Last Night's Action: Don't You Love AJ?

AJ Burnett during the third inning last night (Candian Press/AP)

Toronto 7 Yankees 5: Get excited Yankees’ fans! AJ Burnett is signed for another three years. That’s right, a 10-15 pitcher with an ERA over 5 is coming back for 2011, 2012 and 2013 and at the “bargain” price of $16.5 million a year.

Burnett didn’t make it out of the third inning on Monday night. His final line was 2.1 IP, 7 hits, 7 earned runs, one strikeout and one walk. The Yankees almost came back, but the real question is, how can they possibly trust Burnett in the playoffs? The problem of course is that the Yankees don’t have a lot of other options. At this point, it’s probably best to hope for a lot of rain between Sabathia and Pettitte’s starts.

Mets rained out. They will play a day-night doubleheader n Wednesday and Mike Pelfrey will get the ball tomorrow.

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By Peter Trinkle in News on September 28, 2010 12:05 AM

Comments [rss]

Angelheaded Hipster

he needs another cool necklace

dontLookAtMe

arod has 29 home runs in 132 games, 3 more home runs in 18 less games than david wright. he also has 119 rbi to david's 96. Arod is doing his job producing runs, he doesnt have to hit 55 hrs every year anymore, nobody expected him to anyway. And the yankees always overpay for players, sometimes the contract is going to look bad in the end. It's better than not ever paying for a players in free agency and being in last place. If you want to talk about another bad contract look at johan's, with his elbow problems, he might be useless the rest of the contract.

EastRiver

The lesson of Moneyball was that RBI totals and batting average are less important than on base percentage and slugging. Anybody can knock in a lot of runs if the guys in front of him are getting on base.

jaycjay

A common misunderstanding among those who have read about Moneyball but have never bothered to read the book (including a lot of sports "analysts").

Actually, the lesson of Moneyball was that at the time high-OBA and -SLG players were a better financial value, while players with high HR and BA tended to be paid too much to be worthwhile signings for small-market teams.

The conclusion wasn't players who put up those numbers wins more games for a team, but that they have a greater impact per dollar you have to pay them.

And again, it was an analysis of the situation at that time. Since the basics of what was laid out in the book are now common knowledge, and "sabermetric" stats are more widely accepted, the situation has shifted heavily. Bidding for a high-OBA player now won't get as high as for a guy who hits a lot of home runs, but the gap is much less than it once.

Sketto

A-Roid doesn't "have to" hit 55 hr's every year any more because he actually...uh...CAN'T. Turns out none of them can without the juice.

JenChungsBaby

If you like Burnett at $16.5 million/yr then you'll LOVE this deal: Alex Rodriguez, a .275 hitter with mediocre power numbers, signed until the end of Obama's second term for just $30 MILLION/YR! That's right, just $30 million per year.

jaycjay

And, the Yankees profit financially by having him on the roster, and will continue to as he closes in on the home run record.

The idea that salary levels should be expected to correspond with current statistical performance reveals a common lack of understanding of the economics of professional sports today. The Yankees are very happy with their A-Rod deal.