Photo from NY Daily News
Laughing our asses off at the Yankees’ Bartolo Colon signing was fun while it lasted (several side-splitting hours). But what if they get really slap-happy with former aces from the early 2000s and sign Pedro Martinez?
Why even bring it up this early? Because perhaps the more it is talked about now, the lesser the chance it actually happens later.
Martinez signing with those rat bastard Yankees at some point this season just seems to make too much sense as of this moment. Pedro hasn’t decided if he’ll pitch in 2011 yet. But he loves attention and New York loves fawning over its over-the-hill athletes. The Yankees will need another starter, perhaps not right away, but sometime in June, right when Martinez would likely join a team.
Meanwhile, Brian Cashman isn’t exactly the only one with his hands on the purse strings. (Yes, the Yankees carry their money in a very large purse. It’s not even European…)
It is highly unlikely that Pedro would sign with a team unwilling to both guarantee him a starting rotation slot and pay him the guaranteed money for a few months of his service. The Phillies paid him a base salary of $1 million in 2009 for 61 2/3 innings, including the 17 he pitched in the postseason.
After their embattled offseason, the Yankees may be the only team that can both extend him the “respect” of a seven-figure guarantee and a surefire spot in a contending team’s rotation. Last season, it was fun for Sox fans to imagine Pedro coming back to pitch effectively for some random NL contender. Seeing the legend get by on wile, guile and style alone for Philly in 2009 was oddly intriguing. Any Sox “fan” still begrudging him four years later for his departure in 2005 was, well, probably complaining how “boring” the team was last season anyway.
This season? John Henry and Theo Epstein might just have to bite the bullet and make sure if Pedro does indeed want to pitch again for a team in the Northeast, the Red Sox are the first and only team Martinez calls. Because Pedro in Pinstripes may be the only Fenway sight more perverse than the New Kids on the Block defiling the outfield later this summer.
Fenway Pastoral 