CC staying here?

Last Friday, I received a phone call from a guy who told me that he heard that CC Sabathia approached the Brewers, and said he would resign with them for $100 million dollars over 4 years. I said, "no way, who is reporting that?" My guy said he knows a guy who knows a guy in the upper levels of the Brewers front office. CC approached the team with that figure, and that the team was in the process of working the numbers to find out if the deal was plausible.

Oh ok, "knows a guy that knows a guy." Whatever right? EVERYBODY knows that the Brewers had no chance at resigning CC right? Whenever the topic gets brought up, all that gets said is the Brewers have "no chance."

Well, looks like Buster Olney has heard some of the same rumors in some capacity.

Others in the Brewers' organization say Milwaukee owner Mark Attanasio will try to make it very difficult for Sabathia to leave -- maybe to the point of risking a colossal mistake.

Through a clear-eyed, fiscally responsible lens, the idea of Attanasio competing with a Yankee offer is probably a little nuts. If he were to give Sabathia $22 million to $25 million a year, for argument's sake, that would probably represent something in the range of 25 to 35 percent of the team's payroll -- and if Sabathia were to get hurt, well, his dead salary could become a debilitating albatross for a team with a mid-level budget.

So ok...there appear to be two ends of the spectrum here. We've got Doug Melvin vs Mark Attanasio...in a matter of speaking. Doug is conservative. Mark is aggressive.

Doug understands the economics of baseball and the danger of a mid-market team shoring up a third of the payroll on 1 player (albeit potentially the best pitcher in baseball who's in the prime of his career).

Mark understands economics in general, knowing that with CC here, the Brewers are a contender every year, and that will keep 3 million fans coming to Miller Park every year. If that's the case, the attendance pays for the player. Everybody knows the effect 1 playoff appearance does for a team's revenue stream. 1 year in the playoffs equals several years after of increased revenue from everything: merchandise, increased ticket-prices & parking, & tv advertising.

Is it a gamble? Hell yeah it is. It's not one that I'm qualified to answer, because basically, it all boils down to 1 thing: Will CC get hurt? Obviously, there's nobody that can answer that.

This story is probably the most interesting subplot of the offseason, and much more will be written about it, since it can't be fully analyzed in 1 blog post. I guess we can leave it at this for now. With Gagne not going to be re-signed, and if they deny Cameron's option, they DO have the money to sign him. But...WILL they actually sign him?

I guess it depends on how Mark A's 401K is looking in a month or so...