Andy Pettitte is coming back to the New York Yankees after he and the team agreed on a new one-year contract. Pettitte will make a base salary of $5.5 million but could earn up to $12.5 million if he hits all of incentives. Pretty much if Pettitte can stay healthy for the year and make all of his starts, I’d assume he would hit almost all of those incentives.

Last season Pettitte was 14-14 with a 4.54 ERA for the Yankees. He hopes to improve on that and have a strong second half unlike in the 08 season.

Good deal for the Yankees!

It was a busty day for the New York Yankees just like most teams as upper management and players tried to work out deals before the salary arbitration deadline at noon. The Yankees signed Xavier Nady and Melky Cabrera to deals before the deadline.

Nady agreed to a one-year, $6.65 million deal, while Cabrera signed a one-year deal worth $1.4 million. Nady earned $3.59 million last season, and is likely to become a free agent after the 2009 season. He has been rumored in some recent trade talk so that could happen before the season starts. Nady at $6.65 million seems like a lot when you see that it is almost double of what he was making last season.

The Yankees will only have to goto a hearing with one player as they were unable to strike a deal with Brian Bruney who was asking for $1.55 million and the Yankees were offering him $1.1 million.

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The New York Yankees just made another huge splash in the free agent market as Mark Teixeira and the team have agreed on a eight year contract that will be worth $180 million. Yes, you heard me right, $180 million! That means that the highest four players in major league baseball all will be playing for the New York Yankees.

The contract would pay Teixeira an average of $22.5 million per season. New York has spent $423.5 million in salary in the last month, with $161 million going to left-handed pitcher C.C. Sabathia in a seven-year deal and $82.5 million on right-hander A.J. Burnett for five years.

The Boston Red Sox and Washington Nationals were the two other teams that were in the final three for Tex. This was a big time signing for the Yankees, now let’s all just hope that it doesn’t backfire!

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The New York Yankees made sure that starting pitcher Chien-Ming Wang was not forgetting with the recent signings of C.C. Sabathia and A.J. Burnett. The team signed Wang to a new one year contract worth $5 million as the two parties avoided arbitration.

Wang was 8-2 with a 4.07 ERA in 15 starts for the Yankees last season before spending the rest of the year on the disabled list with a sprain of the Lisfranc ligament in his right foot and a partial tear of a tendon in the same foot.

If Wang can stay healthy for the Yankees in 2009, expect him to be the number three or four starter in the rotation. Three if Andy Pettitte is not brough back, and number four if he is.

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The New York Yankees made another splash in the free agent market over the weekend as A.J. Burnett agreed on a five-year deal that will pay him $82.5 million dollars. This coming shortly after the team signed C.C. Sabathia to a $161 million dollar deal earlier in the week. It looks like the Yankees are tired of not making a deep run in the playoffs and are opening up the checkbook to better their chances of getting there in 2009.

“A.J. Burnett has great stuff,” Yankees manager Joe Girardi said recently. “I think he’s matured a lot as a pitcher, as well. He’s learned to control the running game a lot better. He attacks hitters and gets hitters out quickly, throws a lot of strikes, fields his position. I think he’s much more complete as a pitcher than he was a couple of years ago.”

As long as he can stay healthy I think this is a good signing for the Yankees. He will be a great addition to the starting rotation that is for sure.

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The New York Yankees made the biggest off season splash as they will soon be signing free agent pitcher CC Sabathia to a seven year $160 million dollar contract. The Yankees have been hard after Sabathia and have been talking with him for the past three days before he agreed to become the newest New York Yankee.

Sabathia, 117-73 in eight big league seasons, will bring something to the Yankees that they haven’t had in three decades: a relatively youthful pitcher at the top of their rotation. Traded to the Brewers by the Indians on July 7, the left-hander almost single-handedly carried Milwaukee to its first postseason berth in 26 years by going 11-2 with a 1.65 ERA in 17 starts.

Sabathia had been courted by the Milwaukee Brewers, the San Francisco Giants and the Boston Red Sox. The Los Angeles Dodgers said that Sabathia, who lives in California, had expressed interest in playing there, too, although the team did not publicly make him an offer.

In the end however, Sabathia chose the Yankees and he hopes to get back into post season action this next year. It’s an exciting time to be a Yankee fan!

Wow has it been a busy week for the management of the New York Yankees. Earlier in the week the team announced that they had signed pitcher Damaso Marte to a new three year – $12 million dollar contact. Marte will make $3.75 million next year, $4 million in 2010 and $4 million in 2011. The 2012 option is also worth $4 million and includes a $250,000 buyout.

And then on Thurday the Yankees picked up Nick Swisher and a minor leaguer from the Chicago White Sox via a trade that sent Wilson Betemit, Jeff Marquiz, and Jhonny Nunez to the White Sox. Expect Swisher to get looked at to the everyday starting first basemen. He can also play all three outfield positions for the team.

Swisher has three years left on a five-year, $26.75 million contract. He’s scheduled to make $5.3 million in 2009, $6.75 million in 2010 and $9 million in $2011. His deal also includes a $10.25 million club option for 2012, with a $1 million buyout. As you can tell, the deal didn’t come cheap for the Yankees.

On Tuesday the New York Yankees declined options and starting pitcher Carl Pavano and first basemen / dh Jason Giambi. Pavano’s option was to be worth $13 million instead it was bought out for $1.9 million. Giambi’s was worth $22 million and he was bought out for $5 million. Not a bad payday for going on the free agent market if you ask me.

Pavano could possibly be re-signed by the Yankees if he will take a cheap deal but don’t look for the Yankees to really negotiate with Giambi.

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Mike Mussina logged his tenth win of the season and the Yankee offense powered the team to an 8-4 victory in Houston taking the first two games of the series.  The Yankees have reached their high water mark going three games over .500 for the first time this season.

Alex Rodiriguez got the Yankee bats started in the 2nd by delievering his 11th home run of the season into the right-center field seats.  Back to back doubles from Jason Giambi and Melky Cabrera added another run to make it a 3-2 game.  In the third, with a man on third, Houston pitcher Wandy Rodriguez issued three consecutive walks to Rodriguez, Giambi and Cabrera to tie the score at three.  Jose Molina then ripped a single to left scoring A-Rod and Giambi to put the Yanks in front for good.  The Yankees tacked on three more runs throughout the game including a pinch-hit RBI single by Robinson Cano in the 8th. 

Mussina got off to a rocky start being greeted by a long three-run homrun by Carlos Lee in the first inning, but he settled in quickly after that retiring 13 of his next 15 batters.  Mussina worked 6 strong innings allowing only the three runs.  The bullpen of the Yankees continued to impress allowing 3 hits and 1 run over the final three innings to preserve the victory for Mussina.  Mussina has now reached a minimum of 10 wins in each of his last 17 seasons.

The Yankees go for the sweep Sunday afternoon at 1pm CDT.  Alberto Gonzalez rejoined the team and got the start Saturday after being recalled from Scranton on Friday. Shelly Duncan was sent back to make room for Gonzalez.   

The New York Yankees have signed infielder Morgan Ensberg to a one year contract.  Ensberg will probably fill in a first and third base and pitch hit a little bit.  I wouldn’t expect to him to have much value to the Yankees unless Alex Rodriguez or Jason Giambi get hurt.

Ensberg had a pretty bad 2007 season, and was actually non-tendered by the San Diego Padres.  So maybe changing uniforms and playing for a great team like the Yankees will get him going back in the right direction.

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