Bobby is a declining player. we have a decent player in swish for less money. I am not a fan of strining players along on one year contracts (ahem andy pettite ahem) either sign the player or dont.

His D sucked.. and he seemed like he turned it off and on when he wanted to..

The Yankees did not hold an option for Bobby Abreu in 2009. They could have offered him arbitration, however, the rules of the system won’t allow a player to take more than a 20% pay cut. Abreu made $16 million in 2008, so he couldn’t have made less than $12.8 million this year, and realistically, he wasn’t coming off a bad season, so he probably would have made $16-$18 million in arbitration. The market for good-hitting, poor-fielding corner outfielders had already tanked ahead of the Dec. 2 arbitration deadline, so it was pretty clear that Abreu’s best option would have been arbitration.

On November 13th, the Yankees traded for Nick Swisher, who has a similar skill set to Abreu, but who was guaranteed $21 million over the next three years.
Swisher hits for a lower average and doesn’t steal bases, but he’s six years younger, hits for more power, and provides substantially better defense in right field.

Overall, Swisher has been worth 3.8 Wins Above Replacement this year while Abreu has only been 3.2 WARP, and the Yankees have him under control for three more years (two guaranteed plus a team option for 2012).

So, yeah, in a vacuum, keeping Abreu would not have been a horrible decision, but trying to get a younger, better player, who’s under team control for far longer, was a much better decision.

in the last decade I would’ve like to see stay a Yankee, Alfonso Soriano
If the Yanks could have just found another way to get Alex.

well he was good,maybe very good but not for $16,000,000 millions dollares at year,
that’s teixeira tipe money; and remember he didn’t have a choice no other team was talking to him only the angels.

Guy hit 300 with 100 +RBI consistantly,scared of the wall but decent arm,BA in the playoffs is acceptable.16 million was way to much but he did alot of good things when with the yanks.