Here is an excerpt from an article from yesterday:

The Newark Star-Ledger is reporting that the Yankees and Diamondbacks are talking about a Randy Johnson deal.
A baseball official from a third team is the Star-Ledger’s source. The official said the Yankees do not want to pay any of Johnson’s $16 million salary as part of a deal, which would be a big hurdle if true. Even in this market, Johnson is a poor risk at $16 million for 2007 and the Diamondbacks weren’t interested in spending that kind of money on a free agent. We’re skeptical anything will happen.

And reportedly the Diamondbacks are offering some younger pitchers in this deal. I don’t know what to think about this. It seems kind of crazy to trade for a guy that is 43 years old and just had a very bad season. The D-Backs would be lucky to get a 4.50 ERA from him and Randy has given up a lot of home runs in his few seasons with the Yanks. That doesn’t translate well to Chase Field, which is a big home run park. Also, his contract is worth $16 mil. and he’d be looking to get a one year extension. That seems just too much for a team that’s still struggling with money problems after the 2001 championship year. They’d better hope that they could get the Yankees to pay at least a small portion of his contract.

Another reason not to do this trade would be that they’d be giving up some of their future big pitching prospects. With all the moves they have made in recent years, the Diamondbacks are obviously trying to get younger and with the struggles of the pitching staff, pitching prospects are something that wouldn’t be a good thing to give up. I am not overly impressed with Nippert or Enrique Gonzalez so if it’s both of them it would be okay, but to give up one of the others would be dumb. They haven’t had a chance to play in the majors and at least one of them will be a good starter so I’d be worried about giving them up for someone who’s good years are far behind him. Also, what would it be like for the clubhouse to have a grouchy old guy with a bunch of kids?

Of course there some good things that will come from this deal. First of all, it brings back a fan favorite. The best player in this team’s history could get his 300th win here and it’ll bring back a piece of the short, but great Purple Era of this team. The fans will, for at least a little while, come to the ballpark and buy Diamondbacks products. The added revenue will really help this team for future years as they try to sign free agents.

Furthermore, if they can get the Yankees to pay a little bit of the salary and also get rid of some of their own (Eric Byrnes???) then it would be a low-risk, high reward type of deal. Johnson will have less pressure on him with the Arizona media than the New York media and possibly going back to a place he spent the best part of his career in would allow him to put up better numbers. Besides, the warm air is better for his old bones.

I am not liking a deal for RJ right now, but I wouldn’t be too upset about it unless the front office makes a really dumb trade. I just don’t think that Randy has anything left in the tank. He has had a great career but now it’s just time to hang up the cleats.

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