The New York Yankees have reportedly reached an agreement with free agent first baseman Mark Teixeira on an eight year deal worth $180 million.

The Yankees’ bitter rivals, the Boston Red Sox had been favored to land the slugger but the Bronx Bombers once again won the war of the pocketbooks. Teixeira’s deal takes the Yankees’ off season tab up to $423.5 million to three players over an 8 year period, and also gives the team famous for it’s spending, the 4 highest paid players in the game (Teixeira, Sabathia, Jeter, and Rodriguez).

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The Free Agent pool of players got a bit bigger at midnight on Friday when players who were not tendered contract offers from their teams became free agents. I’ve broken the list down by position and as you can see, there are a few surprises here including former Dodgers closer Takashi Saito (2.49 ERA and 18 saves) and Nationals starter Tim Redding (10 wins).

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The New York Yankees continued their offseason spending spree, signing AJ Burnett to a 5 year deal worth $82.5 million. The Yankees appear to be capitalizing on the down turn in the economy, going on a historic spending spree while the rest of the league has been cutting costs and keeping a sharp eye on their bottom line. Earlier this week the Yanks inked CC Sabathia to a 7 year, $161 million deal, the largest ever contract for a pitcher. The latest signing is pending a physical which is usually a formality, however, with the injury prone Burnett there are no guarantees.

If you thought committing a total of $243.5 million over the next 7 years would take the Yankees out of shopping mode, think again. The New York Post reports that they’ve now joined the bidding for first baseman Mark Teixeira, with Manny Ramirez as a backup option should they lose out on the switch hitting first baseman.

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Ken Rosenthal is reporting that the Atlanta Braves are prepared to lose long time pitcher John Smoltz if another team is willing to give the veteran hurler a guaranteed deal. Smoltz has had a long list of surgeries on his throwing arm, most recently a shoulder surgery in June, and the Braves are apparently only willing to give him an incentive laden deal.

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Teams have until midnight eastern time tonight to extend offers of arbitration to their free agents and I’ll be updating this page as often as news becomes available about teams’ arbitration actions.

Update

The offers are all in, and according to the AP only 24 players were offered arbitration. The list is as follows:

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Orange County Register reporter, Randy Youngman, doesn’t think free agent slugger Mark Teixeira will be back with the Los Angeles Angels next year. He calls it a “gut feeling” and mentions that the people he talks to within the Angels organization don’t seem optimistic about the slugger’s return. Instead, Youngman predicts, Teixeira will sign with [...]

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The Boston Red Sox have traded the best name in baseball (Coco Crisp) to the Kansas City Royals for flame throwing reliever Ramon Ramirez.

Ramirez has a blazing fastball and will likely become the setup man for All-Star Red Sox closer Jonathan Pablebon. Ramirez pitched 71 2/3rds innings last year and compiled an ERA of 2.64 along with 70 Ks.

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Update 5: Well, if Sports Illustrated’s Jon Heyman is to be believed, the title of this post may be accurate once again! Apparently the deal has Manny Ramirez (I hold him personally responsible for this whole mess) going to the Dodgers, Jason Bay heading to the Boston Red Sox, and the Pirates getting 4 prospects [...]

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Well, if we were to believe all the different sources that have said a trade for Jason Bay is a done deal, he’d have been traded about 23 times by now.
However, this being a rumor site, it would be remiss of us to not tell you that MLB.com is reporting that the Los Angeles Dodgers [...]

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Update 2: Ken Rosenthall has said this one is dead barring a miracle. So that’s the end of that right? Bay is staying a Pirate right? Maybe not. I’ll have a post up shortly.

Update: MLB.com is NOW reporting that the deal isn’t finalized just yet. I realize all the MLB reporters want to be the [...]

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