Mark Charles Teixeira, born April 11, 1980
Contract status: Tex is entering year three of an eight-year deal worth $180 million.
2010 in Review: .256/.365/.481, 127 RC+, 3.5 WAR
The Good: Mark Teixeira continued to provide solid offense and defense in his second year in pinstripes. He led the team in walks (93) and runs scored (113), and was third in OPS+ (125) and second in defensive runs saved (behind only Brett Gardner). Perhaps his best attribute is his durability: Tex played at least 156 games for the third straight year and at least 130 in all eight of his big league seasons.
The Bad: It was Tex's worst overall season since 2006. He had the lowest batting average and second lowest slugging percentage of his career. Despite leading the team in runs, Tex was generally a station-to-station runner: he failed to hit a triple or steal a base (in one attempt). You might remember that his season was ended early due to a pulled hamstring in the ALCS (in which he was 0-14).
2011 Outlook: Tex says his hamstring is fine and that he's been running at 100%. A regression, in a good way, can be expected from him. Tex will turn 31 in April, so he should still have a few great years ahead of him. His BABIP was a career low .268 (vs. .303 career), so we can reasonably anticipate a season much closer to his career norms of .288/.377/.536. At the very least, unlike the Yanks' former first-sacker, he will play solid defense for the remainder of his contract.