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Friday, February 22, 2008

K-Rod Arbitration

I missed this over the weekend but better late than never. Francisco Rodriguez and the Angels are headed for arbitration. Teams normally hope to win arbitration; the Angels need to lose this one. If they don't this could be K-Rod's last season in Los Angeles Anaheim.

Rodriguez is facing a tough situation. He is going into arbitration after a down year. The Angels reportedly offered him $34 million over 3 years. Rodriguez is likely looking to get a little closer to the 45 million over 3 years that Yankee shut down man Mariano Rivera recently received.

Rivera isn't really worth the $45 million in the twilight of his career. Rodriguez though isn't quite into his twilight. After the offer the Angels made they can't buckle to his demands. Setting a precedent like that is the fast road to Yankee-ville.

If the Angels lose arbitration, they have a fall guy. They can come back to Rodriguez, with an offer closer to what he is worth. Making an offer that reflects the arbitration, the Angels would meet Rodriquez half way without setting a bad precedent.

The Angels have some flexibility; doing nothing though will ensure Rodriguez leaves. His feelings are clear with statements like this "If they wanted me here, they would have done something a long time ago. In the meantime, I have to put that out of my head and do my job."

Ideally the Angles would offer him two years for a little more instead of three. He isn't to the twilight I mentioned yet; 3 seasons from now he'll be eye-to-eye with it.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Angels won the case, K-Rod will have to make do with $10 million instead of 12.

Ron Dean said...

Unfortunately, I think the Angels will have to make do; with him disgruntled this season, and with out him after 2008