Report: Mets Top BoSox Offer For Pedro, From MSNBC Options

[jonerik]

Report: Mets top BoSox's offer for Pedro
New York G.M. Minaya offers three years, $38 million

Updated: 10:38 a.m. ET Nov. 30, 2004

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic - The New York Mets have topped the Boston Red Sox's offer for free-agent pitcher Pedro Martinez, the New York Times reported Tuesday.

On Sunday, the Mets and general manager Omar Minaya offered the right-hander a three-year guaranteed contract worth $38 million with a vesting option for a fourth year, surpassing the Red Sox's proposal of a two-year deal worth $25.5 million with a third-year option, the Times said.

Last month, Martinez helped the Boston Red Sox win their first World Series title since 1918.

Martinez has gone 117-37 for Boston from 1998-2004, winning the AL Cy Young Award in 1999 and 2000. After beating St. Louis in Game 3 of the World Series, he acknowledged it could have been his final appearance for Boston.

Martinez is 182-76 with a 2.76 ERA in 13 seasons with Los Angeles, Montreal and Boston.

Last season, Boston general manager Theo Epstein had Thanksgiving dinner at Curt Schilling’s home outside Phoenix while trying to persuade the pitcher to accept a trade to the ReSox.

[HereWeGoSouthie]

Didn't the Sox offer Pedro $40 million over 3 years, with the first 2 guaranteed and the 3rd being vested easily?

[Dookie]

Didn't the Sox offer Pedro $40 million over 3 years, with the first 2 guaranteed and the 3rd being vested easily?

I thought it was 37.5 million if he got the third year...I mean how could the Sox try and screw him like that?!

I say good bye Pedro.

[the other dave]

well if Pedro wants to play for a shitty team and bat twice a game, i say, have fun in New York, don't let the Yankees daddy you in those interleague games!

[zaxxon]

I am Kreskin.

[Sul]

Gee, the Mets sure know how to rebuild a franchise by getting OLDER. You'd almost think a Duquette was involved or something.

[brukakis]

How dare the Red Sox offer up a mere 37.5 million for Petey? They should be ashamed.

If he takes it, we will get two good pitchers to replace him. If he stays, that's great too. I just hope he can pitch well against the Yanks if he sticks around.

If not, I'm sure he'll love being back in the National League and not contending for the rest of his career for a 10% difference in pay.

[MrAl]

I've been hearing Pedro would prefer to go to an NL team if he left because he wouldn't have to face the DH... but the Mets? $90 million + payroll last year, only 77 (?) wins... something like that. They spend money foolishly and it doesn't always work out. Tom Glavine has been lousy since going to the Mets...

[fallout]

They can have him. The Sox are smart enough not to enter into a bidding war for him.

[zaxxon]

They spend money foolishly and it doesn't always work out.

They remind me of me.

[Guest]

Pedro, Until we Met again
By Eric Wilbur, Boston.com Staff | November 30, 2004

Dear Pedro,

Take the cash.

You can only imagine the delight of Red Sox fans upon hearing this morning that not only did their team re-sign backup catcher Doug Mirabelli (and from your seven seasons here, you realize that even that is a big deal in Red Sox Nation), but that the New York Mets have offered you a guaranteed three-year deal worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $38 million.

If it’s the cash…oh, I’m sorry, respect that you want then snatch up that deal while it’s on the table in Queens. I’ll tell you right now there’s no way you’re going to get that kind of contract up in here in Boston. Or least, we hope there’s no way. You say the Mets offered an option for a fourth season? And you haven’t signed before they come to their senses?

Not that we’re showing a lack of respect, you understand. It’s just that it’s money that can be better spent elsewhere. As much as this base of fans has loved watching you pitch, they also have to realize that come the third year of that deal, they very well could be watching an aged hurler getting by on breaking balls and a fastball in the 80’s.

You’ll be headed to the National League, where what is essentially a seven-man batting order may help extend your career to that third season. And outside of interleague play, you won’t be facing your former mates as you would be had you jumped ship to the Yankees. And no matter how many press releases George Steinbrenner puts out, we can still all guffaw at the fact that the cross-town baseball team stymied him. And LaGuardia is right next door for all those last-minute trips back home to the Dominican.

Now, from the Red Sox’ perspective, yes there will be an instant backlash from many fans here still stinging from losing Roger Clemens all those years back, but in his office, Theo Epstein must be silently pumping his fist that all this is happening. With the money they offered you, the Red Sox may be able to make a more significant offer to a guy like Matt Clement, who might just be the most underrated hurler on the free agent market. Although the 30-year-old was just 9-13 last season with the Cubs, he held batters to a .229 average (ninth-best in baseball) and his 9.45 strikeouts per nine innings were among the best in the game in 2004. Imagine, Fenway fans watching another fireballing Clemen.

And you could make it happen, Pedro. Just take the money and run.

It’s hard to fathom Sox fans dreaming of a Curt Schilling – Carl Pavano – Clement – Bronson Arroyo – Tim Wakefield rotation rather than a Martinez – Schilling – Pavano – Arroyo – Wakefield rotation, but this is hot stove season 2004, and it’s a different ballgame. The Sox are World Series champs, a title you helped deliver and for that you will forever be revered among the greatest athletes in this town’s great sporting history. Bird – Williams – Orr – Martinez – Yastrzemski – Clemens – Russell – Bourque. It’s got a nice ring to it, doesn’t it? Your signing with the Mets isn’t going to change that well deserved stature.

By signing with the Mets, you get the money and the Red Sox can get younger without losing that championship stride. It’s win-win. If the Sox sign Clement to a three-year deal, he will be your age when it is up in 2007. If the Sox sign Pavano to a three-year deal, he will be 31 by the time it comes to completion.

We know we don’t have to remind you, but you will be 36.

Yes, playing in Queens will be an adjustment at first. You’ll go from a ballpark with history popping out at the seams to what is generally regarded as one step above the Quincy Shipyard in Shea Stadium. You’ll go from a championship banner-waving city to one where the Mets are on par with those aging teams you were a part of in the late 90’s here. You’ll be the ace of the staff all right down there. Martinez – Tom Glavine – Kris Benson. It makes New York fans giddy all right. The Yankee ones. In fact, it was the Mets’ signing of Glavine that has many in New York nervous that the team may be making the same mistake. Maybe, but that’s not your problem. As long as you don’t mind being on a sub-par team the next three years, go for it.

Adam Rubin of The New York Daily News wrote the following today: “In Flushing, Martinez would anchor what quickly would become one of the NL's top rotations, joining Kris Benson, Tom Glavine, Victor Zambrano and Steve Trachsel.” Now, we’re not quite sure what kind of hallucinogens are infested in that borough water, but consider this your warning to buy bottled. With this deal that shouldn’t be a problem.

If last season proved six million things in Red Sox Nation, here’s one: One man does not a team make. If we foolishly hadn’t already learned that with the football team we enjoy down on Route One, we learned it in the Fens when Epstein grew the kohonas to deal Nomar Garciaparra. And despite what you guys say about that not being the moment this team got better, we all know it was. Orlando Cabrera fit better with this team.

As good as you still are on that hill Pedro, maybe you also no longer fit on this team.

Red Sox Nation would love to still have you on its side, don’t get me wrong. But the investment that you are seemingly demanding the team make in you simply doesn’t work in the economics of today’s game. The Red Sox understand that. The Mets, of course, do not. Beware Dan Duquette syndrome. The Duke of course was a coup for the Red Sox when they lured him from Montreal, before he started spending cash like Kirstie Alley at Old Country Buffet, and getting winners like Dante Bichette and Mike Lansing in the fold. Might Omar Minaya be making the same mistakes upon leaving Montreal and finally having a payroll to work with? Yeah, you and Sammy Sosa and Shawn Green might be productive for a short time period. But eventually a team needs to rebuild.

Take the cash, Pedro. It will make you happy. It will make Mets fans happy. It will drive Steinbrenner nuts. It will give Epstein economic freedom to make the Sox a contender over the next few years.

It was fun. But it’s over. You know it and we know it. Pedro Martinez a New York Met. You think that has a nice ring to it?

We do.

[Sul]

Please, when posting articles about sports, post ones by real sports writers. Not jack ass bloggers.

[zaxxon]

Hells yeah, take the cash.

C'mon over, Petey. It's a pitcher's park. You'll love it.

Please, when posting articles about sports, post ones by real sports writers.  Not jack ass bloggers.

Here F'ing Here

[zaxxon]

I know nothing the guy's written previously, but I thought it was a pretty solid piece.

Telling me what I want to hear, and all that.

Petey won't take that offer from the Mets. If they gty'd a 4th year or perhaps his own mango tree on Queens BLVD then perhaps. Right now, agents are just waiting for some a-hole to give a stiff like Derek Lowe $10 mil a year so they can use that as a measuring stick to blood-suck more money out of GM's across the league for their guy. Wait a week and regardless of whether Pedro's signed or not, you'll probably know if he'll be back with the Sox.