I liked the Berkman and Kearns acquisitions a whole lot more than this last one:

The New York Yankees acquired pitcher Kerry Wood from the Cleveland Indians on Saturday, the third deal in less than 24 hours for the World Series champions as they beefed up for the stretch run.

Wood, a hard-throwing, 33-year-old righty, gives the Yankees another setup option alongside Joba Chamberlain for closer Mariano Rivera.

The Yankees sent Cleveland a player to be named or $500,000, and the Indians gave New York $2,172,131. New York will pay $1.5 million of the $3,672,131 remaining on Wood’s $10.5 million salary this year. His contract includes an $11 million team option for 2011.

OK, the only true cost was cash and clearly the Yanks have enough free cash to toss $1.5 million at a pitcher who throws hard but carries a poor injury history and a recent spotty performance history. If his name wasn’t Kerry Wood, would we even be remotely excited? This is a guy fresh of the DL with just 20 IP this season. He’s got a nice K rate but a lousy BB rate, which sounds like some of the current Yankee bullpen staff. The team loses essentially nothing if he flops -aside from cash- so for the most part, it’s a riskless transaction. That doesn’t mean it’s a good one.

Maybe Wood will form a three-headed monster with Joba and Robertson to successfully bridge to Mo, or as I fear, he will simply be an expensive accelerant. He still carries a strong reputation from his early Cubs days, but that pitcher is long gone by this point. What we have now is just another reliever with a big, fat (6.30) ERA (5.21 FIP, 5.04 xFIP), who has control problems and a high home run rate. Sounds like the guy the team just DFA’d to make room for Wood.

Meh.

(click “view full post” for some Park vs. Wood comparisons)