Hot Stove Mailbag No. 6
Posted by: Peter Abraham - Posted in Misc on Jan 02, 2008 
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Happy New Year. Not a lot of questions via e-mail lately, but enough for a short mailbag.
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John writes: If the Yankees are paying $25 million or so in luxury tax, does every Major League team under the salary threshold receive a portion? Are they free to do whatever they want with it? It seems to me that it’s a complete waste if a greedy owner is just going to pocket the cash instead of improving his or her team. Wouldn’t it make more sense for MLB to mandate the money being used to improve the ball club?
Answer: It’s a popular misconception that the luxury tax payments go to other teams. In fact, the money goes to Major League Baseball. Half of the money is used for player benefits (pension, health care, etc.). A quarter goes to supporting amateur baseball and a quarter goes into an “industry growth fund.” Revenue sharing payments go directly to small-market teams. Rest assured, some greedy owners pocket that money.
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Andy writes: Just before the Mitchell Report came out you wrote, “It also will be interesting to see whether any Red Sox are named. If not, the report’s credibility will take a hit.” Based upon the only prominent recent Sox on the list was Gagne, do you think the report is further worthless?
Answer: Worthless is a strong word. The report was flawed in a lot of ways and certainly lacks credibility given that the two main sources (Kirk Radomski and Brian McNamee) are based in New York. It doesn’t seem Mitchell and his investigators looked too hard for dealers in other cities, including (or especially) Boston. But to his credit, Mitchell admitted his report was limited in scope.
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Kevin writes: Any word on the health of Bobby Murcer? I hope he’s doing okay and will be back in the booth again. I’ve never met him but it seems that almost everyone who has says that he’s a great guy. I’ve never heard anyone say anything negative about the man.
Answer: I have not heard anything since the end of the season, Kevin. I’ll take that to be a good sign. Bobby looked and sounded great when he was on the air at the end of the season. You’re right about him being a great guy. The print and television guys generally don’t work together much. But Bobby is universally respected and well-liked by everybody around the team. Trust me when I tell you, that’s rare.
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Allison writes: Pete, who do you think will make the Hall of Fame. Who did you vote for?
Answer: I do not have a vote yet, Allison. You have to be a member of the BBWAA for 10 years and 2008 will be my eighth year as a member. From talking to other writers, I get the sense that Goose Gossage and Jim Rice will get in. Jack Morris, Tim Raines and Bert Blyleven seem to have a chance.
Thanks for writing. Feel free to e-mail me with any comments, suggestions or questions.
Re: revenue sharing. Yes, some “greedy owners” pocket that money like say, the Marlins owner? Their payroll should be around $8 million next year, and I’d venture to say that they receive around $40 million between revenue sharing and proceeds from MLB.com alone. Sickening.
Amusing Jessica Alba story, for anyone that cares. ha
http://mlbfleecefactor.com/200.....ands-alba/
Two more years Pete!
Gossage better make it, or else!!!!!!!!
Paxton Crawford flat out admitted to HGH use and that his needles spilled in the locker room and people just laughed. Manny Alexander was caught with steroids in his car. These are two incredibly strong leads with ties to Boston that we haven’t heard about.
The report is a complete waste of money and time, and only done so MLB could say they did SOMETING.
It seems like the Marlins are being treated unfairly can’t anyone force the owner to pay for at least a normal team or sell if there isn’t such a rule they should make one It’s not fair to the fans
Hope to see many great HOFs voted in (with your help) from 10 and on Pete
What’s the status on arbitration any word yet from the Yankees office
There’s is a news article about clemens interview next week at Fox Business and it writes there what “A witty Blog credited Peter Abraham thinks is going to be the type of interview on 60 minutes” Free publicity for this ‘Witty Blog’ Good Going and Thanks Pete
Morris getting in ahead of Blyleven (or arguably, at all) would be a travesty.
Goose HAS TO make it this year.
http://www.baseball-reference......ja02.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference......be01.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference.com/r/riceji01.shtml
http://www.baseball-reference......ti01.shtml
When is it announced?
“These are two incredibly strong leads with ties to Boston that we haven’t heard about.”
not to mention asking that guy who has been known to talk about steroids and played in Boston for 2 years, Jose something-or-other. Canseco, is it?
Anyone else back at work?
unfortunately, yes.
turntwo- It is already Wednesday
That is good news.
short work week… certainly one way of looking at it!
all i know is that i woke up on xmas morning, and Johan wasnt under my tree.
FYI: Bobby Murcer is doing an appearance here in NJ later this month, so he must be doing reasonably well. I will be getting his autograph and I look forward to wishing him well.
I have a question for the working world. Does anybody else sneak away from their cube in the middle of the work to go take a 45 minute nap in the bathroom stall i.e. a pot nap? And then when your cellphone alarm goes off and you wake up your legs are all numb and its like you have stingers in your legs so you have to steady yourself for about 2 minutes before coming back into work? Or this just me?
goirish772 -
Where in Jersey?
Goose, yes…
Rice, blechh…
Thank you, Pete, for finally explaining the difference between the luxury tax and revenue sharing. Somewhere along the way people mashed the two together, and I really don’t know why.
The luxury tax is a penalty. Revenue sharing is a distribution of MLB profits. It’s quite simple, really.
HOF is next Tues, Jan 8th.
Theo Epstein (signing 2 players Donnelly & Gagne that were whispers about being connected to HGH before he acquired them) along with Manny Alexander & Paxton Crawford were mentioned in the Mitchell Report.
And Jeremy Giambi, Jose C.
“Theo Epstein (signing 2 players Donnelly & Gagne that were whispers about being connected to HGH before he acquired them) along with Manny Alexander & Paxton Crawford were mentioned in the Mitchell Report.”
right, Alexander and Crawford were mentioned because they were already confirmed cases. there was no way to not mention them.
The New York Daily News is reporting that $70 million in taxpayer money will be used to build a parking garage (near the new Stadium) for the free use of Yankee staff and their VIPs (year round – 660 spaces). One of those “fine print” items in the bond issue …..
Just when I thought that the Red Sox had supplanted the Yankees as The Evil Empire, those conniving Yankees throw us back into second place. Why worry about luxury taxes when you have NY City cab drivers and maintenance workers subsidizing Princes Hank and Hal?
Good deal if you can get it, I suppose. I’m so jealous.
Jennifer Hip-Hip Jorge,
The signing is in Secaucus…
Here’s the website with all the information: http://www.mab-celebrity.com/default.aspx
I’ll be there on Sunday too. Gotta get Paulie and Bobby!
Thanks!! Is there also an admission fee?
Screw you guys, I’m going to take a pot nap right now.
“Just when I thought that the Red Sox had supplanted the Yankees as The Evil Empire, those conniving Yankees throw us back into second place. Why worry about luxury taxes when you have NY City cab drivers and maintenance workers subsidizing Princes Hank and Hal?”
right, as opposed to the Twins and the Brewers and all the other “Evil Empires” with taxpayer financed stadiums.
Don’t foget the Nats.
hmmmm …. I’m not talking about the stadium subsidies …. I’m talking about ticket prices rising for the “Average Joe” while VIPs park for free on the way to their luxury boxes (which have been emphasized at the expense of more affordable seating). Another revenue stream eschewed to the detriment of the less affluent.
Don’t get defensive. It’s a way of corporate life. But it doesn’t make it right.
For example, some people would say tha Vlad the Impaler was just a “man of his times.” But does that make serial impaling right?
Who gives a $h!t about the parking garage? Yankees employees need to park SOMEWHERE, don’t they?
You Red Sox fans are really reaching these days. It’s kind of pathetic. But hey, at least you’ve got your World Series-winning ball to admire.
Oh wait……
And speaking of “Average Joes” having to deal with ticket prices, I think the Red Sox fans have the least grounds to be sanctimonious. You sell out every game and jack up the ticket prices accordingly. Yet the Yankees’ Front Office are the greedy ones.
Fido ate that. First he said he didn’t know where the ball was, now he says Fido knocked it down and ate it. Um wouldn’t you put the ball in a glass case?
Don’t get mad at Brian because he is a Red Sox fan. He is right. Raising the prices on everything is ridiculous.
OF course it is. My seats used to be $18 bucks, a very good deal. Now they raised it to $27!! You want to raise it, fine, raise it $5. $10 a game is insane. And I won’t even touch the raise in prices for the very good seats, mainly cause I don’t care cause I couldn’t afford them to begin with.
“I’m talking about ticket prices rising for the “Average Joe†while VIPs park for free on the way to their luxury boxes (which have been emphasized at the expense of more affordable seating). Another revenue stream eschewed to the detriment of the less affluent.”
right, and if the Yankees didn’t have to pay tens of millions of dollars into the pockets of the richest men in the world, like Carl Pohlad, maybe they would have paidfor their own parking garage. well, they probably wouldn’t have, but that’s not the point.
the Yankees will only lower ticket prices when people stop buying them. it’s that simple.
i’m not sure what i think about goose gossage . i’m not sure he really gets it what it is to be a yankee. he says a lot of things that off the wall. his recent comments about clemens giving back cy young awards is an example.
he only played for the yankees 6 years out of a twenty year career. surprisingly i think he won one world series ring in 1978. there’s a fine line about what defines a core player. i’ll stay away from the” real yankee” label because so many people have a problem with it( personally, i don’t ).
gossage was obviously a core player during the 78-83. but i don’t look at him as a yankee like i do someone from that period like randolph, nettles, or pinella. i realize this is a totally subjective opinion.
you don’t see remarks like the ones that came out of gossage about clemens from players who are more bonded with the yankees. my feeling is that maybe gossage is a hall of fame player, but he’s not likely to be getting a plaque in monument park.
while the yankees are making themselves over with a younger more homegrown core, when adding veterans they should keep in mind the difference between players like o’neil, nettles, pinella, and randolph and a player like gossage. ideally they should focus on the ones who really get what it means to be a yankee.
i’m on the fence if gossage is in the same class as the others mentioned above.
Every few Blogs in the offseason gets 1 redsox fan or another complaining about the Yankees lets be smart about it and stop getting into arguments with them if they want to Blog about the game fine BUT if all they come here for is out of jealous or hatred thoughts lets not reply to them
hmmm-
maybe we shouldn’t give brian(red sox fan) so much trouble. he after all must think the lohud yankee blog and all of us on it more interesting than red sox blogs.
if he didn’t, why would he stretch his brain to come up with things like how yankee employees are going to park their cars and post his ideas here?
Randy 1 …. I won’t address Gossage’s “Yankee Pedigree,” but he was one helluva reliever back when relievers were “firemen.” As you remember, the m.o. for managers was to wait until a pitcher was in trouble, and then bring in a reliever to “put out the fire.” And relievers pitched a ton of innings in his time.
Gossage was durable, courageous and productive. He had a presence and aura with his sidewinding fastball and no-nonsense, get the ball and throw it approach.
He deserves to be in the Hall ahead of many of the more recent “saves leaders,” who pitch in limited and carefully orchestrated situations. (The way things are going, Tod Jones might make it …. and maybe Borowski.)
P.S. The Jones/Borowski comment was sarcastic.
Will that also become the players lot? Or will they be separate?
Randy 1 …. frankly, this blog IS more interesting. I already know what Sox fans think and say ….. pretty smug and self-serving, sometimes misinformed. But very predictable, and ……. boring.
So in those (Sox) blogs, I’m just visiting with myself. Interacting with other views is a lot more exhilirating.
brian (red sox fan)-
makes sense. competing is more interesting. the only thing i’d throw in is that sometimes yankee fans want to discuss a situation with other yankee fans. other times the red sox/yankee banter does liven things up. over the past year ,it seems like you’ve figured out to make the distinction of when it’s a good idea to comment and when it’s not for an opposing visitor.
if Rice gets in, it would be a joke. His whole basis would be his ability to slug – and this “great slugger” doesn’t even have 400 homers. Worse, the guy was just a Fenway hitter – look at his career home/away splits:
http://www.baseball-reference......38;year=00
he’s a .920 OPS at Fenway, a .789 OPS elsewhere. So we have a guy who’s a poor fielder that played about 25% of his games as a DH, and who, in half of his games, was maybe an average to below-average hitter for a left fielder-DH. Hardly an all-time great.
My view is that no one should get in the HOF this year, although I admit to being very conservative about it every year.
statistically speaking Bert and Raines should be no brainers. and Gossage will get in.
Rice would indeed lower the bar at least.
GET BLYLEVEN IN ALREADY! MY GOODNESS!