Friday, December 12, 2008

I'd rather see Carol Burnett than A.J. Burnett as a Yankee

Just wanted to voice my extreme displeasure over the Yankees reportedly signing A.J. Burnett. Let's review - the Yanks finally got under from giving the, shall we say, oft-injured Carl Pavano four years and $40 million. So they turn around and give the oft-injured Burnett a five-year, $82.5 million contract. How does this make a lick of sense?

It's just that Burnett is an injury risk; he's been on the DL nine times since 2000. It's that he's not very good in the first place. His career record is 87-76, with a 3.81 ERA. He's only won over 12 games a year once, which was this season. That's worth $16 million a year? Good grief.

Meanwhile, Brian Cashman is flying to Houston and telling Andy Pettitte to take it or leave it when it comes to the Yanks' $10 million offer. At this point, I can't blame Pettitte if he's peeved over this. He shouldn't be getting $16 million next year, but he's certainly worth more than $10 million.

Earlier this week, I thought the Yanks' Pettitte offer was reasonable. Not any more. If the Yanks have money for Burnett, they should have money to keep Pettitte, one of their dynasty's icons.

And give me Andy's personality over A.J.'s any day. Andy took it upon himself to be the man. A.J.? Not so much. Look what John Gibbons, his former manager, said about him:
"I like the guy," said Gibbons, currently the Royals' bench coach. "He is a high-strung guy with a ton of talent. I know things happened in the past, the sarcastic tip of the hat to the fans, but I enjoyed having him on my team."
Let's review. As the Post notes, he's had two good seasons - both in his walk years. He's got a bit of an attitude. And he's pitched 200 innings exactly three times in a decade. And this guy is a good fit for the Yankees why, exactly?

I've got to stop my rant now, before I blow a gasket. Suffice it to say that I'd rather see Carol Burnett as a Yankee. At least she'd keep the fans in stitches. A.J. Burnett, on the other hand, will be the one getting the stitches!

What do you think of the A.J. Burnett signing? Leave us a comment!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cashman is really sticking his neck way way out there. CC the hefty lefty for 7 and fragile A.J. for 5, but I believe Cashman's was only 3 soooo he may be long gone before all the fall out if things don't work out. History tells us over-paying in desperation almost never works out. But what am I thinking I forgot they added the huge bat of Nick Swisher and are about to add a sterling 36 yr old strikeout prone CF--world series here we come!!!

Roger 9 said...

Maybe we should wait to see how the latest Cashman rebuilding fiascc works out before we criticize too sharply. However, it looks like plan destined to fail because of the usual "suspects"...age, injuries, and mediocrity!Viva la Brian!

Unknown said...

AJ Burnett has good numbers against Red Sox and Rays ... remember we face this teams 36 times in the year.

Anonymous said...

To Cashman, more is more. We have had a lineup full of thumpers while being light on the pitching - harkening back to the 80's when we had Winfield and Mattingly but staffs full of Rhodens, Shirleys and Rawleys. I think that the watchword for Cash is not to be short on pitching anymore, whatever the cost. I'd rather have given another chance to Hughes, Kennedy and Aceves but 8 years since the last world championship is a long time in Yankeeland.

Toby O'B said...

Now he just has to work on how those grimaces he makes while pitching. When they announced his signing in the papers, that back page picture from the Post looked like the Yankees hired somebody's grandpa. LOL!

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