Hideki Matsui
Rumors

Jayson Stark from espn.com has a new article up with plenty of off season rumors.

• Milton Bradley appears to have three different suitors: Rays, Rangers and Jays. However, Bradley is owed $21M over the remainder of his contact, so the Cubs will likely have to take on a bad contract in return.
• The Marlins had discussions about trading Dan Uggla with the Giants and Rangers.
• Rather than bid on Jason Bay or Matt Holliday, the Yankees seem content to try and resign Johnny Damon or Hideki Matsui.
• Derek Lowe's contract is becoming burdensome for the Braves, especially as they look to extend Javier Vazquez. They'll try to move Lowe and hope to get a hitter in return for him.
• The Phillies are considering Placido Polanco, Mark DeRosa and Adrian Beltre at third base.

Johnny Damon is an off season priority for the Yankees

Ken Rosenthal has a new column up.  Let's take a look.

• The Mariners would like to move Adrian Beltre, Jarrod Washburn or Miguel Batista to free up some money to go after free agents, but moving them would be difficult.
• One possibility was that the Mariners would swap Washburn for Hideki Matsui with the Yankees, but Matsui is set to make $3M more in 2009, so the deal fell apart.
• The Twins would like to move Delmon Young.  The Twins showed interest in Washburn last year, but it's not clear whether the two players could form the basis for a larger deal that would be necessary to accomodate the swap.
• The Yankees are not interested in Juan Cruz.
• If the Yankees do trade Xavier Nady or Nick Swisher it will likely be to improve their bullpen.
• Brian Shouse is high on the Rays wish list.
• Rich Hill to the Orioles would likely take only a low level prospect to complete with the Cubs.

The rumors of Mark Teixeira signing with the Yankees have been confirmed.  Now let's take a look at the various reports about how the deal went down:

• Bill Madden of the Los Angeles Times writes that Teixeira told him that he prefered New York over Boston and Los Angeles all along.  
• Gordon Edes of Yahoo! Sports gives a rundown of events that brought Teixeira to New York.
• Joel Sherman of the New York Post notes that the decision to sign Teixeira, along with their entire 2009 off season haul (CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett) was made with the poor 2010 free agent class in mind.  Sherman also points out that the team will now try to trade one of their outfielders: Nick Swisher, Johnny Damon, Xavier Nady or Hideki Matsui.
• Danny Knobler of CBS Sports reports that the contract does not include an opt-out clause as Sabathia's did.  He also notes that the Sox do not intend to go after Derek Lowe simply because they missed out on Teixeira.
• It appears as if the Red Sox final offer was eight year, $168M according to Joel Sherman.

Here is Jon Heyman's latest post.  Below are the highlights:

• The Yankees are making CC Sabathia their off season priority and plan to offer him more than the $137.5M that Johan Santana signed with the Mets last year. 
• Beyond Sabathia, the Yankees are expected to go after AJ Burnett, Derek Lowe and Oliver Perez and may even try to sign two of the three plus Sabathia.
• Mike Mussina seems likely to retire, but the Yankees decision on Andy Pettitte will pend Mussina's decision.
• The White Sox are not expected to keep Juan Uribe.
• There have been vague rumors about Hideki Matsui being traded, but Heyman doesn't see much merit there.

With the playoffs starting on the first day of October, there's still plenty of rumors to discuss:

• Rangers owner Tom Hicks admits that trading John Danks was a mistake.
• The Astros declined Doug Brocails's 2009 option.
• The Seattle Mariners have received permission to interview Blue Jays assistant Tony LaCava.  LaCava was rumored as a general manger candidate in Seattle earlier.
• Dodgers general manager Ned Coletti's future is still in doubt.
• Buster Olney heard this week that Andruw Jones' awful signing was orchestrated by Dodgers owner Frank McCourt rather than Coletti.
• Joel Sherman wonders if the Yankees manager, Joe Girardi, discourages free agents from signing in New York.
• Brian Cashman would like to get a full time first baseman rather than convert Johnny Damon or Hideki Matsui. 
• The Padres are filing a grievence against Khalil Greene after the shortstop was lost for the season after punching a storage cabinet in Petco Park in late July.  The team is looking to recoop approximately $1M.