Players, agents will probably blink first

There was a little flurry of activity in the last couple of days of 2008. Brian Fuentes is signing with the Angels. Brad Penny appears to be headed to Boston. Aaron Miles was signed by the Cubs, who traded Mark DeRosa to the Indians. Mark Hendrickson is headed to Baltimore.

But the money available to teams seems to be drying up quickly. And it's hard to believe that any of the remaining free agents are going to get the salaries they think they deserve.

Check out some of these names still without a deal: Derek Lowe, Manny Ramirez, Bobby Abreu, Pat Burrell, Orlando Hudson, Pedro Martinez, Garret Anderson, Oliver Perez, John Smoltz, Ivan Rodriguez, Ken Griffey Jr. and Jason Giambi. There are more than a couple of Hall of Famers on that list. All might be over the hill to a certain extent, but all could be of major help to pretty much any team out there.

Teams are reluctant to enter bidding wars, because they might be bidding against themselves. There simply isn't that much money out there. An ESPN.com researcher points out that non-Yankees free agent spending is down significantly. Last year, when the calendar turned to 2008, four players had already signed deals worth more than $40 million total to teams other than the Yankees. This year, only Ryan Dempster (four years, $52 million to stay with the Cubs) is on that list.

The bargains are here. And I think the players and their agents are going to blink first.