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I doubt Arod would even be league average at SS anymore. His skills have eroded.

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the thing is, jeter is so ridiculously far from league average it would still be an upgrade. not today, obviously, but if arod stays, how could the yankees not seriously consider telling him to get into shortstop shape?

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because they have done fine with Jeter at SS.

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that is stupid reasoning and if a team thinks like that they arent going to stay ahead of the competition in the long term

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They will if they are the Yankees.

There are far greater concerns for the Yankees than Derek Jeter's defense at SS. Moving Jeter would be far far worse for the organization and team than keeping him at SS would be.

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this is true. but i'd like to add that part of jeter's value is due to outstanding offensive production at a skill position. so batting runs+defensive runs is still way high, and arguably second to only the guy at 3B.

now, an average CF is no more productive than an average SS (i am guessing, i don't have stats to back this up right now), so you could argue that if his offensive production stays the same, Jeter's total value would be even more. all of this is speculative. overall, i think Cash has already looked at the total value of Jeter@SS+ARod@3B+replacement level@OF vs. that of Jeter@OF+ARod@SS+replacement level@3B. i actually think the former is more valuable, but once again, i don't have numbers right now.

having said all that, i think if Torre is out next year, there will serious talk within the organization of moving Jeter to RF or even 1B. Melky is CF, and LF is crowded with Matsui and Damon. who knows who might fill in at SS, but is won't be angellini. probably not Gonzales.