Matsui on Yanks Radar?
By Mike Silva ~ July 29th, 2010. Filed under: Mike Silva, New York Yankees, Rumor Mill.
Brandon Tierney of ESPN Radio reported on the “Wheelhouse” tonight that Anaheim may be ready to dump some of their veterans. He believes the Yankees might be able to reacquire Hideki Matsui at the trade deadline.
With all the talk of Adam Dunn, Matsui might be a more reasonable acquisition to beef up the offense. Funny how the Yanks passed on Matsui and opted for the brittle Nick Johnson and may have to reacquire him to fill the same DH spot he left.
Matsui would make more sense than Dunn for two reasons: 1) prospects and 2) you and still use the DH spot to rotate veterans like Posada, A-Rod, and Jeter.
I am sure the Yankees could get Matsui for cheap since this would be more of a salary dump than a trade. Matsui was signed a 1 year $6 million dollar deal this winter. What I find odd about Tierney’s comment is that Anaheim acquired Dan Haren on Sunday and nearly had Derrek Lee from the Cubs. Why the change of heart? Maybe they realize Texas is too good to overcome an 8.5 game deficit at this point in the season.
On the season Matsui is hitting .251 with 14 homers and 55 RBI. He surely will be helped by a return to the short porches of Yankee Stadium.
July 29th, 2010 at 6:02 pm
Why the change in heart? Joel Piniero got hurt.
Also, how could the Yankees still rotate DH’s with Matsui instead of Dunn? They won’t use him in the outfield. This makes no sense unless the plan is for him to come off the bench.
July 29th, 2010 at 6:34 pm
Silva doesn’t have any idea what he’s talking about. The Yanks didn’t “pass” on Matsui.
He got an offer very early on in the free agency period and he took the Angels’ offer before the Yanks could make a decision on him.
July 29th, 2010 at 7:01 pm
@ Viper…not true..the Yankees knew they had turned the page on Matsui….the signing of Johnson made no sense because of the reason they gave when they moved on from Matsui…Matsui wanted to play the outfield too..
Mike-could a package of Shields and Matsui be possible.both will be free agents at the end of this year…is there truth to this Matsui thing anyway? Tierney is good but id rather hear it from a source closer to the yanks
July 30th, 2010 at 6:55 am
Viper
Your playing games on syntax of wording. The yanks passed on Matsui because they thought they could do better. I don’t think the timing of how/when they did it matters. FWIW, I was a supporter of Nick Johnson because I thought he was recovered from the injuries of prior years. I was wrong. If you want a low cost bat then I think Matsui would do just fine. Why spend big on a luxury like Dunn (appears Cashman agrees) when you could simply wait and see on the offense. Now the bullpen (see Downs and Soria) that’s a different story.
October 30th, 2010 at 12:26 am
Matsui is a great solid player, reliable and great work ethic. No wonder he’s a big star. If he had better English, he could be getting more commercial endorsements. At least he’s getting appearing in some TV commercials in Japan
http://www.japansugoi.com/wordpress/kirin-fire-canned-coffee-tv-commercials-featuring-godzilla/