Yankees Trade A.J. Burnett To Pittsburgh
A.J. Burnett’s tumultuous three year tenure with the Yankees will come to an end. The Yankees and Pirates have agreed on a trade that would send Burnett to Pittsburgh for two low level minor leaguers, according to Fox Sports’ Ken Rosenthal. New York would pay $20 million of the $33 million remaining on his contract, Rosenthal said.
The prospects going back to the Yankees are 25-year-old righty reliever Diego Moreno and 21-year-old lefty LF Exicardo Cayonez. Moreno fared well as a reliever in advanced A, but struggled a tad in AA. From Ben Badler: “Diego Moreno can get his fastball into the high-90s. Also went undrafted in the Rule 5 draft in December.” Cayonez is still slowly developing as a player and may need more time in the Gulf Coast League before he goes to Short Season A.
The deal is pending MLB approval and a passed physical on Sunday, but those are seen as formalities. Burnett had a very good season in helping the Yankees win the World Series in 2009, but he went 21-26 in 2010 and 2011 with ERA’s north of 5 and had control issues throughout his tenure in the Bronx.
That being said, Burnett will be a low risk addition for the Pirates, joining Charlie Morton, Erik Bedard, James McDonald and Kevin Correia in the rotation. There will be less pressure in Pittsburgh and the rigors of the AL East will be replaced by the light hitting NL Central.
The $13 million the Yankees are saving will allow them to fill their bench with an infielder and an outfielder, expected to be Eric Chavez and Raul Ibanez. Ibanez’s lefty power stroke and ability to still field somewhat adequately as a corner outfielder would make him a good fit with the short right field porch in New York.
Of course, all this is contingent on the two sides agreeing to prospects coming to the Yankees, approval from Bud Selig and a passed Burnett physical.
Jeremy Lin’s Lucrative Decision To Pursue Basketball
Jeremy Lin’s chosen career path as an undrafted basketball player was certainly a gamble, but one that has turned out pretty well for him to say the least.
Lin graduated Harvard University with a degree in economics, and would have made a fine salary if he had tried to go to work even with a bachelor’s degree from such a prestigious school. It’s hard to exactly pin down how much money he would be making right now, but it would likely be something close to six figures. A call placed to Harvard’s Office of Career Services came with a reply that “we don’t collect salary data in our office,” so an assumption will have to be made in that regard.
If Lin had not pursued basketball, it’s not an enormous stretch to say that he would have gone to Harvard’s Business School to pursue an MBA. Though a two-year MBA from Harvard would cost over $120,000, according to a BusinessWeek report, that money would be made back rather quickly. A 2010 BusinessWeek report that came out just as Lin was graduating from Harvard said that the average salary for an MBA with less than two years of experience would have been $133,000 and that Lin would have made a total of $3.8 million in salary over a 20 year career. So Lin’s decision turned out to be a pretty good one.
After being released by Golden State and Houston, Lin signed with the Knicks and you probably know the rest of the Linsanity story and how it quickly captured the attention of basketball fans and casual observers around the world. Lin is on the last year of his rookie contract, which will pay him a pretty robust $762,195 this season. After the season is where Lin will really be able to cash in. Lin will likely make around $5 million next season if the Knicks use their midlevel exception on him, which is more than he would have made in 20 years as a graduate of one of the best business schools in the world. Factor in the endorsement deals Lin will likely receive and it’s fair to say that Lin’s decision to stick with basketball worked out pretty well for him and the New York Knicks.
