Goodbye, City Life!

Recalling the theme to Green Acres when New Yorkers Oliver and Lisa Douglas left the Big Apple for Hooterville... Time to focus on a pair of pitchers whose New York days came to an end on Wednesday:

Two pitchers, with a combined total of 13 New York seasons, are heading elsewhere. After seeing the Yankees trade for Jameson Taillon and sign Corey Kluber Masahiro Tanaka read the handwriting on the wall and returned to Japan, re-signing with his former team the Rakuten Eagles. While never becoming the ace the organization hoped, he turned in two terrific and several very good seasons, before slumping last summer. His price tag might have also been a detriment to re-upping with the Yankees. Recent performance suggested that the now-32 year old wasn't worth anywhere near his previous $22 million salary.

The Mets then parted company with their homegrown lefty. There'd always been big expectations for Steven Matz, especially after his sparkling 6-0 debut during the second half of their pennant-winning 2015 season. Subsequent years left plenty to be desired. While he would occasionally tease with an impressive game or two, he never became a dependable number-three starter behind Jacob deGrom and Noah Syndergaard. Finally, after Sandy Alderson returned to run baseball operations, the organization's patience finally ran out. The Mets traded him to the Blue Jays for prospects -- and hope to find a better way to spend what would have been his $5.2 million salary.





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