As in A-Rod saga, Henry's woe-is-me rings hollow

Here's what Red Sox owner John Henry had to say last night after the Yankees signed Mark Teixeira, a player the Red Sox reportedly had coveted for years:

"From the moment we arrived in Boston in late 2001, we saw (competing with the Yankees) as a monumental challenge. We sought to reduce the financial gap and succeeded to a degree. Now with a new stadium filled with revenue opportunities, they have leaped away from us again. So we have to be even more careful in deploying our resources."

Not so fast, Mr. Henry. The Red Sox offered somewhere in the neighborhood of $170 million. The Yankees won the bidding war with a contract in the neighborhood of $180 million. That works out to about $1.1 million per year over the eight years of the deal.

That's not New Yankee Stadium money. That's Jose Molina money.

It's fun to be the underdog, the team without the overwhelming resources of the Evil Empire. But when you spend $51.1 million to land negotiating rights with Daisuke Matsuzaka, you aren't the underdog anymore. Your cries for sympathy ring awfully hollow.

The Red Sox lost this one. They thought they were calling Scott Boras' bluff, and it backfired on them. It happens, just like it happened in the Alex Rodriguez negotiations in 2003, when the Red Sox got hung up over what amounted to chump change on a payroll north of $100 million. Sure, that one worked out in the end, but we'd look at the deal very differently had Dave Roberts been thrown out at second base.

The Red Sox had a shot then to get Rodriguez and didn't do it -- not because the Yankees have such overwhelming resources, but because they were trying to save $4 million a season.

What's $4 million? It's less than half of what they'll pay Julio Lugo to sit on the bench for the next two years. It's a little more than half of what they paid Manny Ramirez to play for the Dodgers in August, September and October.

The Red Sox had a shot to get Teixeira this week and didn't do it -- not because the Yankees have a new stadium, but because they held a line with Scott Boras to save $10 million.

What's $10 million? It's a fraction of what they paid just to sit down at a table with Dice-K.

“There is really no other fair way to deal with a team that has gone so insanely far beyond the resources of all the other teams,” Henry said after Rodriguez landed in New York.

Fired back George Steinbrenner, “Unlike the Yankees, he chose not to go the extra distance for his fans in Boston. It is understandable but wrong that he would try to deflect the accountability for his mistakes on to others and to a system for which he voted in favor."

The Yankees are and always will be the Yankees. The Red Sox, though, aren't exactly the Pittsburgh Pirates. Steinbrenner was right then and would be right if he said the same thing again today. Henry can't have it both ways.