Cliff Lee

Dear Messrs. Wilpon,

    Just do it. Seriously. If you have to pay for it out of your own pockets, do it. It'll probably pay for itself in ticket sales long-haul, anyway. Get Cliff Lee. Yes, it'll cost plenty. Yes, the Yankees will probably be trying to get him. But seriously, get Cliff Lee. He struck out 13 Yankees tonight, while allowing approximately two hits, one walk, and zero runs in eight innings. At Yankee Stadium. In the NLCS, to give his team a 2-1 lead that has them very well positioned in this series. He's transformed himself from a totally mediocre pitcher prior to 2008 (4.64 ERA, 124 IP/year, 0.9 WAR/year) to an elite pitcher since then (2.98 ERA, 222 IP/year, 6.2 WAR/year in the regular season), and that doesn't even include the 7-0, 1.26 ERA, 8 IP/G, 9.4 K/9IP, 1.0 BB/9IP post-season spectacularity. Most of which is against the Yankees. With three complete games. The guy just doesn't mess around. We'd have a legitimate ace, ace-plus, to anchor the staff early in the season next year. Then, if Santana comes back as Johan Santana, we'd have two of the very best pitchers in the game going back-to-back. Add in some combination of Dickey, Pelfrey, Niese, and Mejia, and we've actually got too many starters to go around. Get Cliff Lee. Add Lee to what we've got already, which is an 88-win-style team, and we're talking post-season here. Especially if you then add Bobby Valentine. I think that's worth swallowing a little bit of a short-term monetary hit.

Sincerely,
    An Optimistic Fan