Today I read an article showing in detail what all the players playoff shares are. You see team names on there you’d expect. Yankees, Phillies, Dodgers. Those all make sense.
But at the bottom of the list is the Texas Rangers. Apparently finishing second in your division (and being a non Wild Card team), also affords you a playoff piece. Granted, it’s way smaller, but it just seems weird to see the Rangers pop up in the list of playoff share money. Just seemed weird.
Anyway, here’s the numbers for the Rangers…
(Share of Players’ Pool: $590,731.16; value of each full share: $9,276.38) – The Rangers awarded 58 full shares, 5.25 partial shares and 4 cash awards.
Merry Christmas
A bit early I know, but watch this video. It’s really funny. Lots of visual gags, too.
Reinstatements
- P Matt Harrison, P Eric Hurley, & OF Brandon Boggs reinstated from 60 day DL to 40 man roster.
Andruw Jones
Given Andruw Jones has filed for free agency, and the Rangers have said he’s not coming back, I can officially categorize this news story as “Former Rangers News”. Anyway, I decided to check into his money situation, given he had a quite strange salary situation in 2009. As you might recall..
His total base salary in 2009 was $15 million dollars. $500,000 of that was paid by the Rangers, so he made out like quite the bandit from the McCourt’s out in LA. That’s just the base. Here’s a summary of his incentives with the Rangers in 2009.
- $75,000 – 340 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $75,000 – 380 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $125,000 – 420 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $125,000 – 460 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $125,000 – 500 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $125,000 – 540 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $175,000 – 580 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $175,000 – 620 plate appearances (nope, 281)
- $200,000 – Comeback Player of the Year (nope – well, not yet, but I doubt it)
- $100,000 – MVP (not yet announced, but come on – this is a no)
- $50,000 – All Star Selection (nope)
- $50,000 – World Series MVP (nope, Hideki Matsui)
- $25,000 – Gold Glove (not announced, but come on – this is a no)
- $25,000 – Silver Slugger (not announced, but come on – this is a no)
- $25,000 – LCS MVP (nope – CC Sabathia)
To sum up, he reached NONE of his incentives, which would have brought his Rangers salary to $1.975 Million. The total outpay from the Rangers was just $500,000, though. That’s not a salary problem there.
The fun part of this is that he still is owed money from the Dodgers from what I can tell. $5 million of his original signing bonus is due in 2010. Bet they’ll still love paying for that.
Off Season Stuff
The first batch of items for the off season have happened.
Marlon Byrd: On the first day of free-agent eligibility, Marlon Byrd filed. No surprise there, he probably deserves a decent paycheck. As we all know, there’s been a lot of noise about him wanting to stay, but whether he remains is unknown. It’s down to money, and the fact that there is a logjam coming behind him. Don’t know how long we’d want to commit. There’s just too many variables now. There’s some talk that should we not bring back Byrd, they might sign Jermaine Dye as a replacement. That would have to be a single year deal.
Omar Vizquel: Some talk that Vizquel might re-sign here to be a backup again in 2010. I have to say, he seriously surprised me. He never failed to produce as a backup, never complained about playing time, he was awesome. If he came back next year and produced the same way, I don’t think anyone would complain about that. Plus he’d probably be cheap, so I say do it.
Sale of Club: No updates that I’m aware of. Everyone’s been talked to. Not sure what the actual next move is.
Pudge: There was a lot of talk at the end of the season about there being interest on both sides for Pudge to come back, even if everyone is healthy, catching wise. The rangers article today says that they now want to see how Salty is doing. Bummer. I want Pudge back without thinking about other guys.
Starting Rotation: There’s also talk today that both CJ Wilson & Neftali Feliz are candidates for the starting rotation. Feliz is not a surprise,really – that’s what he was in the minors. CJ Wilson briefly started early in his career, but hasn’t done that for awhile. Is our starting 5 so weak that we’re looking at moving TWO relievers in there? Eek!
Guys not coming back: Hank Blalock & Andruw Jones are done. They’re not being pursued apparently. Eddie Guardado is likely retiring, and who knows about Joaquin Benoit. The major paper and web stories label him as “in limbo”. What the heck does that mean – really? His contract is technically up, I think. Benoit had figured it out before he got hurt, and he is by far the longest tenured Ranger. Not sure who that would be at the moment if he was let go.
UPDATE: Just as I was about to publish this on my site, I saw the story on the official Rangers site that the following Rangers have officially filed for free agency: Ivan Rodriguez, Hank Blalock, Marlon Byrd, Eddie Guardado, & Joaquin Benoit. None of these are surprises, and all are covered above, but the official announcement has been made.
Clint Hurdle
Well, Rudy Jaramillo’s successor has been named, and it’s not Rusty Greer. It’s Clint Hurdle. I don’t know a lot about Clint Hurdle, but if you read the article on the Rangers site about him, there’s this quote..
the importance of a team-first mentality
There was some noise at the end of the season about Jaramillo’s mentality being too much for the three run home run. I don’t know how true that is, but the “team first” mentality quote plays off those remarks. I can’t add anything profound about Hurdle, as I don’t know jack about him, but let’s hope he turns out OK. Probably won’t make anything worse.
The one question I want to know is what uniform number will he wear? :)
The Rest of the World Series
Well, I never wrote specific commentaries for the rest of the games of the World Series for two reasons. Well, first, I had family in town to visit for my son’s Baptism, which was this past Saturday. With them in town, I didn’t have much time to write, and then on the last day they were here, I got sick. Pretty sick – I had spiked a fever as high as 102.8. Today is the first day I’ve not had a fever since, but I’m still pretty “hazy” in my head, so I won’t write much.
I’m disappointed that my Phillies didn’t repeat, and I’m doubly disappointed it was to the Yankees. Unfortunately, my early playoff prediction turned out right. Yankees over Phillies in 6. Sigh. Yeah, I could take solace that my hometown team was in the World Series two years in a row. But it would have been so nice to WIN twice in a row, something that still hasn’t been done in a little over 30 years in the NL.
Congrats to Chase Utley for tying Reggie Jackson for most home runs in single World Series (5).
The other thing is that former Rangers Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez, & Jerry Hairson, Jr (!?!?) have World Series rings now. :(
Anyway, this is the last update for the “2009 Game Updates” series. I’m not in the mood to retroactively write updates for the games I missed – much less Game 6 where it was over.
Clint Hurdle
- Clint Hurdle named pitching coach [ Link ]
WS G2: Yankees bounce back against Phillies, win 3-1
Normally, I don’t write about games the Yankees win, but this is the World Series, I kind of have to. :)
Game two of the World Series goes to the Yankees. To be honest, I figured the teams would leave the Bronx tied. Obviously, I would have preferred my Phillies take 2-0, but it pretty much turned out the way most people expected.
On paper, I thought the Phillies had a good chance if Pedro could hold up. He had a great game in LA, but somehow I didn’t think he’d be like that again. He wasn’t, but he was still pretty good. AJ Burnett I saw as the weak point in the rotation, I figured we could get to him. We didn’t. Their lines:
Pedro: 6IP, 6H, 3ER, 8K, 2BB
Burnett: 7IP, 4H, 1ER, 9K, 2BB
Pedro gave up solo home runs to Texieira & Matsui, which was all they needed. The Yankees tacked on another run later, but the last two innings were pitched by Mariano Rivera, who didn’t give up anything (although he had a somewhat shaky 8th).
Jayson Werth was picked off first base by the catcher, which was embarrassing, and seemed to issue a change in tone for the game at that point.
Both teams benefited by a bad call. The Yankees by a called DP where replays showed the Philly runner was safe. The Phillies by that lineout double play that was really a short hop that Howard “caught”.
Really odd to see Jeter bunt with two strikes. That makes me wonder. You can foul off 50 pitches, and it stays strike two. You tap at one, and you’re out. Who decided that?
Finishing off with Pedro, I felt he shouldn’t have been out there for the 7th. I think he should have been done after six, and some national media were saying after 5. But overall, his line was not bad at all. Really.
Looking forward to the games in Philly. My family is in town for my son’s baptism this weekend, so we’ll be watching the games here.
Richardson Signs
- C Kevin Richardson signs a 1 year minor league contract with an invite to spring training. [ Link ]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 121
- 122
- 123
- 124
- 125
- …
- 521
- Next Page »