http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=1735937
ESPN.com news services
NEW YORK -- Alex Rodriguez was one step from playing for the New York Yankees.
New York and Texas finalized the terms of a trade Sunday, and the players' association gave its approval. The last hurdle was for commissioner Bud Selig to sign off on a deal, a high-ranking baseball official told The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity.
New Bronx Bombers
The Yankees' potential lineup with A-Rod, per inning based on 2004 salaries.
Player Dollars/9 innings
1. Kenny Lofton, CF $2,126
2. Derek Jeter, SS $11,659
3. Alex Rodriguez, 3B $14,403
4. Jason Giambi, 1B $6,858
5. Gary Sheffield, RF $8,916
6. Bernie Williams, DH $8,230
7. Jorge Posada, C $4,115
8. Hideki Matsui, LF $4,801
9. Miguel Cairo, 2B $617
Kevin Brown, RHP $10,288
Total $72,013
Approval from Selig was expected Monday, and the Yankees began planning for a Tuesday news conference in New York to introduce the first reigning MVP ever traded.
"I was just as surprised as the Yankee fans and the Boston Red Sox fans when I opened up my paper today," President Bush, the Rangers' former owner, told NBC at the Daytona 500. "It, obviously, is a big deal. ... A-Rod's a great player and the Yanks are going to be a heck of a team with him in the infield."
Rodriguez will move from shortstop, a position where he's been a seven-time All-Star, to third base, where he will replace injured Aaron Boone. The Yankees will keep their captain, Derek Jeter, at shortstop.
Texas will wind up paying $140 million for three seasons with Rodriguez, an average of $46.7 million annually for three last-place finishes in the AL West. The Yankees will owe him $112 million for seven years.
Under the deal, the Yankees pay Rodriguez $15 million in each of the next three seasons, $16 million each in 2007 and 2008, $17 million in 2009 and $18 million in 2010, according to contract information obtained by the AP from player and management sources.
In each of the first four years, $1 million will be deferred without interest, to be paid in 2011.
The trade calls for Texas to pay $43 million of Rodriguez's salary over the remaining seven years: $3 million in 2004, $6 million each in 2005, 2006 and 2010, $7 million apiece in 2007 and 2009 and $8 million in 2008. In addition, the Rangers will pay the $24 million remaining in deferred money from the original contract, with the interest rate lowered from 3 percent to 1.75 percent.
In the end, Texas will pay $67 million of the $179 million left on Rodriguez's record $252 million, 10-year contract, and will get All-Star second baseman Alfonso Soriano and a player to be named.
All the deferred money owed by Texas -- $36 million including salaries from 2001-03 -- will be lumped with the original $10 million signing bonus, of which $4 million is still owed. The payout schedule will be pushed back to 2016-2025 from 2011-20.
In exchange for the alterations, which devalue the present-day value of the contract by $5 million, Rodriguez will receive a hotel suite on road trips, have the right to link his Web site to the Yankees' site and get a guarantee that the deferred money won't be wiped out by a work stoppage.
Ultimately, baseball's biggest spenders will raise their payroll to about $190 million.
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Fuck em all. Especially the players union that blocked the trade to Boston.
