YankCrank wrote:

Heyman said Damon was offered a one year $6 million last week and turned it down.

Assuming that’s correct, I guess we can put the idea to bed that the Yanks didn’t try to go “over budget” and sign Damon.

Well, that’s not exactly right. The offer was $3 million now, and $3 million deferred to next year. That’s only $1 million more than they gave Winn for this year, with $3 million shunted off to next year’s budget. It’s possible the Yanks’ signing of Winn left a million in the budget, and Cashman was able to make this offer without blowing this current budget limit.

There was no way Damon and Boras accept that offer at this point in time, and therefore, Cashman went with an offer to what he thought was the next best available guy.
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Lupica is an idiot, in general, and this column is just more of his usual claptrap.

Steve can agree with it. I think he’s wrong for doing so, but that doesn’t mean I think he’s an idiot for doing so. The column fits in with Steve’s overall viewpoint concerning the team, so he’s going to agree with it. I think he’s wrong about that. So what? Is he going to change his opinions because I disagree?

Pffffffffft.

Heyman said Damon was offered a one year $6 million last week and turned it down.

Assuming that’s correct, I guess we can put the idea to bed that the Yanks didn’t try to go “over budget” and sign Damon.

Whether the Yanks should have offered more than $6 million for one year is up for debate, i’m sure we all feel differently. But here’s what was turned down by Johnny and Boras:

2 years, $20 million
2 years, $14 million
1 year, $6 million

Good luck finding better than any of those elsewhere, Johnny.

egghead71 wrote:

More importantly… they don’t want Damon in the outfield. Damon’s only real chance to return to the Yanks was as DH. And, when they were filling the DH role they got a high OBP guy for less than 6 million, and a 1 year commitment. Those parameters would have been a joke to Damon/Boras back in December. Admittedly a gamble, but that’s what Cashman is paid to do.

Thank you egghead. This is very accurate. Cashman had to look at Damon 2 ways: First, as a DH/LF (in that order). At that point in time, Boras and Damon were miles apart from the Yanks number. Once the DH role was filled (and the hurry was that Matsui was gone) Cashman had to look at Damon in a different way: LF. He’s already in theory replaced a bunch of Damon’s production with Granderson/Johnson offensively. He wanted defense in LF.

It sucks that we could not blow the bankroll a little for Johnny. But given there is a limit, Cashman did what he had to do to offset the fact that the Yanks and Damon were miles apart at the wrong time.

Raf wrote:

Nomah…

Everytime I hear that name, I throw up in my mouth just a little.

Time will tell… Of course, I scratched my head when the Yanks went with Girardi over Stanley, and when they went with Tino over Mattingly. Scratched my head when the Sox went with Orlando Cabrera over Nomah…

@ Steve Lombardi:
Couple of assumptions here Steve…
First that Damon would settle for one year 5 million. Debatable.

More importantly… they don’t want Damon in the outfield. Damon’s only real chance to return to the Yanks was as DH. And, when they were filling the DH role they got a high OBP guy for less than 6 million, and a 1 year commitment. Those parameters would have been a joke to Damon/Boras back in December. Admittedly a gamble, but that’s what Cashman is paid to do.

@ Steve Lombardi:
1) You don’t have to convince me that spending a few extra million to get Damon was the right move. I’ve been saying that all along. I think it’s completely idiotic to have picked Nick Johnson over Johnny Damon and I’m on record as having said that from the start. That doesn’t make me a saint or a hero, I’m just writing that to be clear that I agree with you that letting Damon walk wasn’t the way I’d have let it all go down.

Having said that, I have three quarrels with your first comment (#9):

a) One percent, two percent, 10 percent or 100 percent is irrelevant. If the man with the money says “this is your number and that’s final” then that’s that. Again, I argued that exact same point with both Damon and Wang. For less than 5% of the total payroll, the Yanks could’ve kept valuable assets. But, be that as it may, you can’t assume that Cashman didn’t go to his employers to see if something could be done for Damon. We know that he tried acquiring Mike Cameron last year and was turned down. So to believe that Cashman sat on his hands this time around is something that we simply don’t know. Any smart employee knows when to test his employer’s patience. As much as I disagre with it, perhaps Cashman simply didn’t think Damon was worth spending political capital on when there’s an entire season’s worth of unknowns to contend with. What if — GOD FORBID — Jeter misses the whole season and Cashman has to get an emergency $10M approved to get Tulowitzki from Colorado (for example)?

b) Charitable donations have nothing to do with it. I don’t see why you’d bring it up since whatever the Yanks give to Haitian relief has no impact whatsoever on their payroll for the 2010 roster. I’m not a tax attorney or an accountant but I’m pretty sure that charity is tax deductible and Johnny Damon isn’t.

c) Mentioning Teixeira is following the same flawed assumption that Lupica made regarding the consistency of budgets from year to year. Perhaps last year the total flexibility was up to $230M and perhaps this year it is only $210M. For that reason, arguing what happened in the past makes no sense since there’s no way of knowing if Cashman is operating under the same directive. I would argue, in fact, that he is clearly not operating in the same climate as he was last year. The reason(s) for the change I’m not privy to, but I can make that assumption pretty safely.

2) I didn’t make any personal attacks on you. Lupica’s column is poorly argued, makes faulty assumptions and ignores facts in order to make his points. You’re entitled to agree with it, it’s a free country. I don’t think you should, given that it’s a foolish argument from top to bottom, but go ahead and knock yourself out if you want to associate your name with such foolishness.

@ Steve Lombardi:

Do we know for sure that Johnny would have resigned for $5-7 million (Winn’s new deal plus $3-5 million)?

Some how I doubt that, part of me is actually happy a front office (anyone’s front office) stood up to Boras’ posturing, and another piece is happy the Yankees didn’t go the 2/$26mln route because that gives them an “extra” $13 million to spend next offseason where there are, in my opinion, likely to be better talents available to fill the left field/two-hole spot than an aging Johnny Damon.

Hell, Damon himself will probably be available both next offseason and during the season via trade.

Steve Lombardi wrote:

That’s like saying “Only an idiot would appove of this column.”

No, that’s like saying “Only someone with an equally myopic view on this topic would approve this column.” But you seem to want to read personal attacks into most every criticism that I make on this site, which is why my posting has become significantly less frequent.

yagottagotomo1 wrote:

I never said that it reflects poorly on you.

Correct. MJ wrote that. You wrote:

“I thought this column was epic in its stupidity and myopic nature. Glad to see you gave it two thumbs up.”

That’s like saying “Only an idiot would appove of this column.” If you don’t want to own up to that, that’s your “prerogative.”