.

Also, the Yankees got better. For their own sake. It wasn't just so they could beat the Red Sox. It was so they could beat all the other teams, too.


By the way, the Rays will lose because their young players will become eligible for free agency and then the Rays won't be able to afford them. A few years near the top of the standings will cost them high draft picks. Throw in a disinterested fan base and I think the Red Sox have more staying power.


"But no one could have imagined the kind of shameless shopping spree the Yankees have been on this month - $161 million for CC Sabathia, $82.5 million for A.J. Burnett and a reported $180 million for Teixeira - at a time when more than 10 million Americans are out of work and another 4 million might join them in 2009."

I'm someone, and I imagined this.

I would have been very surprised had the Yankees not signed Teixeira.


"After winning four of five World Series between 1996 and 2000 with relatively modestly financed rosters built around pitching, timely hitting and skilled role players, the Yankees went big-ticket with the likes of Rodriguez, Jason Giambi, Hideki Matsui, Carl Pavano, Johnny Damon, etc., etc.

They have won nothing since."

Matthews wasn't whining when the Yankees traded for Clemens after winning 114 games in 1998? Was Clemens a role player?

The 114-win team sparked all this luxury tax stuff. "The Baseball Universe is coming to an end. Only six teams are going to exist!"

The 1996-2000 Yankee teams were hardly "modestly financed." They were built around highly-priced free agents. (I think Baltimore had the highest payroll in 1996, but the Yankees the rest of the time.)

Why all the hand-wringing and revisionist history every time the Yankees sign a big-ticket free agent?

Why does it make Wallace Matthews feel better to pretend Paul O'Neill was a role player or Tino Martinez and David Wells were Yankee farmhands?

How come I know more than Peter Gammons and Buster Olney?

All this talk about gaping holes being filled reminds me of Pettitte and Clemens.

"Tired of waiting for the Yankees to make a move, the Brewers killed the proposed deal for Mike Cameron Wednesday, leaving a gaping hole in center field in the Bronx.

Could that hole be filled indirectly by Manny Ramirez?"

No.

Because Manny Ramirez doesn't play center field.

Thanks for asking.

Besides, I'm not sure if Brett Gardner/Melky Cabrera/Johnny Damon are really enormous gaping holes in center field.

A GM said ...

Good news for Yankee fans:

"I think [the Red Sox are] in the lead and ahead of where everyone else is right now," the GM said. "I'm not sure who's bidding against them at this point."

I say the Yankees blow Teixeira away with an offer he can't refuse.

Sixteen years and $800 million.

Sportswriting reaches its nadir.

Peter Abraham gets a chance to reunite with his daddy:

"Were it up to Joe Torre, the Winter Meetings would be in Las Vegas every year. The manager of the Dodgers arrived early with a large group of friends in tow and embraced the scene. The Torre posse - think 'Entourage' for the AARP set - stayed at the luxurious Wynn Las Vegas and enjoyed the best of food, wine and cigars.

'We fight over whether we're going to shoot craps or bet horses,' Torre said. 'It's a trip for the boys.' "

Really? You weren't discussing the importance of starting pitching depth? You weren't analyzing Jeff Kent's batting average on balls in play in 2008?

I understand.

No better place to get away from baseball than the baseball winter meetings.

"Yankees manager Joe Girardi, conversely, looked pained every second he was there. Girardi doesn't smoke, drink or gamble. He barely touched the rich chocolate dessert served at the annual managers' luncheon on Wednesday."

The rich chocolate dessert which ended up in Peter Abraham's coat pocket.

I've got an offer for you ...

$9.50 an hour to wash Joba's towels.

If you refuse this offer, your photograph goes up in every ticket booth.

You won't be allowed into the Stadium with a ticket.

Yeah, but ...

"After that, the Yankees and their fans will expect nothing less than greatness. If he delivers anything less than a championship, if he doesn't win big in October, he will be deemed a failure.

...

That challenge eventually destroyed Chuck Knoblauch and confounded Roger Clemens for most of two seasons."

Chuck Knoblauch won one ring before he joined the Yankees and then three rings in his first three seasons with the Yankees.

Chuck Knoblauch's teams are 13-1 in playoff series.

Olney somehow concludes that October failures eventually destroyed Knoblauch.


Clemens won two rings in his first two seasons with the Yankees.

The next year, Clemens won the Cy Young Award.

Seems like smooth sailing to me, other than gratuitous criticisms from dopey sports columnists.


Perhaps the lesson is, if Sabathia feels too much pressure, he ought to soothe his nerves by taking lots and lots of steroids.


"It's a challenge that still seems to gnaw at Alex Rodriguez."

Most likely, the lack of a ring gnaws at ARod.

Didn't seem to bother Mussina, though, did it? Or Fan Favorite/Steroid Abuser Jason Giambi. Or Chien-Ming Wang and his 14,000.00 post-season ERA; or Matsui; or Abreu.

In fact, for the past half-a-decade, only one Yankee player gets blamed.

I was at a game where Giambi caught a pickoff throw from the catcher, spun to tag the ghost baserunner who was not there because he was already running toward second base. Giambi then threw the ball out of the shortstop's reach. Giambi was paid $22 million last year, or something like that. Giambi didn't get booed that day.

You know who got booed. In fact, ARod didn't even play that day. He was booed when he appeared on the Diamond Vision telling the fans to watch out for foul balls.

Hey, everybody! A sportswriter says something stupid!

"And so far Sabathia hasn't been much better than A-Rod as a postseason performer, 2-3 with a 7.92 in five October starts, four for the Indians and one for the Brewers."

A lot worse than ARod, you mean.

Of course, as everybody knows, Sabathia pitched, like, 50 straight complete games for the Brewers down the stretch, all on two days' rest, and was simply wiped out by the time the playoffs started.


"Of course, he also showed great heart and toughness for the Brewers after being traded last season, carrying them to the playoffs with dominant pitching throughout August and September, the last few starts on three-days' rest after an injury to Ben Sheets left Sabathia as the Brewers' only hope.

In fact, some scouts and executives dismiss his poor Game 1 in the playoffs against the Phillies that saw him give up five runs in 3 2/3 innings, believing all the extra innings and short rest finally caught up with him in October."

Of course.


One more thing: Can the Yankees actually get to the playoffs before we start evaluating the playoff performances?

Attention to detail is the foundation of journalism

The New York Daily News polls its readers. Nice work, fellas:

How many games will C.C. win for the Yankees in 2009?

0-5 4%
5-10 4%
10-15 18%
15-18 36%
18-20 2 7%
more than 20 12%

I think C.C. [sic] will win exactly 15 games.

So I voted twice.

Because I think he will win both 10-15 games and 15-20 games.

The biggest fraud in baseball.

Cash in with a stupid GM while you can:

"A far better way to measure a reliever’s value is a statistic called Win Probability Added, which compares a team’s chances of winning a game before a pitcher takes the mound to the same figure once he departs. So the closer who protects the three-run lead in the ninth is credited with only 0.035 wins — the difference between the 96.5 percent likelihood of victory when he entered and the 100 percent when he left — while the setup man keeping a game tied in the eighth gets 0.113 wins, for increasing his team’s odds of victory from 36.5 percent to 47.8 percent.

Rodríguez’s 3.33 W.P.A. was only the fourth best among American League closers last year, trailing Mariano Rivera, Joakim Soria and Bobby Jenks."

I don't need Win Probability Added to know that K-Rod is not the best closer in the AL.

The End of Logic.

"It would probably cost the Mets $20-22 million a year for five years, but they are getting $25 million a year for 20 years from Citigroup, which is getting $45 billion from our wonderful government. Call it a Federal Bailout of the Mets."

Either Manny is worth that much money or he is not.

The value of the product is not determined by the source of the funding.

The Mets can probably afford to pay Manny $22M, and it's likely a good idea. But that's also $22M in opportunity cost -- like an entire bullpen.


"I know Manny laid down at times last year because he was unhappy about his contract status (just ask Mariano Rivera and every member of the Red Sox), but there are a lot of people who believe Jose Reyes and Carlos Delgado did the same thing because they were unhappy with Willie Randolph."

So Manny's negative is no longer a negative because Reyes and Delgado share the same negative.


I love logic. This guy stumbled into the right answer and can't give a good reason why.

It's not even really that difficult to figure out why Manny is worth it: He hits good.

Took you long enough.

"If Pettitte signs elsewhere, regardless of the dollar figure, he should be viewed as a world-class phony forever around here.
...

In his moment of need, when it was revealed Pettitte was both a liar and cheater, the Yankees stood by him last season. At that time, Pettitte was only too happy to say the Yankees were the only team he ever wanted to play for any more. He did not say he only wanted to play for the Yankees unless they offer him a paycut.The Yanks have indeed offered that cut. Pettitte made $16 million last year and, according to sources, he was offered $10 million to return in 2009. So far, Pettitte has rejected that bid while his camp has done nothing to dispel reports linking him to Joe Torre and the Dodgers."

Good article, but it's five years late.

Awww, shucks.

This guy's a trip:

"Before seducing free-agent CC Sabathia with a six-year, $140 million pitch, the Yankees made an offer to Pettitte. The offer was less than the $16 million the 36-year-old left-hander made last year, when he was 14-14 with a 4.54 ERA in 33 starts.

...

Nevertheless, the Yankees received word that Pettitte didn't want to take a pay cut."

So he's going to go play for the Dodgers and blame Steinbrenner again.