Johnny Damon on why Yankees didn’t retract again after 2009: ‘I wasn’t there’

Johnny Damon never wished to leave the Yankees after a success the World Sequence in 2009. But he, along with World Sequence MVP Hideki Matsui, win been goners after no longer getting the cash they wished. And in Damon’s eyes, that’s why the Yankees couldn’t retract yet another championship within the years following title No. 27.

“I knew why they couldn’t safe it performed. I wasn’t there,” Damon said fair no longer too lengthy ago on the “Spoil a Bat” podcast. “Matsui wasn’t there. A minimal of 1 of us ought to serene’ve been there. You appropriate had a selected truly feel for them.”

After the 2009 season, the controversy was once that Damon wished the same $13 million a season he had appropriate made with the Yankees the outdated four years. The Yankees didn’t decide on to pay Damon that, and because the offseason went on, the signings of Prick Johnson and Randy Winn within the waste left no room for Damon, who said no longer being brought abet was once “crushing.” Here’s what Damon says now about what transpired.

“I truly wished to shut abet. They ended up providing a contract, and I appropriate wished to order fairly bit,” Damon said on the podcast. “My agent (said,) ‘You simplest win 5 minutes to employ it.’ I was once devour, ‘Why enact I win 5 minutes? Let me survey what they’re bearing in mind.’ They wished to lower my salary in half of, and I was once devour, ‘why don’t we lower it by 30 percent?’ I’ll be gay with that. I know I’m rising older, my outfield isn’t as substantial as it was once. So I was once asserting ‘OK, 30 percent lower.’ Then Prick Johnson signed and I’m devour, ‘Man, yeah, he would maybe presumably also want a substantial on-irascible share, however I’m able to get from wherever and I was once a crew chief.’

“I don’t know. Profitable the World Sequence and all of a unexpected, you’re out. But I safe it. It’s a exchange. It truly stinks, however I safe it. They haven’t gained since and that’s the disgrace of it, on fable of Matsui and I, you never needed to alternate the lineup. With a sharp-hander or left-hander, the lineup was once the same the total time. They ended up changing us with [Brett] Gardner and [Curtis] Granderson, and yes, incredible players, however they’d hit one and two against a sharp-hander, and with a left-hander they’ll hit six and 9, or one would play and one wouldn’t. So your lineup changes daily. I’ll present you, that’s super annoying as a participant. Though the baseball nerds, sabermetric guys, they bid it shouldn’t matter, however it issues quite a bit.”

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Damon, 46, was once a chunk of the Red Sox’s curse-breaking 2004 World Sequence crew. When asked whether he was once extra of a Yankee or Red Sock, he spoke extra favorably of Contemporary York.

“I present of us Boston is devour an ex-lady friend where you’ll need them well and also you loved being a chunk of it, however you admire what, you growth on, your lifestyles will get substantial, you marry your trophy indispensable other and also you win gotten six extra kids. That’s what Contemporary York was once for me,” Damon said. “I liked the total lot with Boston, and I truly feel for them. I truly feel for the fans on fable of even now, they appropriate got rid of their simplest participant, Mookie Betts. It constantly occurs for Boston. Yankee players aren’t primarily leaving if they don’t decide on to. Yankee players are going to cease, however Boston – when I got here over to Contemporary York in 2006, there win been simplest six guys left from the 2004 Red Sox crew. … They constantly scrutinize at me and advise ‘How would maybe presumably you? How would maybe presumably you?’ Effectively, all my guys are long gone.”