By Mark Gonzales
The landscape is different for the White Sox at this time than it was last winter, when they offered salary arbitration to free agent Orlando Cabrera. They were confident he would decline because of the emergence of Alexei Ramirez and the fact that Cabrera could have been cut and lost the majority of his salary.
By Tuesday night, the Sox must announce whether they will offer salary arbitration to their Type A free agents: right fielder Jermaine Dye and reliever Octavio Dotel. The Sox declined to announce their intentions any earlier, but chances are they won't offer arbitration to either player.
The landscape is different for the White Sox at this time than it was last winter, when they offered salary arbitration to free agent Orlando Cabrera. They were confident he would decline because of the emergence of Alexei Ramirez and the fact that Cabrera could have been cut and lost the majority of his salary.
By Tuesday night, the Sox must announce whether they will offer salary arbitration to their Type A free agents: right fielder Jermaine Dye and reliever Octavio Dotel. The Sox declined to announce their intentions any earlier, but chances are they won't offer arbitration to either player.
If that occurs, opposing teams would be expected to increase their
interest in each player since they would no longer run the risk of
losing a high draft pick. Meanwhile, the Sox would lose out on the
chance to gain more high draft picks but would avoid the risk of either
player accepting and receiving at least a fraction of their 2010 salary.
It's extremely rare for a player to take a pay cut in salary arbitration. Dye earned $11.5 million in 2009 and Dotel $6 million. Even if either player accepted salary arbitration and they were later cut in spring training, those players would receive either 30 days' pay or 45 days' pay, depending on the date in spring training that they were released. The major league calendar is around 180 days.
Last winter, Cabrera declined salary abribration but waited until early March to sign with Oakland for about $3 million.
A major league source told the New York Post last week that the Yankees had internal discussions about Dye (a report that general manager Brian Cashman denied to the Post), but Atlanta and San Francisco are in the market for power-hitting outfielders of Dye's caliber.
The Sox already have shored up their bench with the signings of Mark Kotsay, Omar Vizquel and Andruw Jones. SI.com pointed out that the Jones signing (for $500,000 base salary) marked a thaw in the relations between agent Scott Boras and the Sox, but Jones already is assured of about $13.8 million in deferred payments since getting his release from the Los Angeles Dodgers after the 2008 season.
And in last June's draft, the Sox selected Rocky Mount (NC) High School outfielder Brian Goodwin, who was advised by Boras but is attending the University of North Carolina.
In other free agent news, FOX Sports reported the New York Mets are close to signing backup catcher Henry Blanco, whom the Sox have interest in, according to Blanco's agent.
It's extremely rare for a player to take a pay cut in salary arbitration. Dye earned $11.5 million in 2009 and Dotel $6 million. Even if either player accepted salary arbitration and they were later cut in spring training, those players would receive either 30 days' pay or 45 days' pay, depending on the date in spring training that they were released. The major league calendar is around 180 days.
Last winter, Cabrera declined salary abribration but waited until early March to sign with Oakland for about $3 million.
A major league source told the New York Post last week that the Yankees had internal discussions about Dye (a report that general manager Brian Cashman denied to the Post), but Atlanta and San Francisco are in the market for power-hitting outfielders of Dye's caliber.
The Sox already have shored up their bench with the signings of Mark Kotsay, Omar Vizquel and Andruw Jones. SI.com pointed out that the Jones signing (for $500,000 base salary) marked a thaw in the relations between agent Scott Boras and the Sox, but Jones already is assured of about $13.8 million in deferred payments since getting his release from the Los Angeles Dodgers after the 2008 season.
And in last June's draft, the Sox selected Rocky Mount (NC) High School outfielder Brian Goodwin, who was advised by Boras but is attending the University of North Carolina.
In other free agent news, FOX Sports reported the New York Mets are close to signing backup catcher Henry Blanco, whom the Sox have interest in, according to Blanco's agent.
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