Are They C.C. Serious?

"Free-agent left-hander CC Sabathia has reached preliminary agreement on terms with the Yankees on a seven-year contract worth approximately $161 million, according to a major-league source."
- Ken Rosenthal, Fox Sports

All I can say is, "WOW!"

Let's be frank about this signing right out of the gate. This is outrageous money. Just when we thought, based on the deal that Francisco Rodriguez agreed to with the Mets, that the economy was going to have an impact on this year's batch of free agent contracts, leave it to the Yankees to blow that out of the water.

But in fairness, this doesn't come as a surprise, and I truly have no ground to stand on in any complaints about the dollar figures involved with this contract. As a Red Sox fan, I can't complain about what anybody spends on free agents as long as we are willing to drop top dollar on Mark Texeira. No, this deal didn't come as much of a surprise in that manner. The Yankees had been upfront about wanting him from the get go and it was just a matter of time before the right dollar figure fell into place.

Instead, I'm more alarmed that about two other aspects of the trade.

First, in order to get the deal done, they had to stretch the contract out to seven seasons. For a pitcher like Sabathia, who at 28 has 117 career victories and a 3.66 lifetime ERA, this might seem like a great chance to take, locking up a young pitcher who seems to be hitting his prime. But then you need to remember that Sabathia has pitched 513 regular season and postseason innings over the last two seasons alone, meaning he has roughly the same amount of mileage on his arm as our President-elect put on during campaign time. The Yankees are libel to use him in one of two ways. They'll either ride his ability to eat innings in order to relieve stress on their bullpen or they'll try to nurse him along due to the length of his deal. If they over work him, they may run the risk of being the straw that broke the camels back so to speak, making a seven year deal look like another Carl Pavano signing.

Secondly, I can't figure out for the life of me why they would grant an out clause after three seasons. Didn't they just get burned by Alex Rodriguez having such a clause in his contract? Aren't they trying to take advantage of A.J. Burnett exercising the same kind of clause in his escape from Toronto? It seems to me that they wanted to make this investment so badly that they took anything that the player or agent laid out on the table. The out clause, if it was such a sticking point, should have negated the need to go to a seventh year in the deal. One or the other, but not both. I just can't see the return of investment in granting an out clause. The player wants you to show him you'll be willing to commit to him, but wants to make sure he has a way to say bye-bye. I don't buy it and neither should the Yankees.

They were committed to landing Sabathia at any means necessary, and in the end, it looks like they exhausted those means. Now I guess it will be interesting to see how this signing impacts their pursuits of Burnett or Lowe to plug in behind him. There is no doubt that having Sabathia at the head of their rotation, with Wang and Chamberlain falling in behind him, makes the Yankees a better team. But how much better depends on the decisions they make throughout the course of the winter.