Yankees and...Crawford?

Written by Josh W. | 03 December 2010

Buster Olney: Sources: the Yankees are very much engaged in conversations with free agent outfielder Carl Crawford.

This is very strange for two reasons: (A) the Yankees already have a good outfield and (B) if they signed Crawford they would not have enough money for Lee. One doe not need to go far to verify (A); the Yankees' three outfielders, Gardner, Granderson, and Swisher, had a combined fWAR of 13.1 in 2010, a tremendous figure and one of the best in the league. There's also a very strong argument to be had in support of Gardner being more valuable to the Yankees than Crawford would be. While Crawford is better, the difference not large, and he would obviously make a lot more money. It's pretty easy to conclude that the outfield is not really an issue for the Yankees. 

This leads us to point (B). Signing Crawford would likely put the payroll at it's limit, and thus preclude the Yankees from signing Lee. This would be problematic because the current state of the rotation is not that good; Its' basically the same as last year (right now), without Vazquez but with an older CC, AJ, and (likely) Pettitte. If the Yankees were to sign Lee, he would be replacing the innings (and more) of Vazquez, which would make a huge difference. 

Thankfully, there are two other explanations for this activity that make more sense. It's possible the Yankees are just trying to raise the price of Crawford for other potential bidders, like the Red Sox. The other explanation is that the Yankees feel that they either will not be able to sign Lee or that he won't be worth the price. If this is the case, the Yankees might be planning on signing Crawford to make a package of one of their other outfielders for a starting pitcher. 

In the end, it's important to understand that we really don't know how serious these talks are. It's very possible that this could be a non-story in a week.