WasWatching.com

Larry Larry Larry....::shakes head::

And people think Hank Steinbrenner is bad.

Svengali Bora$$ is seeking twelve (12) years at $400 million.

The Yankees will offer arbitration, they have said so. A-Freud, under the spell of his mind-control agent, will decline. The Yankees then cannot get involved in any offer until....... ? It is over.

I'm sorry but I heard that A-rod was looking for 400 million dollars. And that just makes me mad. I'm sorry, A-rod is great and talented. But he is not worth the same payroll as the Nationals or any low-tier team. If a team is going to waste 400 million dollars on a player who will is great in the regular season and not so great during October. Eventually A-rod will become like Bonds, people don't go to be in awe of his ability but rather look for the opportunity to ridicule or see a bunch of home runs for a losing team. As the Dodgers learned with Kevin Brown and the Red Sox have kinda learned with Manny is that a high priced player will suck too much capital from expanding the team. With 40 million dollars the yankees could buy every single Dominican or Cuban player and field 2 teams instead of just 1.

Hell, Hank Steinbrenner could give the whole US population a million dollars and it'd still be better than signing a-rod again.

$400 million? So I guess this is PR so he can say he tried to give the Yanks a "hometown" discount at $350.

I am really, really curious to see where this goes, because the numbers being thrown around are beyond ridiculous. Things just aren't adding up with him refusing phone calls and meetings, opting out so early, etc.

I think we're going to find out once and for all how smart Boras is, or if he's finally overplayed his hand. From the outside, it seems to me that he's misjudged things royally, but I never would've figured he'd get $252 million from Texas either.

and the Red Sox have kinda learned with Manny is that a high priced player will suck too much capital from expanding the team
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Ummm....not exactly. The Red Sox have won two World Series with Manny and they've managed to expand their payroll in the years he's been there. Facts are facts.

Just a bunch of hypocritical fans. They'll take it out on him if he makes $30-40 million a year, huh? He might as well go for it since the fans were taking it out on him when he was making $24 - remember how pleasant he had it in 2006?

Why does anyone care about what A-Rod earns? It isn't coming from public funds. Maybe fans should be more concerned about the owners holding up municipalities for new stadiums and other perks. Or perhaps we should be screaming about owners who try to increase already (obscene?) profits. Think luxury boxes at the expense of ordinary fans, for example.

When a salaried person seeks to improve his earnings, he is greedy and unappreciative. When an owner seeks to earn more, he is ambitious and hard working.

I agree JeremyM, we'll see what Boras is made of now. It's going to be really kind of fascinating to see how this plays out.

I agree with Bob R.

Until one or more teams are dissolved because of financial circumstances I'll be sorry but I don't see that day coming in the near future.

If someone doesn't want to match a player's salary requests that's fine with me.

If the players don't get the money it's just retained by the owners. Is that fun to root for?

And the price of tickets and parking, etc., that has nothing to do with players salaries? That isn't the real world.

Yes it does, but probably not as directly as most people think. Prices are not set solely by payroll but by the interplay of factors. To illustrate, I will use purely hypothetical numbers, to simply the math, but the point should be clear.

Suppose a team has 40,000 seats. If it charges $10/seat, it can fill 30,000 of them. If it raises prices to $20, it will only fill 10,000. Again, oversimplifying grossly I know, but if those are the only 2 choices, regardless of payroll, the team will rake in more money at $10 than at $20.

Why would more people come if prices went up? Most likely because the team is more competitive, that is if it signs better players. So the team signs a big star, and now at $20 it can sell 20,000 seats. In that sense, the increased payroll has led to an increase in ticket prices, but also to an increase in value received (by customers) per ticket bought. If the big star flops, chances are attendance will not increase and then the $20 price will either decrease or the team will make less money.

I know this is ignoring many other factors, but it does illustrate that increasing payroll is not responsible by itself for the rise in prices.

And even if it does, it is still not as egregious as the owners plundering city coffers for handouts or even for reconfiguring stadiums so there are fewer "cheap" seats. The notion of owners crying poverty is too ludicrous for words. The players are simply seeking the same advantages that any person with the opportunity does.

Players also put up no capital.

This is not a question of who is more deserving. We cannot compare the effort, resources, skills, time, risks and so forth that each, owners and players, expend and say one or the other is more worthy of raking in huge profits/earnings. It is a simple recognition that the popular conception that players are ungrateful, greedy individuals concerned only for their own selfish gain is misleading and foolish when seen within the context of the overall system.

Owners work the system to their advantage as much as possible. Anyway who reads the history of baseball knows that when it comes to greed, selfishness, unfair advantages and out and out dishonesty, the players' today are pikers compared to the crap that owners pulled for 100+ years. And anyone who follows the blackmail and false advertising the owners perpetrate on municipalities and the general public today should, if so inclined, feel a lot more outrage at their machinations than at the players trying to wring every cent they can from the clubs. Selig and his cutthroats have managed to frame issues in such a way that the players always appear on the defensive, and it is unfortunate that so much of the public is gullible enough to take the bait.