Father Mike
Piazza with Pope John Paul IILooks like the Phillies can cross out C/1B/DH possibility Mike Piazza as a candidate to fill the top righthanded hitter off the bench role vacated by Jason Michaels. Piazza has reportedly agreed to a 1-year contract worth $2 million with the San Diego Padres. Hard to blame Piazza for this one - he gets to return to Southern California (a region with a pro-Piazza fanbase built in), catch a whole heck of a lot more than he would have in Philly, and enjoy the excellent weather, great beaches, and fish tacos (or In-N-Out Burger if so inclined). There are rumors circulating around that Piazza turned down more money from the Phils to play for the Padres - I have no verification on that information at this point in time. The bottom line remains: Piazza is no longer available. This leads us to the question that remains: What next for the Phillies?
Sources (not that I'd make this up or anything...):
Philadelphia Inquirer
Padres.com
Ken Rosenthal at FoxSports.com (who else this offseason?)
posted by XXX at 10:37 PM
2 Comments:
I'm suprised over the Piazza numbers. 1/$2M! I thought he would go for $4-6M. Good point on the money issue, it defintely sounds like he cut the Padres a break for a return to sunny Cali.
Seriously, how many other teams would have been after him needing a catcher or not if he was like "Hey, all I want is $2M for one year and add a $8M mutual option for '07"
If I was running the Phils, I would have offered him a one year deal worth $2 million and then a mutual option for 2007 worth $100 million. I'd like to see him turn that offer down...
Seriously though, I was surprised with it only being $2 million as well. Going to San Diego really makes the most sense for him professional though, so it is hard to blame him for choosing the Pads. I still don't get why they even bothered to announce the mutual option. Wonder if it is an ego thing to make the overall value of the deal seem artificially higher than it is. Seems so pointless to me.
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