Yankees Problem

There is a big problem with a Major League Baseball team. The team is the New York Yankees. The Yankees have sent out offers to free agents and if all reports are correct they would make CC Sabathia, the coveted free agent of the 2008 class, the richest pitcher in baseball history. Also, the Yanks are in the market for another pitcher, AJ Burnett, and they have apparently offered $80million over 5 years.

Is it me or are the Yanks going overboard with their spending?

It was not so long ago that people signed with the Yanks because they wanted to be apart of the tradition and wear those pinstripes. Playing on the field where the baseball legends played, where they roamed the field, where they won pennants and championships, and where they enjoyed playing the game that most of us have come to love...baseball. It all seemed so pure.

Over the past decade or so players who were close to free agency and put up big numbers always knew that there was a huge payday on the horizon. The big numbers didn't even have to be over a 3-5 year span, as long as you had a big year in your walk year the Yanks would offer you some big time money.

A guy like AJ Burnett does not deserve an $80million contract because he just doesn't deserve that much money for what he does. He has put together big time numbers in years that are important, the walk years. All the other years, he is just mediocre at best. If the Yanks decide to drop the ball and pay AJ, they are just shooting themselves in the foot and are setting themselves up for another Pavano, well not quite, but they aren't spending that $80mil wisely.

Playing for the Yanks was once a proud thing but now the only thing I see is the Yanks having to over pay for players because all big time free agents know that they will. So, in the end, player/agent holds out and basically takes the Yanks for all they can afford, which is plenty, and go to bed with a giant dollar sign plastered to their mouth.

Free agents go to the Yanks for the money and nothing more. No idiot would come out and say this but we all know it. The Yanks use to be the place for World Series rings but now it just seems like a place where people collect pay cheques.

With all that money the Yanks have at their disposal, they better realize that to win championships it isn't about throwing cash at random free agents who happen to have just completed a career year, it's about finding players who are going to have a career year.

Cheque please.