Pinch hitting: Heartland Pinstripes
Posted by: Peter Abraham - Posted in Misc on Jan 28, 2009 
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January is traditionally a slow month for baseball news. So for the second year in a row, we will showcase other blogs with a series of pinch hitters.
Next up is Jason from Heartland Pinstripes.
Jason is a doctoral student in History at the University of Illinois, and has maintained his blog for nearly two years. His favorite player is Mariano Rivera.
Here’s his post:
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This off-season, the Yankees have come under fire for their high-priced, free agent acquisitions. After they signed Mark Teixeira, Peter Gammons compared them to Wal-Mart braying, “Wal-Mart eats up small-family businesses. The Yankees eat up the Brewers and the Indians.” After they acquired CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, and Teixeira, some, including Astros owner Drayton McLane, clamored for baseball to adopt a salary cap. While I object to the Yankees’ receiving city-sponsored tax-exempt bonds and their new stadium’s cost overruns, I disagree with both Gammons’s misguided portrayal of the Yankees’ financial relationship to other teams, and with knee-jerk cries for a salary cap.
Do the Yankees financially “eat up” teams such as Milwaukee and Cleveland? Revenue-sharing figures suggest otherwise. In 2005, Milwaukee received $24 million in revenue-sharing money and Cleveland $6 million, with the Yankees contributing $76 million of roughly $312 million that 13 teams paid the other 17.
The purpose of revenue sharing is to improve the competitiveness of small-market teams through earnings redistribution from larger-market teams. Yet teams often accept such largess to offset payroll without re-investing in new talent or keeping their own. The $24 million paid to Milwaukee represented just over 60 percent of its $39,934,833 payroll that year. Florida received $31 million in revenue sharing for 2005, yet refused to re-invest that money. In fact, that $31 million represented nearly half Florida’s combined payroll for the 2006-2008 seasons, $67,317,000, aided by its 2005 trade of Josh Beckett and Mike Lowell to Boston.
What many small-market teams have done, and what the current revenue-sharing system rewards, is to profit as the team struggles and fans fish for reasons to attend games. The Marlins and Royals are prime culprits, profiting from low payrolls and with low attendance figures (each at or near the bottom in attendance every year from 2004-2008). Florida has occasionally competed for the playoffs since winning the 2003 World Series, while the Royals are perennially a profitable laughingstock far more valuable now than eight years ago. Poor win-loss records do not necessarily equal destitution.
Even as the small-market, low-payroll Rays reached the World Series last year, others caterwaul for a salary cap. Yet will this achieve either on-field parity or greater profits for small-market teams? Not necessarily. The NFL, NBA, and NHL not only have salary caps but salary minimums, pegging mandatory payroll spending to their respective salary caps (86.4% for football, 75% for basketball, roughly 72% for hockey). Should baseball adopt a salary cap after the 2011 season, it may come with such spending minimums. Based on its 2008 payroll of $21,836,500 Florida would have to increase its spending by roughly $68 million just to reach the league average.
Would baseball’s small-market teams accept this structure when mediocrity or worse has been profitable? That would require payroll investments and accountability to fans that many franchises abhor. Critics should neither pity the Yankees their riches, nor criticize them and their recent re-investments without examining profitably unsuccessful teams too often indifferent to making such improvements.
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Thanks, Jason, you made some good points. Coming tomorrow: Jeremy from the Blog of Champions.
lame
I really don’t understand why Torre would write this book. For what a couple of million dollars??!! For him to say anything negative about George is absolutely disgusting. Not only because of what George did for him but I would like to see what Torre is like at George’s age. If I was in the Dodgers organization I would watch myself. I could only imagine what he will have to say about that team in 5 years in “Torre does Hollywood”. Let me guess how cheap they are, how Andruw Jones ate all of Calif. Everyone says that Torre would always say whatever happens in the club house stays there. Well I guess not for the right price. And everyone thought he was the great Uncle Joe….
And when KC does spend money, they give Kyle Farnsworth 2yrs/$9.25M and Jose Guillen $36M
Gammons is a piece of garbage.
http://njmg.typepad.com/yankee.....anton.html
I’m not familiar with the Athletes Performance Center, but it sounds like an amped up gym. I hope it helps Phil……everything will fall into place for him if he stays healthy.
Whoa, Jason, you mean I’m not the only history grad student here? Dude, sweet.
Great post, great points.
With the team’s five starters only including joba out of the young guys, Hughes is poised for a big season. Some people see these signings as somehow blocking phil for the major league level when i see it as nothing but positive all around for the career and future of Phil Hughes. There is no way on earth that all five starters will stay healthy and effective each for 200 innings this year. I can guarantees that mainly because Joba pitched merely 100 innings last year and will not to be replaced but even taking that out of the equation, there will be injuries as there always are.
Hughes will not be the first one up in April but could certainly be the first one up in June. This gives him precious time to hone his craft and prepare himself for the big leagues, precious time that he did not have last season and that he clearly needed in case someone was not watching the games in April.
Hughes will likely be anywhere from good to phenomenal but rushing him is asking for trouble. The yanks organization up until last season did nothing but baby the kid at every single level with pitch counts and innings limits and then, last year, decided to just throw him in the fire resulting in almost immediate catastrophe – that was not just bad luck.
A few years ago, Hughes not joba was the number 2 prospect in all of baseball and the prize of our system. HE did not lose his talent or poise along the way – it is still there waiting to be harnessed. And when it is, he should be a top of the rotation starter in no time. Unlike many year, I still have the utmost faith in Hughes and feel that this time in the minors next year will bring a quick assent to the major leagues and subsequent stardom. Just wait and see…
Jason – good post. Im surprised you did not bring up the percentage of major league teams that have made the playoffs and the variety of team that have won it all this decade. Those numbers also speak strongly against the argument for a salary cap. If almost every team in the major leagues can make the playoffs at least once within the last eight seasons, something must be right with the current system. Of course, logic does not prevail with some owners who would rather cry about not having any money for the team because they spent it all on yachts and jets. Your right as these same owners who whine about the yanks spending and argue for a salary cap would be the first ones in line to bash the idea of a minimum team payroll. They want to have their cake and eat it too because they live with a perpetual silver spoon in their mouth and they don’t know it any other way.
nice choice of topic jason. it does make one think how much a team can do with so little spent when one considers the rays. on the other hand it points out that without good baseball people and scouting in the organization you will end up with perennial losers like the royals and the pirates…no matter the size of payroll. conversely you have the mega rich pohlad family spending nothing on their team, yet they are contenders most every year.
“so little spent when one considers the rays”
The Rays are a bad example. They are a good team because they had the #1 pick for 10 years.
The Marlins… that’s another story.
Random question not concerning baseball:
What do you do with a PhD in History? Become a professor?
Dave, couldn’t agree with you more…
BTW Here are the MLB Network idiots debating where Joba belongs… I love how they all agree that if Mo isn’t healthy, Joba should definitely be the closer…
Do these guys follow baseball? Do they know that there’s such a thing called the Minor Leagues?! Have U ever heard of a guy named Mark Melancon?! My goodness. It’ll never end, will it?
http://mlb.mlb.com/media/video.....1273777552
“… there’s a really, really, harsh, harsh quote that Mariano Rivera is not what he used to be, hasn’t been the same since he blew the save in game seven against the Diamond Backs… and it’s a quote from Mike Mussina.”
This is apparently a bash fest. If Moose indeed said Mariano hasn’t been the same since 01 then I have lost a bit of respect for the Moose. Mo posted a 1 ERA with a bum shoulder this year.
“Teammates were fed up with Johnny Damon early in ’07″
Wow. Now Torre is dishing out details of another private meeting with a former player….
http://weblogs.newsday.com/spo.....s_394.html
Boston Dave–the royals had very high draft choices for years and have gone nowhere. same with the pirates…my point was that you need to make the right choices in the draft
Doogie: Most become professors (this is what I, a long long time from now, plan to do), but you can also work at a museum, write books, do archival research, enter politics…there’s a fair bit out there.
“Boston Dave—the royals had very high draft choices for years and have gone nowhere. same with the pirates…my point was that you need to make the right choices in the draft”
I know. I’m just saying that economics, which was the premise of the post, has very little to do with the Rays success. It’s not a fair argument to say “You don’t need money to win. Look at the Rays.”
Mussina is right….Rivera is no longer bullet proof…Remember he was invincible from the he 97 homer he gave up to Alomar until he imploded in game 7 against Arizona..Since then he became a little more mortal…Granted he’s still the greatest ever, and age is catching up with slightly, but that edge was lost on that Novemeber night……
Rebecca,
I could be mistaken but I believe my friend, now an attorney, was a History major before attending law school. So I guess that’s another path. Though I think you, personally, can do better. You don’t seem slimy enough for that
Rebecca:
I was a double major in history and political science and I DESPERATELY wanted to pursue history more but was eventually talked out of it. The sole reason: “What are you possibly going to do with it, son.” haha.
oh well. go yankees.
“Rivera is no longer bullet proof”
His stats over the past several years would beg to differ with that. I mean, if you’re holding him up to a standard which doesn’t allow for any mistakes, sure. But he’s been one of the best closers in baseball, every year, through last season. I’m not worried about the guy.
Doogie: For me it was between history and English, so I think my parents were a bit relieved, haha!
Actually, history and poli sci go hand in hand. I find it impossible to understand current poli sci situations without understanding history, even as far back as the middle ages.
Good post. I had to hear a Mets fan, of all people, make wise cracks about payroll and HGH when the Pettitte signing came up in conversation. Of course my instinct was to argue about how the Mets have had all kinds of drugs, not just PEDs, running rampant in the past and an infamous clubbie…I also wanted to argue about how the Yankees should have more money to spend because they have more fans, and how the Mets spend a lot of money too, not always in the smartest of ways…and how revenue sharing is mishandled by small market teams…but alas, I just don’t have the energy to make that argument anymore. I just sighed it off and let him bask in his ignorance. Then I antagonized him by suggesting the Yanks should sign Manny and Dunn, while moving Nady and Swisher to the bench.
Totally agree Rebecca, in fact I coordinated it so my minor of African American Studies tied into to both majors in a socio-poltical/historical way. It was awesome and I miss college so f’n much.
I’m in business school now and it is just so…dull. No imagination whatsoever.
Yeah, let’s lay off of Rivera. He posted the best season of his career last year. ERA+ of 317. K/BB ratio of 77/6 in 70 innings. WHIP of 0.66. Screw K-Rod, Mo posted perhaps the best season a one-inning reliever has ever posted.
Boston Dave….Let me preface my comments by saying Rivera stands alone when one considers the great closers of this generations and likely of all time….What always distinguished him above all of his peers was his postseaon domianence….That has shifted this Game 7 in Arizona….Without looking up stats, I’m certain that he has more blown saves and more looses since then…..Mussina is correct if indeed he was quoted in that content….Boston 04 playoffs come to mind immediately….
I really cannot understand the fascination with salary caps. If I own a widget making factory, I’m going to hire the best talent I can afford to design, manufacture and sell my widgets. BajaWidgets Inc. has an obligation to its stakeholders to win the widget world series every year, and to hell with the competition. As the owner of the factory, I have an obligation to reinvest the profits of the factory in new tools and hiring the best employees. I seem to recall a handsome young President saying something about a rising tide lifting all boats.
In baseball, the actual playing field has to be level to facilitate fair play. Off the field, in the real world, “fair” is a term used by children and weak adults to justify their pouting and demands for handouts.
about Johnny Damon’s physical and emotional struggles early in the 2007 season, when a leg injury sapped him of his enthusiasm and he began to annoy old-guard Yankees.
“In a private meeting, Torre told Damon, “The kind of player you’ve been your whole life is the player who goes out there and fully commits himself. You’re not that kind of person now. It’s easy to see that.” To which Damon said, “I’m not sure I want to do this.”
The book says one teammate visited Torre and was near tears discussing Damon, saying, “Let’s get rid of him. Guys can’t stand him.”
http://weblogs.newsday.com/spo.....s_394.html
I thought the guys liked Johnny?
Pat M, Win and Losses, Saves and Blown Saves are crap stats. Don’t use them.
Doogie: Ugh, my sympathies.
For example, when he “blew” Game 5, he came in with two runners on base, one of which was on third, and gave up a sacrifice fly. We’re going to hold that against him? I don’t.
Good post.
This is precisely why there will never be a salary cap in baseball. It would require a salary floor and there are far too many teams that will never spend what the Players Association would ever agree to for a salary floor.
That’s not even considering what the larger market teams would request be the salary floor.
The only way a salary cap works is if all teams have to spend roughly the same amount of dollars like in the NFL and NBA.
If every team had to spend 100 million to field a team in MLB half the owners would run for the door.
The system works because at any time any team can go all in and try to buy the players/talent they think will get to them top whether it be a free agent, re-signing their own free agent or drafting a kid or signing an International free agent.
There’s nothing stopping any team from having the off season the Yankees just had other than aversion to risk and long term contracts.
They may not have the Yankees revenue streams, but the Yankees give back so much money everyone is getting a piece, not to mention when the Yankees sell out on the road, it’s good for the smaller market teams.
Do you honestly think KC would rather the Yankees be a 4th place team full of kids?
If Fred Wilpon wakes up tomorrow and tells Omar “sign Manny” he’s free to do it. Same for Billy Beane in Oakland.
That’s why the system works. You can spend what you want when you want and the true challenge is to spend it wisely.
If you happen to win with a low payroll you’re branded a genius and if you win with a large payroll you’re still branded a “genius” as Theo could attest.
Fans of other teams should stop hitting message boards with salary cap talk and instead write to their owners of their teams and ask why they can’t put together a 100 million payroll rather than a 30 million one when the Yankees and other large market teams are giving them free money every off season.
I tend to think the owners of the Royals and Marlins may talk salary cap, but secretly would never support it as they don’t want that Yankee money to ever go away. It’s all bluster.
Kevin,,,Wins ,losses, saves and blown saves are crap stats….Since when did wins vs losses become crap stats….
Since they depend largely on factors beyond the pitcher’s control, such as run support and bullpen effectiveness (for starting pitchers) or situation upon entering the game (for relievers). We have much better ways of evaluating performance.
blown saves in the playoffs count far more heavily against a pitcher than blown saves in the regular season… Every win means so much more, a blown save takes on more meaning in the post-season.
Pat M
the #s don’t back up your statement. I’m not saying you’re wrong because I don’t know. I’m just saying I don’t see anything to back up what you are suggesting. nothing.
“Every win means so much more, a blown save takes on more meaning in the post-season.”
wow, we have a rocket scientist among us.
Again, are we blaming Rivera because Gordon left him with a complete mess? He came in, runner on third, nobody out, up one in the eighth inning. He didn’t even give up a hit, but because Gordon sucked it up, the fly out was enough to get him credited with a blown save. How is that his fault?
can we stop talking about the 2004 playoffs… please???
Rivera is nasty. period. case closed.
But since we insist on using inferior numbers, have a go at this:
Rivera’s save rate from 1999-2004 (for some reason, MLB.com doesn’t list Save Opps before ’99) – 252/282, or 89.4%
From 2005-2008? 146/158, or 92.4%
So yeah, even by worthless metrics, Rivera didn’t perform worse After Dave’s Steal.
Er, the cut was ’01, not ’04. Still, from ’02-’04, the save % was 89.7%. Right in line with prior years.
Rivera Postseason ERA:
Pre-2001 (63IP, 5ER) = 0.714 ERA
Post-2001 (33.2 IP, 3ER)= 0.813 ERA
I don’t feel there’s much of a difference. That is sheer dominance.
Source: http://www.mariano-rivera.info.....ing-stats/
Those are also insignificantly small sample sizes, and little inference can be drawn from them, but there’s little evidence to suggest that Rivera is any less of a pitcher now than he was in years past. Again, last season was his best.
all the more reason to sign Gammons’ favorite player Manny Ramirez.
Last season was not Rivera’s best. He blew way too many tie games. Also, great guest blog post.
Jason
Good post. I don’t understand how the RS escape being in the same category as the Yankees when it comes to spending. It isn’t as much about the spending as it is being jealous of the Yankees sucess. Alot of their sucess is because of their willingness to be agressive and forward thinking. It is similar to people singling out a Wal-Mart but not acknowledging that there are others like Home Depot ect. that compete with the small business for market share. And they don’t have revenue sharing.
for those in favor of a salary cap, don’t forget to add in to your calculations the cost of a 1(+) year baseball strike and the cancellation of at least one WS and the resulting fan backlash, because the cap would be starting after a nuclear winter. start each team with a huge debit from having zero income for a year or more, lower your attendace estimates by 1/3 and then see how you like the cap. it would be years under the capped system before these teams get back to status quo ante.
then apply your system of rewarding mediocrity and punishing top performers. and you’d better hope you didnt kill the goose that lays the golden egg (the yankees) in the process.
the salary cap idea comes from the same people who insist the every kid wins a ribbon in the soccer tournament. god forbid competition should actually separate the excellent from the poor, you might hurt somebody’s feelings…
Ham Fighters
Good point. Kinda like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
instead of a salary cap, why dont teams just take turns being champions. this year its the twins, next year its the tigers, the year after its the reds. this way everybody’s a winner and nobody gets thier feelings hurt, which seems to be the aim of both the salary cap system and communism.
Or like every kid gets to make the team. Even if it’s the parents that want them to not the kid.
Thanks to Pete for the chance to pinch-hit. I appreciate it. Thanks a lot to everyone for the kind words. To address some of the points; on what to do with a Ph.D. Doogie Hauser, Rebecca is right on the options. A professor is the usual choice and is mine, though the job market is tight at best and next-to-impossible at worst. But I knew that going in and can’t complain, although dish washing jobs are looking a little more enticing everyday in this economic climate…
dave, on MLB teams making the playoffs under this system, good point. You’re right. I wanted to stick to the 500 word cap for guest posts here, no easy task for a chatty guy like me as readers of my blog, all five readers, know. So for the post at The Heartland, I added two main things, the stats for different teams in the playoffs and as champions since 2001, with 23 different teams and seven different champs, and the other was data on small-market team profits. Significant is all that is with half the teams eligible for baseball playoffs compared to other sports, too. Parity already exists to a good degree in baseball without a salary cap.
MikeEff, you’re exactly right about the onus on drafting and player development, which is why the A’s have done a good job despite having a payroll not too much higher than KC’s. Boston Dave, we see eye to eye on KC’s spending. That 1999 fan walkout during the Yanks game was hilarious. The 2000 Royals had Dye, Damon, Beltran, and added Ibanez in 2001–and re-signed none of them. Beltran was traded then got the big contract with the Mets, but the others could have been had for a few million, not tens of millions. They’ve made lots of bad, penny-pinching decisions. Eye to eye on Rivera, too. No one else compares, period.
G. Love, thanks and exactly. There are more business models than the two I set up in this post, and an effective cap would place more emphasis on drafting and player development, which themselves involve some investments. Yeah, KC and others LOVE when the Yanks come to town. They keep smaller percentages of home revenue than big-market teams do, but get gobs of cash from road trips to NY, Boston, Anaheim, too. Small-market teams get loads of scratch.
MaineYankee, is it me, or does Boston seem like the personification of Conrad Dobler in the old Miller Lite commercials, arguing about Yankees spending to get small-market teams arguing with them in “Tastes Great! Less Filling” fashion, then sneaking off with a smile and their $8 beer? As if Boston doesn’t spend loads of money and gouge their fans, er, I’m sorry, Red Sox Nation.
See what I mean by chatty? My comment was as long as my post. That 500-word limit had me sweating bullets.
Jason
I think the delay until this post is because people are still reading your last comment!
You do have a bit of the atypical history teacher in you, don’t you? lol.
pete wanted us to read the book first before forming an opinion.i have not read it but if these quotes are true then i am dissappointed with torre.
what torre said might be true or mostly true but i lost respect in him because what made torre different in my eyes is that he always did the right,respectfull thing.
only a bitter,angry person would say such things.i can care less about the book,just giving an opinion.
Jason
You are right. Even now they still complin about how much the Yankees spend as the RS spend 50mil. to just talk to Dice K. They are mad at Boras because of how things worked out with Tex. when in reality their ego got in the way as they tried to flex their muscle thinking they had the advantage. They didn’t like getting embarassed by the Yankees.
First, Jason, good post. I think a lot has to do with the motivation behind owning a baseball team (or other sports team) in the first place. Is it an investment, or does the owner really want to excel in developing his product? It certainly looks as if for a few of the owners, at least, it is more of an investment, a “look-at-me-I-own-a-baseball-team” venture. As Yankees fans, we lucked out. The owners actually want to advance their product.
As far as Mariano goes, I would venture to say that the “change” is not so much Mariano as it is our perception of Mariano. After losing the 2001 World Series, it became crystal clear that Mo was at least a little bit human. He’s still incredible and has just come off one of his best seasons. But he does have some bad outings. So now instead of being 100% sure that Mo’s gonna lock it up, we’re only about 97% sure. I’ll take that any day of the week. And twice on Sundays.
I keep reading and hearing that Joe Torre’s book isn’t as bad as some of the early excerpts have led us to believe, and yet with each published excerpt, the Johnny Damon incident being the latest, it just gets worse and worse. What purpose does making this public serve? While these people are still active in their jobs/careers? The betrayal of trust here is mindboggling. I do notice though, that the name of the old guard teammate who was practically in tears asking that Damon be gotten rid of was protected.
So another thought I’m having is that as long as Torre was in charge, there would have been a split between the “old guys” who were gritty and won 4 rings, and the “new guys” who didn’t share that glory. The insiders and the outsiders, so to speak. And it seems so far, judging by what’s been exposed, that exactly none of the acquistions after 2001 had “the right stuff,” doesn’t it?
I think if what is being said about Torre and the old guys and the new guys is true it also is a defense for Joe G. There were stories about some of the players not liking how he ran things. This could explin partly why.
Mariano Rivera is as good as he always has been. For example, he had exactly ONE blown save last year (Against Minnesota). That is not exactly slipping.
As for the salary cap argument and helping small market teams, it is not about small market teams. Instead, it comes back to ownership and management. EX: Chicago: The NFL has a salary cap, and and total revenue sharing. With it, the Bears won exactly ONE Super Bowl, the same amount of titles their two baseball teams won. Here is another: The small market Royals have won the same amount of titles as the Chiefs…….. ONE.
I think it is an other case of Yankee envy. It is ok subsidize the likes of the Pirates with luxury taxes and to support building stadiums for them, but God forbid the Yankees get the same thing? It is unfair.
revera’s blows save or saves in the ws against arizona,wasn’t that a bad throw & a couple of dribblers???
i don’t remember a lot of it but i remember a bad throw & a couple of cheap hits.
damn, the torre book interested me for about 2 hours, now its last weekend’s news. nothing that was said is shocking or really even suprising. then temper that with the fact that we are just reading the juciest quotes without the context and you have the makings of a nothing book. it changes nothing about my perception of torre or anyone else.
this is the same as the pettitte negotiations, its all posturing for more money and in this case, he lost the gamble, too bad for andy, but it changes nothing of my perception of him.
im glad he’s back but another guy who would have put up the same #’s would have made me just as happy to have.
when all is said and done, nothing has changed after the torre book and the pettitte negotiations, at least in my book.
Boston Dave
January 28th, 2009 at 2:40 am
can we stop talking about the 2004 playoffs… please???
Rivera is nasty. period. case closed.
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so let me get this straight.you can talk about the 2004 playoffs & when you are sick of hearing yourself talk about it you wan’t everyone else to stop talking about it.
thanks for clearing that up.
I think the RS are like the Mets. Always striving to compare to the Yankees. If you heard how they talk here in Me. you would think they are the dynasty and the Yankees are trying to measure up to them. I truly hope the Yankees at least make the playoffs and the RS finish in 3rd. That would restore things back to the way things should be. Course then they would say the Yankees are buying their way in and the RS are doing things the right way. Living here in Me. you can’t win being a Yankee fan. lol
what we need is for the yankees to beat down the socks in the ALCS this year to put the chowdaheads back where they belong.
Ham Fighters -
What was your perception of Torre before the book? I liked Torre as a manager because I thought his biggest strength, the ability to handle the politics of a team like the Yankees (balancing egos, being a buffer between mgmt & players) was exactly what was needed for the teams that were put together here. I never thought he was perfect as a manager or as a human being (none of us is), so the fact that he may have harbored some bitterness over the way the end of the relationship occurred didn’t disturb me.
But what has surprised me is that for all the hurt feelings, or whatever, I figured Torre’s best revenge would be to manage another team successfully and move on with this life. This book is an example of someone not counting to ten, or not thinking before one speaks. This book, “The Yankee Years,” written after he retired, maybe 2, maybe 5, maybe 7 years down the road, would have some perspective. It wouldn’t have been necessary to pull back all the curtains. Perhaps it would have been a little kinder, perhaps not, but at least it would not seem a bit vindictive.
So, at least until I’ve read the book in its entirety, I am immensely disappointed that a man who prided himself, as a manager, on keeping things close to the vest, on not airing dirty laundry in the press, has chosen to do just that.
But, even if the book ends up being about a whole lot more than just these salacious tidbits, it doesn’t make it okay.
Anti-Yankees sentiment sells. He wrote a book to sell a book and make money. He sold himself out, if you ask me, by including private matters.
Very good post. Interesting, especially in the context of recent economic developments, and opinions on the Yanks throughout the baseball world and elsewhere on Peter Gammons’ home planet. A few things surprised me …
One thing that surprised me, the dollar mount of Forida’s player salaries for 3 years was paid for my money given to them by other teams. Sure, there’s overhead … but seriously. They have to scrimp THAT much?
I don’t think we need a salary cap for the rich teams and a single league-wide minimum salary for the poor teams. We need a minimum payroll for the poor teams based on the amount each receives from the rich teams.
You want $30M free dollars this year for your small-market team? OK, half (or whatever) has to go into your player payroll. For this year alone. And it can’t be more than half (or whatever) of your player payroll. For this year alone. And you can’t complain.
Now … I’m not sure what amounts or percentages are practical or feasible, but there should be something of that nature put in place before any talk of placing a salary ‘cap’ on the rich teams.
The other thing that surprised me (well, in a way it didn’t) was that the first two comments after this post were ‘lame’ and (yawn) some more supposedly astute words on the Torre book? What? Are you guys kidding?
“… was paid for BY money given to them …”
Sorry for the typo.
And even if the most damning observations came from Verducci via the various interviews he did in putting the book together, Joe Torre has his name on the book, so whether or not he actually approved, by putting his name, he did so.
Brad Pitt’s better-looking brother, guilty as charged. 100%
I ramble, therefore I am.
Sorry, ANSKY. I know the book has been beaten to death. I just can’t help having gut reactions to new revelations. If people would stop posting the new excerpts, I would stop having reactions!
Especially since Jason’s post is a compelling one and deserves our full attention!
Doreen
I think your feelings about Torre are the same as alot of us. I had alot of respect for how he carried himself and his ability to handle people. If he was vindictive towards some behind the scenes I am disappointed. Even though I was sorry to see him leave I also thought it was time to move on.
“Joe Torre has his name on the book, so whether or not he actually approved, by putting his name, he did so.”
And he man’s up to it
_________________________________________________________
*Torre is the co-author of the book, but it contains both his thoughts and independent reporting, according to Verducci. Torre told the Times that “knowing that my name is on it, I know I’m going to have to answer for it.”
He later told the Times: “I’m comfortable with what I contributed to the book, even though I’m probably going to get more credit or more blame than I deserve, whichever way you want to look at it.”*
Ham Fighters
I’m not sure I want them to meet in the ALCS. If by chance the Yankees lost it makes for a long winter.
this book was written 10 years too early.
torre should of taken the high road & maintained that father figure that people respected him for.
he doesn’t have too but his armor just got peeled away.he comes out of this looking bitter,angry & seeking revenge.
torre always said the right things & protected his players.he is hollywood joe.he got too big for his own good.
if i am arod i come out with a book about how fear consumed torre in the alcs against boston & he wasn’t trying to win but trying not to lose.being up 3-0 & losing and you hear nothing about it ever.
Jason- good post and follow up. Thank you.
Re: Torre before the book he was a Yankee masquerading as a Dodger. After, he’s just a bitter Dodger bashing the Yankees. Timing is everything, and Torre’s sense of timing is terrible. Some might argue in more ways than one.
doreen
as far a my imgae of torre goes, im a ‘grain of salt’ or ‘shades of grey’ kinda guy. i never saw either clueless joe or st. joe in him myself. actually i always liked torre and still do. he was a great hitter for the cards when i was a kid, and when he became a met and i got to know more about him, i liked him alot more.
when torre got the yankees gig, it helped me get over bucks unfair (i thought) firing and from the start it was clear he could get the team to play up to its potential, which at the time was exactly what this very young and unproven team needed.
at the same time, i could see that as the yankees won, torre was becoming a cult. basically in my mind, joe was the leader and the ny press were the cult members. thats what started St. Joe. he became bulletproof, no writer ever challenged him or the fans perception that he never made a mistake. this went to joe’s head some, how could it not?
lets remmber how the yankees operate, they dont need a manager to win games, they just need a manager who stays out of the way and lets the highest paid players on the planet win games. huggins knew it, casey knew it, and torre knew it.
as the non-title years began to build-up it was wierd how little the press questioned torre about his moves, which i think bred more bad moves. absent the need of self-reflection we tend to get a little lazy intellectually. torre never got called on how or why he did things b/c of his cult of reporters, so he drifted.
im not a huge arod fan, but im sure pulling for the guy, but on the day he got dropped to the 8 hole, i knew joe had just lost his ability to judge what was in the best longterm interests of the club and let his ego run amok. sure arod might even have deserved it, but you dont embarass one guy on a team full of underachievers. it was as if he was shaming the whole team by shaming its best player. and it seemed like blame-shifting to me.
that should have been time for one side or the other to decide to break up the marriage, but when you’ve succeeded, you want to think you can recapture the magic, so torre stayed too long.
(this is by far the longest piece ive ever written on here.)
anyway, my conclusion is that torre is a really great guy and a terrific manager, but he’s also a complcated guy with a top athelete’s ego and blindspots. i felt that way when he left and i feel the same now, the book doesnt change that at all. id still love to have a cup of coffee (green tea?) in his office with him and listen to him tell stories but i dont think he’s any kind of saint.
Maine Yankee
I agree 100%, the Sox will always use the Yankees as a way to measure their own success. I live in Mass. and you wouldn’t believe the extent of Sox fan’s inferiority complex. Half the Sox “fans” don’t even remember who they beat in the ’04 World Series.
Very good blog post today!
Ham Fighters
Some very good points. Do you think that the Yankees didn’t make the break from Joe sooner because they knew it would create a firestorm? No good way to end it.
Are you guys seriously saying that Mo was never the same. Is anyone even close to Mo’s numbers? This is what seperate us from crappy orginizations, is we (yankee fans) expect nothing but greatness, anything less than a World Series is failure. If we won a world Series we probably would not be speaking about Mo’s numbers changing about 71E-3 ( scientific notation for .071). Mo is the best player ever to play his position.
Nice post.
Ham Fighters -
I suspect my husband would love to join you and Joe in that cup of green tea.
I appreciate your perspective and the fact that you wrote such a lengthy response.
the socks do measure themselves against the yankees, just as the yankees measure themselves against the socks. this is a fundamental change in the yankees/socks dynamic, whether yankees fans accept it or not.
the proof is aaron boone. if not for 2004, aaron boone would be bigger than bucky dent. boone is kind of an afterthought now, not because he left the team, but because the yankees lost the WS after his homer and then the socks crushed the yankees in 2004. its almost like we dont want to think of boone, because he’s too close to that ugly incedent.
the 2004 loss is really the first time in my lifetime (i turn 50 this yr.) that the socks ever beat us in a meaningful game. before that they were the washington generals. if they were even good enough to be on the radar screen. the Orioles were always a bigger enemy than the socks, who could be counted on to roll over at the appropriate time.
not anymore. the socks became real rivals with the 2004 win and now both teams measure themselves by each other.
it is nice to finally have a solid rotation 1-5
cc
burnett
wang
pettitte
joba
with hughes,kennedy,acevez & others as debth all while keeping our prospects.in all my years as a yankee fan i have never seen this happen when we kept our prospects so that we can compete for years ahead.
we are going to be tough this year.we also need to be very carefull with joba,135 innings tops.
Some of Mo’s failures are really a result of his strengths. I can rember a number of hits against him were bleeders that would just get over the infield. The hit that won it for Arizona is one example. Not saying he hasn’t given up big hits because he has. I was at a game in Oaklnad in 07 when he gave up a home run to lose the game in the bottom of the ninth. That is the exception rather than the rule. Even the best are going to fail at times.
The best thing to do is not buy the book, let the media shape it however they want. In the end this garbage is no more fun to read than the Red-Sox-run Mitchell Report.
i think the only way it could have ended well between torre and the yanks would have been if torre won another ring then retired. but by the fact he’s still managing, it appears likely that had they won in say 2006, he would have gotten a 3 yr extention or something and the same thing would eventally have happened.
i think pete’s post the other day (“it never ends well”) applies here. (but i would point out that pete’s hero, mike mussina is an exception to the rule.)
Since socialized baseball awards rights to the best young players to the poorest quality teams, the unfortunate winning teams have either to acquire free agents at high prices or face the prospect of falling to the bottom of the league. Do you remember the Yankkees of 1990-1994 and 1965-1972?
Do you like rooting for A-Rod and Mark Tex or Jerry Kenney and Danny Cater?
True we haven’t won anything in quite some time. Even dregs like the Red Sox have won more WS in this decade than the Yankees.
A salary floor would have the effect of raising player salaries across the board. A cap and floor would destroy a franchise like the Yankees for decades. We have had socialized baseball for a long time. We don’t need communism in baseball.
Teams that are perennially bad finishing last more than 60% of the time should be contracted or designated for assignment to the AAA.
The devil rays deliberately stayed in the cellar for years rather than risk mediocrity and lose their monopoly on all the high draft choices.
If Josh Hamilton and Elijah Dukes had remained on the Devil Rays and not self destructed along the way the Rays would be a bigger power house than the team that went to the WS last year. Their 13,000 fans would doubtless be filled with joy.
If salary caps existed, Tampa Bay would have a permanent advantage- a winning team, glorious weather, a beautiful domed stadium….( 2 out 3 anyway)
the funny thing about these sports books is that i never read them. most of them are really pretty terrible and a month after you read them, you cant remember anything you read. in this case, i actually appreciate the tidbits that get played up in the press. i consider them like litte cliff notes that help me avoid reading them. i enjoy the catty little snippets that sell the book, mix in a healthy dose of cynicism and realize that whatever i read in the paper is the most jazzed-up and juiciest part of the book and i move on.
i feel the same way about blockbuster movies. most pretty much suck. so if i go to see a decent movie and see the trailer for the MEGA DESTRUCTO i feel like i got the best of 2 movies in one trip.
no offense but i think the actual book would put me to sleep pretty quick, and i like torre and the yankees.
I love Moose, in part because he’s so honest, but Mo is one person he shouldn’t be “honest” about…..Of course, in this case, he’s wrong. I really don’t like hearing quotes from players (Mike was a current player at the time the book was written) about their teammates.
Ham Fighters
I agree about 04 changing how things were between the Yankees and the RS. Before 04 there was jealousy, after they acted entitled. Listening to talk radio here they almost take a ho hum attitude now if they don’t make the WS.
Pat, it’s unfair to ask ANYONE to be absolutely untouchable, perfect…….and I still disagree. I can’t do this now because I have to get to work, but I can name a bunch of instances, esp. in the post-season, where Mo WAS untouchable. I know Moose is brilliant, but it doesn’t mean he’s always right.
seems like a book of opinions and personal conversations.
so how much fact is involved?
maine, when i was a ski bum up in sugarbush back in the 80′s the socks fans were almost apologetic about it, like it was a genetic deformity they just had to live with.
thats why i say i want the socks in the ALCS. THIS YEAR! there is only one way to stop this nonsense and that is to bludgeon them ourselves in the postseason.
i say bring em on! in 2009 we set the universe back on its rightful axis!
These poor guest columnists. Everything they write turns into a discussion of The Yankee Years.
This was a decent post, albeit nothing we haven’t seen before from Ham Fighters, SJ44, and CB. The salary cap arguments are just sour grapes from owners who aren’t willing to invest the massive resources necessary to create a perennial contender and a “brand” for that contender, like the Yankees and Red Sox have done.
….um, does the universe even HAVE an axis?
Notice how when Mo “blows” a save, usually the hits against him are of the broken bat variety. Things happen, he IS facing great players after all. To say he wasn’t as untouchable after 2001 because he showed some humanity on the mound just isn’t the truth. The man has been other-worldly like in his ability to sustain his incredible performance as closer (the most difficult position in th game) for 14 years. Now that is absolutely astounding.
As to Joe – boy, I guess he felt the need to just reveal everything, didn’t he? He’s taking shots left and right at everyone who wasn’t considered “his guy” (meaning a dynasty player). That in and of itself tells me all I need to about this man. Other players, not just Mo, Andy, Po and Jeter, tried hard – and they won plenty of games. They just didn’t win the WS – holding that personally against them is so small-minded. I can easily picture a somewhat fractured clubhouse which Joe Torre didn’t bother trying to mend. I don’t mean that the players themselves didn’t get along, just that there was undoubtedly a difference in how Joe treated the dynasty/non-dynasty guys. Is this someone you want managing your team? The Damon comment is ridiculous and since Johnny has a great reputation in the game, is also hard to believe. Again, whether this info takes up 2 or 400 pages of the book doesn’t matter. The words are out there and it’s too late to take them back. How can anyone, yes especially the Dodger players, trust him again?
hobbie
I’m not sure I agree with you about what a cap and floor would do to the Yankees. I think they would change how they built their team if there was a cap. The team of the 90′s had alot of key players that came from their farm system.
In regards to Hamilton and Dukes I’m not so sure that Tampa would be willing to pay the salaries that they would demand. I think that is what will keep Tampa from staying on top in the AL East.
Ham
Yeah it’s called Arod…… j/k
MaineYankee
January 28th, 2009 at 7:34 am
“I think the RS are like the Mets. Always striving to compare to the Yankees. If you heard how they talk here in Me. you would think they are the dynasty and the Yankees are trying to measure up to them. I truly hope the Yankees at least make the playoffs and the RS finish in 3rd. That would restore things back to the way things should be. Course then they would say the Yankees are buying their way in and the RS are doing things the right way. Living here in Me. you can’t win being a Yankee fan. lol”
Good morning MaineYankee. I live in Maine and will admit that some Sox fans can be rude and inconsiderate, but it has been my experience that a percentage of fans from any team can be that way.
I have three good friends that are Yankee fans and we get along great.
I think there is a lot of misinformation and false rumors being spread about The Yankee Years. The Mussina comment about Rivera looks like a prime example. When have you ever heard anyone, fan, sportswriter, radio show host, or player, say that Rivera has lost a step? No one says this because it’s obviously not true. Just look at his numbers over the past 7 seasons.
Now, if anyone is going to ignore the obvious and say Rivera got worse after 2001, is Mussina going to be that person? I highly doubt it.
Another reason I think this story is false is it repeats a popular myth about closers: that they become permanently ineffective following a crushing blown save in the playoffs. It’s popularly thought, for example, that Byung-Hyun Kim failed as a closer following his disastrous performance in the 2001 WS, but 2002 was the best season of his career. I also remember reading how Brad Lidge would never be the same after Pujols took him deep in the 2005 NLCS, and we all saw that Lidge turned out just fine.
I have a feeling that the only way to know for sure what’s in TYY is to read it, and that there will always be false rumors about its content.
Preaching to the choir!!
Jeremy- Donnie Moore is a tragic example of what can happen to a closer who blows a playoff game.
Ham Fighters
I agree it would be sweet to BEAT them in the alcs. And I do think the team is good enough to do it. Just causes a little nervousness if they by some chance won.
Some of the sweetest wins were Boston Massacre 1& 2
Can’t wait for the new book ” Our Rubber Arms ” by Paul Quantrill and Tanyon Sturtze. Many contributions by Joe Torre.
Ray, Absolutely true. Both teams have their share of reasonable and jackass fans but even some of the reasonable Sox fans see their team as the small market David to the Yanks goliath. They look at their team as one that was built from within the organization and don’t even realize that the 2004 opening day roster consisted of only 1 home grown starter (Varitek). Theo is a genius at P.R. the way he sells this down home image while keeping his team in the top 3 in spending year after year.
the yankees are the only team that adopted an all-out reinvest in the brand strategy that has separated them from the rest of the sport when it comes to revenues and profitablity. the yankees revenues dont just come from the big market, the cubs, phils, astros, braves and dodgers have huge markets, they come from the big market plus the notariety, the glamor, the sizzle that is the yankees. the yankees arent another baseball team, they are the engine that drives the sport.
if the dodgers or the cubbies had plowed resources back into thier brand the way george steinbrenner did, either of them could be the behemouth of the national league, even the rivals of the ‘damn yankees’ but going back all the way to catfish hunter, the other teams have been too scared to follow this buisness model and instead criticize it.
steinbrenner has invested probably over a billion dollars in free agents, some of whom performed great, some of whom sucked, but each and every one of them brough more fame and notariety to the brand of the yankees.
now the yankees are enjoying the fruits of that investment (while continuing to reinvest) and other teams want to stop them from doing it.
if im the stein’s id break with all the other owners if they voted for a lockout to try to force a cap. it is in effect trying to prevent the yankees from enjoying the profits from thier own investments in baseball.
ray(sox fan)
I enjoy your input on hear and appreciate how respectfull you are. I think you also have seen the ones I’m talking about. If you listen to the JAB you know what I’m saying. I enjoy good fun amongst fans. I get tired of the ones who think the louder they talk the more right they are. Where in Me?
Ham Fighters
Very well said. Fans that dislike the Yankees should instead be mad at their ownership for not being willing to to the things to be sucessful. As good as th Twins are they wouldn’t have to spend alot more to dominate.
Tony C
I believe Varitek came in a trade with Seattle.
Very good post, Jason! Very interesting and timely.
I think it’s so strange to have to explain to normally intelligent people, even people involved in business, the logic behind reinvesting in your business to continue to produce a quality product. Any other business plan is doomed from the start! And then to penalize that business in order to finance all of the other businesses who don’t follow the same plan – ludicrous!
Thanks for the post and the follow up.
Forgive me for my typo’s. I guess I need to proofread better.
Maine Yankee
Your right about the Seattle trade although Varitek never saw any time in the majors until he went to Sox. So I will ammend my post to read “no starters including the rotation from the ’04 Sox team were home grown”.
It doesn’t get much further north than Jackman, Maine as a solid, forever Yankee fan.
Not much available for newspapers but computer and satellite helps a lot to be updated.
MaineYankee,
I enjoy your posts too and indeed I have seen the Sox fans you have referred to. I am sometimes a bit embarassed by them.
I am from the Wilton/Farmington area. Did I see somewhere that you are from the South Paris area?
Northern Maine
Been there. Nothing but trees.lol Played basketball against them back in the 70s. Stayed in homes of the locals. Had a good time.
ray(sox fan)
Yes I’m from South Paris. My wife went to college there. Also know people from there as well. My Uncle used to live in Chesterville.
Thanks to everyone for comments and criticisms. If nothing else, I figured that as long as I didn’t accompany the post with a photo of me looking like Matt Drudge taking a cigar break from an adult film shoot, I’d cut the amount of criticism in half.
There have been various models to success in baseball, not all of which have involved big spending. But I think the Yankees deserve credit for the level of re-investment in players, especially as they’re also re-stocking the farm system. The teams that cry about competition while literally being handed tens of millions and not re-investing are the ones that slay me. Imagine if major corporations re-invested as much revenue in their employees as the Yankees do. People would complain that it was socialism. Yet the criticism of the Yankees engenders exactly the opposite.
Part of what bothered me about Gammons’s comments, a guy whose work I generally like, is that he ironically compared the Yankees’ spending to a corporation that was successfully sued for hundreds of millions for stealing overtime pay from employees and making them work through lunches and breaks–for UNDERPAYING their employees. Plus, Wal-Mart doesn’t hand mom-and-pop stores a yearly revenue-sharing check to help keep them in the black.
There are some alternatives. One is a salary floor if a cap is instituted. Another is what ANSKY (thanks, BTW) said, that revenue-sharing could in essence be put in escrow and used for salaries during a period of time, if not then lost. A variation of this already exists with luxury tax money but, I believe, without the loss of money penalty. I’ll double-check. Another option is to reward teams for increasing attendance by giving more revenue-sharing to teams that re-invest AND draw fans, and there is a decent financial-attendance correlation relating to W-L, and less money to teams that don’t. There are options beyond just cap or no cap.
On that, and I considered writing about this aspect but will blog about it at The Heartland later, is the labor relations side of the cap issue. Count on it being an issue in 2011. Dollars to donuts. Players are not an oppressed class now. Through the MLBPA, the average and minimum salaries are very high, they get cuts of merchandise money, per diem is good, they now have protections and also some say-so over trades, and more. It’s a far cry from the de facto peonage of the reserve clause days. That said, watch how much media coverage salaries will get around 2011 negotiations, especially in comparison to media coverage of teams that sit on revenue-sharing money, that care little about attendance figures and actual competitiveness, about franchise value appreciation through what have been prosperous years for baseball, about tax breaks for teams especially from new and improved stadiums, about executive salaries, about TV and Internet revenues, about the growing globalization of the game.
Much more will be said about players’ salaries. High-priced players become magnets for criticism deflecting attention from myriad ways of profiteering among franchises, including small-market ones. The next round of negotiations just might see small to medium sized teams align on one side (with Houston, crying about salaries in the fourth-largest metro area in the nation), and an interesting coalition of large-market teams willing to pay big salaries and the MLBPA knowing where their membership’s financial bread is buttered on the other.
Jason
One thing that I don’t think is dicussed about the Yankees and there payroll is return on investment. I think that that plays a roll in who they sign. Yes they sign the big names and it is to win but I don’t think they do it with a total disregard to the bottom line. For the complaints about what Arod makes I don’t think they went over 4mil. fans till he came. Putting seats in the seats is major goal. It cost to do that. Something that is lost on some teams. Kinda like saving a nickle that cost you a dollar.
It’s a good point, MaineYankee. I definitely agree. Return on investment both on the field and in the stands. And, with this year, the big acquisitions were re-investments of money coming off the books from other players, as you all know well at LoHud. The cries about a cap make it seem as though the Yankees increased their spending from 2008 to 2009 by $70 million.
Most of the crying is due to the fact that the Yanks landed the two biggest fish in the free agent pond at a time when the country is hurting. I say if that’s the risk they’re willing to take, then so be it.
in 2001 the Yankees lost the WS to a team they were effectively bankrolling. Without Yankee dollars there would not be randy johnson and curt schilling on the mound.
The Marlins have twice shown how a “small market” team can win the series under the present set of rules.
I believe in Free market baseball. You find em and you sign them.
Anything else is socialism
Socialism has no place in a competitive sports environment
If the K.C. Royals can’t compete in a free market economy
Foo bucking Hoo
Exactly. The Royals don’t have a God given right to a baseball team. If they don’t invest back into their product and the fans don’t show, too bad, that’s part of capitalism.
I hope everyone noticed the difference in quality between an article by a Doctoral student and one by a high school senior. There is a reason why people get advanced educations.
Lambchop Louie, that was gold
excellent post — well-written, interesting and supported with ample facts. might be the best pinch hitter to date.
Good post! Good job keeping it short to the point and making a clear point.
The focus on homegrown talent that people seem to relish is a bit mystifying. Who cares whether you snagged a guy in the draft or signed him via free agency? As to the homegrown talent on the Sox ’04 team, does it get diminished if they come from trades? As in the Sox did not draft Varitek, but got him from the Mariners (Pretty sure). Why is trading for a minor league player better than trading for proven talent. It costs less, but its more of a crap shoot.
One thing that should be pointed out when slamming small market teams, is that they are in small markets! I agree that they should be putting revenue sharing in to the team, but to suggest that the Royals have the same cost/benefit analysis as the Yankees when they are thinking about signing a big talent is wrong. You have to spend money to make money but don’t pretend that the Royals, Marlins, etc. are facing the same constraints as the Yankees when it comes to making player decisions. That said there ought to be some sort of matching requirement to get the owners to invest in their clubs.
Also Florida people should lose their teams if they won’t support them after what they have accomplished in a relatively short time. They Rays had talent that made them fun to watch before they started winning. The Marlins actually won and still can’t get people out without the “Manatees” or what ever stunts they are using.
Great post. That’s the thing that I will never understand. People decry the Yanks for spending all this money on salary, but they are investing in the team to put a winning product on the field. Teams like KC, FLA, CIN, etc., don’t do a thing to help their club and sit and wait for the Yanks’ check to clear so they can make a nice profit for the year. Why does no one talk about that?
If the Yanks spend and win, they are accused of ‘buying championships’. If they spend but don’t win, they are accused of being frivolous with their money. They can’t win.
I would rather be a Yankee fan and have to hear about the salary, than a KC fan and not hear anything about the team at all…
“so let me get this straight.you can talk about the 2004 playoffs & when you are sick of hearing yourself talk about it you wan’t everyone else to stop talking about it.
thanks for clearing that up.”
bru,
ouch. I was joking about the 2004 playoffs because it was a painful memory! pull that stick out of your…
Doogie Hauser, my neice has a Ph.D. in history from UCLA. She is struggling to get tenure at a lesser university. She may or may not ever get tenure there. Academia doesn’t have enough openings for the number of new Ph.D.s. Some of them are forced to seek other careers.
Ahh, I remember when Jason had his blog back over at MLBlogs. We had a tight knit community there. His HDLR’s [Heartland Digital Living Room] days are still a must to stop by to.
In a telephone interview on Mike and Mike in the Morning on Tuesday, Justice said that in 2000, Brian McNamee told him he could give him HGH to help him recover from a groin injury. McNamee told him it could help him and that it wasn’t steroids. He said McNamee brought HGH to his locker, but when he saw it was needles, he couldn’t do it. If the HGH were in pill form, Justice said he probably would have taken the HGH that McNamee gave him.
negro
Well Bob’s mom has a tremendous history of all things Yankee. She grew up in NJ and I guess there was a point in time that the Triple A team was located there or near there? She dated some of the players and had great stories to tell. (She moved to RI after Bob’s dad died and Bob is going to take her in so I can have lunch with her and hear some of her stories!)
Bob’s favorite story to tell is about how his dad’s favorite player was Charlie Keller and how one day someone who was a friend of the family (and had some connection to the team) took Bob’s dad and one of his friends to a game. After the game they waited to get autographs and Joe DiMaggio came out. Without waiting for Joe Di’s autograph, Bob’s dad asked him if he could possibly get him Charlie Keller’s autograph. He said that Joe just said no and grumped away.
Me too. I have a great story about something that is going to be in the new Yankee Stadium. I work with a professor who has a tremendous background in the history of the Negro Leagues and especially as they relate to NY and things having to do with the Yankes.
curator
Well the curator of the museum space at the new Stadium is setting up a display that will be devoted to the Negro League.
And the guy I work with is the one who is providing the information!
He has already met with the curator several times
Florida receives $31 million on revenue sharing scheme but refused to re-invest. I am concerned on how small team can improve when they take less priority in improving its team capability to compete better.
O course, one may have to look at other successful story in other league such as NBA on how small team can rejuvenate themselves by fully utilizing the revenue sharing package given in bigger proportion to small team.