A Rod to Miami?

It looks like ARod is spent. I wouldn't be surprised if he retires after this season (it's got to be humiliating to be a $25M/year player and get pinch hit for in a playoff game).

Where does ARod rank among the greatest player of all time?

Among players from his era I would put him behind Jeter, Chipper Jones, Thome, Pujols, and Bonds. If I were to make a list he would probably fall just outside the top 50 all time.

 

Re: The ARod question

He is not behind Jeter, Chipper, or Thome.

 

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Just based on stats alone I see what you're saying. I would like to see a number of how many of Road's HRs had no impact on the game and were merely stat padding.

 

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He is behind Raul Ibanez.

 

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Statistically, he's one of the best players of all-time, but he will be known as someone who just could not bring it come the postseason. I know he has a ring, but I don't think that matters to too many people.

How many future Hall-of-Famers have been pinch-hit for in that situation? Not only did I laugh when it happened, but I laughed even harder when the move paid off...

 

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That's because those people dislike his attitude and contract and aren't afraid to dishonestly bend the facts to make their case, for the most part.

He brought it in the postseason at a rate nearly indistiguishable from the rate he brought it in the regular season. If anyone wants to insist that the 1 total base per 30 at-bats difference in his SLG percentage is pivotal, I'll listen. But anything else is just cherry-picking.

 

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Where does he rank is less interesting to me than "Where do we go from here?" I'm really curious to see what the Yankees do with him after next season. There is absolutely no way he retires with $115 million still owed to him. (God, it's stunning to type that.) He'll be in pinstripes for another season, probably hitting sixth or seventh for the entire year, and then it will get interesting. Does he DH for a full season? Can you pay $20 million a year of his deal and ship him somewhere else, with another team picking up the $7 million to $10 million he's still owed each year? Could he re-energize himself in the National League, where the pitching just isn't as good? Is there a chance he juices again because he just can't take the shame of being this bad?

 

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I will say this about him, and maybe it's been addressed on the postseason thread: He handled last night about as well as he could have possibly handled it. And he wasn't just spouting the right cliches, either. He sounded genuine, particularly in admitting that six or seven years ago, he would have been pissed.

 

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The Yankees should trade ARod to Pittsburgh and pay 90 percent of his salary, just so we can hear OOP tell us that $3 million is too much for the Pirates to pay one player.

 

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Agreed with all this. He has not aged nearly as well as hoped (a common theme coming up in the possibly PED-light era?), and he's becoming a problem.

This year, he was down to a .783 OPS in a hitter's park. League average for a 3b is .740 (where his defensive skills probably give some of it back) and for a DH is .758. He basically a slightly above average player right now, and with the risk of his skills further eroding each year. The Yankees can afford to eat the money, but they aren't in the business of fielding below-average players in starting roles, and he's in real danger of becoming that as soon as next season.

As far as trading him somewhere and sending along money, aren't there rules about how quickly that has to be resolved? I don't think you can just promise to cut a check for $20 million every year for five years to pay his salary.

And they definitely don't like him enough to pretend nothing is wrong.

 

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He's not retiring. He cares about the money and the records and he's probably hoping that another ring or two will make people forget that his game goes down a level in the postseason.

 

Re: The ARod question

Except when it doesn't.