The ripple effect of Mussina’s retirement
Posted: Friday, November 21, 2008 2:28 PM
Nothing major has happened in the first week of free agency. Mark Teixeira was on the Georgia Tech sideline Thursday night for the Yellow Jackets win over Miami and when interviewed he said his signing process will take several more weeks.
Elsewhere, the retirement of Mike Mussina could prove an added financial windfall for free agents CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Derek Lowe. All three are targets of the Yankees. Having lost Mussina, the Yankees now need to sign two of the aforementioned trio of starters to fulfill their stated offseason goal of bolstering their rotation.
Sabathia has already been presented with an extremely lucrative offer by the Yankees – one that reportedly would exceed Johan Santana’s $137.5 million, six-year contract with the New York Mets both in total and average per year.
Expect huge offers to Burnett and Lowe from the Yankees -- a team that an AL general manager said can only “be held back by its conscience. If they want, they could add $100 million in salaries for this year.”
Hal Steinbrenner became the controlling owner Thursday. Word is that Hal the Silent agrees with Brian Cashman’s view of building a farm system to augment the free-agent signings. Hank the Loud, Hal’s brother, advocates going for the big names. Over the next month, we should see clear evidence of which approach prevails.
Word is leaking that, as predicted here, the Giants will try to sell Sabathia, a Bay Area native, on coming home. But can a team already saddled with Barry Zito’s deal, outbid the Yankees?
Burnett and Lowe are in the enviable position of waiting for Sabathia’s decision and allowing the “losers” to romance them.
Mussina’s decision is only surprising in an era where most players chase milestones. For Mussina, he retires at 270 wins, unwilling to commit to three more years, the number he regarded as realistic to reach 300 wins.
Should his Hall of Fame candidacy be impacted by this decision? I think not but have read several voter remarks that place Mussina as a strong but not definite inductee.
Mussina’s career goes back to the debate held in this space over the last week -- namely, how much do we value someone who simply wins?
Admittedly presented in isolation, consider these career winning percentages: Phil Niekro .537, Don Sutton .559, Nolan Ryan .526, Gaylord Perry .542 and Robin Roberts .539.
All are in the Hall of Fame and none created much angst because all but Roberts reached 300 wins. Thirty wins shy of that mark is Mussina, whose career winning percentage is .638.
I wondered about the great Juan Marichal, a Hall of Famer who never earned his proper accolades during a career overshadowed by Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, Bob Gibson and Tom Seaver. Marichal won 243 games with a winning percentage of .631. His ERA was decidedly lower than Mussina (2.89 to 3.68) but ballparks and BALCO have to be factored into that difference.
In no way is this meant to equate Mussina to Marichal -- the eras are too different. Rather the point is simply to explore the concept of a starter winning games. Marichal was rewarded for that. Will that also be the case with Mussina?
FIVE MORE SWINGS:
1. WHEN I HEARD ABOUT CHASE UTLEY’S…hip problem, I immediately wondered “why the wait?” There must be a medical reason for a delay of nearly four weeks between the Phils’ last game and a surgery that may sideline a key player until June.
Besides getting Utley back healthy, the Phils have another issue to watch in 2009: Will Cole Hamels be this year’s Josh Beckett? Think about this: The Phils clinched a playoff spot on Saturday of the last weekend of the regular season, allowing them to rest Hamels and have him pitch Game 1 of the LDS, a feat he repeated in the LCS and World Series. He pitched 262 innings this year, a whopping number in this era, and the last 35 were in postseason pressure. Beckett never rebounded from the lead role he played in Boston’s 2007 title run and his inning total (230, 30 of those in the postseason) was significantly lower than that of Hamels.
2. MORE ON TIM LINCECUM…as I talked with Giants pitching coach Dave Righetti this week and he emphasized that Lincecum “would have been crushed if we would have shut him down” in the final week, especially when the Giants played the Dodgers. Righetti confirmed that the innings and pitch count run up in the final two months is more concern to people like me than to Lincecum. He was strong and never once altered his delivery.
3. A RULE CHANGE THAT GUARANTEES…full length postseason games was officially announced by MLB commissioner Bud Selig. But why is the All-Star Game included? No matter how hard everyone tries to legitimize this game, it is still an exhibition.
4. FREE AGENT RAFAEL FURCAL…continues to attract more interest than I would have predicted. Turns out more teams have a need for his leadoff skills and Furcal’s rank does not warrant draft pick compensation. So it looks like he may land a three or four year deal despite missing most of the 2008 season.
5. AARON HEILMAN…needs to get out of New York. He was mercilessly booed by Mets fans for most of 2008 and New Yorkers don’t easily forgive or forget. Heilman’s agent says the pitcher wants to be a starter, affording the Mets a nice escape hatch to use in dealing Heilman for a reliever.
