the sports section

Melky Trade Held Up by Yanks’ Insistence on Acquiring CC’s Buds?

This morning, the Daily News reported that a deal that would have sent Melky Cabrera to Milwaukee for Mike Cameron was all but complete. And throughout the day, reports were that it was close, but not necessarily finished. Now, Ken Rosenthal is reporting that it may not happen altogether. It sounds like a straight-up Cabrera-for-Cameron trade was first proposed, then the Yankees wanted to expand it to include the Brewers’ Bill Hall. But the Brewers became hesitant to also pay some of Cameron’s salary, and somehow the name Kei Igawa got involved, and this, unsurprisingly, cooled things down.

It seems worth noting that both Cameron and Hall are good pals with CC Sabathia, to whom the Yankees just gave $161 million — and who has a clause in his contract that allows him to opt out in three years if he’s unhappy in New York. And though we should probably wait for him to at least throw his first pitch before beginning the opt-out speculation in full, it’s good to at least see that the Yankees are making the effort to please him. (We suppose, technically, there are other reasons to acquire Cameron, namely defense and Cabrera’s complete lack of improvement.) But the Yankees shouldn’t be so concerned with bringing Hall to New York, too. After all, we all know there’s only one friend of Sabathia whose coming here really matters. And, now that you asked, yes, LeBron James is quite happy that his pal CC is now pitching for his favorite team.

Melky Trade Held Up by Yanks’ Insistence on Acquiring CC’s Buds?