I Almost Got Punked, Well Not Really

Okay. This whole Mark Teixeira thing needs to end. I'm sick of this whole will they or won't they dance. Mt friend Danny Mac tried to pull a fast one on me today. He forwards me text alerts he gets from ESPN. This is what I got from him today:

ESPN MLB - Yankees reach agreement with 1B Mark Teixeira worth 5 years and $95 million. Details are not known except for the above being a complete fabrication. LOL.

The first things that caught my eye were the words Yankees, agreement, and Mark Teixeira. For a brief second I was extremely overjoyed and then I saw the terms of the deal and I thought something was off. Danny Mac must have forgotten that Teixeira and his agent are angling for an 8-10 year deal in the $180 million range. It would have been much funnier had he left off the part about it being made up. I probably would have ran with it or at least mentioned the alert and that I couldn't verify it. I really hope the Yankees come through at the last second with a winning bid. I'm convinced that they're going to go after Teixeira or Manny Ramirez. I see the merits of signing both but I think 8 years of Teixeira is better than 3 years of ManRam. Hopefully, this saga ends by Christmas. I'd like to move on from it. Teixeira said before that he wanted it done by the holiday, so it should be happening soon.

In other news, the Yankees and Chien-Ming Wang agreed to a 1 year deal for $5 million. I love Chien-Ming Wang. He's one of my favorite pitchers and I he stays in pinstripes for his entire career. I personally think he's one of the better pitchers in the game and as I've written before, he's an ace. I disagree wholeheartedly with anyone that thinks he isn't. I know wins aren't the best measure of a pitcher but Wang was the 3rd fastest pitcher in the last 50 years to reach 50 career wins. Wang reached the 50 win plateau in his 85th career start. Doc Gooden and Ron Guidry won 50 in their first 82 starts. I don't know anyone that doesn't see those two as aces. You don't win 19 games in back-to-back seasons if you're not a top of the rotation starter. Who knows? We could be talking about back-to-back-to-back seasons if the Wanger knew how to run the bases. He was 8-2 when he went on the shelf last year. Bottom line is Wang wins ball games. The Yankees have a great 1-2-3 combo now that Sabathia and Burnett have joined the fold. I wouldn't be surprised if Wang bests these guys in wins. I think he's that good. $5 million is a steal. Nicely done Yanks.

Finally, if you want to see just how cool of a person Phil Hughes, check this link out. It comes from Zell's Pinstripe Blog. He ran into Phil on a message board and Phil hooked him up with some free swag. It's definitely worth a look and just goes to show how cool Phil really is. If only I collected baseball cards. Signed balls are more my thing.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie