Cliff Lee’s Christmas surprise

The Daily Gazette, Schenectady, N.Y.: Money isn’t everything. At least not to Cliff Lee, one of the best pitchers in baseball, who turned down an obscenely generous offer from the New York Yankees to play for far less money from the Philadelphia Phillies. It was one of the biggest surprises to come out of baseball’s winter meetings in years.

Lee toiled last year for the Texas Rangers (and was one of the big reasons they, and not the Yankees, represented the American League in the World Series). He was widely expected to go to New York, which initially offered him $138 million over six years, then just a few days later upped it to $150 million over seven when their dreaded American League rivals, the Boston Red Sox, signed its second top free agent of the winter meetings.

But for who knows what reason, Lee decided he’d rather go back to the Phillies, whom he’d played briefly for and won a World Series with in 2009 — even though the Phillies traded him after that season and even though the Phillies offered him $30 million less.

Obviously, Lee will not go hungry on “just” $120 million — not ever — and he could wind up with $135 million before he’s through if the Phillies pick up an option for him to play a sixth year. But in a game where the average salary now exceeds $3 million, no one is starving, and after a point, the amount of money the top players demand is more a matter of ego gratification than anything. Lee’s a great pitcher and likely has an ego to match, but it’s apparently not as great as some of the game’s other premier players, who in similar situations have — almost without exception — gone to whichever team was offering them the most money.

But money doesn’t always buy happiness, or World Series rings.