Ricciardi: "I don't see us getting involved with anybody"
For now, that appears to be the Blue Jays’ take on the free-agent market. Sure, they plan on making a run at re-signing A.J. Burnett. But beyond that? Toronto might not be much of a player on the open market.
If the Jays don’t retain Burnett, Jays general manager J.P. Ricciardi told MLB.com that he doesn’t think “there’s anybody else out there that, for what you’d probably have to get involved with from a money standpoint, that we would feel comfortable getting involved with. I think we’d probably stay in-house.”
As for Toronto’s search for more offense, Ricciardi denied that the Jays are targeting free-agent slugger Jason Giambi, or that free-agent Milton Bradley is a top priority. If anything, Ricciardi said that the Blue Jays hope to find what they’re seeking through the trade market and not through free agency.
“We’re still going to keep listening and seeing what’s available to us,” Ricciardi said. “But right now, I don’t see us getting involved with anybody. Something is going to have to really make sense for us and the best way would be via trade.”
That includes a possible search for a shortstop, too. Ricciardi said the Jays don’t plan on getting involved with any shortstops through free agency, nixing the rumors that have pegged Toronto as a suitor for Rafael Furcal.
The Jays don’t have an excess of spending money this winter, though Ricciardi didn’t rule out using trades to possibly free up some more payroll.
“We’ll be open to anything,” Ricciardi said. “We’re not in a slash payroll mode, but we’re in a situation where if we can make ourselves better via trade we’ll look that way. But, if we can’t, this is the team we have and we’ll just be creative with what we’ve got here and try to plug in our holes internally.”
–JB
Major League Bastian 
After reading this entry my optimism for ’09 dies a little more. I can’t see how J.P. can pull off deals to fill certain holes while not creating others. I hope he proves me wrong though.
That said Riccardi does have a history of downplaying what he plans on doing and then he goes and does something big. We’ll see I guess.
On another note anyone here anything new on whom Paul is looking at for being team pres. ?
Out of all the off seasons to not get involved in, It happens to be this one when just about every good player is available and needed on this team. J.P makes me sick.
In my opinion, Scott Boras has ruined baseball. I don’t think I have to explain myself because we all know it’s because of him we have all of these extememly overpaid players signing these ridiculously outragous contracts, which makes every player now greedy and wanting more than what the other player gets.
I’m sure it’s a disappointment to fans in most mlb cities to understand the Yanks have the budget to sign the 3 top pitchers available (Sabathia, Burnett & Lowe) and the two top hitters (Manny & Tiexera) and still have cash left over.
It’s also disappointing to see Petrolia win the mvp with mediocre numbers and anyone not thinking his playing for the Sox didn’t help him has their head in the sand. I, as others know, when we’re playing the Yanks or Sox, any close umpire call goes to the Yanks or Sox.
It’s becoming very obvious baseball goes out of it’s way to help get either the Sox or Yanks in the playoffs to capture the highest tv audience. That’s who baseball want in the series, they certainly don’t want Toronto, Kansas City or Milwaukee.
All the playoff and series games started at 8.00Pm, we have lost the afternoon games because of tv ratings and revenue. As a young kid, one of the greatest enjoyments I got was watching the world series games on the weekend with my baseball pals and dad.
Today, if I was still the same age, I wouldn’t be able to watch a single game because my bed time as a kid was 8.00PM. As a result, young kids are watching other sports and baseball will live to regret this decision sooner than they think when fans leave them for other sports.
These decisions are all made to maximuize revenue, in order to pay higher salaries to players. Really, is any athlete playing a team game worth 140 million over 6 years or $23.333,333.33 per year? Sabathia has averaged 32 starts per season and if we assume he averages 110 pitches per start, he will be paid $6,628.79 per pitch for each pitch he throws for the next 6 years. That, ladies and gentlemen, brings a new meaning to greed and obsenity. I wonder how Sabathia thinks about that, knowing 25% of the homes on the market in the county he was born in are foreclosures of families who lost their homes.
And yet, Hank Jr., so ancious to prove he can outspend his dad, is about to offer Burnett $80-100 million and who knows how much they’ll offer Lowe, Tiexera and Manny.
I certainly don’t know what the answer is, whether it’s a salary cap as suggested by michaelgorman or length of contract or what it is. What I do know is this over exuburance reminds me of CEO’s salaries and bonuses on Wall Street and we all know what’s happening there. Surely baseball can not be far behind.
… the usually wordy Byrne from Baseball and Relativity prefers this evening to simply contemplate the 2009 season, one in which surely his fantasy baseball team will provide more excitement than his home town Jays – when will the Riccardi era end?
Why even write down Riccardi’s comments? Really? Most of what he says is BS and lies. Whatever he says is meaningless. He’ll do what he wants, when he wants, regardsless of how bad it makes him look. His words are meaningless and anyone who belives anything that he says needs to get their head checked. We need to run this guy out of town…. Maybe he should be in politics?
It really is sad that the Yankees can spend and spend while other teams like the Blue Jays for instance have trouble signing a decent free agent. Something really needs to be done with the salary cap idea. Good luck Jays fans.
http://hardballblog.mlblogs.com/
every time I hear the time i hear riccardi quoted, all that i hear in my head is a reference to george costanza – cantstandya, cantstandya, cantstandya.