New York Yankees catcher Jorge Posada fights old habit

KISSIMMEE, Fla. -- Habits die hard, especially for the quintessential creature of habit, the ballplayer. Which is why New York Yankees catcher Jorge Posada, while standing in the on-deck circle on Monday, had to catch himself.

Two days after aggravating his right shoulder with a stretching routine he does before an at-bat, Posada almost made the same mistake twice. Without thinking, the catcher grabbed his bat at its ends, with both hands in front of him. Then, as he's done for years, he wanted to stretch the bat over and behind his head. Only this time, Posada caught himself before he could raise the bat above his chest.

"You get in the game, I went like this," Posada said, chuckling as he raised his arms. "Yeah, I almost did it again."

He played long toss but did not catch starter Chien-Ming Wang in the bullpen as scheduled. Still, Posada went 1-for-3 with an RBI single in the Yankees' 5-5 tie with the Houston Astros. He played as New York's designated hitter just two days after being pulled from the lineup when he irritated the shoulder, the same one that required surgery last season.

Perhaps Posada's biggest regret at the moment is not being able to catch when longtime teammate Derek Jeter steps into the box -- against the Yankees. The Bombers host Team USA at 1:15 on Tuesday. It will be the first time the Captain will oppose his longtime team.

Said Posada:"It's too bad I'm not going to be behind the plate, so I can really mess with him."

Posada joked that he told Yankees starter Phil Hughes to throw "nothing but fastballs inside" to Jeter. It was Hughes, of course, who in his first start of the spring, hit a pair of batters while trying to bust them inside with fastballs.

But, it seems, Yankees manager Joe Girardi got to Hughes first: "I already told Hughes he's not allowed to throw inside to Jeter." Girardi also issued another edict, this one to baserunners: no taking Jeter out at second.

Not that Posada will be affected by the latter warning. "I don't think I'm fast enough to get there," he said.

Nick Swisher, a candidate for the Yankees starting right field job, hit the wall in foul territory on Monday while making the long run to make a difficult catch.

"Me and the wall, we're buddies," Swisher said. "It's kind of like a football game. You're nervous until that first hit. Them, it's okay."

Bad contracts, Yuri Sucart and the New York Yankees

Some morning reading to lead off this Tuesday:

Hot stove guru Tim Dierkes of MLB Trade Rumors compiles a list of the worst contracts in baseball. Three Yankees make the not-so-prestigious list -- though A.J. Burnett's five-year, $82.5 million contract was spared. Here are the three Yankees representatives, not the least of which is the Immortal Kei Igawa:

-- Jorge Posada, Yankees. Four years, $52 million ($13 million per year). Signed November of 2007.

-- Hideki Matsui, Yankees. Four years, $52 million ($13 million per year). Signed November of 2005.

-- Kei Igawa, Yankees. Five years, $46 million ($9.2 million per year). Signed in December of '06, this was a clear and poorly thought-out response to Boston's Daisuke Matsuzaka signing.

And after reading this, I actually feel awful for Yuri Sucart. ESPN's Amy K. Nelson lays out the very strange relationship between Alex Rodriguez and his cousin, who is apparently severely underpaid while his rich cousin rides around in one of these.

And finally, Victor Wang at The Hardball Times creates his own
top prospects list (a popular undertaking this time of the year). Center fielder Austin Jackson is ranked at No. 38 while Jesus Montero checks in at No. 44 overall.

MLB Game Summary - NY Yankees at Houston

(Monday, March 2nd)

Final Score: Houston 5, NY Yankees 5

Kissimmee, FL (Sports Network) - Chris Johnson drove in two runs and Brian Bogusevic knocked in the tying run with an infield single, as the Houston Astros scored three times in the eighth inning to rally for a 5-5 tie with the New York Yankees in Grapefruit League play.

The Yankees built a 5-0 lead, scoring four off Houston starter Mike Hampton, before the Astros staged a comeback. Geoff Blum started the rally with a sacrifice fly in the fourth and Matt Kata homered in the fifth for Houston.

Hampton, who was scheduled to pitch three innings, went just two because of a high pitch count. He was roughed up for four runs on six hits with a walk and two strikeouts.

Angel Berroa doubled and homered for the Yankees, who saw a number of their players leave for the WBC. Melky Cabrera, battling for the center field job with Brett Gardner, went 2-for-3 with a pair of runs batted in and a run scored.

Jorge Posada also returned to the lineup after taking two days off to rest a sore shoulder and went 1-for-3 with an RBI as the designated hitter.

Chien-Ming Wang, in his first start since suffering a foot injury last season while running the bases in a game against the Astros, worked two scoreless innings for New York. He allowed two hits without a walk or a strikeout.

New York Yankees Plan to Cap Joba Chamberlain's Innings

According to the New York Daily News, Joba Chamberlain will be on an innings count this season. They say he will total around 150 innings this season. He only threw 100 1/3 innings last year, but it might change his value to the team.

The Yankees have said multiple times that he will be a starter, so I don’t see that changing. I have no problem with that, but let the guy pitch! They act like he was never a starter before.

Now..the question is whether or not they will move him to the pen later on in the year. It is going to be very interesting to see how they handle him this season.

New York Yankees find free-market way to stop scalpers

Ever since the movie "Groundhog Day" came out in 1993, that term has been used to describe events that happen over and over. And that is a perfect description of the practice of ticket-scalping. So it is entirely fitting that the big controversy over the scalping of Bruce Springsteen tickets began on the morning of Feb. 2.

That fight ended last week with Attorney General Anne Milgram announcing a settlement in which Ticketmaster will pay the state $350,000 and agree not to link its main ticket site to its other website in what is known as "the secondary market" -- the polite term for scalping.

But the actual scalping continues as surely as events of Groundhog Day repeated themselves for Bill Murray in that movie. If you doubt that, I invite you to visit TicketsNow, the site at the center of the controversy. There you will be asked to pay as much as $1,070 for a ticket that some lucky soul bought for $95.

To Springsteen fans, this looks like a ripoff. But to economists, it looks like a classic case of supply and demand.

"Among economists, the fundamental argument is that if there are long lines, the price is too low," says Steve Happel. "So why do venues not raise prices when they see long lines?"

That question has been amusing Happel for years now. He is a professor of economics at Arizona State University who is an expert in the market for tickets to entertainment and sporting events. He's been watching Springsteen struggle against scalpers for more than two decades. The problem, says Happel, is that the Boss wants his true fans to see him play at a reasonable price. But the fans don't always play along.

"If I stand in line for four hours for that $50 ticket and it's value is going up to $400, I might stop being a true fan and become a scalper," he says.

On this past Groundhog Day, thousands of Springsteen fans emerged from their burrows and saw a shadow website. After logging onto Ticketmaster they encountered a "no tickets found" message along with a message telling them to try TicketsNow.

"They didn't know it was a resale site," said Milgram when I spoke to her the other day. "There's so much time pressure and Ticketmaster was taking advantage of that."

The A.G. is still investigating just how all those tickets got onto TicketsNow so quickly. Some tickets even appeared on the secondary site before the box office opened, said Milgram.

"When we looked at the tickets that were on sale before 9 a.m., we saw seats that didn't even exist," she said.


Apparently the scalpers would take the money and then try to come up with a reasonable substitute for the ticket sold. As part of the agreement, TicketsNow will no longer list tickets for sale prior to the official box-office opening.

But that won't stop scalpers, said Happel. The only way to do that, he says, is through what economists call a "Dutch auction." This is the reverse of a regular auction. Instead of rising, prices drop. A ticket that starts at perhaps $400 might drop $10 a day until all are sold. Scalpers won't invest in a product that is declining in value, Happel said.

No one has tried this yet, said Happel. But the first such experiment may now be underway courtesy of the man they call "the Boss." Not Bruce Springsteen -- George Steinbrenner. The Yankees have priced seats for this season at a level that would make a scalper scream. Seats behind home plate home in the new Yankee Stadium are going for as much as $2,500. That's for one game, not the season. Seats along the baselines are selling at $350 a pop -- but only in a 20-game package.

Why so high? Happel theorizes that the Yankee management is thinking, "We need more revenue so we can buy more players and finish third again." You can tell from that quote he's no Yankee fan. I am, however, and I can recall that the first game I went to as a kid cost $3.50.

I sure won't be paying a hundred times that much to go to a game. A lot of others will feel the same way, Happel predicts, and as an economist, he's having more fun watching this market than most fans have watching a baseball game.

"This will be a good one if the Yankees have to come off of this," he said. "Maybe you'll see a really heavy Dutch auction. Those tickets may be dropping fast."

The Yankees aren't commenting. But I for one can't wait to see what the price for a single seat will be this season. Somehow, I can't imagine some guy in an alley offering to sell a $400 seat for a regular-season game at $500.

So that's the big difference between George Steinbrenner and Bruce Springsteen. The man they called "the Boss" on the other side of the river may not have solved his pitching problems yet. But he sure has solved his scalping problem.

MLB Game Summary - Minnesota At NY Yankees

Delmon Young stroked three hits, scored twice and drove in a run, leading the Minnesota Twins to a 7-3 victory over the New York Yankees in Grapefruit League action.

Brian Buscher put the Twins ahead for good in a three-run third inning, as his two-run double snapped a 3-3 tie. Jason Kubel also doubled in a run and Carlos Gomez homered in the victory -- Minnesota's fourth without a loss this spring.

Francisco Liriano made his first start of the spring for Minnesota and was tagged for three runs -- two earned -- on four hits in two innings. The remaining six Twins pitchers combined for seven innings of three-hit relief, with Jason Jones notching the win.

Joba Chamberlain worked just one inning in his first spring start for the Yankees and was charged with two runs on three hits. Dan Giese took the loss after allowing four runs on four hits in two frames.

Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter each drove in runs for New York with sacrifice flies. Jeter also had a hit and scored a run, while Mark Teixeira rapped a double.

New York catcher Jorge Posada, who has been the designated hitter in his first two spring games following last season's shoulder surgery, was scratched from the lineup with a sore shoulder.

Cincinnati vs. NY Yankees Game Recap

Craig Tatum hit a grand slam in the seventh inning for the go-ahead runs, helping the Cincinnati Reds outslug the New York Yankees, 13-11, in a spring training tilt.

Chris Dickerson went 3-for-3 with two home runs and four RBI, while Joey Votto and Laynce Nix added solo home runs for the Reds.

Aaron Harang surrendered three runs on six hits in his three innings on the mound for Cincy.

Alex Rodriguez, who met with Major League Baseball officials for two hours on Sunday to discuss his use of performance-enhancing drugs, had two doubles and two RBI for New York. Robinson Cano had a homer and four RBI during a 3-for-3 effort at the plate.

Derek Jeter also had three hits and two runs scored, while Brett Gardner and John Rodriguez each belted solo homers in the loss.

Alfredo Aceves lasted just one inning, allowing three runs on two hits and a walk for the Yankees.