By Kirby Arnold
Herald Writer
SEATTLE – Somewhere between the contract Bret Boone is seeking and the deal already offered to him by the Seattle Mariners, there’s a high-dollar mark that the team won’t cross.
General manager Pat Gillick made it clear Monday that the Boone sweepstakes won’t become a bidding war, at least one that would lead the Mariners into the salary stratosphere.
The Mariners know what the free agent second baseman is worth to them and they won’t let their best business judgment be overridden by emotional sentiment that Boone provided with his best career year.
“We’d like to have him back, but we’ve lost two players the last two years who were coming off similar seasons,” Gillick said, referring to Ken Griffey Jr. and Alex Rodriguez. “We’re going to draw the line in the sand.”
Gillick said the team hasn’t had any recent meetings with Boone or his agent, Adam Katz, and nothing is scheduled.
“We’re not blowing our brains out (over efforts to re-sign Boone),” Gillick said.
Boone is reported to be angling for a five-year contract at about $10 million per year, and the Mariners already have made an offer substantially less than that, said to be three years, plus an option year, at $20 million to $24 million total.
Beginning today, any team in baseball can sign any free agent. What that means to the Mariners is that they now have competition for the two free agents they would like to bring back most: Boone and infielder-outfielder Mark McLemore.
Boone, after hitting 37 home runs and winning the American League RBI title with 141, is one of three favorites (along with teammate Ichiro Suzuki and Jason Giambi of the A’s) to win the AL Most Valuable Player award, which will be announced today.
Boone is expected to draw serious interest from several teams, including the big-money New York Yankees.
McLemore, whose versatility made him one of the most valuable Mariners last season, says he wants to return to Seattle but he also is expected to draw interest from his hometown Texas Rangers.
Mariners assistant GM Lee Pelekoudas said last week that the team expected to talk with McLemore’s agent on Monday, but Gillick said no meeting took place and nothing is planned.
Still, Gillick said, the Mariners plan to be active this offseason even if the lack of a labor agreement or the possibility of contraction has left other teams uneasy about making moves.
“We just have to do what we want to do and try to make headway where we want to make it,” Gillick said. “We’re going ahead, we’re not waiting. We’re going to be aggressive.”
Meaning the Mariners could make news in the next few days?
“I doubt it,” Gillick said.
Gillick has long maintained that the Mariners will use trades to satisfy most of their offseason objectives – obtaining a left fielder and improving the offensive production at third base.
The available free agents in left field are players who may demand money the Mariners aren’t willing to pay, especially guys like Barry Bonds (who the Giants may offer a four-year deal at $18 million per year), Juan Gonzalez (who made $10 million in Cleveland last year) and Johnny Damon (not likely to get his desired $10 million per year from Oakland).
One affordable free-agent outfielder might be Roger Cedeno, who made $2.7 million and hit .293 last year for Detroit, but is considered a platoon player who doesn’t hit left-handed pitching well. Dmitri Young (.302, 21 homers, 69 RBI with the Reds) also has surfaced in trade talks.
At third base, Craig Paquette is much like McLemore in that he’s a switch hitter (.282, 15 homers, 64 RBI) who plays both third and the outfield, and he was a highly valued player whom the Cardinals hope to re-sign. That leaves Vinny Castilla, who hit 25 homers and drove in 91 runs with the Astros, and John Valentin (a career .281 hitter who made $6.35 million while injured most of the year) as the free agents who might be an offensive improvement over David Bell.
Two other National League third basemen are known to have piqued the Mariners’ trade interest: Jeff Cirillo of the Rockies and Scott Rolen of the Phillies.
Cirillo, who lives in Seattle in the offseason, batted .312 with 17 homers and 83 RBI, and he has an 84-game errorless streak that is one short of the NL record. The stumbling block is that he also has a $29 million contract over the next four years that the salary-purging Rockies would love to lose.
Rolen (.289, 25 homers, 107 RBI) turned down the Phillies’ offer of seven years at $14 million per year and said he will test free agency after next season. That could prompt the Phillies to enter serious trade talks for a player who is considered one of the great third basemen in the game.
The Mariners will need to keep several options in mind, because if Boone goes elsewhere it will almost mandate obtaining a strong offensive player in left or at third base.
“We have worked on a lot of different scenarios here,” Pelekoudas, the assistant GM, said. “Getting one guy or not getting that guy creates a whole set of circumstances and puts different things in motion. It’s really a moving target.”
“Whenever it involves possible trades, that’s probably a little more murky than the free agent market. You know where you want to go in the free-agent market as far as the amount of dollars you want to spend. With trades, you just don’t know.”
M’s shift 40-man roster: The Mariners moved eight players to the team’s 40-man roster on Monday. They are: left-handed pitchers Ryan Anderson and Matt Thornton, right-handers J.J. Putz, Allan Simpson, Jeff Heaverlo and Aaron Taylor, and infielders Antonio Perez and Willie Bloomquist. The roster now stands at 39 players.
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