The sponsor's message on Carl Pavano's Baseball-Reference page:
OH NO !!!!!! NOT AGAIN !!! Arm surgery looming? Can I get my money back for sponsoring Carl's page ?! Not his fault, but he's not lived up to the 40-dollar sponsorship!
Alas, the Yanks are on the hook for a bit more than that. In fact, Carl might want to use some of his $10 million 2007 salary to get the rights back?
PS: Sox Fans: You can get Matt Clement's page for $30!
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YF, Genuine question here: is Carl Pavano the worst acquisition, when you combine amount of squandered money plus gap-between-expectations-and-actual production that the Yankees have made in the past decade?
They've had some bad ones - Kevin Brown pops to mind - but expectations for Pavano were higher given that he was supposedly entering his prime years, his disappointments played out over more years, and his contract was just huge.
Posted by: IronHorse (yf) | Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 05:06 PM
I think, yeah, Pavano was a huge mistake, probably the biggest mistake in that period, but I would disagree with your conceit a bit. I think there was a strong consensus among sabermetric analysts—though, to be fair to the Yanks, the Sox also bid on his services—that Pavano was not that great a property even before he was signed. So there may have been "expectations," but I think a good number of people felt the signing was bad from the outset, before the injuries and lackluster play. This is something different than, say, Brown, Johnson, Vazquez, and to a lesser extent Contreras, who all came in with legit credentials. Looking back in hindsight, those deals didn't work out to the Yankees favor, though at the time they were made, I think they were all more or less defensible. I don't think you can say that about Pavano. School's still out on the Igawa deal—he could turn into a relatively cheap property, with a bit of improvement—but obviously the prognosis there isn't sensational.
Posted by: YF | Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 05:17 PM
Oh, and I neglected to mention the biggest rental: Clemens. I think the public has decreed his 2007 a pretty monumental flop, but I'd argue that he stabilized the rotation when he returned, and his presence allowed the Yanks to make the playoffs, so there was some value there.
Posted by: YF | Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 05:23 PM
Igawa: he could turn into a relatively cheap property
Only if he's upzoned, and New York City has never upzoned a human being.
Posted by: SF | Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 05:42 PM
I don't view Clemens as a flop of anywhere near the magnitude of Pavano for the reason you mention YF and also because no one expected more than a few months from him. Pavano should have played for years - even if he did not pan out as a # 2-3 rotation guy, I think most people thought he'd be a dependable #3-4 guy for years, no?
Giambi is an interesting case. He has had some huge moments and good early years of his contract, but he has also been a shell of himself for the past couple and his contract is enormous.
In the end, Pavano has either stunk or not even showed up since pretty much the moment he arrived so I think he has them all beat.
Posted by: IronHorse (yf) | Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 06:05 PM
Zito could turn out to be much worse.
Posted by: AndrewYF | Wednesday, November 28, 2007 at 10:27 PM
Instead of sponsoring Carl Pavano's Baseball Reference page, how about sponsoring his ex-girlfriend Gia Allemand's web page instead?
It has some groovy music at least!
http://www.giaallemand.net/
Posted by: SoxFan | Thursday, November 29, 2007 at 11:22 AM