Payroll

http://mlbcontracts.blogspot.com/2005/01/los-angeles-dodgers.html

According to Cott's baseball contracts the Dodgers have, roughly, 88 million locked up for the 2009 season. I am estimating 5 million each for Ethier, Martin, and Broxton. I think Martin and Ethier will get more than 5 and Broxton less, but in the end were talking about less than 2 million each way. So the payroll is currently between 82-94 million range. Still far less than last year.

And while we are still not using our resources to the best of their abilities (Dewitt at second?), we still have enough cash free to sign Manny. But we also need at least one more starter. We are still 28 million below what we were at last year, but given the decline in the economy, I am to assume that we will be somewhere in the 110 million range.

A guy like Andy Pettitte must be on the dodgers radar. At 10 million next year I'll take him over having Sheets, Perez, or Garland all of which have significant draw backs and multiple year contract requests. Garland might be the pony of the group. He would eat innings at a terrible cost. Perez would be a nightmare watcing because he walks everyone. And Sheets is just another Jason Schmidt in the making. He's missed significant time 3 of his last 4 years. He's been effective, but what we need is someone to eat innings (be healthy), be effective, and also not cost us more than one year.

Randy Johnson right?

Wrong.

Anyway, Pettitte should be the only one on the Dodgers list. If we could trade Jones and eat some of the salary then great. But I'd rather just send him to Albuquerque and hope he figures it out.

Hopefully after signing Pettitte we still have enough money to make a run at Manny for 2 years and 45 million again. Backload the contract so we can pay him more when Jones and Schmidt leave.

By 2010 Martin, Ethier, Broxton, and Bills will all qualify for a bump. It's only going to get harder from here on out. I hope Ned gets fired!