King Kaufman's Sports Daily
A-Rod hot stove: Who'll sign him? Red Sox? And will he play shortstop? Plus: Curt Schilling blogs his free agency.
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Nov. 1, 2007 | The Alex Rodriguez hot stove is just starting to spark to life now that he's opted out of the last three years of his contract with the New York Yankees. The Yanks say they're done with A-Rod, won't negotiate with him, and since most other teams can't afford him, the list of possible destinations for the game's best player is short.
And fairly obvious. The two L.A. teams, the Mets, Red Sox, Cubs, Giants. The Tigers are in the mix too, and while they're a little bit not-like-the-other in that group, they have a history of getting along with Rodriguez's agent, Scott Boras.
Also, they have Brandon Inge playing third base.
On the Boras score, the Dodgers might be off the list, since they're reportedly not on speaking terms with him after his client J.D. Drew opted out of his contract with them last year.
Boras, by the way, issued an apology for announcing A-Rod's decision the day of Game 4 of the World Series, widely seen around baseball as an oafish move. I think it was an oafish move, but I also think people made a whole lot bigger deal about it than it deserved.
I wonder why almost all of the whither A-Rod speculation takes as a given that he'll be signed as a third baseman. The only reason he moved from shortstop to third base four years ago was that Derek Jeter, a much lesser shortstop than A-Rod, was manning the position and wasn't going to move.
Rodriguez has said he'd be willing to move back to short, where his value would be even greater than it is as a third baseman, where he's the best player in the game. He'll turn 33 at midseason next year, so he's not likely to be a shortstop for the entire run of a long contract, even if we define a long contract as being half of the 10 years he's reportedly -- and ridiculously -- seeking.
But Derek Jeter's more than a year older, and if he were a free agent he'd be shopping himself -- and getting bought -- as a shortstop. Cal Ripken Jr., the prototype of the big shortstop like A-Rod, played the position until he was 36, though that was probably a year or two too long.