Yu Darvish Not Joining Yankees or Cubs
By Editorial Staff
We’re hours away from an official Yu Darvish announcement, and the details (rumors) surrounding Darvish’s posting process have become clearer over the past several days. We’ve learned that there was a “whopper” of a bid offered for Darvish. We’ve learned the names of several clubs that have submitted bids for Darvish, and yesterday we learned more about the sincerity of said offers.
According to sources, it now appears that the Yankees and Cubs will not be winning the bidding for Darvish. While this had been rumored to be the case, a person with knowledge of the situation told Marc Carig of the Star-Ledger that the Yankees are in fact “not getting” Yu Darvish.
The Yankees were one of several known teams that submitted a bid for Darvish last week. But, according to sources, the Yankees interest was merely “lukewarm” and their bid was “modest”.
Yankees general manager Brian Cashman was unwilling to comment one way or another regarding the Darvish matter, but another source to Carig that New York’s offer doesn’t come close to the “ridiculous number” that is the winning bid.
This “ridiculous number” is said to be north of $50 million, and Franz Lidz of SI.com reported yesterday that the winning bid for Darvish is the highest in the history of the posting system. This would mean that it would exceed the $51.1 million the Boston Red Sox paid to negotiate with Daisuke Matsuzaka in 2006.
The Chicago Cubs are another team that has been tied to Darvish over the past week. While they are known to have submitted a bid, it is “very low” according to Nick Carfado of the Boston Globe. Not only that, but Carfado says that Cubs “have no illusions of winning the rights to negotiate with Darvish”.
There was no new information released regarding the favorites to sign Darvish, the Blue Jays and Rangers. While both are still considered to be in the running for Darvish, most are calling the Blue Jays the front-runners to land the 25-year-old.
You can check out all of the available free agents by position below.