Doc to the Yankees Still a Possibility

The evil empire continues to add pieces to its championship team, and it seems that Doc is still on their radar. The way this article states it, there are reasons to be optimistic that the Yankees will still land Doc for the following reasons:

• Jesus Montero: both the Yankees and the Jays love this kid, but since his future is at 1B/DH, the Yankees have no spot for him and definitely want sound return on investment. Who else is on the market and better than Doc as a return? Nobody. So, if the Yankees are going to trade Montero, it might as well be for Doc. they can't keep him in the minors forever!!
• The Yankees can still include one of Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes while retaining the other. In layman's terms, when you look at their 2009 lineup, whichever one of these 2 they decide to move for Doc would essentially be traded straight up for Doc. That's quite an improvement. And since neither of the 2 is a sure thing in terms of longevity or ceiling, it makes a ton of sense to grab Doc.
  
• With Andy Pettitte waiting to re-sign, if they add Doc they only need 1 of the 2 to fill their rotation. It would give them a top 5 of CC Sabathia, Roy Halladay, AJ Burnett, Andy Pettitte, and one of Joba Chamberlain or Phil Hughes. That's one hell of a rotation!
• The article by Joel Sherman also goes on to say that Yankee brass would not want to sign Doc to an extension. They'd rather wait to pick up the 2 top picks and rebuild their minors and feel there are enough top end FA starters coming up in 2011 to replace Doc in the rotation. 
• TB and BOS. If either of these teams land Doc, it will make it harder for the Yanks to win the AL East outright. Add to that the fact that the Orioles intend to spend a ton this off-season and nothing is guaranteed for the evil empire. Should they not want to spend 200 million plus and wind up out of the playoffs, they probably would be better off making sure they got ALL of the pieces they can to make it happen. Oh, how I dream of Boston winning the division with TB winning the wild card. lol.

With all of those points, the Yankees and Jays still match up very well. I still expect Alex Anthopolous to need a few young prospects to be added, but nothing significant. We'll see if the Yankees can pull it off, I just hope it costs them in 2012 and beyond when the Jays start winning streaks of their own with Montero hitting cleanup!