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Some angry guy just came here to act like a jackass

Angry_guy by mgtbfb on

Well, I just heard this morning on the car ride to work that the inevitable was going to happen.... Indians management is working on the final details of a trade that will send C.C. to the Brewers. With the way the season has gone, we all knew this was coming, however it's still a kick in the groin when it happens.

I've basically accepted that the Cleveland Indians will never be able to keep their elite players and if we do finally win a championship it will be a fluke. Weak and/or cheap ownership has probably cost us what should have been at least two titles over the past ten years or so. People bashed the Marlins for having a fire sale and dumping salary after their two World Series wins including many of us here in NE Ohio (myself included....) but at least they got it done. I'd happily endure three to five years of 70 win seasons for a title.

Even more disappointing and frustrating are the Cleveland Cavaliers. I'd be willing to bet that LeBron is playing elsewhere come 2010 and that David Stern and Nike will be the biggest reason why. LeBron says he wants to win a title in the worst way and that will be the determining factor in where he will play in the future. While I believe him to be sincere, I feel that the pressure from David Stern, Nike and the rest of LeBron's sponsors will be too much to resist. He'll be gone and Cleveland will be boned again with nothing to show for it. I've suspected that the league has tampered in favor of it's big market teams for some time. Minnesota made a trade that was completely one sided and benefited the Celtics, ditto the Grizzlies/Lakers trade putting Gasol with Kobe. Is it any surprise that the teams that benefited are in huge markets? Hmmmmmm.

Worse yet is how the talking heads such as Steven A. Smith and Skip Bayless openly imploring LeBron to leave Cleveland. How is this not tampering?

All this is why I'm pretty much giving up on sports except for football. The NFL have by far the fairest salary system, draft system and free agency system. There is no (or very little) big market bias in the NFL, at least as far as signing and drafting new players and keeping the ones you have (TV coverage is a different story). The Bills and Browns have just as good of a chance to compete with the Cowboys and Giants of the world provided they draft well and sign good players in free agency.

 

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Worse yet is how the talking heads such as Steven A. Smith and Skip Bayless openly imploring LeBron to leave Cleveland. How is this not tampering?

Are they imploring Lebron to work for ESPN? Maybe that’d be tampering.

You know Selig? Ombudsman.

by rolub on Jul 7, 2008 9:56 AM EDT   0 recs

/yawn

is it just me, or is having to endure all of this “outrage” worse than actually losing C.C.?

by fingolfin on Jul 7, 2008 10:05 AM EDT   0 recs

How old do you have to be to not remember 8 consecutive good seasons from 1994-2001, including 6 post-season appearances. Isn’t that sustained success? The Indians all-time best stretch, 1947-1956, was only 10 seasons. If anything, the Indians obsession with depth and internal development makes them the Cleveland team most likely to have sustained success. The salary-cap/free agency structure in the NFL makes it near impossible for NFL teams to have sustained success.

This is dumb.

by APV on Jul 7, 2008 10:21 AM EDT   0 recs

Does this mean I won’t hear a senseless “Here We Go Brownies” chant at the ballpark for the rest of the season?

Wow, you like football “bestest” of all sports? You do realize this is a baseball forum, no?

Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 10:25 AM EDT   0 recs

Please, please, no more Cavs discussion on this Indian-centric website.

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 10:25 AM EDT   0 recs

And no more Browns discussions either. Talk about a team that takes its fans’ money …

by peter m on Jul 7, 2008 10:37 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

boooo OSU

by Brick. on Jul 7, 2008 10:55 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Oh cmon, the Browns were a new franchise, it’s tough to start from scratch. Now that they have a competent GM, they will be a good product on the field.

by Roger Dorn on Jul 7, 2008 10:58 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Common now Roger, I’m pretty sure Pete was referring to the previous owner. You remember him, the guy from NYC who moved a franchise selling out every game. Remember?

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 11:03 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Haha, barely. I was only 10 at the time, and hadn’t even moved to Cleveland yet

by Roger Dorn on Jul 7, 2008 11:07 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I was actually referring to the new team - seat licenses, the cost of the stadium, etc. The NFL and the Browns held up the city and its fans (because they could). The quality of the team is less the issue, but the Browns always get a free pass (and the Indians management always get dumped on) when in fact both have been typical franchise owners - finding every way to squeeze a few more shekels out of the working men and women who care about the team. I just get fed up with the way the Browns never get called out for that.

by peter m on Jul 7, 2008 11:37 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

It’s more of an issue of people improperly calling out the Indians than not calling out the Browns. I was just hoping this post didn’t spark a dump on the Cavs and Browns thing since this is a baseball website.

by Roger Dorn on Jul 7, 2008 11:42 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I will cease and desist.

by peter m on Jul 7, 2008 11:46 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

It’s really tough for me to get worked up about the economics of baseball when we’ve had seven different World Champions in the past eight seasons.

14 of the 30 MLB teams have been in the playoffs since 2006.

It certainly seems to me that the Indians have a chance to compete if they draft well and do well in free agency. Unfortunately, the Tribe decided that Jamey Carroll and Masa Kobayashi were enough this past offseason. And as much as I like Mark Shapiro, the next consistently above-average MLB player he drafts, develops, and keeps will be the first. Laffey and Guthrie are as close as he has come, but he cut Guthrie and I think it’s a bit too early to count Laff.

by thejamootz on Jul 7, 2008 10:40 AM EDT   0 recs

Fausto.

by KevinV on Jul 7, 2008 10:56 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Not drafted.

Undrafted free agents are absoutely important, but I was just pointing out that a team in the Tribe’s position can’t afford to punt the draft every single year. They simply have to do better, and if they do, they’ll be more likely to compete consistently.

by thejamootz on Jul 7, 2008 11:03 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Sigh. Go read Jay’s posts on this.

by Voltaire on Jul 8, 2008 1:00 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

The Indians are a long and short term success. This year is an abhoration. This deal, as speculated, makes the team better and even more of a threat next year than they were coming into this year…and most baseball wonks had the Indians winning it all this year.

I could go on and on and on, but I’m not going to. So let me sum up. (It is so hard for me not to quote, “Buttercup marry Humperdink in little less than half an hour”, so I won’t resist.)

The Indians have gone through a “market correction”. Look for them to contend next year and go on a serious run once everyone comes back healthy. Don’t hop off the bandwagon. Just know that it is going to take the bandwagon a little longer to get there.

proverbial "moron in a hurry"

by 94neverout on Jul 7, 2008 10:53 AM EDT   0 recs

Aaaah, you were paying attention to the Tribe in ‘06, right?

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 11:06 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

la la la la la la la la la la la, I’m not listening. la la la la la la la la la la.

this season stands alone as a spectacular disappointment. Somehow ‘06 was different.

proverbial "moron in a hurry"

by 94neverout on Jul 7, 2008 1:49 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I like abhoration as a misspelling of aberration. It’s got that sense of thorough sadness and disgust that comes to my mind when thinking of the way this team has underachieved from the get-go this year.

Free Andy Marte!

Pronk Needs You

by woodsmeister on Jul 7, 2008 11:16 AM EDT to parent up   2 recs

yeah, yeah, yeah. I was a little angry and indignant when I was typing. I was more concerned about cleaning up my draft, as it was needlessly harsh, than checking my spelling. I was extremely impolite in the first draft.

Damn spellcheck has ruined my brain.

Irregardless, there a more better team now as upposed to than.

proverbial "moron in a hurry"

by 94neverout on Jul 7, 2008 1:24 PM EDT to parent up   1 recs

Do you have grammar check? It should have caught “irregardless,” which is considered “nonstandard.” Now, “regardless” works just fine.

It's the Arizona talking, really.

by RD74 on Jul 7, 2008 7:10 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

If you read the entire last sentence you can probably surmise that he was intentionally being not talking pretty.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Jul 7, 2008 7:43 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Or was RD74 being ironic, correcting only the first error?

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 8:59 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I don’t exist on a mental plane that deep.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Jul 7, 2008 9:05 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Standard rules for drive-by FanPost.

mgtbfb — if you’re still around, please reply to this note.

If you don’t, I’ll be deleting this whole post.

We don’t go for people stopping by to blast off some bile and then leaving. If you’re not interested in being part of the discussion, we don’t really need your little essay.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 11:00 AM EDT   0 recs

You can just substitute my name as author to his rant. He spoke the truth.

by elsandito on Jul 7, 2008 11:03 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Not the point.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 11:04 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I know, and the only thing I would disagree with is trading a World Series ring for 5 bad seasons. I don’t think that’s worth it emotionally or financially. But all that financial disadvantage detail of smaller markets has been rehashed here man times.

by elsandito on Jul 7, 2008 11:06 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

What I really like about his comments is that he speaks to “long term” success. The current business buzzword is “sustainability”. The current financial arrangement of football allows any org to maintain long term success, such as the Patriots. Smaller baseball markets must rebuild peridically thereby thwarting any chance to sustain.

by elsandito on Jul 7, 2008 11:14 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

This guy joined this morning and couldn’t sustain a competent argument so he had to talk Browns, not to mention quickly devolved into a “is LeBron leaving” rant.

This is a textbook example of a non-baseball fan trying to talk Tribe.

Also, I’ll bet my house he was listening to WTAM on the way to work.

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 11:17 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Not many football teams achieve “long term” success (the Patriots being the obvious exception). Most years you have teams go from terrible to greatness - the Rams a few years ago, the Bears and Saints recently - and vice versa. Contracts are not gaurenteed, so players are cut in the middle of deals frequently, which leads to greater player movement. Yes, the footall salary cap and revenue structure is more fair, but it results in many mediocre teams and teams that go from terrible to great and back to terrible in a few years. Is that what you want in baseball?

In baseball, you can sign good, young players to long-term contracts and build a base for a team for a few years. Then you supplement your team with free agents where you have holes. Sure, the Indians lose players when they reach their free agency years, but by then they have given most of their good years to the Indians. What most fans don’t realize is when players sign big free-agent deals, teams are paying big money for years of decreasing production (usually). It may look good for the first couple years, but the last years of contracts are usually terrible. Look at all the bad baseball contracts out there. Smart teams stay away from that.

I hate when people complain that only the big market teams can compete in baseball. That’s just not true! Look at the playoff results of the past few years. Sure, the Yankees have made the playoffs for something like 13 straight years, but when was the last time they won it all? As mentioned above, we’ve seen seven different champions the past eight years. So it’s not true that the small markets have no chance of winning. Are they handicapped? Yes. But with smart management, long term success can be built. Are we forgetting 1995-2001 here in Cleveland? You don’t call that “long term” success? Sure, they never won a championship, but that’s mostly luck once you reach the playoffs—look at St. Louis two years ago, they certainly weren’t the best team in baseball.

by Buckeye Brad on Jul 7, 2008 12:22 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

This decade, 12 playoff berths for the Yankees and Red Sox, 20 playoff berths for the other 12 teams combined.

Until we balance the berths, the system is horrible.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 12:24 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

The Rays are trying their damnedest berth-balancing this season.

I did a Google image search for "Andy Marte." It turned up zero results.

by emd2k3 on Jul 7, 2008 12:36 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I agree with you Jay, but I’m not certain I see the incentive from MLB’s perspective.

I suspect near-guaranteed playoff berths for big money markets mixed with a good smattering of hope amongst the remaining fanbases is a profit maximizer every time. Given that the playoffs nearly amount to a three-round coin-flipping tournament, the league brass can always point to the wide array of WS winners over a decade and pat themselves on the back for achieving an amazing level of parity.

by CBusSteve on Jul 7, 2008 4:20 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

You have nailed a big part of the problem exactly.

Collectively, the owners do a little better when the revenue of the big-market clubs is being maximized. On the other hand, the more that revenue is divided evenly, the more the small-market clubs benefit from the success of large-market clubs — so to a large extent it becomes zero-sum for the small market clubs.

That being the case, you would think that the bulk of owners would remember that none of them got into this business to make money — and that they’d restructure the game’s to orient it around a level playing field. I remain convinced that this could be done within what could be negotiated with the MLBPA.

Having said that, the owners decided to prioritize overall profit maximization over true competitive balance in their negotiations for the last two CBA deals. Mind you, I’m not asking for a cap. What I really think needs to happen is simply the sharing of all TV revenues — nothing less will really work, and nothing more is really needed.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 6:53 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Another solution, though just as unlikely to ever happen: move a franchise (the Marlins?) into the Meadowlands. Allow another franchise in Providence. NYC metropolitan area has a population circa 20 million, with two MLB teams. Chicago area has 10 million, with two teams. LA 13 million.

by odradek on Jul 7, 2008 7:36 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Oh, I’m certainly not advocating that the system is perfect. But it’s not as bad as he, and many fans, make it seem. Small and mid-market teams can compete, if they’re smart.

Of course, the big-market teams can make up for a lot of their mistakes with money. And that’s not fair. Plus, they can spend more on the draft and can take prospects who fall because they want a large signing bonus. Teams didn’t take advantage of this for many years, but now the Yankees, Red Sox, and Tigers are doing this (along with possibly other teams).

by Buckeye Brad on Jul 7, 2008 9:32 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I can see that argument — but it’s a BS point, always has been, because no team ever gets to make that decision.

We don’t get to buy a ring; nobody does. All you can buy is good chances at a ring, and that’s how the roster strategy is designed.

The Brewers actually have a very unique opportunity. Had we been challenging for a playoff spot this year, with our ace probably walking at the end, we would not have been able to trade for a C.C. For one thing, there wouldn’t be a C.C. available — there usually isn’t. And for another thing, we didn’t have the don’t have the quality prospects available to get him — not this year, and not last year either.

The go-for-it move that people always want to see is almost never out there, and when it is, it’s exceptionally high-priced in terms of talent. This season, C.C. was there to be had, and the Brewers had reason to value 2008 over 2009-2011. Last season’s best available trade guy was Teixeira — seriously — and the cost was high, and we had good reason not to be punting too much for 2008-2010.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 11:18 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I’ve basically accepted that the Cleveland Indians will never be able to keep their elite players and if we do finally win a championship it will be a fluke.

It wouldn’t be any more of a fluke than most of the champions this decade — NOT TRUTH.

Weak and/or cheap ownership has probably cost us what should have been at least two titles over the past ten years or so.

Totally untrue. Both Jacobs and Dolan put excellent management teams in place and allowed them to do their jobs. That is strong ownership. They also spent close to 100% of revenue — and in Dolan’s case, often more than that. Occasionally one or two owners will deficit-spend for a year or two, but it never lasts long and rarely does any good vis-a-vis contending or getting that ring. NOT TRUTH.

People bashed the Marlins for having a fire sale and dumping salary after their two World Series wins including many of us here in NE Ohio (myself included….) but at least they got it done.

They “got it done?” They snuck into the playoffs and got hot. It could have been us, but it wasn’t — none of this has anything to do with Cleveland’s economic position or the quality of Indians stewardship. NOT TRUTH.

Worse yet is how the talking heads such as Steven A. Smith and Skip Bayless openly imploring LeBron to leave Cleveland. How is this not tampering?

?

I agree that the NFL has the best economic system, and I agree that the media wants LeBron in New York — and loves the intrigue of any player going anywhere. Hell, if LeBron were on a terrible Knicks team, they’d be talking about how he wants to go home to Cleveland, where management is ready to do whatever he wants.

I certainly agree that the economics of the game make it tough to be a fan. Recent developments in the game’s economics have made it better, but only a little, and not nearly as much as the media parroting would indicate.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 11:13 AM EDT to parent up   1 recs

What recent developments have made it better? When we looked a the Forbes article on the value of sports franchises, we saw that player payroll for NY tripled since 2000 and went up 50% for Cleveland. The financial gap has quadrupled in the past 8 years.

by elsandito on Jul 7, 2008 11:17 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

The last two CBA deals have improved competitive balance marginally — at least enough that the Brewers haven’t traded Sheets YET — by increasing revenue sharing, instituting a mild luxury tax to curb spending by the Yankees and a few other teams just a little, and by rule changes that make it easier to develop players. The other significant change is an extra $30 million going to every team from the MLB Internet operation — it goes to every team, but at least it’s balanced.

Going the other direction is simply the maturation of the market for baseball media (and Congress/MLB acting like MLB has antitrust exemption for baseball broadcasts, which they don’t). The Yankees probably should have had 4x the Indians payroll ten years ago, they just hadn’t figured that out yet. In that sense, the last two CBA deals have emboldened them — they were targeted, so they stopped all pretense of holding back on spending.

Despite this, I will tell you that the situation has improved. Because the free agent market is so nuts, when you give the poorest team $30 million and the Yankees $100 million, the on-field performance gap actually narrows — up to a point. Because of that same effect, the on-field difference between an $80 million payroll and a $120 million payroll might be very minimal at this point, so any further improvement would have to come from a massive restructuring of media revenue.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 11:26 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

This reminds me of season 5 of The Wire when Omar called Marlow out to the street and Omar got capped by a little hopper before Marlow could man up.

Jay, delete this thread!

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 11:05 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

NAH.

Hard truth: Your eyes lie.

by AngG on Jul 7, 2008 11:06 AM EDT   0 recs

I just tried to read stuff over at brew crew ball, but their arbitrary use of subject lines made my eyes hurt after a few minutes. I think they’re happy over there. I think.

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 11:25 AM EDT   0 recs

I just took their front-page poll, though, and only 27% of them supported trading for CC if it involved giving up big-time prospects.

by APV on Jul 7, 2008 11:26 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Wow, those guys have drunk the small-market Kool-Aid even more than we have.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 11:27 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Did they give up multiple prospects? My initial feeling is that we’ve gotten short changed. LaPorta is a big-time prospect but the two pitchers Castrovince is reporting (Rob Bryson, Zach Johnson and a PTBNL) look like junk based on this year’s numbers.

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 11:30 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

The PTBNL is going to be the second-best player in the deal if it’s Green.

by Ryan on Jul 7, 2008 11:37 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

first…I think the poll was basically saying any big-time prospect, not multiple.

second…LaPorta is our best position prospect now by leaps and bounds and probably the best one we’ve had in our system since Thome and Ramirez. The PTBNL, if it’s either Brantley or Green, will immediately be one of our top 3-5 position prospects, somewhere in between Mills/Weglarz and Hodges. Bryson actually has stellar numbers and is young, something we actually have an abundance of (but with pitching prospects you can never have too many), but certainly not just a “throw-in”. Johnson gives us another potentially useful insurance arm in Buffalo, something not of great value, but not worthless.

by APV on Jul 7, 2008 11:39 AM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I basically agree. I hope to be satisfied with the PTBNL.

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 12:20 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Delete forever.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Jul 7, 2008 11:49 AM EDT   0 recs

No wait. I like this better.

Steel Nick

by nickjs21 on Jul 7, 2008 12:27 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Outside the box, baby. Why squelch when you can ridicule and deter?

I know, I’m an a-hole, whatever.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 12:32 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Well done, sir, well done indeed!

by PatBordersHelmet on Jul 7, 2008 12:35 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Bravo – (but at first I thought you were referring to Chuck)

"It's hard to win when you don't score." Cliff Lee, 9/28/05.

by Harry Doyle on Jul 7, 2008 1:03 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Careful Harry – I know where you live.

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 1:42 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

I hate replying to this junk, but can I just point out that Cleveland had Sabathia for 8 years? And the Cavs will have had LeBron for 7 years? And sure, a couple of those years were at developmental level, but not most of them.

I would have love to have both of those guys for their whole career, Cal Ripken-style. But the system doesn’t work that way, NOR SHOULD IT. We throw around the word “deserve” a lot here, but really and truly, these guys deserve the freedom to go where they want at this point. And that shouldn’t obscure the point that we got to watch both players develop and then push and compete for a Cleveland championship for multiple years.

Whiny posts like this are asking for nothing more than the ability to keep these players in Cleveland for as long as the team wants. Such a sentiment is outdated, inefficient, and probably even unfair. I’m not living in Ohio anymore, and most of the people here aren’t either.

The only systematic problem here is that New York should have 6 teams, and Boston should have 4, so that payrolls would be closer. But that still wouldn’t guarantee that Sabathia serve you forever. How many Yankees are only Yankees? How many Sox?

The player control rules are seeking a balance here, and maybe they should be tweaked slightly one way or another. But it’s time to grow up and realize that teams have a significant window of exclusive control over the player, and it’s understandibly less than his whole career. All you are doing is sucking the joy out of following these guys while they are here.

by dgcambridge on Jul 7, 2008 12:11 PM EDT   2 recs

These discussions are about maintaining some semblance of parity. How fair is it that Baltimore developed Mussina, Oakland developed Giambi, Seattle developed ARod, etc. and the Yankees swoop in and take them when they are somewhere near their peak? We want to improve the game, and if whining incessantly accelerates the day when real change occurs, it’s worth it. We have nothing to lose by venting.

by elsandito on Jul 7, 2008 12:28 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

There is a semblance of parity, but there’s not equality, commie.

Totally kidding: I’m not saying the payroll disparity is fair. It’s not fair, if only because on the situation I described above. Whine if you want, but I’m going to address these vast exaggerations. Look at the production that Baltimore, Oakland, and Seattle got from those players (relative to the cost), and compare it to the production that the Yankees got from those players (relative to cost).

I guess the unfairness comes down to this: Cleveland teams can only compete by developing or acquiring low-cost talent. New York can obviously compete that way also. But New York might also compete just by spending cash. Might. MIGHT.

The stupid rant above is claiming that towns like Cleveland can’t compete even if they do develop low cost talent, because they will lose it someday. That is just absolutely untrue. Baltimore was very good. Oakland was very good. Seattle was very good. And the Indians were very good, way back in 2007.

by dgcambridge on Jul 7, 2008 12:49 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Unless they’re playing intra-squad games, there should be an equal distribution of the collective – not the use of Marxist terminology – income. Some semblance of competitive balance is good for every team.

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 1:46 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

How fair is it? It’s perfectly fair, and exactly how the rest of the world works. Is it “fair” that my first employer spent a lot of money training me, only to have me leave for more money just as I crested the learning curve? At least sports franchises get a few years of guaranteed service.

Plus, Angelos could easily have spent some of his asbestos litigation money on Mussina, but chose not to. The O’s would be a large-market team if they cared to be so.

by FredOx on Jul 7, 2008 12:51 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Sports are not supposed to be affected by submersion into a larger free market, where external success becomes a massive internal advantage.

Sports are supposed to be based on a level playing field.

by Jay on Jul 7, 2008 2:18 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

And yet, where are the Yankees right now? Third place. When was the last time they won a World Series? Almost ten years ago. The Marlins and White Sox have won more recently than the Yankees.

The Yankees were dominant in the 90s because they developed Derek Jeter and Bernie Williams and Mariano Rivera and Jorge Posada and Andy Pettitte and on and on. They won because of their player development system. Did it help that they could afford to keep those guys? Of course. But the Yankees are no different than any other team in baseball – they can’t just go out and throw a pile of money around and win. They have to build a quality team from the ground up.

Put another way, if money is all it takes, than why do the Mets, Dodgers, and Cubs miss the playoffs so much?

The one thing the Yankees have that the Indians don’t is the ability to make bigger mistakes. If Travis Hafner is truly done, the Tribe is stuck with a lousy, expensive albatross for the duration of the contract. A team with more resources would bite the bullet and pay someone to take him.

by thejamootz on Jul 7, 2008 12:52 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Yeah well, when was the last time the only team I care about – the Indians – won a World Series?

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 1:47 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Of course money is never all it takes in any endeavor. If you put excellent mgmt in NY, you get a sustainably high level of efficienty. If you put excellent mgmt in Cleveland, you get periodic levels of efficiency. That’s what we’re saying here, the difference is significant.

by elsandito on Jul 7, 2008 1:50 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs

Like I keep saying thank god Cashman’s an idiot who works for a moron. Otherwise they’d win the pennant 50% of the time and the WS 25%.

Resident LGT beer kinda sewer

by mauichuck on Jul 7, 2008 2:14 PM EDT to parent up   0 recs