Please, Avoid Yu Darvish

The Yankees need to be right in the mix of it.

1) It is not your money.
2) There are truckloads of it
3) If he fails, the only thing that it costs is money – not picks, not luxury tax (more money, whatever) – so just spend it. Until the Yankees themselves decide that they want to dial it down, then who the hell cares

Frankie, I’m a little concerned about your comment that “2 years from now the Yankees will be paying $152M to just 8 players…” By my calculations 2 years for now is Nov. 2013. By then both Soriano’s and Burnett’s contracts will have expired. Cano and Granderson are likely to be resigned but that is no guarantee. The only “guaranteed” contracts I see on the Yankees books for the 2014 season (2 years from now) is: A-Rod, CC, Tex and Jeter for about $71 or $72M. Cano and Granderson are probably likely but certainly not guaranteed at this point in time. Even if you want to jump the gun and add Cano and Granderson to the Yankees 2014 payroll it still would probably only and I say only come to about $125M +/-.

than the 50 million boston paid for Dice K ? Because if thats it then we definitely need to avoid him.

the problem with most long contracts is that the players signed are dirt old at the end of them. This is a opposite of darvish who would just be hitting his prime at the end of say a 5- 6 year contract.

But weeve seen da filmz. Heez gunna be a star!

$100 million for an unproven player when we already have an ace locked up for the next 5 years???? No way. Our money will be BETTER spent and more SAFELY spent on Mark Buhrle. 1) He will command only 3 or 4 years for around $50 million. 2) He has proven himself for 10+ years in the AL as well as the post season and has never been significantly injured (pitching 200 innings and winning double digits every year for a long time). 3) He is left handed and a better fit for Yankee Stadium. He could be what Pettite was for all the years as our #2 or #3 starter. 4) At three or four years max he can hold the place for Banuelos and Bentaces to advance and someday become our top of the line starters we hope for. Sabathia/Buhrle/Nova/Hughes/Garcia sounds like an experienced post season rotation that could do really well, with some great upside if Hughes returns to old form and Nova takes a step forward instead of back from hiis great 2011 season. BOTTOM LINE: Why risk $100 million on an unproven (albeit with higher upside) when we can get “guaranteed” success (if there is such a thing) from a proven veteran for half the price.

People are bringing up good points on both sides here. Sure, Darvish sounds like he will obviously be overpaid. But lets not act like this is some extraordinary scenario either. How many pitchers in the MLB are overpaid?! It’s impossible to predict how a pitcher is going to perform. You cannot predict injuries, and you cannot predict when his arm will fall off from throwing x-innings.

If money is the only reason the Yankees should NOT go after Darvish, well, that’s just silly. The Yankees are fortunate to be a team that can handle overpaying a pitcher (see Randy Johnson, Kevin Brown, Carl Pavano, Andy Pettitte, AJ Burnett, Rafeal Soriano, etc… seriously, do I need to keep going?).

Now, if the reason for the Yankees to NOT sign Darvish is because we want to hold a stop gap for one or both of our Killer Bs or if we have our eye on another, better pitcher, then sure I would understand that. Darvish comes with no MLB experience and he is just as liable to be a bust as an ace.
What matters most is who ELSE is out there for the Yankees to get. People say Mark Buehrle. Buehrle carries a career 3.83 ERA in his 12 seasons. He has only been under 3.50 twice and 2005 was the last year he did so (3.12). Is THIS who you would ratehr have? Of course he is gonna be cheaper! But who wants to drop $12mil on a guy whos stats look like another AJ Burnett, but without the upside. Buehrle isn’t gonna be a frontline starter… he’s gonna be like a 4 or 5, except we would pay him as a frontline guy.

Some people want CJ Wilson. Well, at least in his case there is an argument to be made. Of course, he is gonna be overpaid as well, but at least Wilson still has some upside and has recently shown himself to be a viable frontline rotation guy. Has he plateaued already? I don’t believe he has, but who knows if his arm will hold up. He has only been starting for 2-3 years now. Didn’t pitch so well in the postseason this year either.

My point is that a guy with the upside and youth of Darvish (he is just 25yrs old) isn’t entirely uncommon, but to be able to sign him without losing any of the famr system, nor any current players… well, that IS uncommon. If this kid turns out to be excellent, well, the Yankees were smart to sign him when he was young. If he is a bust, he simply joins a long line of pitchers who didn’t pan out and the Yankees still have their team and farm system. In the end, they may only lose money. But more importantly, there isn’t any immediate talents available who would be better options than a young 25yr old kid with electric stuff. And THAT is why the Yankees do what they can to bring him to NY.

The giant posting fee does not go to the player, but the player has unrealistic expectations because he “cost” the acquiring team so much money.

The acquiring team has to pay through the nose and take all of the risk of the posting fee + contract dollars, with no protection in the event of, say, a catastrophic injury in spring training the first season.

The team in Japan makes out like a bandit. They can reject the posting bid if it’s not large enough for their liking, and if the player doesn’t negotiate a deal with the winning bidder, they own his rights. By their rules, even if that player retires from NPB, he is not allowed to go and play somewhere else. I don’t know if there is an arbitration system in NPB, so I won’t try to make a statement about how fair (or not) the pay scale is for players. But I will say this. For those of you (david d) who seem to think these players have an obligation to play out their contracts and become free agents, don’t think for a minute they are hurting their teams doing this. The player can only request that the team post them – that decision is 100% up to the NPB team, and they have incentive to post the player, because the kind of money they can get from MLB for one talented star can be a huge windfall for them.

I know you’re trying to think of other options, but he has said time and time again that if he doesn’t go back to Chicago, he’ll probably retire. Someone near retirement is not going to consider a media hellhole like New York.

Not to mention he’s past his prime…

Is this actually your opinion, or did you just write an article about the possible negatives to getting him?

Regardless, how often do we see 25 year old aces on the market that costs nothing in terms of prospects? These opportunities don’t come often. Yes, it will be very expensive. Likely 100-120 million overall. But the absolute worst thing that can come from this is that they eat a contract and move on. This is the Yankees- they basically print money, and if he sucks I doubt it will be anything other than a small inconvenience.

I find it much more likely that he comes and he performs at the level that every scout who has watched him pitch expects him to perform. And if thats the case, then he instantly makes the starting rotation a strength, creates a strong 1-2 punch with CC at the top of the rotation and increases this teams chances of winning a world series. Pitchers at his age that can do something like that usually comes in a trade and requires a team to give up prospects or players on their starting roster. This case, it’s only money. They can instantly make this team better as well as preserve the future. And thats the most intriguing part to me about him is.