No birthday gift for Mariano Rivera from Yankees

Mariano Rivera's 41st birthday came and went yesterday with no news on a new deal with the New York Yankees. Perhaps it will just be a belated birthday gift.

Mo hasn't been heard from publicly so far this offseason, but it has been reported that he wants a two-year deal, which I think is entirely fair. The Yankees supposedly have concerns about going that long on a new contract, but Mo hasn't given any indication that age has slowed him down at all. In fact, his only rough patch in 2010 was attributed to poor mechanics, which he corrected right in time for the playoffs.

Baseball contract negotiations can be tricky and contentious so I don’t discount the possibility of things getting ugly between the Yankees and Mo as they have with Derek Jeter. But I hope the Yankees don't draw the same line in the sand that they have with their captain. Unlike Jeter, Mo had another typically great year and should be rewarded for maintaining his status as the best closer in the game by having his very reasonable request of two years granted, along with a solid raise. The Yankees can’t afford to let Mo go because they don’t have anyone ready to replace him. Signing Mo for another two years will give them a chance to groom some brave soul to take his job when he retires.

Mo’s new deal will come after his birthday, but better late than never. Happy Birthday, Mariano! And a very happy birthday to my nephew Jonathan!

Better luck in the National League, Javy Vazquez!

After returning from a weekend in Barbados blissfully free of any baseball hot stove talk, I come back to find that Javier Vazquez has left the New York Yankees for the National League. That was not at all a surprise, just like it wouldn't surprise me if he has a very strong year for the Florida Marlins in 2011.

His tenure with the Yankees ended when he was kept off the roster for the playoffs, even though an argument could be made that he was a more effective starter in 2010 than AJ Burnett. But the writing was on the wall, especially with Brian Cashman openly admitting that trading for Vazquez a second time was a mistake.

Vazquez has some talent and I’m not at all surprised he got $7 million from the Marlins despite his rough 2010 campaign. I have no doubt he will do better in the National League, with its shorter lineups and away from the glare of the New York spotlight. Say what you will about Vazquez in NY, but he has had good years in other cities, including in Atlanta where he was 15-10 with a 2.87 ERA in 219 innings pitched in 2009.

I would expect a performance closer to his 2009 self than the guy often mercilessly booed at Yankee Stadium this year. I wish him well and I hope other Yankee fans will too because there were other Yankee employees far more responsible for the disappointing end to the 2010 season of the Bronx Bombers.

No reason to give thanks to Yankees for Jeter, Mo

Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera have plenty of things to give thanks for this holiday, but the gratitude of their bosses is not one of them.

Just in time for the holidays, Jeter and Mo are learning that their loyalty to the New York Yankees only goes one way. I honestly thought that when the Thanksgiving holiday came around, the Yankees would be well on their way to securing the signatures of both Jeter and Mo on new contracts to end their careers in pinstripes. But I was banking on the Yankees remaining professional through the process and showing the proper respect for their legendary stars. I guess I gave the Yankees way too much credit.

Instead of engaging in quiet and civil negotiations, the Yankees are demonstrating their gratitude for everything Jeter has done by publicly portraying him as a greedy athlete. They haven’t mentioned Mo as much, but we can safely include him in the comments Hank Steinbrenner made about the Yankees already making their athletes rich enough. How dare they publicly belittle their homegrown free agents when they are banking on their loyalty to the only organization they have every played for to keep them in pinstripes?

I hope Cliff Lee is watching the Derek Jeter saga because if he signs with the Yankees, this is the way he will be treated when his contract is up, no matter how many World Series titles he helps the Yankees win.

Being the deeply religious man that he is, Mo will probably find plenty of reason to be thankful this holiday. Jeter is probably more offended by the behavior of his bosses, as he should be. But I hope wherever they choose to spend the holiday, Derek and Mo can forget all the messiness of the contract negotiations and just focus on being grateful for what they already have (great careers, healthy families and the adoration of millions).

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Yankees wrong to paint Jeter as greedy

The New York Yankees are in serious spin mode right now, painting Derek Jeter as greedy just because he apparently isn't happy with the offer they made. That's just wrong.

Why should Jeter jump at the offer? He probably fairly assumed it would be a first offer and a jumping off point to start negotiations. But now Brian Cashman and the Steinbrenners are freely granting interviews to spin their side of the story, arguing that they have made a fair and appropriate offer and implying they have no intention of going beyond three years and $45 million for Jeter's services. Hank Steinbrenner was particularly insulting talking about how some ballplayers are wealthier then their bosses (the people in glass houses cliché suddenly springs to mind). Hey Hank, last time I checked, no one went to Yankee Stadium to watch you be an owner. But since 1996, millions have walked through the gates at both the old and new stadiums to watch Jeter play shortstop.

Cashman practically dared Jeter to test his value on the free-agent market. Of course, the Yankees will pay a lot more for Jeter's services than any other team. But that's true for nearly every player the Yankees sign because of their vast resources. Just two years ago, they offered CC Sabathia tens of millions more than any other team. And last year they gave Nick Johnson $5.5 million with his injury history. I doubt any other team was offering anything close to that. The important issue is Jeter's value to the Yankees, not his value to other teams. And if Cashman has any questions about that, the general manager should go to wherever he stores his World Series rings and take a good, long look at them because he would not have any of those rings without Derek Jeter.

Perhaps Cashman is just being a good soldier and doing what Hal Steinbrenner is telling him. But it seems to me the Yankees are too focused on winning the media war and not working hard enough to get a deal done. They sound like Jeter should be grateful for the offer and should just shut up and take it. It doesn’t work that way, not after everything Jeter has done for the organization. At the very least, he deserves to be treated with respect and not portrayed as just another greedy athlete.

Robinson Cano will get another shot at MVP

Robinson Cano will have to be content with his Silver Slugger and Gold Glove awards, at least for now.

In what seemed like a foregone conclusion, Josh Hamilton won the American League Most Valuable Player award by a pretty hefty margin over Cano and the other candidates. Despite missing 28 games at the end of the season, Hamilton put up strong enough numbers to clearly convince the writers of his value to the Texas Rangers. It must feel like a particularly gratifying achievement after all the troubles Hamilton has endured.

But I must admit to being very surprised by the lack of first-place votes for Cano considering the New York Yankees actually made it to the playoffs while the Detroit Tigers and Toronto Blue Jays both watched from home. Ever since Alex Rodriguez started winning MVP awards during his time with the Rangers, it has become clear that some writers will cast their votes for the players with the gaudiest numbers rather than the players who are actually most valuable to their teams in helping them get into postseason play. I have no problem with Hamilton winning, but the writers who put Miguel Cabrera and Jose Bautista ahead of Cano really missed the boat. Granted, those guys put up fantastic numbers this year, but Cano kept the Yankees in contention when ARod went down and other big-time players such as Mark Teixeira and Derek Jeter struggled.

But Cano’s MVP loss doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things. And Cano is young and has become one of the best players in baseball. He will get another shot at an MVP award eventually.

Yankees hard-line stance on Jeter wearing thin

It's still fairly early in the negotiations between the New York Yankees and Derek Jeter, but already the team's hard-line stance is starting to rub Captain Jeter the wrong way.

Why else would his agent Casey Close, who unlike the Yankees has kept pretty quiet so far, call the team's stance baffling? Personally, I'm with Close. Acting like Jeter's status as an iconic Yankee and the model citizen of baseball should have no bearing on the negotiations is indeed puzzling. I will believe Jeter’s popularity is a non-issue the next time I go to a Yankee game and can actually count the number of fans wearing Jeter T-shirts without losing track. Heck, it’s nearly impossible to wall down a city street without bumping into someone wearing a Jeter jersey.

Yes, Jeter's 2010 stats should give the Yankees cause for some questions about whether he has started to decline, but those numbers could also have been a symptom of him playing more games than ideal, as Joe Girardi has alluded to, or simply Jeter having an off year. It's shocking because we expect so much more from Jeter, but it happens to the best of players and perhaps Brian Cashman & Co are unfairly focusing on one bad year.

The Yankees like to pretend that the ridiculously long contract jam packed with frills that they gave to Alex Rodriguez has no bearing on the Jeter negotiations because Hank Steinbrenner, who was more like his emotional and media-hungry father George, was running the team at the time rather than the quiet, introspective Hal. But they are kidding themselves.

It's unfair for them to try to bully Jeter, who has been an integral part of five World Series championships as well as a fearless, unsullied leader on and off the field, into accepting a deal on their terms when they so quickly caved to ARod even after he publicly humiliated the team by opting out of his already generous contract. No doubt they would love a do-over on the ARod deal, but that doesn't mean they can act like it didn't happen.

Unfortunately for Jeter, the Yankees hard-line stance means these negotiations will likely take a lot longer than they should. I still think the two sides will come to an agreement, but the Yankees will have to get off their high horse first.

Mission impossible for Larry Rothschild?

The mission for Larry Rothschild, which he has chosen to accept, is to make sure AJ Burnett doesn't self destruct again. Is it a mission impossible?

Rothschild doesn't seem to think so. If he did, he probably wouldn't have accepted the job offer from the New York Yankees, knowing that Burnett will be his top and at times his only priority.

Sure, he will work with CC Sabathia to see if they can lessen the big lefty’s mechanical problems early in the season so he can be as effective in April as he is in August and September. And he will work with young Phil Hughes to curb his tendency to give up home runs at Yankee Stadium.

But Burnett is project #1. No one was getting the job as pitching coach for the Yankees unless they could provide a roadmap for getting Burnett back on track.

Will Rothschild's plan work? Brian Cashman seems to think so. Why else would he give the new coach a three-year deal?

I hope Rothschild has some good ideas for fixing Burnett. The guy has so much talent and potential and maybe Rothschild can figure out a way to harness all that and to stop those self-doubting thoughts from creeping into AJ's head. Rothschild is a coach, not a shrink, so there may be a limit to what he can do. But hopefully it isn't an impossible mission.

Thanks to Wjmummert via Wikipedia for the photo.