Seeral winners in Santana Sweepstakes

So, Johan Santana will be a New York Met. The long, dreary Winter of Santana has finally come to an end. From this vantage point, this looks like the perfect ending -- everybody wins.

The Mets win because, well, isn't it obvious? The Mets win because they get Santana, arguably baseball's best pitcher the past five seasons and an ace who is not yet 30 and likely has another 5-7 years of dominance remaining.

MetsBlog puts it this way.

As I had been saying, for me, this deal had to be done, if for no other
reason than it is becoming harder and harder to acquire an ace on the open
market…so, if one became available by trade, who was attainable, the trigger had
to be pulled…especially if he comes at the cost of three pitchers, who the Mets
believe will not be as good as Santana during the next few years.

Santana wins because he will get paid exorbitantly -- something to the tune of six years, $150 million. He also wins because he goes to the National League, where will look even more dominating and maybe extends his career.

The Yankees win because Santana did not end up in Boston. They also win because they thought with their heads instead of their wallets for a change and didn't go get Santana just because they could. Instead, they saved the money and the top-notch pitching phenoms -- a choice that should help the franchise for years to come.

The change signifies a change in Yankee thinking.

From Tyler Kepner in the New York Times.

The Yankees’ extraordinary luxury tax penalties rarely seemed to bother George
Steinbrenner. But his sons look around and see other teams succeeding without
paying heavy taxes. It is a fact that teams can win without spending as wildly
as the Yankees have in this decade, and it is reasonable for the Yankees to go
about it another way.

The Red Sox win simply because they kept Santana away from the Yankees. Getting him out of the league was a bonus.

The only loser in all of this might be the Minnesota Twins. Not only do they wind up trading Santana, which they obviously did not want to do -- but they didn't get maximum return.

From ESPN's Buster Olney.

In return for Santana, the Twins would receive center fielder Carlos
Gomez and pitchers Phil Humber, Kevin Mulvey and Deolis Guerra -- a package
which some talent evaluators believe could be the fourth-best offer that
Minnesota received during this process.

So, the Santana Watch is over. It's almost time for Spring training. Yeah, baby!