Friday, December 12, 2008

Burnett's on the way?

If you believe this from GAKIII, he sure is:

Talking to a Yankee recently, A.J. Burnett informed the player they were going to be teammates.

"
He wants to come to New York - those words came out of his mouth," the player told The Post last night. "He really wants to play here."

From all indications, Burnett will join CC Sabathia at the top of the Yankee rotation, and the deal could be sealed as early as today.
Five years? Can't they give him a 3 year out, too?


UPDATE
(12/12/08, 6:31pm)
: So it's done. Just got home so I'll try to get something up later tonite.
Free agent right-hander A.J. Burnett has reached preliminary agreement on a five-year, $82.5 million contract with the New York Yankees.

The Yankees made a late charge to beat out the
Atlanta Braves for Burnett, who went 18-10 with a 4.07 ERA in 35 starts with Toronto this season. Burnett won 10 of his last 12 decisions. He set career highs in wins, strikeouts (231) and innings (221 1/3).

6 comments:

tadthebad said...

Man, my arm hurts just reading this.

Jason @ IIATMS said...

Musta been a busy day for you, Tad. I expected something sooner. ;)

tHeMARksMiTh said...

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3765754

Deal appears done. Okay, now the Braves are about Plan D by now while the Yankees just made the Red Sox and Rays pee in their pants. Let's just think about this: CC, Burnett, Wang, Joba, Hughes as of now. Money is still left for someone else to push Hughes or Joba out of the rotation. Still, that's a lot of money and risk tied up in few players, but when you have a pretty new stadium and a lot of money, those risks become a bit smaller. I guess we'll see.

Mark said...

Yes, this is coming from a Boston fan, but...since when have the Yankees had to overpay to get a free agent to sign?

And -- five years? Ouch. They should have given AJ the opt-out, instead of CC.

Jason @ IIATMS said...

Well, I've got mixed feelings here. I'm happy that we have a rotation the is good but the prices are nuts.

As for the yanks overpaying for burnett... I think it was just outbidding atlanta. There has never been a NY discount, Mark. Not even for our own guys like Mo and Posada.

Anonymous said...

Or Pettitte.....