Jeff Karsten hangs them up

Ex-Yankee pitching lugnut Jeff Karsten is done. He's retiring. Don't stop the presses. Guy hasn't pitched in two years. He's just 32, though. The good die young.

Karsten went to Pittsburgh in the 2008 Cashman Coup, which brought us the china doll, Xavier Nady, and LH Damaso Marte. Neither could salvage the awful 2008 season, (which closed Yankee Stadium and officially ended with Robbie Cano refused to dive for a ground ball. Seattle still owes him $192 million.) But Marte pitched lights out in the 2009 post-season.

Who won the trade? Hard to say. The key cog was Jose Tabata, who at the time was being hailed as the future Yankee version of Manny Ramirez. Oh well. He currently has a lifetime .275 average with no power and no stolen bases. He's only 26, generally the age of our prospects at Scranton. And if I remember correctly, Tabata married a woman about twice his age. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

We also gave up Daniel McCutchen - bullpen fodder - and Ross Ohlendorf, who won 11 games for the rancid Pirates in 2009 (and could have helped us.)  But it was Karstens - the guy without the press clippings - who chugged along and did the most. He won 9 games for lowly Pittsburgh  in 2011 with an ERA of 3.38. We definitely could have used him.

Karstens was like David Phelps and/or Adam Warren: He didn't have the Phil Hughes' build-up or Joba's YES publicists. But he had a damn good career.  I wish we could have traded somebody else and kept him instead.