According to David O’Brien of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Braves’ interest in Johnny Damon has increased in recent days, to the point where the club has sent the 36-year old outfielder a one-year offer. Further confirming this is Mark Bowman, who notes that the proposal includes some deferred money. The organization has also had the face of their franchise, future Hall of Famer, Chipper Jones, call Damon in order to talk up Atlanta in the hopes that he would consider joining them. Damon, however, while stating just yesterday that he would like to join the Braves, is still demanding a two-year contract and has yet to budge from that position. In fact, his agent, Scott Boras, is claiming a team currently has a two-year offer on the table for Damon, yet did not disclose that team’s identity (of course).
Given Damon’s lack of options, I seriously doubt Boras’ mystery team ploy will work. Everyone will call that bluff.
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Yesterday, the lovable Scott Boras took to the media in order to try and find his client, the 36-year old outfielder, Johnny Damon, a well furnished home. Speaking to Lynn Henning of the Detroit News, Boras connected Damon to the Tigers, who could presumably use a reliable left fielder. “Johnny believes the addition of him to Detroit’s lineup would make the Tigers a winner,” said the agent. “I can make the Detroit Tigers a winner,” Boras stated, quoting his still homeless outfielder. Strangely, though, while Boras often utilizes an assortment of media channels in order to talk up his customers, doing so to a geographically specific news outlet – one that is based in Detroit – was somewhat atypical. In this instance, Boras attempted to peddle Damon to one particular party rather than to a series of parties, and, when one asks why, exactly, this occurred, the reasoning seems fairly clear. While they would be loathe to admit it, Johnny Damon is currently desperate to find a new team for 2010 and Boras’ latest is representative of that.
As stated by ESPN’s Buster Olney, “The fact that Boras told the Detroit News how much Damon wants to play for the Tigers is being read, within the industry, as a sign that Damon isn’t exactly flush with options right now.” The Rays, Jays, Braves, and Tigers, in no particular order, are perceived as the only teams with any sort of interest in Damon, however, given Boras’ conversation with Lynn Henning, one wonders just how enthusiastic the cited parties really are about the 36-year old outfielder. The apparent lack of legitimate interest in Damon has sparked hope in those who still wish to see a Yankees-Damon reunion. Joe at River Ave Blues wrote about the idea yesterday while Joel Sherman of the NY Post contemplates the situation in his latest piece. While such a scenario is extremely unlikely, it is certainly not impossible (just improbable). The Yankees would presumably have to trade one of Randy Winn or Chad Gaudin, or perhaps both, in order to make such a deal happen, although this is easier said than done. In addition, Brian Cashman seems rather pleased with the flexibility provided to Joe Girardi by the team’s current roster, therefore, I think it is safe to say that such a remarriage is more than doubtful. After all, Damon is the desperate one, not the Yankees.
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Buster Olney has an interesting account of the Johnny Damon negotiations that I am inclined to believe. He suggests that Damon was the Yankees’ Plan A in left and at the 2 slot in the lineup, but simply kept rejecting offers that were commensurate to his value at the time. There are a few relevant excerpts here, but I would like to include the caveat that Damon’s camp would likely dispute some of the details, and suggest the Yankees never actually made an offer. Keeping that in mind, here is Buster’s account of the talks:
Well, in the hours after the Granderson trade was completed, they moved to seriously engage Damon in talks, and — as reported on ESPN.com at the time — they were told over and over: If you’re going to offer a contract that represents a decrease in salary, don’t bother to make an offer. Damon, himself, told the Yankees that directly. If you want to cut my salary, talk to the hand….
They believed that Damon didn’t have offers along that the lines that Boras was talking about, but they didn’t know for sure — the Red Sox can speak to that experience, having lost out on Mark Teixeira — and the Yankees’ offer to make offers wasn’t even being entertained.
So they moved on, pursuing Nick Johnson, who had the highest on-base percentage of any free agent — and they had to move fast, because Johnson was deep into negotiations with the Giants. Johnson was the Yankees’ Plan B to Damon, and given that their Plan A wasn’t even willing to talk, they reached an agreement on a one-year, $5.5 million deal with Johnson.
It wasn’t until after word of Johnson’s impending deal broke that Damon’s side indicated a willingness to barter, and the Yankees did talk about a two-year concept — which was immediately rejected. But at that point, having reached a verbal agreement with Johnson, the team’s priorities had shifted…
Last week, Damon reached out to the Yankees, wanting to talk, and so the Yankees again re-engaged the left fielder, offering the money they had left they had under the budget that was set before the winter meetings. Even then, however, they were told that Damon had other options, including multi-year offers. They were told he wanted more than the $6 million package in salary and incentives that the Yankees were willing to pay.
This account of events sounds authentic to me, if only because it fits what we have heard about Boras and his method of negotiation. He likes to set a high bar to open negotiations, threatening to not even come to the table unless certain demands are met. In this case, that gambit likely cost his client a 2 year deal, as the Yankees decided to move on to Plan B so they could focus on adding a starting pitcher. Then, after Boras read the market again and realized he had overplayed his hand, Damon came back to the Yankees offering to take a much smaller deal than the one the Yankees had considered offering him previously. Yet instead of returning with a conciliatory attitude, Boras continued to play his “mystery team” games, and once again the Yankees moved on.
It will be interesting to see how much Damon gets from whoever signs him for 2010. It seems that Scott Boras plays a very dangerous game, making outrageous claims and spreading rumors of nonexistent offers so as to scare teams into caving on demands from a player they covet. Often, this results in his player getting an above market deal from a club that had no real competition for a player’s services (see Holliday, Matt). However, on occasion, the target club will see through Boras’ machinations and will simply refuse to budge on their offer or will move on to their next option. This leaves the client without a deal from the club that he wanted to play for, as is likely the situation in the case of Johnny Damon. Such is the risk of signing on with Scott Boras.
While Scott Boras seems to signal that Johnny Damon’s pinstriped tenure is all but over, Sports Illustrated’s Jon Heyman indicates that there is still a chance the Yankees and the 36-year old free agent can come to an agreement. Brian Cashman, Heyman writes, “is said to only want to do a one-year deal at this point and believed to want to spend no more than $6 million.” This is inline with the figure I put forth yesterday as the number is small enough to be viewed as a big value buy for the Yankees. Heyman, however, acknowledges that the team might have to “stretch” that figure a bit in order to land the outfielder. Maybe a $6 million base with an extra $2-3 million in incentives could get the job done? Incentives are not included in the opening day payroll, so the Yankees, in an effort to adhere to their budget cutting principles, could still maintain that the signing has not put them over the $200 million mark by a large margin. Plus, they could always trade Chad Gaudin, who could possibly earn close to $3 million after arbitration, in order to free up payroll resources.
Basically, despite Cashman’s admission about Brett Gardner being the everyday left fielder, the Yankees are still in a very good position to land Johnny Damon at their price. The patient approach which they have employed this winter has worked wonders, as Damon’s demands have fallen dramatically. He may not be amenable to a one-year deal and an incentive-laden contract (which is my suggestion), however, at this point, it could end up being his best option.
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From Pete Caldera:
Out in the Bronx, there is no cause to add a slugging left fielder to the Yankees’ lineup.
“Our team is, for the most part, set,” Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said Tuesday by phone from his office at Yankee Stadium……..
“We have a left fielder,” Cashman said, adding, “We do like Brett Gardner.”
“With the money we had to spend, we chose to spend it in those spots,” Cashman said. “We’re just playing with the bench right now.”
Still, the Yankees have room for another outfielder – preferably a right-handed bat; Cashman acknowledged that he’s searching for a right-handed hitter.
Cashman has mislead the fans about potential signings before (Johnny Damon’s 2005 dealings with the Yankees come to mind), but the combination of the Yankees stated budget and Cashman’s quotes suggests that Johnny Damon’s tenure in the Bronx is over. Scott Boras seems to agree, as Bryan Hoch provides the following soundbite:
And in the instance of Johnny Damon it was just a situation where, you know, for whatever reason he really wasn’t given an opportunity to return to the Yankees and, you know, he’ll have to just move forward.”
Taking all of this information together, it seems that the Yankees have moved on, and will target players such as Xavier Nady, Reed Johnson, Marcus Thames, Johnny Gomes, or Rocco Baldelli to spell Gardner in left field against tough lefties. This is an unfortunate conclusion to Johnny Damon’s tenure in pinstripes, one that could probably be avoided with a creative offer similar to the one Adrian Beltre garnered from the Red Sox. Alas, it appears that it is not to be, and JD will be manning the outfield for another club in 2010.
Photo Courtesy Of The Daily News
Via Buster Olney (ESPN), we learn that in “the early conversations between the Yankees and Johnny Damon’s side, there appears to be a very wide gulf between what the team is willing to pay and what Damon expects to get paid in this winter’s market.” In fact, Jon Heyman (SI) tweets that the Yankees and Damon are $34M apart, as the Yankees are only offering $18 over two years while Damon wants $52M over four ($13M per). Clearly, the two parties view the market from differing perspectives (the Yankees’ view is more realistic). Perhaps the Yankees would be best served waiting until January to get a deal done. Then again, they may not be able to prolong the patient approach for such an extended period, as there are other priorities on Brian Cashman’s ledger.
One of those priorities is finding a DH. According to Mark Feinsand of the Daily News, “if Damon is unwilling to take a two-year contract in the next two weeks or so, a source said the Yankees would likely turn their attention to Hideki Matsui, who is willing to accept a one-year deal to return to the Bronx.” If you’re the Yankees and you can have Matsui back for one-year, whether or not Damon wants to come back, you do that deal.
From Joel Sherman (NY Post):
So much for the hometown discount. The Yankees have been hoping Johnny Damon’s desire to stay a Yankee is great enough that he agrees to return on a one- or, at most, two-year contract.However, his representative, Scott Boras, hardly sounded like Damon was going to be a short-term bargain for the Yankees. Instead, he compared his client to Derek Jeter and sounded an awful lot like someone who expects a three- or four-year deal for Damon.
If that is indeed the case, then the Yankees and Damon are very likely heading for divorce this offseason. The Yankees are concerned about how Damon’s desire and body will hold up under another long-term contract plus they have overall worries about tying up too many thirtysomething players long-term and facing an aging cataclysm in around 2012-13.
Sherman goes on to say that Damon’s agent, Scott Boras, is trying to link Damon and Derek Jeter together so as to make it seem as though the two players are reliant upon each other (and, therefore, the Yankees lineup is reliant upon Johnny Damon). Thus if you lose Damon, according to Boras’ logic, Jeter’s production will suffer. Sherman also notes that Boras cited Jorge Posada’s 4-year deal as a comparable contract for Damon—Posada was given the deal when he was 36—although it’s much harder to find a good hitting catcher than it is an offensively solid yet defensively inept left fielder. That contract was signed prior to the 2008 offseason, as well, which is when the free agent market really bottomed out (just ask Bobby Abreu).
In the end, a depressed market—not Boras—will ultimately dictate Damon’s deal. If he wants too many years and too much money, you let him walk (I’m opposed to him returning at all). It shouldn’t be a hard decision given his flaws.
SI’s Jon Heyman is reporting that A-Rod is ahead of schedule, and will return to action sometime during the first week in May.
Alex Rodriguez and the Yankees have moved up A-Rod’s target date and are now shooting for a return to the team sometime in the first week of May, sources say.
Rodriguez and the Yankees were originally calling May 15 the target date for his return, and that is still the publicly stated goal. However, Rodriguez’s progress has been so good, both he and the team are hopeful he can return more than a week earlier than first expected
While this has been hinted at for some time, when Heyman reports something on a Boras client, its pretty much official. Taking a quick look at the Yankee schedule, that would mean he returns for either the Monday and Tuesday games vs Boston, or the following games against the Rays. Knowing Alex and his flair for the dramatic, expect to see him wearing a pinstriped cape in the Bronx on Monday night.
MLBTR is reporting (via Peter Gammons) that Scott Boras is looking for a record setting bonus for the highly touted San Diego State pitcher.
ESPN.com’s Peter Gammons heard from some club officials that top amateur pitcher Stephen Strasburg and his agent, Scott Boras, could demand $50MM over six years if he’s selected first overall by the Nationals in the June draft. If the Nationals pick Strasburg and seem unwilling to pay him as much as he wants, Boras could threaten to send the prospect to pitch in Japan for a year. If the Nats are scared off, the Mariners and Padres are next in line for Strasburg.
So how could an amateur player get away with these lofty demands? Strasburg has struck out 74 and walked only seven in the 34.1 innings he’s pitched for San Diego State and scouts rave about his stuff.
For some context, last year’s top draft pick Tim Beckham signed with the Rays for 6.15 mil, and only 2 other players (Hosmer/Alvarez) got as high as 6 mil each. The all time record to this day is still Mark Prior (10.5 mil 01 draft) followed by Mark Teixiera (9.5 mil 01 draft) and David Price (8.5 mil 07 draft).
At that price tag, its not inconceivable he might fall to one of the big market teams at the bottom of the draft. If the Red Sox (28th pick in 09) were willing to pony up 100 mil for Dice-K and the Yanks (29th pick) could spend 42 mil for the immortal Kei Igawa, then neither team would blink at that price tag for a once in a generation talent like Strasburg. It’s also possible that if any of this happens Strasburg might end the MLB amateur draft system as we know it. If a perfectly healthy pitcher was to fall that far in the draft simply due to salary demands, it would be obvious to all involved that Boras is steering the high end talent to the big market teams, which shatters the whole premise of giving the teams with the worst record (typically small market teams) the top picks and a chance to get better via the draft.
A team could still select him and call Boras’ bluff, but they would run the risk of having the player go unsigned and wind up without a 1st round pick in 09. They would retain the same pick for next year’s draft, but that still represents a year of lost development time and a wasted 09 draft pick. A player like Strasburg might be ready to play in the bigs before that team selects again in the draft. But things like this have happened before, and chances are this is just Boras blowing smoke.
Stay tuned . . .
Rich Lederer over at The Baseball Analysts has a very detailed analysis posted about the credibility of SI.com and MLB Network contributor John Heyman. The most compelling point that he makes is in regard to Heyman’s relationship with Scott Boras:
It is plainly obvious that Heyman, known among fellow writers as scottboras.com, is getting fed such stories by Scott himself, which is fine and dandy except there is more going on here than meets the eye.
You see, Boras throws Heyman a bone on a Tek or Tex signing but also uses him to spread rumors about the level of interest and terms in ongoing free agent negotiations to create a false sense of demand. Teams that fall for this trick wind up competing against themselves, which is exactly what Boras desires.
While Boras is no fool, Heyman is a tool for the Scott Boras Corporation. Boras knows how to game the system to get the best deals for his clients and will gladly use Heyman as long as the latter plays along or until the market realizes what is going on. As it stands now, it’s almost as if Heyman, who was seen exiting Boras’ office after midnight during the Teixeira negotiations, is on the SBC payroll.
Most knowledgeable fans knew this already, but Lederer brings some evidence of Heyman’s subjugation, focusing on the events surrounding Manny Ramirez and Mark Teixeira over the last few months. Ultimately, it means that anything Heyman writes must be taken with an enormous grain of salt. Only trust Mr. Heyman when he reports a Boras client signing, as those reports are worth their weight in gold. Even items about non-Boras players may be reported just to alter the market in a way that could benefit Boras clients. So when Heyman reports next week that the Yankees are considering adding Manny, try to keep your head on straight and think about who the price is being raised for.
