Haven't we read things like this before? Haven't we read a "Thank God, Player A is clean and breaking records because it makes up for records during the Steroid Era" column before? Some writers just either (a) don't learn or (b) won't let the Steroid Era drop. It's over. It's been over. What is worse in this column by Scott Miller is that he does the whole "Albert Pujols hasn't been affiliated in any way with steroids so it's not fair to lump him in with them" dance (which I agree with by the way...agree 100%), but this isn't the position he takes when it comes to voting for Hall of Fame inductees. Weird how that works isn't it? Rumors of PED use are partly what keeps Scott Miller from voting Jeff Bagwell and Mike Piazza into the Hall of Fame, but he chooses to believe Albert Pujols when he says he hasn't used PED's during his playing career. After all, Albert Pujols sued Jack Clark for suggesting he used PED's. Who would actually take the time to sue a person accusing them of using PED's if that person wasn't truly innocent of these charges (ahem, Lance Armstrong)?
Anyway, I think Pujols is clean too. That's not what this is about. It's about Scott Miller not giving the benefit of the doubt to other players who haven't tested positive for PED's and his insistence the 500-homer club means something once again.
By far, the most toxic part of the steroid era was the way it grotesquely distorted Major League Baseball's record book.
It's incredibly toxic! The records are a mess and there's no way to simply ignore the records set during the Steroid Era. We need Congressional input on how to resolve this perilous situation immediately!
Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, some of the game's most revered
numbers were twisted and turned as if standing in front of a fun-house
mirror operated by the worst kind of skanky carnies and shyster gypsies
imaginable.
But hey, at least Scott Miller isn't being dramatic about the record book being tainted by PED users.
Now comes Albert Pujols blasting his way into the 500 Home Run Club, and do you believe?
I never stopped believing. Though if Fred McGriff had just hit seven more home runs then Jon Heyman would totally believe in the 500-homer club again.
Do you believe in the credibility of 500 again?
I never stopped believing. Barry Bonds didn't 263 more home runs simply because he used PED's. That's not how it works. Bonds would have surpassed 500 home runs whether he obeyed Nancy Reagan and said "no" to drugs or not.
Do you believe in the purity of Pujols?
I'm not sure I believe or don't believe in the purity of any baseball player. I just watch the sport and try to enjoy it as much as I can. One thing I certainly don't believe in is the teeth-gnashing over the loss of innocence when it comes to baseball's records. Those records lost their innocence many years ago. You know, back when blacks weren't allowed to play baseball so pre-1947 baseball players didn't set their records against the best baseball players in the United States. These records could have also lost their innocence since everyone and their brother was using greenies during the 1960's and 1970's. Or it could be that baseball and it's records never lost it's innocence because this innocence never actually existed.
Once upon a time, the 500 Club meant something. And I'd like to think, a
decade into the toughest performance-enhancing drug testing program in
any sport, that it again means something.
Thank you so much for saving baseball, Albert Pujols.
In fact, strike part of that last sentence. I know it means something.
In fact, strike part of that last sentence. Thank you so much for saving the world as a whole.
Say what you will about the Los Angeles Angels' franchise player, but
Pujols has been tested, tested and tested again—just like everyone
else—since the program began in 2004. So far, so clean. Furthermore, his
name did not turn up in BALCO records, and it wasn't lurking in the
Biogenesis files.
Oh okay, well that's an interesting point of view coming from a Hall of Fame voter who refuses to vote for Jeff Bagwell or Mike Piazza. Here is a good summary of Scott Miller's Hall of Fame ballots.
As the site I linked said,
Miller’s HOF columns put him firmly in the “no suspected PED users in
the Hall” camp. Read his 2013 column for the full details on his
position.
Great idea! Let's read the full details on his position while attempting to reconcile his "Albert Pujols must be clean because he's never tested positive" position with this "Jeff Bagwell and Mike Piazza have suspicion around them so who cares if they have never tested positive" position.
Jeff Bagwell and Mike Piazza: Did they do steroids? Loads of
speculation, no proof. I want to vote for both, but I'm just not going
to rush into it.
I don't know entirely what this means. Bagwell and Piazza are either Hall of Famers or they aren't Hall of Famers. Their numbers aren't going to get any better or worse in the next year or so. It certainly sounds like Scott Miller isn't going to vote for them because there is speculation, no proof, that they used PED's. Interesting how he's so quick to defend Pujols but he isn't willing to vote for Bagwell or Piazza to be in the Hall of Fame when there is nothing but speculation surrounding their PED use.
For me, each is in sort of a holding pattern. I want to give it a
few more years, and see if any more of the Steroid Era vagaries
clear.
Well of course. It makes sense. Give it another year, which Miller did, and then see if any of the speculation they used steroids clear up.
Spoiler alert: Nothing changed in regard to the "Steroid Era vagaries" and Scott Miller still didn't vote for either player to be inducted into the Hall of Fame. In lieu of additional information that Piazza or Bagwell didn't use PED's Miller is working under the assumption the speculation is correct and they did use PED's. Not voting for either player because of speculation surrounding their PED use and defending Albert Pujols' 500-homer record as "clean" because there is no proof he used PED's is quite simply an inconsistent position. Either Miller believes the speculation or he doesn't. Yet he feels the need to pick and choose which speculation he believes rather than stick to his "tested and tested...so far, so clean" reason for stating Albert Pujols has saved the 500-homer record for all of mankind.
Okay, so back to Albert Pujols and how he saved the 500-homer club from not being credible.
And when former St. Louis Cardinal Jack Clark, on The King and the Ripper Show—which he co-presents—irresponsibly said last summer that he knew for a fact that Pujols juiced, Pujols not only angrily denied it, but said he would sue. And then he followed through with that threat, filing suit in a St. Louis court last October.
Lance Armstrong sued anybody and everybody who suggested he used PED's to win the Tour de France. He ruined the lives of quite a few people when suing them as well. The ability to hire an attorney and file paperwork doesn't mean Albert Pujols is an innocent guy. Again, I don't have any reason to believe Albert Pujols has used PED's, but Scott Miller is using circumstantial evidence to point out why Albert Pujols CLEARLY never used PED's while withholding his vote from potential Hall of Fame inductees due to their suspected ties to PED use. Maybe Piazza or Bagwell should have sued someone for suggesting they used PED's and Scott Miller would then decide to vote for them to enter the baseball Hall of Fame.
Sadly, in our cynical world today, even all of that is not proof positive.
Yes, sadly there are baseball writers who have a Hall of Fame vote that withhold that vote based upon speculation and rumors. It's sad to hear about. Scott Miller must never go around mirrors if he thinks he isn't one of these cynical people.
The dirty, chronic liar Ryan Braun, among his many acts of treachery,
did some serious damage to the game's clean players as well. Because
after listening to Braun's righteous indignation that was pure,
unadulterated horseradish, we're now inclined to believe in a guy's
outer shell of honesty even less than we were before.
Yes, "we" are less inclined to believe in a guy's honesty than before. Thanks for speaking for me. I, and the rest of the public, are unable to speak for ourselves because we are mouth-breathing morons who are unable to understand our own opinions and feelings.
It says something—to me, at least—that Pujols not only followed through
with his threat to sue Clark, but also pressed forward until Clark
finally waved the white flag and apologized in February.
You are ignoring my straw man argument though! What about those eligible for the Hall of Fame that have only been suspected of PED use and it's never been proven? How can Miller reconcile these two positions? He crusades for the ABSOLUTE INNOCENCE of Albert Pujols and holds him up as a champion for the 500-homer club and a person who gave credibility back to the MLB record book, but won't let Jeff Bagwell into the Hall of Fame despite the lack of solid evidence he used PED's?
That we even need to cover this ground before talking about Pujols'
swing, his career and his healthy legs in 2014 is too bad, but that's
where we are thanks to his recent predecessors.
Well, that and writers like Scott Miller have already set the precedent that a player with even a whisper of PED use won't be elected into the Hall of Fame. We can thank these people as well for any suspicion surrounding Albert Pujols. Miller fails to see the irony of this.
Of those 11 players to crack 500 since '99, seven were blatant cheats: Rafael Palmeiro, Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, Mark McGwire, Manny Ramirez
and, yes, Gary Sheffield. (He admitted using Bonds' BALCO supply once
before he knew what it was, so believe what you will there.)
And of course after using Bonds' BALCO supply one time it immediately turned Gary Sheffield into a superhero hitter who had superpowers to hit a baseball. One use of steroids is like turning a baseball player into a living version of The Hulk.
That leaves Ken Griffey Jr., Jim Thome, Frank Thomas (who will be
inducted into the Hall of Fame later this summer)...and Pujols.
Thank God they can make the 500-homer club credible again. I was deeply worried my overly-moralistic soul would never be right again concerning the baseball record books being clean and clear of cheats. You know, because the only cheats in the baseball record books are PED users.
Nobody had ever hit Nos. 499 and 500 in the same game until Pujols,
rejuvenated at 34, belted a Taylor Jordan changeup over the fence in the
first inning and deposited another meaty Jordan offering over the fence
in the fifth.
Boy, if this were 2021 and Pujols failed a drug test in 2016 then I think we would look back at this "rejuvenated" comment and laugh at the obviousness of Pujols' PED use, much like the home run chase in 1998 is laughed at now.
Again, I believe Pujols has not used PED's, but one decade's "rejuvenated" slugger is another decade's "clearly cheating" slugger. The language doesn't change, the knowledge that player had help in being rejuvenated changes though.
The Angels spilled out of their dugout en masse and flocked to greet Pujols at the plate.
More evidence Pujols is clean. Zero of their teammates ever flocked out to greet and congratulated PED users on their accomplishments as they happened.
He is the third-youngest player to hit his 500th, behind only A-Rod* (32 years, eight days)
See the asterisk beside A-Rod's name? HOW FUCKING CUTESY IS THAT?
and Jimmie Foxx (32 years, 337 days).
Where is the asterisk noting that Foxx set this record while not playing against the Negro League players?
It is totally different this year. It would be too much, at this stage,
to ever expect to see the MVP Pujols of 2008-09 re-emerge. But what he's
showing right now is what he's shown us since his debut for Tony La
Russa in 2001:
Oh, Pujols played for Tony La Russa. Hmmm...interesting. I bet if Jeff Bagwell played for Tony La Russa that would be more evidence that he did use PED's, given La Russa's history of managing players who were revealed to have used PED's.
No other sport does numbers like baseball. From 714 to 755 to .400, from 31 and 56 to 500, and beyond.
And no other sport is more contradictorily (is that a word?) sanctimonious about the numbers in their sport. No other sport's writers think the more they talk about the past the better chances the past will simply be erased, as opposed to just dealing with the past and moving on.
Do you believe?
I believed before. They are just numbers. I consider a lot of old-time records to not be credible since they were set while MLB was consciously preventing Negro Leagues players from competing in the majors. That's just how I feel. I don't go around saying those old-time records are totally not credible and act like a pompous ass about it. Albert Pujols hasn't saved the 500-homer club and Scott Miller needs to apply his "Innocent until proof of guilt" to Jeff Bagwell at the very least or else he is coming off as a hypocrite.
Pujols has given us no reason not to, and because of that, it was a
night of celebration, unlike so many 500s over the past decade.
Well, they were nights of celebration until it was found out a few years later they should not have been. Lack of evidence is lack of evidence unless it comes to Hall of Fame voting apparently.
Showing posts with label albert pujols. Show all posts
Showing posts with label albert pujols. Show all posts
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Monday, June 4, 2012
2 comments Murray Chass Uses a Sample Size of Three Players in Wondering Where All the Power-Hitting 1B Have Gone
Somewhere towards the end of this article, Murray Chass states he has gotten off his main point. I wasn't even aware this article had a main point really. Murray seems to be taking a shot at doing some research to find out where all of the slugging first basemen have gone, but doesn't really come to a conclusion about the answer. He uses a sample size of three players, Adrian Gonzalez/Mark Teixeira/Albert Pujols, as proof slugging first basemen aren't around anymore. He ties salary into this discussion, so maybe he is proving slugging, productive, highly-paid first basemen aren't around anymore.
So not only is Murray Chass using a sample of three hitters to base his conclusion upon, he is about 30% of the MLB season (and zero historical data that shows these three guys can/will turn it around) as the sample size in claiming there is a decline in slugging first basemen. Murray wrote this article on May 24th, so I will be using data from that date. I'm still not sure if this article is a warning against paying first basemen big money in free agency or is simply just a poor observation based on a limited sample size. Either way, it is good to see Murray trying to do some research (he even uses OBP!), but I'm not sure what he has actually proven here.
In the space of three years, December 2008 to December 2011, Mark Teixeira, Adrian Gonzalez and Albert Pujols signed contracts whose salaries and signing bonuses totaled $574 million.
BREAKING: MLB teams will overpay for players considered to be one of the best players at their position. Just don't tell that to that guy who wrote the Bleacher Report article about how Albert Pujols' contract has caused MLB GM's to change their opinion on expensive, long-term contracts forever.
Now Murray looks at each of these three players' past performance in an effort to let us know he will focus on 45 games during the 2012 season rather than focus on these players' past performance when coming to whatever conclusion he seems to come to. Again, this conclusion isn't really clear, this article just sort of stops for no apparent reason.
For example, in his first 10 years in the major leagues, Pujols batted .331, slugged more than 40 home runs six times and no fewer than 32 the other four times and drove in more than 100 runs each season. An “off year” for him was last year when he batted .299 with 37 homers and 99 r.b.i.
Pujols was hitting .213 with 4 home runs and 20 RBI at the time Murray wrote this. He was on pace for 11 home runs and 70 RBI for the season in 625 at-bats.
Gonzalez did not go to Boston as a free agent...In his last five years in San Diego Gonzalez hit 167 home runs and drove in 536 runs.
So not only is Murray Chass using a sample of three hitters to base his conclusion upon, he is about 30% of the MLB season (and zero historical data that shows these three guys can/will turn it around) as the sample size in claiming there is a decline in slugging first basemen. Murray wrote this article on May 24th, so I will be using data from that date. I'm still not sure if this article is a warning against paying first basemen big money in free agency or is simply just a poor observation based on a limited sample size. Either way, it is good to see Murray trying to do some research (he even uses OBP!), but I'm not sure what he has actually proven here.
In the space of three years, December 2008 to December 2011, Mark Teixeira, Adrian Gonzalez and Albert Pujols signed contracts whose salaries and signing bonuses totaled $574 million.
BREAKING: MLB teams will overpay for players considered to be one of the best players at their position. Just don't tell that to that guy who wrote the Bleacher Report article about how Albert Pujols' contract has caused MLB GM's to change their opinion on expensive, long-term contracts forever.
Now Murray looks at each of these three players' past performance in an effort to let us know he will focus on 45 games during the 2012 season rather than focus on these players' past performance when coming to whatever conclusion he seems to come to. Again, this conclusion isn't really clear, this article just sort of stops for no apparent reason.
For example, in his first 10 years in the major leagues, Pujols batted .331, slugged more than 40 home runs six times and no fewer than 32 the other four times and drove in more than 100 runs each season. An “off year” for him was last year when he batted .299 with 37 homers and 99 r.b.i.
Pujols was hitting .213 with 4 home runs and 20 RBI at the time Murray wrote this. He was on pace for 11 home runs and 70 RBI for the season in 625 at-bats.
Gonzalez did not go to Boston as a free agent...In his last five years in San Diego Gonzalez hit 167 home runs and drove in 536 runs.
In his first year in Boston he maintained that kind of production, slugging 27 homers, knocking in 117 runs and adding a career-high .338 batting average.
Gonzalez was hitting .269 with 3 home runs and 22 RBI at the time Murray wrote this. He was on pace for 11 home runs and 79 RBI in 625 at-bats.
In 2008 the Yankees finished third and out of the playoffs. Determined not to let that happen again, they decided to spend heavily in the 2008-09 free agent market. They signed the best pitcher available, CC Sabathia, and the best hitter available, Mark Teixeira.
The Yankees then won the 2009 World Series due to the help provided by CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeira.
In stops in Texas, Atlanta and Anaheim, Teixeira did not produce a steady stream of monstrous seasons, but he was the best hitter among free-agent hitters
He hit .283/.368/.533 with 153 home runs and 499 RBI during his four and a half seasons in Texas.
He hit .295/.395/.548 with 37 home runs and 134 RBI during his one full season in Atlanta.
He hit .358/.449/.632 with 13 home runs and 43 RBI during his (54 games) nearly half season with the Angels.
Tex was hitting .226 with 5 home runs and 21 RBI at the time Murray wrote this. In 575 at-bats, he is on pace to hit 19 home runs with 78 RBI.
I feel like Murray is dismissing Mark Teixeira's first six seasons in the majors a little bit. These aren't monstrous numbers, but if he continued to put those numbers up for his entire career he could have a claim for Hall of Fame consideration. I wouldn't simply proclaim him the best hitter among free-agent hitters after the 2008 season. That seems to mean he was the best that was available and not actually one of the best hitters in baseball when he became a free agent. Tex was considered a somewhat elite hitter at the time and as I have stated over and over, he is the best second-best hitter in the majors. He's not good enough to carry a team, but he has the ability to be the best second-best hitter on a team in the majors. He has struggled this past year, granted.
Whereupon he had the three most productive seasons of his career, slugging 111 home runs and knocking in 341 runs.
The use of RBI's to show good Tex is does annoy me a bit. Obviously this is a function of having runners on-base, but we could never convince Murray of this, so I'm willing to play by his rules for the time being.
A reader called attention to the intriguing development.
“What’s up with the dramatic decline in the production of 1B sluggers?” he asked. “Pujols, Teixeira, and now Gonzalez who seems to have stopped hitting HRs. Gotta be a coincidence, but still….”
Yes, it is a coincidence. Pujols/Gonzalez started off slowly this year while Teixeira has had bronchial inflammation holding him back and he is usually a slow starter anyway. There are quite a few first basemen who have not started the year off slowly. Simply because the usual suspects aren't the best hitters at the first base position doesn't mean there aren't slugging first basemen.
Bryan LaHair had 10 home runs with 21 RBI and a .310 batting average. He is on pace for 39 home runs and 81 RBI in 500 at-bats (I am adjusting the at-bats to reflect some of these first basemen have different number of at-bats. LaHair only had 129 at-bats...or 49 fewer than Pujols. Clearly, I am doing my best to guess at the number of at-bats each of these hitters will have).
Paul Konerko had 9 home runs with 25 RBI and a .381 average. He is on pace for 34 home runs and 94 RBI in 550 at-bats.
Prince Fielder has 7 home runs with 25 at-bats and a .285 average. He is on pace for 25 home runs and 91 RBI in 600 at-bats.
Joey Votto also has 7 home runs along with 28 RBI and a .295 average. He is on pace for 29 home runs and 115 RBI in 600 at-bats.
So there are three first basemen whose power seems to have declined and there are other first basemen who are still slugging the ball well. I think this is evidence there are slugging first basemen in the majors.
Investigation of the matter did not produce any smoking guns or ongoing conspiracy against wealthy, lusty-hitting first basemen. In fact, Joey Votto, the Reds’ young slugger, who was the National League most valuable player in 2010, is having another productive season, as is Carlos Lee of Houston.
(It pains me to ignore the fact Carlos Lee is not worth his six year $100 million contract and if Murray really wants to talk about players who underperform their contract Lee would on the list, but I must not get sidetracked.)
Right, so we can only conclude this is all just a coincidence and will be the end of this article. Right? We've proven nothing, except Tex/Gonzalez/Pujols are struggling to start the season. End of story, right? Wrong. There's more.
But to qualify for the Pujols-Gonzalez-Teixeira category, a first baseman apparently has to make a lot more money than Votto’s $38 million for three years
How about $225 million? That's the value of the contract extension Joey Votto signed which puts him right in the territory of Pujols/Gonzalez/Teixeira. Way to do research, Murray. Votto will make the $26.5 million (including $17 million in 2013) over the next two years. I would probably go ahead and throw him in as making a lot of money with the big three sluggers Murray is writing this article about. How did Murray miss this $225 million contract extension of Votto's? Votto belongs in the group of highly paid slugging first basemen, as does Ryan Howard. So Howard is injured, but Votto is playing well and he makes/will be making a large amount of money.
Let’s see what the Angels, the Red Sox and the Yankees are getting seven weeks into the season for the huge expenditures they made for their first basemen (through Wednesday):
| BA | OB % | SLG % | HR | RBI | ||
| Pujols | .213 | .258 | .331 | 4 | 20 | |
| Gonzalez | .269 | .333 | .406 | 3 | 22 | |
| Teixeira | .226 | .291 | .381 | 5 | 21 |
I show this graph, simply to show that Murray Chass is using OB%. Of course he calls it "OB%" and leaves off the "P" in favor of a "%" sign, but at least it is progress in some form.
Let’s look at another nouveau riche first baseman, Prince Fielder, and see if he belongs with the rest of the group. At $214 million for nine years, he certainly qualifies economically:
| BA | OB % | SLG % | HR | RBI | ||
| Fielder | .285 | .346 | .461 | 7 | 25 |
Yes, he belongs. No, he isn't struggling as much as these other three guys are struggling at the beginning of this year. He still is below his career averages though. He, like Pujols, has switched leagues.
I'm still not sure if there is a point to this article. If the point is that highly paid first basemen are struggling, this isn't entirely true. Votto just signed a huge extension and he is still playing well and Paul Konerko makes $12 million this year and he is having one of his best seasons of his career. Carlos Pena is having a typically Carlos Pena-like year with a low batting average but a high OBP. If the point of this article is sometimes slugging first basemen start the year off slow, well, I thought that was just common sense knowledge.
The title of this column is "Where Have the 1B Sluggers Gone?" and the answer at this point appears to be "nowhere." Three of the best slugging first basemen started the year off struggling, but this doesn't mean they will struggle the rest of the season, and there are other first basemen who are hitting the ball well. It just so happens the three first basemen Murray is focusing on are expensive players who play in large markets. Maybe this is shading his point of view.
Gonzalez and Teixeira have made no errors, Gonzalez in a league-leading 423 chances, Teixeira in 372 chances. Pujols has committed one error in 406 chances. Then there is Fielder, who made his sixth error Wednesday night in 360 chances.
Those six errors are significant I say and immediately dismiss them!
Before you dismiss Fielder’s errors as insignificant, know that No. 6 cost the Tigers their game with the Indians.
Vexed again by Murray Chass!
I didn't know one of those six errors cost the Tigers a game. That completely changes my opinion in regard to whatever the hell Murray is trying to prove.
The error also broke Fielder’s tie with Yonder Alonso of San Diego for the major league lead in errors committed by a first baseman.
A statistics nut would point out a player's number of errors committed in itself isn't necessarily a sign he is good or bad at fielding his position. After all, I could play shortstop and stand there never moving for a ground ball further than two feet from me and never commit an error all season. Does that mean I am great at fielding my position? It does not.
Alonso does not make as much as Fielder – he signed a five-year, $4.55 million contract with the Reds after they made him the seventh player picked in the 2008 draft. But in some ways, he is outhitting Fielder.
And in regard to the topic of this column, which if you can recall is a discussion of slugging first basemen, Fielder is outhitting Alonso. Let's not change the criteria around to try and prove your point. If you want to talk slugging first basemen, then stick to the "slugging" part of the discussion. Alonso gets on-base and hits for a high average. Historically, and even this season, and in terms of actually slugging the ball Fielder is outhitting Alonso.
(Granted, Alonso plays at Petco Park, which is not a hitter's paradise. He still had only hit 1 home run in 56 road at-bats during the season. He isn't exactly slugging the ball away from Petco Park either.)
Alonso: .300/.384/.413 with 1 home run and 13 RBI.
Fielder: .285/.346/461 with 7 home runs and 25 RBI.
All these numbers prove to me is this column was written on May 24. By the end of the year I believe Alonso will only have a higher batting average than Fielder.
I have strayed from the primary point of the column,
Which I honestly still have no clue what this primary point actually was.
the mysterious disappearance of the offense provided by Pujols, Gonzalez and Teixeira.
It's not really mysterious. Pujols has struggled in his first season in the American League, Gonzalez has started off slowly and Tex (who is a slow starter every year it seems) has had bronchial inflammation. The struggles of these three players really doesn't seem to be a trend and instead is a coincidence. Historical data for these players show all three will turn these numbers around before the end of the season.
But it may be more rewarding to follow the future of a youngster like Alonso as he continues to develop than to follow the million-dollar meltdowns of a trio of rich guys.
That's it. That's the end of the article. It can be summarized in this way:
"Mark Teixeira, Adrian Gonzalez and Albert Pujols are struggling at the beginning of this season. Is this a coincidence? I don't know and I care not to look into it, except to throw their season numbers out at you. I do know they make a lot of money and there are other first basemen who make a lot of money who aren't struggling. But these players make a lot of money and are struggling. I wonder if this is a trend? I won't look into whether this is a trend though. One highly-paid first baseman committed an error that lost his team a game and has six errors on the season. Yonder Alonso has also committed six errors. He's playing about as well as Prince Fielder. Maybe we should pay attention to him."
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
14 comments Bleacher Report Thinks Albert Pujols Has Ruined It For All Free Agents
General Managers, no matter what sport, tend to never learn. This is a widely known fact. All it takes is one stupid GM to sign a player to a lengthy and expensive contract. In leagues of 30 teams where every team is desperate to win (with a few exceptions) and more than one team bidding for a player it doesn't take much for a player to make a shit-ton of money in free agency. Well, that's all over now as we will learn today. See, General Managers have learned from Albert Pujols' struggles and we will see a list of ten players who will be affected by Pujols struggles when it comes time to be a free agent after this season.
There are two incorrect assumptions at work here:
1. Each of these players is in some way comparable to Pujols as to be affected by his struggles, which few of these players listed are in a comparable position to Pujols.
2. MLB General Managers have learned their lesson to not overpay for free agents. I doubt that lesson has been learned now since it doesn't seem to have been learned in the past. General Managers didn't learn their lesson in 2001 when the Rockies gave up a combined $172 million for the 28 year old Mike Hampton and 32 year old Denny Neagle. They haven't learned from Jayson Werth's contract given out by the Nationals, the $136 million contract given to Alfonso Soriano by the Cubs, the $126 million contract given out by the Blue Jays for Vernon Wells or the $126 million given to Barry Zito by the Giants. Why would MLB teams learn now? So what I am saying is while I wouldn't call Pujols' contract a bad contract, I don't think any of these players are going to be affected by Pujols' struggles when it comes time for free agency.
Thanks to Cory for emailing me this link. I always appreciate bad writing being emailed to me.
We can all agree that for the better part of the past decade, Albert Pujols has been the best player in baseball and that the 10-year, $254 million contract he signed with the Los Angeles Angels this past winter paid him as such.
I still say the best player in baseball over the last decade was David Eckstein. Pujols rode both of his World Series victories on the back of Eckstein's inspiring, gritty, emotional support...even if Eckstein wasn't on the team for the second World Series victory. We all know Eckstein's heart and grit was what pulled the Cardinals through to victory.
One month is certainly nowhere near enough time to pass judgement on whether his contract is a good one or not,
But it will change the way General Managers value players in free agency forever!
While Josh Hamilton is really the only impending free agent who could be mentioned in the same breath as Pujols in terms of impact on a franchise both on the field and from a marketing perspective, there are a number of players who are likely to find that the offers they receive are for fewer years, less money or both than originally expected.
So there will be offers for fewer years, less money or both of these things than the player expected. I think I understand. All of this is because of Albert Pujols' contract. What is never explained is why GM's are learning now, as opposed to learning over the past decade when plenty of other bad free agent contracts were handed out. Nevermind this, an article needs to be written and we shouldn't get too hung up whether the premise for the article makes sense with reality or not.
It seems this writer doesn't entirely understand the idea of using "comparables" to determine how much a player would be worth as a free agent. He compares outfielders, catchers, and third basemen of varying talent levels to show how Pujols contract and following struggles will affect these players. Let's start the slideshow!
Lance Berkman
Berkman is 37 years old and accepted a one year contract extension during last season. He avoided becoming a free agent and passed up the opportunity to accept a multi-year deal in order to sign a one year deal with the Cardinals. I would think Pujols' contract will have a 1.45% chance of affecting any deal Berkman gets this offseason.
They say that hindsight is 20/20, and that being the case, Lance Berkman wishes that he'd become a free agent earlier in his career, according to Dan Hayes of the North County Times. That being the case, it's fair to assume that the man known as Fat Elvis, who replaced Albert Pujols at first base in St. Louis, has his mind set on testing the waters of free agency again following this season rather than work out an extension with the Cardinals.
And of course teams will look at Albert Pujols' contract and say about Berkman, "There's no way we are giving a 37 year old over $200 million over 10 years." Because Berkman's future contract is so comparable to Pujols' contract and all. If you read the column where Berkman said he wished he had tested the waters of free agency, he was referring to when he was younger, not at his current age.
While Berkman would likely prefer a multi-year deal knowing that it's likely the last one of his career,
And you are basing this assumption on what? If Berkman preferred a multi-year deal he would have tried to sign one after last season.
Michael Bourn
Michael Bourn has nothing in common (in terms of the skill set they provide on the field) with Albert Pujols. He is represented by Scott Boras, who is known for getting top dollar for his clients in free agency and I can't imagine how Pujols' contract will affect Michael Bourn.
Considering that his game is predicated on his speed, perhaps the six-year, $106 million deal that Jose Reyes signed with the Miami Marlins would serve as a better example of why teams will be reluctant to dish out a similar deal to Michael Bourn.
And yet, you compare him to Albert Pujols and his contract. Go figure.
Earning $6.845 million this season, some have speculated that a five-year, $50 million contract extension would be a fair deal for both Bourn and the Braves.
Because we all know Scott Boras wants his clients to avoid hitting free agency as often as possible. The Braves have a 0.51% chance of signing Bourn. Bourn is going to want Jose Reyes-type money or at least five or six years at $80 million and the Braves won't pay that. Combining the fact he will only be 30 at the beginning of next season and his agent is Scott Boras, I think he will get it what he wants and his contract offer won't be affected by Albert Pujols.
While an annual salary of $10 million is probably close to accurate, it's hard to see anyone giving Bourn a five-year deal when you take Pujols and Reyes into consideration.
Not true. Reyes still got 6 years at $106 million last year from the Marlins despite other players reaching free agency and not being worth their contract in the past. I still fail to see how Pujols struggles are going to change free agency this winter.
Edwin Encarnacion
No. His contract won't be affected in any way by Albert Pujol's contract. No teams will shorten the length of a deal or reduce the amount of money offered to Edwin Encarnacion because of Albert Pujols and his contract. Agents use comparable players at his client's position to start a discussion about what a reasonable contract might be. Pujols is not a comparable to Encarnacion.
Andre Ethier
Fox Sports' Ken Rosenthal says that Ethier, who will turn 31 years old next April, is looking for a contract similar to the one Jayson Werth signed with the Washington Nationals a few years ago, in the neighborhood of $126 million over seven years.
So wouldn't Ethier be hurt by Jayson Werth's struggles more than Albert Pujols' struggles?
Josh Hamilton
Right, because if anything drags down Hamilton's value in free agency it is the value of Albert Pujols' contract and not Hamilton's history on and off-the-field. It isn't Hamilton's history of drug use, alcohol use, the scary thought he may relapse or the fact he is injured quite frequently that will drag his value down. No way. It is GM's seeing Albert Pujols struggle for one month and then becoming afraid Hamilton could struggle in the same way.
Since the 2009 season, his first in Texas in which he played 156 games, Hamilton has battled both his demons and his health, averaging 127 games played each of the past two seasons.
If anything, these injuries are why the length of Hamilton's free agent deal will be shorter or for less money than his talent level suggests he could receive.
Hamilton will be the most sought after bat on the free-agent market and is sure to receive multi-year offers from a number of teams and his annual salary will push, if not exceed, $20 million a year.
Which given the market, may be what he is worth. Boy, that Pujols deal really hurt Hamilton didn't it?
The issue with Hamilton will be the years offered—while history would dictate that a five or six-year deal was in the cards, I'd argue that with Pujols' struggles, Hamilton is more likely to receive three and four-year offers at the most.
If Pujols' struggles really affected Hamilton's free agency value wouldn't teams want to pay Hamilton less money per season rather than give him a shorter contract for $20 million per year? I guess it depends on the team, but if teams are scared of a long, expensive contract they may be willing to give Hamilton more years, but less money. Not to mention if Hamilton gets a three or four year offer at the maximum, then it is because of his injury and personal substance abuse history and may not have anything to do with Pujols' contract.
Mike Napoli
Mike Napoli is a catcher/first baseman. His value will most likely be measured against other catchers...which to add to my confusion, the author of this article admits. Yet, this article is supposed to be about Napoli's value being affected by Albert Pujols' struggles.
Napoli's agent, Brian Grieper told Heyman that "Mike Napoli is somewhere between Victor Martinez and Yadier Molina.
(shakes head sadly)
David Ortiz
With the issues surrounding the Boston Red Sox this season, two questions need to be asked in regards to 36-year-old David Ortiz.
1. How long of a contract will he be offered after this season?
2. How the hell will Albert Pujols' contract affect David Ortiz's contract offers?
His options would be limited to American League teams only considering his inability to play the field,
Albert Pujols can still play the field. Therein lies a major difference in Ortiz and Pujols and why one player's contract won't affect the other's contract.
but how many teams would be willing to invest multiple years at an annual salary around $15 million in him?
Not many now that Albert Pujols has struggled for one month after he received his large contract, that's for sure!
Nick Swisher
If it weren't for Albert Pujols, Nick Swisher would have gotten a $200 million contract.
Swisher will get a new contract from someone, but instead of a four or five-year deal in the $75-85 million range, he'll have to settle for a three-year deal around $50 million instead.
If this happens, it happens because the Yankees aren't keen enough to bring Swisher back, which would help drive up his price. Pujols has nothing to do with Swisher's contract situation.
Ichiro Suzuki
He turns 39 in October. He was never going to receive more than a three year deal. If Bleacher Report can't make a list of 10 players for a certain slideshow they are writing about, they need to shorten the number of players. I realize this would reduce their pageviews, but sometimes you have to sacrifice quantity for quality. This is a lesson Bleacher Report has never learned. Quantity always trumps quality in their world.
Shane Victorino
Victorino, who will be 32 years old before next season starts, wants a five-year deal, according to Matt Gelb of the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Of course Victorino wanted a 10 year deal prior to Albert Pujols signing with the Angels. Because MLB General Managers immediately learn from all mistakes, he now knows even though he plays a different position from Pujols and is a completely type of hitter from Pujols that he will have to settle for a five year deal.
Earning $9.5 million this season, Victorino is sure to be looking for a rather significant raise, one that he very well may receive—just not a raise that will pay him through his 37th birthday.
And why is this? Not because teams don't want to pay for a 37 year old player whose speed is one of his biggest assets or because most guys who aren't franchise players don't receive big money after the age of 37 years old. Not in the author's opinion. In the author's opinion Victorino won't get a contract that goes through his 37th birthday because Albert Pujols struggled in his first month as an Angel after signing a huge 10 year contract.
Apparently this author struggles with the idea of using comparable players to determine the market value of a free agent. Pujols isn't really comparable to nearly all of these players. He also underestimates the willingness of one MLB team to give a large contract to a free agent player. All it takes is one team to make a huge offer and that's why Pujols contract shouldn't affect the offers pending free agents will receive.
There are two incorrect assumptions at work here:
1. Each of these players is in some way comparable to Pujols as to be affected by his struggles, which few of these players listed are in a comparable position to Pujols.
2. MLB General Managers have learned their lesson to not overpay for free agents. I doubt that lesson has been learned now since it doesn't seem to have been learned in the past. General Managers didn't learn their lesson in 2001 when the Rockies gave up a combined $172 million for the 28 year old Mike Hampton and 32 year old Denny Neagle. They haven't learned from Jayson Werth's contract given out by the Nationals, the $136 million contract given to Alfonso Soriano by the Cubs, the $126 million contract given out by the Blue Jays for Vernon Wells or the $126 million given to Barry Zito by the Giants. Why would MLB teams learn now? So what I am saying is while I wouldn't call Pujols' contract a bad contract, I don't think any of these players are going to be affected by Pujols' struggles when it comes time for free agency.
Thanks to Cory for emailing me this link. I always appreciate bad writing being emailed to me.
We can all agree that for the better part of the past decade, Albert Pujols has been the best player in baseball and that the 10-year, $254 million contract he signed with the Los Angeles Angels this past winter paid him as such.
I still say the best player in baseball over the last decade was David Eckstein. Pujols rode both of his World Series victories on the back of Eckstein's inspiring, gritty, emotional support...even if Eckstein wasn't on the team for the second World Series victory. We all know Eckstein's heart and grit was what pulled the Cardinals through to victory.
One month is certainly nowhere near enough time to pass judgement on whether his contract is a good one or not,
But it will change the way General Managers value players in free agency forever!
While Josh Hamilton is really the only impending free agent who could be mentioned in the same breath as Pujols in terms of impact on a franchise both on the field and from a marketing perspective, there are a number of players who are likely to find that the offers they receive are for fewer years, less money or both than originally expected.
So there will be offers for fewer years, less money or both of these things than the player expected. I think I understand. All of this is because of Albert Pujols' contract. What is never explained is why GM's are learning now, as opposed to learning over the past decade when plenty of other bad free agent contracts were handed out. Nevermind this, an article needs to be written and we shouldn't get too hung up whether the premise for the article makes sense with reality or not.
It seems this writer doesn't entirely understand the idea of using "comparables" to determine how much a player would be worth as a free agent. He compares outfielders, catchers, and third basemen of varying talent levels to show how Pujols contract and following struggles will affect these players. Let's start the slideshow!
Lance Berkman
Berkman is 37 years old and accepted a one year contract extension during last season. He avoided becoming a free agent and passed up the opportunity to accept a multi-year deal in order to sign a one year deal with the Cardinals. I would think Pujols' contract will have a 1.45% chance of affecting any deal Berkman gets this offseason.
They say that hindsight is 20/20, and that being the case, Lance Berkman wishes that he'd become a free agent earlier in his career, according to Dan Hayes of the North County Times. That being the case, it's fair to assume that the man known as Fat Elvis, who replaced Albert Pujols at first base in St. Louis, has his mind set on testing the waters of free agency again following this season rather than work out an extension with the Cardinals.
And of course teams will look at Albert Pujols' contract and say about Berkman, "There's no way we are giving a 37 year old over $200 million over 10 years." Because Berkman's future contract is so comparable to Pujols' contract and all. If you read the column where Berkman said he wished he had tested the waters of free agency, he was referring to when he was younger, not at his current age.
While Berkman would likely prefer a multi-year deal knowing that it's likely the last one of his career,
And you are basing this assumption on what? If Berkman preferred a multi-year deal he would have tried to sign one after last season.
Michael Bourn
Michael Bourn has nothing in common (in terms of the skill set they provide on the field) with Albert Pujols. He is represented by Scott Boras, who is known for getting top dollar for his clients in free agency and I can't imagine how Pujols' contract will affect Michael Bourn.
Considering that his game is predicated on his speed, perhaps the six-year, $106 million deal that Jose Reyes signed with the Miami Marlins would serve as a better example of why teams will be reluctant to dish out a similar deal to Michael Bourn.
And yet, you compare him to Albert Pujols and his contract. Go figure.
Earning $6.845 million this season, some have speculated that a five-year, $50 million contract extension would be a fair deal for both Bourn and the Braves.
Because we all know Scott Boras wants his clients to avoid hitting free agency as often as possible. The Braves have a 0.51% chance of signing Bourn. Bourn is going to want Jose Reyes-type money or at least five or six years at $80 million and the Braves won't pay that. Combining the fact he will only be 30 at the beginning of next season and his agent is Scott Boras, I think he will get it what he wants and his contract offer won't be affected by Albert Pujols.
While an annual salary of $10 million is probably close to accurate, it's hard to see anyone giving Bourn a five-year deal when you take Pujols and Reyes into consideration.
Not true. Reyes still got 6 years at $106 million last year from the Marlins despite other players reaching free agency and not being worth their contract in the past. I still fail to see how Pujols struggles are going to change free agency this winter.
Edwin Encarnacion
No. His contract won't be affected in any way by Albert Pujol's contract. No teams will shorten the length of a deal or reduce the amount of money offered to Edwin Encarnacion because of Albert Pujols and his contract. Agents use comparable players at his client's position to start a discussion about what a reasonable contract might be. Pujols is not a comparable to Encarnacion.
Andre Ethier
Fox Sports' Ken Rosenthal says that Ethier, who will turn 31 years old next April, is looking for a contract similar to the one Jayson Werth signed with the Washington Nationals a few years ago, in the neighborhood of $126 million over seven years.
So wouldn't Ethier be hurt by Jayson Werth's struggles more than Albert Pujols' struggles?
Josh Hamilton
Right, because if anything drags down Hamilton's value in free agency it is the value of Albert Pujols' contract and not Hamilton's history on and off-the-field. It isn't Hamilton's history of drug use, alcohol use, the scary thought he may relapse or the fact he is injured quite frequently that will drag his value down. No way. It is GM's seeing Albert Pujols struggle for one month and then becoming afraid Hamilton could struggle in the same way.
Since the 2009 season, his first in Texas in which he played 156 games, Hamilton has battled both his demons and his health, averaging 127 games played each of the past two seasons.
If anything, these injuries are why the length of Hamilton's free agent deal will be shorter or for less money than his talent level suggests he could receive.
Hamilton will be the most sought after bat on the free-agent market and is sure to receive multi-year offers from a number of teams and his annual salary will push, if not exceed, $20 million a year.
Which given the market, may be what he is worth. Boy, that Pujols deal really hurt Hamilton didn't it?
The issue with Hamilton will be the years offered—while history would dictate that a five or six-year deal was in the cards, I'd argue that with Pujols' struggles, Hamilton is more likely to receive three and four-year offers at the most.
If Pujols' struggles really affected Hamilton's free agency value wouldn't teams want to pay Hamilton less money per season rather than give him a shorter contract for $20 million per year? I guess it depends on the team, but if teams are scared of a long, expensive contract they may be willing to give Hamilton more years, but less money. Not to mention if Hamilton gets a three or four year offer at the maximum, then it is because of his injury and personal substance abuse history and may not have anything to do with Pujols' contract.
Mike Napoli
Mike Napoli is a catcher/first baseman. His value will most likely be measured against other catchers...which to add to my confusion, the author of this article admits. Yet, this article is supposed to be about Napoli's value being affected by Albert Pujols' struggles.
Napoli's agent, Brian Grieper told Heyman that "Mike Napoli is somewhere between Victor Martinez and Yadier Molina.
(shakes head sadly)
David Ortiz
With the issues surrounding the Boston Red Sox this season, two questions need to be asked in regards to 36-year-old David Ortiz.
1. How long of a contract will he be offered after this season?
2. How the hell will Albert Pujols' contract affect David Ortiz's contract offers?
His options would be limited to American League teams only considering his inability to play the field,
Albert Pujols can still play the field. Therein lies a major difference in Ortiz and Pujols and why one player's contract won't affect the other's contract.
but how many teams would be willing to invest multiple years at an annual salary around $15 million in him?
Not many now that Albert Pujols has struggled for one month after he received his large contract, that's for sure!
Nick Swisher
If it weren't for Albert Pujols, Nick Swisher would have gotten a $200 million contract.
Swisher will get a new contract from someone, but instead of a four or five-year deal in the $75-85 million range, he'll have to settle for a three-year deal around $50 million instead.
If this happens, it happens because the Yankees aren't keen enough to bring Swisher back, which would help drive up his price. Pujols has nothing to do with Swisher's contract situation.
Ichiro Suzuki
He turns 39 in October. He was never going to receive more than a three year deal. If Bleacher Report can't make a list of 10 players for a certain slideshow they are writing about, they need to shorten the number of players. I realize this would reduce their pageviews, but sometimes you have to sacrifice quantity for quality. This is a lesson Bleacher Report has never learned. Quantity always trumps quality in their world.
Shane Victorino
Victorino, who will be 32 years old before next season starts, wants a five-year deal, according to Matt Gelb of the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Of course Victorino wanted a 10 year deal prior to Albert Pujols signing with the Angels. Because MLB General Managers immediately learn from all mistakes, he now knows even though he plays a different position from Pujols and is a completely type of hitter from Pujols that he will have to settle for a five year deal.
Earning $9.5 million this season, Victorino is sure to be looking for a rather significant raise, one that he very well may receive—just not a raise that will pay him through his 37th birthday.
And why is this? Not because teams don't want to pay for a 37 year old player whose speed is one of his biggest assets or because most guys who aren't franchise players don't receive big money after the age of 37 years old. Not in the author's opinion. In the author's opinion Victorino won't get a contract that goes through his 37th birthday because Albert Pujols struggled in his first month as an Angel after signing a huge 10 year contract.
Apparently this author struggles with the idea of using comparable players to determine the market value of a free agent. Pujols isn't really comparable to nearly all of these players. He also underestimates the willingness of one MLB team to give a large contract to a free agent player. All it takes is one team to make a huge offer and that's why Pujols contract shouldn't affect the offers pending free agents will receive.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
5 comments BotB Podcast #8
This week's podcast features some NBA All-Star game discussion, college sports' mascots, and the Albert Pujols saga. If you don't feel like listening to the whole thing, at least tune in at the end for the mascot debate. I think it's an important issue which everyone needs to chime in on.Wednesday, February 16, 2011
2 comments Murray Chass Relays Fay Vincent's "Great" Idea
Murray Chass has an idea. It isn't a terrible idea, but I just don't think it is a great idea. I don't want to be deceptive, so the idea that Murray Chass discusses today isn't exactly his idea, it is former MLB Commissioner Fay Vincent's idea. Murray has had enough of the players getting paid a ton of money through a huge contract. That's just ridiculous! Why not do something less ridiculous like give the player a piece of equity in the team? Or something similar to equity in the team, but make it similar to equity in the team? Why pay a guy a ton of money to do this job when you can give him a part of the team? Yes, I do realize CEO's and shareholders who are also employees with their company have a piece of that company, but the relationship between a MLB player and a team is different than that of a shareholder and a company. A MLB player has a specific skill set that is more difficult to duplicate than your typical stockholder. Therefore giving an MLB player any amount of stock or equity in a team is different than a stockholder having 1,000 shares in a company.
St. Louis position players have a Feb. 18 reporting date with the first workout the next day, but Pujols apparently plans to be early. Usually it’s the union that challenges a team’s effort to have players report earlier than the scheduled reporting date, but in this instance the team might want to tell Albert he can’t report until the scheduled date.
Yeah, just tell him when he can and can't report to training camp. That wouldn't make the contract situation any worse. I am sure Pujols will be open to the Cardinals not allowing him to report to training camp when he wants to. You know what else will help the negotiations move smoother? If the Cardinals kidnapped Pujols family and said they won't get to come home until the negotiations are done. That way, everyone can focus on the contract negotiations.
Not that the Cardinals would do anything to annoy their superstar, but telling Pujols to stay home an extra two days would give them an extra two days to try to negotiate a new contract to succeed the 8-year, $111 million deal that ends this year.
Again, not only failing to meet Pujols deadline, but refusing him to report to camp so the Cardinals can have two extra days to push Pujols' deadline back would probably have angered him a bit.
That 10-year, $300 million proposal has been mentioned as Pujols’ price, but so have 5 years and $250 million. I heard that figure from someone who heard it from a fellow who lives in St. Louis and is well-connected with the team’s owners.
I hope Murray is being sarcastic when he says he heard the 5 year $250 million figure from a guy who lives in St. Louis and is well-connected with the team's owners. I am afraid he is being very serious. This makes Selena Roberts' "anonymous sources" which she based an entire book about Alex Rodriguez upon look good in comparison.
We are talking here about ungodly amounts of money, more than entire offices or residential blocks of people earn in their lifetimes. When Player X rejects $18 million a year and says he wants $20 million, we ask why does he need the extra $2 million? Isn’t $18 million enough?
When a team is willing to pay a player $18 million per year, why do they have to balk at $20 million per year? Is the extra $2 million per year really going to push them over the edge into bankruptcy?
This reasoning can go both ways.
Taking all of this into account plus the fact that he just turned 31 last month, would you give Pujols $30 million a year for 10 years, would you give him $50 million a year for 5 years or would you give him some other outrageous amount of money?
It is not my money, but I would pretty much give Albert Pujols whatever amount of money he wanted. Ok, maybe I wouldn't go that far, but he is worth a ton to the Cardinals in marketing alone. Even when you don't factor in how well he plays baseball, he means a lot to the Cardinals simply by being on the roster and in the community. So while it is ridiculous that any athlete or person would be worth that much money...Pujols comparably could very well be worth that much money to a team in terms of revenue and marketing.
In relation to actual on the field production, maybe not so much, but that's a different story. I would think the Cardinals could improve their team by taking the $50 million per year they would give Pujols and splitting it among four or five players to make the team better all around. So yes, in terms of marketing and the intangible aspects of having Pujols on the Cardinals, he is worth it.
Fay Vincent wouldn’t, and he doesn’t think Pujols should take that kind of money. The former baseball commissioner has an idea about player salaries that makes a lot of economic sense for both clubs and players but is probably too revolutionary to be accepted.
Because nothing screams ideas that are "too revolutionary to be accepted" like an idea that is championed by Murray Chass. Murray isn't comfortable using different and new-fangled statistics to measure a player's performance, but he is all about thinking outside the box when it comes to paying a player. Using VORP to measure a player's performance is stupid, while giving a player in the age of free agency a piece of the team, or the equivalent, is brilliant.
Instead of paying a Pujols $30 million or $50 million a year, Vincent proposes paying the player a smaller salary and giving him equity in the club to make up the rest of his pay.
On its face, this really isn't a terrible idea. In fact, I have read Pujols camp asked for exactly this from the Cardinals. So in reality this could be a possibility, but practically I am not sure this would work. The problem is the logistics of this. I find four immediate major problems with this idea:
1. Baseball players buy nice shit and they want money to support the ability to buy nice shit. A smaller salary doesn't pay the mortgage as well. MLB players aren't looking to put money away for retirement in the future and pinching costs right now. They are retiring AND spending money right now.
2. When a player gets traded, he will have to divest himself from the team, which means he will be invested with the team still as he is about to be traded. Say a franchise is suffering major financial problems and the player's equity in the team isn't worth much...how happy will that player be when he gets traded to another team, a team he doesn't have equity in and is only receiving a small salary? Not only does that player have to cash out his equity in his original team because he was traded, if the team is having financial problems then he may not have made as much money as he wanted when he cashes out his equity. So the player is stuck on a new team with a small salary (and potentially no equity in that team) and paying capital gains on a smaller amount of money than he would like.
3. A player having equity in his team would create a whole new problem around trading a player from that player's perspective. The player has to have a contract, so when his contract runs out it gives the team major leverage. That player can't leave the team in free agency and not sell his equity in the team, so he has more incentive to re-sign with his original team. Players don't like to give away leverage.
4. It will create a whole new era of players telling the owners what to do with the organization. That's not the specialty of these players. Rather than be employees of the organization, these players are employees/owners, which is a good idea in companies with 10,000 employees, but not a good idea when an employee has a specialized skill set that can't be duplicated by more than 25 other people in the world...or duplicated by 2-3 other players when it comes to Albert Pujols.
In brief, Vincent believes players would be ahead of the game financially because by having a piece of the club or something similar to it, when a player sold his share he would pay capital gains tax at a much lower rate than he has to pay in income tax on his salary. The club wouldn’t be affected either way, and it wouldn’t have to pay out as much money during the life of the contract.
Players want money NOW though. They don't want to wait to get their money based on how well their team is run. It does make sense on paper to give a player a piece of the club, but logistically it creates a ton of problems in the era of free agency.
Vincent said the Miami Heat’s signing last year of LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade prompted him to think about the idea.
“Dustin Hoffman owns a piece of Tootsie, and it’s an enormously valuable asset. When he sells it, he sells it on a capital gains basis. He’s been paid the ordinary income for his time working on the movie and has an asset and when he sells it the tax rate is 15 percent, going to 20.”
Right, and again this seems to make sense, but Dustin Hoffman can't get traded to another movie where he would be forced to divest himself of this asset. An actor can get paid $2 million for a movie 2-3 times a year and get a percentage of the movie's take, but an MLB player, like Albert Pujols, won't stand for only making $2 million or $6 million per year.
“Put yourself in the position of Albert Pujols,” he said. “His contract is up. The Cardinals are going to want him to stay. I am Mr. Pujols and I say I’d like to stay and the cash I would want is in the range of $35 million, something north of 30, which is what Mr. Rodriguez and what other players of my ilk are going to be getting.
Maybe in Albert Pujols' situation, taking a part of the Cardinals organization is a good idea. He seems like a good guy and seems pretty savvy. His situation is the exception to the rule. The rule being that a player having a piece of the team creates a situation where that player has a say over the personnel and financial moves in the team and generally have the employee be such a large part of the management of the team may not be a good idea. It creates a whole new set of issues with that player. Even if this idea caught on, I can imagine other issues with why this wouldn't work. Can you imagine the fun Scott Boras would have with this?
Say the Cardinals sign Albert Pujols to a 8 year $100 million contract with a 5% interest in the team. Adam Wainwright comes up for free agency in a couple of years. They want to keep him, so they make him an offer of 4 years $65 million. He rejects it because he wants 5 years $40 million and a 3% interest in the team. The Cardinals don't want to give out more of an interest in the team, so they reject that, but Wainwright sticks to his guns and says he isn't going to sign a contract unless he can have a stake in the team. That's quite a problem.
So even if this was a good idea, which it isn't, there are still some problems with it working effectively if the player accepts this new idea. So that is the problem if the owner actually gives the player a stake in the team, which could possibly not happen. So Vincent has another suggestion...
“Anyone who is sophisticated will say the trick to generating wealth is to convert ordinary income into capital gains,” the former commissioner said. He then suggested a scenario with Pujols and the Cardinals, with Pujols doing all of the talking:
“I’d like 10 percent of the Cardinals. You might not want to give me the ownership, but you give me a piece of paper in which my economic interest is measured as if I owned 10 percent of the Cardinals so down the road when I cash it in, the difference between the value you put on it today and the value you put on it 30 years from now, when I’m an older man, that value will be taxed at capital gains rate, at a preferred rate.”
Again, the issue is going to be this is money the player has essentially invested in the team. So this player is going to feel as if he has a right for as long as he owns this 10% to give his input on the Cardinals and the team...even after he retires.
I don't know if I understand the position of Vincent's that the club wouldn't be affected if they did this. At some point, they will have to pay the player his percentage of what he "owns" in the team. The player will essentially still be a partner in the business, and if this turns out to be a good idea, other players will want the same thing.
However, an interested participant in the Vincent panel discussion was Michael Weiner, head of the players union.
“Major league rules permit a player to own a piece of the club for which he plays, but if he’s traded he has to divest himself of that interest. It happens automatically.”
Which goes back to my original disagreement with this idea. Let's pretend the Cardinals give Pujols 5% interest in the team plus whatever "smaller" contract is agreed upon, so what happens if the Cardinals start struggling? Will they trade him? Pujols would want to have a full no-trade clause. Pujols isn't going to want to get traded, but the Cardinals are going to want to trade him because he has an affordable contract and they can get his interest in the team off the books as well.
Throw in the fact a guy like Pujols would bring in quite a haul of prospects and think of the interest he would drum up. Every team would be throwing great packages at the Cardinals to get Pujols, but Pujols will want a new contract if he gets traded because his current contract, without the interest in the Cardinals, no longer reflects his true value. So the Cardinals would have every incentive to trade Pujols, but they would be stuck with a guy who is on the team and unhappy with even being on the trade block, but even more unhappy his interest in the team will be divested because he is getting traded. It would make the situation of trying to trade Pujols become more of a nightmare than it already would be.
All right then, baseball has had player-managers; will Albert Pujols become a player-owner?
Maybe, perhaps, a small owner of the team. He also won't be giving up a lot of his salary for this to happen. Why not? Because it just doesn't seem like a great idea nor realistic for either Pujols or the Cardinals. Most players want money now and may not want equity in a team.
St. Louis position players have a Feb. 18 reporting date with the first workout the next day, but Pujols apparently plans to be early. Usually it’s the union that challenges a team’s effort to have players report earlier than the scheduled reporting date, but in this instance the team might want to tell Albert he can’t report until the scheduled date.
Yeah, just tell him when he can and can't report to training camp. That wouldn't make the contract situation any worse. I am sure Pujols will be open to the Cardinals not allowing him to report to training camp when he wants to. You know what else will help the negotiations move smoother? If the Cardinals kidnapped Pujols family and said they won't get to come home until the negotiations are done. That way, everyone can focus on the contract negotiations.
Not that the Cardinals would do anything to annoy their superstar, but telling Pujols to stay home an extra two days would give them an extra two days to try to negotiate a new contract to succeed the 8-year, $111 million deal that ends this year.
Again, not only failing to meet Pujols deadline, but refusing him to report to camp so the Cardinals can have two extra days to push Pujols' deadline back would probably have angered him a bit.
That 10-year, $300 million proposal has been mentioned as Pujols’ price, but so have 5 years and $250 million. I heard that figure from someone who heard it from a fellow who lives in St. Louis and is well-connected with the team’s owners.
I hope Murray is being sarcastic when he says he heard the 5 year $250 million figure from a guy who lives in St. Louis and is well-connected with the team's owners. I am afraid he is being very serious. This makes Selena Roberts' "anonymous sources" which she based an entire book about Alex Rodriguez upon look good in comparison.
We are talking here about ungodly amounts of money, more than entire offices or residential blocks of people earn in their lifetimes. When Player X rejects $18 million a year and says he wants $20 million, we ask why does he need the extra $2 million? Isn’t $18 million enough?
When a team is willing to pay a player $18 million per year, why do they have to balk at $20 million per year? Is the extra $2 million per year really going to push them over the edge into bankruptcy?
This reasoning can go both ways.
Taking all of this into account plus the fact that he just turned 31 last month, would you give Pujols $30 million a year for 10 years, would you give him $50 million a year for 5 years or would you give him some other outrageous amount of money?
It is not my money, but I would pretty much give Albert Pujols whatever amount of money he wanted. Ok, maybe I wouldn't go that far, but he is worth a ton to the Cardinals in marketing alone. Even when you don't factor in how well he plays baseball, he means a lot to the Cardinals simply by being on the roster and in the community. So while it is ridiculous that any athlete or person would be worth that much money...Pujols comparably could very well be worth that much money to a team in terms of revenue and marketing.
In relation to actual on the field production, maybe not so much, but that's a different story. I would think the Cardinals could improve their team by taking the $50 million per year they would give Pujols and splitting it among four or five players to make the team better all around. So yes, in terms of marketing and the intangible aspects of having Pujols on the Cardinals, he is worth it.
Fay Vincent wouldn’t, and he doesn’t think Pujols should take that kind of money. The former baseball commissioner has an idea about player salaries that makes a lot of economic sense for both clubs and players but is probably too revolutionary to be accepted.
Because nothing screams ideas that are "too revolutionary to be accepted" like an idea that is championed by Murray Chass. Murray isn't comfortable using different and new-fangled statistics to measure a player's performance, but he is all about thinking outside the box when it comes to paying a player. Using VORP to measure a player's performance is stupid, while giving a player in the age of free agency a piece of the team, or the equivalent, is brilliant.
Instead of paying a Pujols $30 million or $50 million a year, Vincent proposes paying the player a smaller salary and giving him equity in the club to make up the rest of his pay.
On its face, this really isn't a terrible idea. In fact, I have read Pujols camp asked for exactly this from the Cardinals. So in reality this could be a possibility, but practically I am not sure this would work. The problem is the logistics of this. I find four immediate major problems with this idea:
1. Baseball players buy nice shit and they want money to support the ability to buy nice shit. A smaller salary doesn't pay the mortgage as well. MLB players aren't looking to put money away for retirement in the future and pinching costs right now. They are retiring AND spending money right now.
2. When a player gets traded, he will have to divest himself from the team, which means he will be invested with the team still as he is about to be traded. Say a franchise is suffering major financial problems and the player's equity in the team isn't worth much...how happy will that player be when he gets traded to another team, a team he doesn't have equity in and is only receiving a small salary? Not only does that player have to cash out his equity in his original team because he was traded, if the team is having financial problems then he may not have made as much money as he wanted when he cashes out his equity. So the player is stuck on a new team with a small salary (and potentially no equity in that team) and paying capital gains on a smaller amount of money than he would like.
3. A player having equity in his team would create a whole new problem around trading a player from that player's perspective. The player has to have a contract, so when his contract runs out it gives the team major leverage. That player can't leave the team in free agency and not sell his equity in the team, so he has more incentive to re-sign with his original team. Players don't like to give away leverage.
4. It will create a whole new era of players telling the owners what to do with the organization. That's not the specialty of these players. Rather than be employees of the organization, these players are employees/owners, which is a good idea in companies with 10,000 employees, but not a good idea when an employee has a specialized skill set that can't be duplicated by more than 25 other people in the world...or duplicated by 2-3 other players when it comes to Albert Pujols.
In brief, Vincent believes players would be ahead of the game financially because by having a piece of the club or something similar to it, when a player sold his share he would pay capital gains tax at a much lower rate than he has to pay in income tax on his salary. The club wouldn’t be affected either way, and it wouldn’t have to pay out as much money during the life of the contract.
Players want money NOW though. They don't want to wait to get their money based on how well their team is run. It does make sense on paper to give a player a piece of the club, but logistically it creates a ton of problems in the era of free agency.
Vincent said the Miami Heat’s signing last year of LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade prompted him to think about the idea.
“I saw three basketball players get together and make a terrific deal for themselves away from the union,” Vincent said. “What didn’t they do? They didn’t end up with a piece of ownership of the team. In any other business that would be remarkable.”
James, Bosh, and Wade didn't need a piece of the Heat. They already have a piece of the Heat. Does Fay Vincent really think the Heat management won't listen to what James, Wade, and Bosh want? Please. The Cavs spent 7 years trying to keep LeBron happy. Bosh and Wade were brought to Miami to make Wade happy. They don't need the headache of having a piece of the team when they already have an unspoken piece simply by being doing their jobs well.“Dustin Hoffman owns a piece of Tootsie, and it’s an enormously valuable asset. When he sells it, he sells it on a capital gains basis. He’s been paid the ordinary income for his time working on the movie and has an asset and when he sells it the tax rate is 15 percent, going to 20.”
Right, and again this seems to make sense, but Dustin Hoffman can't get traded to another movie where he would be forced to divest himself of this asset. An actor can get paid $2 million for a movie 2-3 times a year and get a percentage of the movie's take, but an MLB player, like Albert Pujols, won't stand for only making $2 million or $6 million per year.
“Put yourself in the position of Albert Pujols,” he said. “His contract is up. The Cardinals are going to want him to stay. I am Mr. Pujols and I say I’d like to stay and the cash I would want is in the range of $35 million, something north of 30, which is what Mr. Rodriguez and what other players of my ilk are going to be getting.
Maybe in Albert Pujols' situation, taking a part of the Cardinals organization is a good idea. He seems like a good guy and seems pretty savvy. His situation is the exception to the rule. The rule being that a player having a piece of the team creates a situation where that player has a say over the personnel and financial moves in the team and generally have the employee be such a large part of the management of the team may not be a good idea. It creates a whole new set of issues with that player. Even if this idea caught on, I can imagine other issues with why this wouldn't work. Can you imagine the fun Scott Boras would have with this?
Say the Cardinals sign Albert Pujols to a 8 year $100 million contract with a 5% interest in the team. Adam Wainwright comes up for free agency in a couple of years. They want to keep him, so they make him an offer of 4 years $65 million. He rejects it because he wants 5 years $40 million and a 3% interest in the team. The Cardinals don't want to give out more of an interest in the team, so they reject that, but Wainwright sticks to his guns and says he isn't going to sign a contract unless he can have a stake in the team. That's quite a problem.
So even if this was a good idea, which it isn't, there are still some problems with it working effectively if the player accepts this new idea. So that is the problem if the owner actually gives the player a stake in the team, which could possibly not happen. So Vincent has another suggestion...
“Anyone who is sophisticated will say the trick to generating wealth is to convert ordinary income into capital gains,” the former commissioner said. He then suggested a scenario with Pujols and the Cardinals, with Pujols doing all of the talking:
“I’d like 10 percent of the Cardinals. You might not want to give me the ownership, but you give me a piece of paper in which my economic interest is measured as if I owned 10 percent of the Cardinals so down the road when I cash it in, the difference between the value you put on it today and the value you put on it 30 years from now, when I’m an older man, that value will be taxed at capital gains rate, at a preferred rate.”
Again, the issue is going to be this is money the player has essentially invested in the team. So this player is going to feel as if he has a right for as long as he owns this 10% to give his input on the Cardinals and the team...even after he retires.
I don't know if I understand the position of Vincent's that the club wouldn't be affected if they did this. At some point, they will have to pay the player his percentage of what he "owns" in the team. The player will essentially still be a partner in the business, and if this turns out to be a good idea, other players will want the same thing.
However, an interested participant in the Vincent panel discussion was Michael Weiner, head of the players union.
“Traditionally it’s not in the union’s portfolio to help players with their money after they get it,” Weiner said. “It doesn’t mean it has to stay that way.
I'm just eyeballing this point, but another issue this would bring up is which side would this put a player on in a union/owner disagreement? The player is a member of the union, but also has a few reasons to side with the owners as well if he has any type of equity, even without some form of actual ownership, in a team. That could create quite a conflict for the player.“Major league rules permit a player to own a piece of the club for which he plays, but if he’s traded he has to divest himself of that interest. It happens automatically.”
Which goes back to my original disagreement with this idea. Let's pretend the Cardinals give Pujols 5% interest in the team plus whatever "smaller" contract is agreed upon, so what happens if the Cardinals start struggling? Will they trade him? Pujols would want to have a full no-trade clause. Pujols isn't going to want to get traded, but the Cardinals are going to want to trade him because he has an affordable contract and they can get his interest in the team off the books as well.
Throw in the fact a guy like Pujols would bring in quite a haul of prospects and think of the interest he would drum up. Every team would be throwing great packages at the Cardinals to get Pujols, but Pujols will want a new contract if he gets traded because his current contract, without the interest in the Cardinals, no longer reflects his true value. So the Cardinals would have every incentive to trade Pujols, but they would be stuck with a guy who is on the team and unhappy with even being on the trade block, but even more unhappy his interest in the team will be divested because he is getting traded. It would make the situation of trying to trade Pujols become more of a nightmare than it already would be.
All right then, baseball has had player-managers; will Albert Pujols become a player-owner?
Maybe, perhaps, a small owner of the team. He also won't be giving up a lot of his salary for this to happen. Why not? Because it just doesn't seem like a great idea nor realistic for either Pujols or the Cardinals. Most players want money now and may not want equity in a team.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
6 comments Ted Keith Fail
Hi all, sorry I haven't posted for a while and, I won't lie to you, I may not post for a while either. Just a quick stop today to bring you this article from Ted Keith. It's a power rankings forr Sports Illustrated and I spotted this.
Somebody throw a bucket of ice water on the Cardinals already because they are on fire. They put together the best winning percentage in baseball in August (.769) and increased their lead in the NL Central from a half-game at the start of the month to 10 1/2 by the end of the month. The biggest reason has been their phenomenal pitching; Cards hurlers posted a big-league best 3.06 ERA for August. That would make pitching coach Dave Duncan as much of an MVP for this team as Albert Pujols.
No.
Somebody throw a bucket of ice water on the Cardinals already because they are on fire. They put together the best winning percentage in baseball in August (.769) and increased their lead in the NL Central from a half-game at the start of the month to 10 1/2 by the end of the month. The biggest reason has been their phenomenal pitching; Cards hurlers posted a big-league best 3.06 ERA for August. That would make pitching coach Dave Duncan as much of an MVP for this team as Albert Pujols.
No.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
5 comments Hat Guy Ignore His Typographical Errors And His Own Idiocy Will Forging On Into Wrongness
Before anyone reads what I write today, I want everyone to know that I do have a bias in what I am writing about. I don't like the Home Run Derby. It is fun for the first round, that much I can handle, but after that it becomes tedious and absolutely boring to me. It doesn't even bother me that half the time the big sluggers in MLB don't bother to show up for it or participate in it. What does bother me is the rest of the competition. Here, in list form of course, is what does bother me about the Home Run Derby:
1. It's boring. Yes, it truly is boring. I am not at the game, I am not getting an opportunity to potentially catch a fly ball and there is only so many times I can watch a baseball being thrown 60 MPH get hit a long distance. It's exactly like batting practice. Hell it IS batting practice. I don't show up early for a game to watch batting practice, so I have no interest in watching the Home Run Derby. It doesn't matter to me the game's "best" "sluggers" are there and Mikey and Mindy Palowack are going to win a free house if a sign gets hit by a baseball. Sure, it is neat for about 30 minutes to watch the ball get hit very far, after that it loses my interest incredibly quickly. After the first round, I am over it.
2. It takes incredibly too long. I flipped over to ESPN in the vain attempt to see if they were showing anything interesting at 10:30pm and the final round had not started yet. It was getting ready to start and it was between two players that I did not care about because I realized the HRD started at 8pm and was not over yet. It was 10:30pm. There is no one in this world that can complain baseball games last too long if this person watches the entire HRD. There are only 8 people and 3 rounds in the HRD and it still lasts going on 3 hours. 3 freaking hours! I could watch any of the Godfather movies or read one of my posts in that time.
3. Chris Berman. I can't hear him say "back, back, back" at any point again in the future. When it is an actual baseball game, sure I can handle it because I don't watch games he calls and you never know when a home run may get hit, but this is the freaking HRD where there will be absolutely tons of home runs hit. We don't need that tired schtick every time. We also get Joe Morgan in the booth as well and I turned over to ESPN long enough to see Steve Phillips was "calling" the HRD as well. When ESPN has the opportunity to pair up two of their worst analysts and an announcer who literally has not changed his schtick in 20 years why wouldn't they do it? And why would I watch?
4. The format stinks. This could fix #2. The players get to choose their own "pitcher" so I think the players should have to swing at every pitch that "pitcher" throws. If it is off, well tough shit, you chose the guy. I don't want to wait around all night watching these "sluggers" cherry pick the best pitches to hit. It ruins the flow and just generally annoys me. It's wonderful to watch Josh Hamilton hit a home run when the ball is down the middle of the plate, but what kind of slugger is he when the pitch is not perfect? I know that's what the fans want to see, home runs, but it just slows the whole thing down for me and ruins the flow when a hitter hits a home run and then takes 4 pitches waiting for the perfect one. This is the same reason I don't watch the Slam Dunk Contest during the NBA All-Star Game weekend. If you can't get a dunk on the second try, sit down, you shouldn't be in the competition anyway.
I am sure halfway through writing this I am going to think of more reasons I don't like the Home Run Derby. Mike Celizic likes the Home Run Derby, in fact, he seems to think it cures all the ails that Major League Baseball has including the steroid problem. As you have read or skimmed through above, I disagree. Have I ever mentioned that I find him to be an idiot?
It’s the only day on baseball’s calendar when no matter how many home runs fly ridiculously long distances, you’ll never hear anyone talking about steroids.
Celizic wrote this on Sunday and the article was posted Sunday night and everyone most likely read it on Monday...the same day as the Home Run Derby. So basically by writing this article, Celizic has negated his opening sentence because he partially talks about steroids.
For that reason alone, Home Run Derby deserves its reputation as the best part of the All-Star break.
Am I the only one that doesn't like the Home Run Derby? It's like watching paint dry for me. I have watched it before but only because there is nothing else on and generally I end up changing the channel several times about thirty minutes to an hour into the "contest."
There is nothing great about the All-Star break in my mind. A boring contest and an exhibition game are all that go on. I miss real baseball, I miss seeing my favorite team lose baseball games to teams they should beat, and then complaining to everyone about it.
I might have missed a snide column after some bygone derby, but I can’t recall ever seeing anyone complain the next day that the winner might have been cheating. Not when Mark McGwire participated or when Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi won it.
Here's another reason I hate the Home Run Derby...I hate steroids and their effect on baseball. Through the years the HRD has become a contest that is like a Who's Who of users in the Steroid Era. I would expect the players to be able to hit a baseball far when they are taking batting practice, especially if they are on some sort of PED.
The reason no one complained the winner may have been cheating is because many times no one knew the winner was using steroids when they won the Home Run Derby. Just because it is a pointless contest that has no bearing on the Major League Baseball season doesn't mean I am going to ignore the fact many of the players participating were cheaters. Let's look at the Who's Who of steroid users and suspected users, but have not been caught yet, who participated in the HRD (I am only going back 15 years to 1994):
1994- Albert Belle, Jeff Bagwell, Mike Piazza
1995- Belle, Manny Ramirez, Sammy Sosa
1996- Mark McGwire, Brady Anderson, Barry Bonds, Jeff Bagwell, Sammy Sosa
1997- McGwire, Anderson, Bagwell
1998- Rafael Palmeiro, Alex Rodriguez, McGwire, Javy Lopez, Vinny Castilla
1999- McGwire, Bagwell, Sosa
2000- Sosa, Ivan Rodriguez
2001-Luiz Gonzalez, Sosa, Jason Giambi, Bonds, Bret Boone, A. Rodriguez, Troy Glaus
2002- Giambi, Sosa, Bonds, I. Rodriguez
2003- Giambi, Gary Sheffield, Boone
2004- Miguel Tejada, Palmeiro, Sosa, Bonds
2005- I. Rodriguez
2006- Tejada, Glaus
2007- None
2008- None
2009- None
I am sure there is someone in the last 3 years who participated who will be busted for steroids at some point and I even left some names that I am personally suspicious of but there is not too much proof of steroid use. Guys like Lance Berkman and Jim Thome who are more guilty by association if anything, so I would not include them.
Hat Guy's point about how we all forget about steroids during the HRD may be entirely true but the HRD is the one time we should be paying attention to who is participating because a good majority of those guys in the past have been caught using steroids. For me, the HRD in the past is like a steroid exhibition, and yes I realize it is an exhibition, but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth to watch these guys hit home runs when they are using PEDs. The only person in the 2001 contest who hasn't been busted or suspected yet is Todd Helton.
I know the HRD is an exhibition but I also think it has in the past been a display for steroid users to show off what the drugs can do for them. So Celizic is wrong, I will complain about the past winners were on steroids. If these writers and columnists are going to get on their high horse and complain Manny Ramirez, Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa and A-Rod have used steroids so they should be out of the Hall of Fame, then they should also have a problem with their past participation in the HRD and not celebrate the event, but hold it in suspicion. Just because it is an exhibition, the same public health concerns the columnists have don't go away, they just get conveniently ignored so everyone can watch baseballs get hit very far.
The subject wasn't even whispered last year when Josh Hamilton lit up Yankee Stadium with 28 homers in the first round and Justin Mourneau beat him in the finals.
That's because the story was Hamilton coming back from being a druggie, which got mentioned 8,000 times, as if getting addicted to drugs and ruining you and your family's life, then finally getting back on track makes him a stronger and better human being than Justin Morneau (can Hat Guy not find the spell check for Morneau's last name?) or anyone else. Inspiring? Yes, it is inspiring and I am glad he turned his life around, but he almost ruined his and his family's life due to his addiction. He had an obligation to everyone who stood by him to try and beat his drug use and addiction problems. He can be inspirational to many, but to hear how everyone held him so high was a little vomit inducing after a while. I guess Morneau sucks as an inspirational athlete because he was never addicted to any type of drug...that and he is from Canada and plays for the Twins, where apparently there is no media.
Home runs hit during the season count in the game’s sacred record books. But dingers hit in HRD don’t count for anything other than bragging rights.
Obviously, but don't be absolutely blind to the fact that despite the home runs not counting in the record books, it is an exhibition display of what PEDs can do for baseball players. At least it has been in the past. The HRD doesn't put away the steroid and PED problems for the night, it makes me remember baseball having those problems and the HRD in the past has been a perfect example of the media turning a blind eye so they can be entertained...as they have done so many times before.
The object is to hit as many out as possible.
Thank you for clearing that up. I thought the point was to induce a mass suicide through hearing Chris Berman speak for over two hours.
So why would anyone even think about steroids?
Because about half of the participants in the past have been busted or are seriously suspected of using steroids. That's why. You are stupid if you can't see the connection between past participants and steroids.
Say I held a fundraiser every year to fund research for prostate cancer and I got different donors and people to speak at the fundraiser. What if it turns out that many of the speakers at the fundraiser were trafficking illegal narcotics and almost 50% of the money that was raised came from people who had some connection to organized crime? Could I try to get others to participate in the future by saying, "It's just a fundraiser, we raised good money for prostate cancer. Ignore the fact the results in the past came from illegal sources, why would you even worry about donating money? You won't be suspected!"
I am sure I could get some money but most people are going to be reluctant to attend or contribute because of the past affiliations. They aren't just going to ignore the past because it "doesn't count" because it is for charity. For me, the HRD is a similar thing. Celizic can't ignore the history of the participants in the HRD and pretend it is a night where steroids don't matter.
This is part of the hypocrisy of the media. These idiots have really no problem with steroid use in baseball. They don't like to see baseball records messed with and they want an opportunity to throw an athlete under the bus or rip him a new asshole in a column when he is caught using any PED. That's what they enjoy. In a situation where the records aren't going to be messed up, they have no problem with steroids and could care less about the sanctity of the game or what message this sends to kids. As if kids watching Barry Bonds in the HRD aren't going to be as influenced as they are when they watch him during a regular season baseball game. As much as Mike Celizic would like to, you can't ignore the past.
The totals don’t go into the record books. They don’t occupy a special niche in Cooperstown. They don’t even result in huge new contracts for undeserving cheaters
It's doesn't count so it doesn't matter! This is a wonderful example of MSM and how they have been culpable and willing to turn a blind eye to steroid use. I don't believe anyone in this year's Derby is using and I am a little questionable on the actual effects of steroids on a person, but if the MSM is going to hand A-Rod his ass for using PEDs, they can't willingly turn a blind eye to the same possible PED use in situations where it doesn't count.
It’s a night to suspend disbelief, an that’s what we d.
Seriously, asshole. Get an editor. Be a professional, not a lousy writer with a hat on. How do you have typographical errors this bad in a column? You almost have to try and make them this bad.
Despite all the agonizing about Manny’s suspension and the pre-season angst about Alex Rodriguez’ dalliance with performance-enhancers, the season has been clear of rumors and suspicion.
Other than two of the best hitters of this generation and sure fire Hall of Fame players being caught as PED users, this season has been pretty quiet on the steroid front.
Having a testing policy will do that for you, and Manny’s suspension actually helped the game’s credibility. Once he was forced to take a 50-game unpaid sabbatical, we could no longer issue blind accusations about how baseball must be protecting its superstars and the testing program must be inadequate.
Fortunately, the media is still around to do what they always have and protect the superstars...until they get caught using PEDs at which point they recommend the death penalty for those users...unless it is an exhibition, in which case it doesn't count, so carry on!
The program probably is inadequate, if only because all such programs are.
Take it from Mike Celizic. All programs are inadequate. His Hat-Wearers Rehabilitation Program was a complete failure.
This year, all that really matters is that Albert Pujols, who is on a pace to break Roger Maris’ 61-home run non-juiced record, will be going for the fences in front of his hometown fans in America’s best baseball city, St. Louis.
I don't think Pujols is on steroids. Of course neither does Jay Mariotti and he wrote an entire article about it today.
Let's do an article in an article and quote Mr. Mariotti about Pujols. Let's see if we have heard this stuff before in from a sportswriter in concern with a player not being a PED user. I will ruin it before we start, we have heard ALL of this type stuff before in the form of a denial or reason why said player is not using PEDs.
But I like how Pujols has spent his finest personal hour on a proactive mission to shoot down the reckless but unavoidable innuendo.
Denials. Those are a first. No steroid user has ever denied it initially...clearly this one denial is enough to convince Mariotti Pujols has never used PEDs.
His training regimen is too dedicated.
Much like A-Rod, Gary Sheffield and Barry Bonds' workout was grueling huh?
His past is too humble.
Much like Sammy Sosa was humble?
His soul, on and off the field, is too grounded. His diet involves too much chicken and rice.
The double whammy! McGwire loved his kid so much and Bonds never let anything in his body that could hurt him.
His monstrous numbers haven't wavered since testing kicked in six years ago.
Neither did Manny or A-Rod's.
And his words are too powerful -- attacking suspicious whisperers and bloggers the way he crushes pitches, volunteering that he passed six drug tests last year and vowing to take a test every day if necessary.
Like Palmeiro pointing at a Congressman denying steroid use or like Sammy Sosa volunteered to take tests until he was called on it by Rick Reilly (of all people)?
If he fails, he says he'll return the entirety of his career earnings with the Cardinals, tens of millions of dollars over nine seasons.
I believe he will sell his houses and cars. I sure do believe that.
"If anybody can do it, Albert can," Milwaukee's Ryan Braun said. "I just marvel at his consistency. I think he's the best player in baseball. He's like Barry Bonds in the regard that he often only sees one pitch to really hit, and you see what he does with it."
What an interesting comparison.
I am not saying Pujols is on steroids and I don't believe he has used in the past either, there is no proof, but I still am going to remain suspicious especially when I have heard all the reasoning why a player is innocent before and it turned out to all be lies. Not to mention the comparisons to past steroid users and their accomplishments are mentioned by Ryan Braun in reference to Pujols makes me nervous. I hate it more than anyone, trust me.
Ok, back to Hat Guy and how Pujols is all that matters...
Actually that was it, he just kind of threw that out there and then ignored why Albert Pujols is all that matters.
As long as you had a couple big names in the lineup, it was actually more fun watching a guy like Hamilton come out of nowhere and steal the show.
If you follow baseball on a regular basis...did he come out of nowhere? He was the #1 pick in 1999. This is how I feel about Adrian Gonzalez as well. He is finally getting some publicity but he was the #1 pick in 2000. He should be a good hitter when drafted at that spot and those who follow baseball know who he is.
The players usually say that HRD is exhausting and trying to hit home runs for the contest can screw up their swings for months.
A format tweak or two might help. I’d make the first round nine outs instead of 10 — nine is a baseball number and 10 is a Bo Derek number.
What the hell does this mean? How is one less out going to make the participants any less tired? One less out per round, there's the fix, that should give them plenty of rest. That's three full extra outs of rest.
I’d also have the hitters rotate in three-out turns. That may ruin continuity, but it would fight fatigue.
Another great idea. Make a slow event even slower.
The players already fight fatigue by taking 4 pitches in between each swing.
And when the last hitter passes everyone else, let the guy sit down and move on to the second round.
Finally, a decent idea.
No matter how they run it, the show is pure fun for everyone, from the kids who get to run down the outs on the field
And get to watch their favorite PED using slugger, but not be affected negatively because it is an exhibition and doesn't count.
to the hand-picked BP pitchers many of the players bring to serve them up for them,
And then take 4 straight pitches per at bat, lulling me to sleep.
to the hitters and most important, to the fans.
Who if they are like me are completely bored with and over the event after the first round.
Bottom line: I find it insane to think the Home Run Derby is a way to get away from the steroid rumors when many of the participants in the past have been caught using PEDs. It doesn't make sense to over react to steroid use during the regular season and think about "the kids who idolize the players" then but ignore it during the HRD simply because it is an exhibition.
1. It's boring. Yes, it truly is boring. I am not at the game, I am not getting an opportunity to potentially catch a fly ball and there is only so many times I can watch a baseball being thrown 60 MPH get hit a long distance. It's exactly like batting practice. Hell it IS batting practice. I don't show up early for a game to watch batting practice, so I have no interest in watching the Home Run Derby. It doesn't matter to me the game's "best" "sluggers" are there and Mikey and Mindy Palowack are going to win a free house if a sign gets hit by a baseball. Sure, it is neat for about 30 minutes to watch the ball get hit very far, after that it loses my interest incredibly quickly. After the first round, I am over it.
2. It takes incredibly too long. I flipped over to ESPN in the vain attempt to see if they were showing anything interesting at 10:30pm and the final round had not started yet. It was getting ready to start and it was between two players that I did not care about because I realized the HRD started at 8pm and was not over yet. It was 10:30pm. There is no one in this world that can complain baseball games last too long if this person watches the entire HRD. There are only 8 people and 3 rounds in the HRD and it still lasts going on 3 hours. 3 freaking hours! I could watch any of the Godfather movies or read one of my posts in that time.
3. Chris Berman. I can't hear him say "back, back, back" at any point again in the future. When it is an actual baseball game, sure I can handle it because I don't watch games he calls and you never know when a home run may get hit, but this is the freaking HRD where there will be absolutely tons of home runs hit. We don't need that tired schtick every time. We also get Joe Morgan in the booth as well and I turned over to ESPN long enough to see Steve Phillips was "calling" the HRD as well. When ESPN has the opportunity to pair up two of their worst analysts and an announcer who literally has not changed his schtick in 20 years why wouldn't they do it? And why would I watch?
4. The format stinks. This could fix #2. The players get to choose their own "pitcher" so I think the players should have to swing at every pitch that "pitcher" throws. If it is off, well tough shit, you chose the guy. I don't want to wait around all night watching these "sluggers" cherry pick the best pitches to hit. It ruins the flow and just generally annoys me. It's wonderful to watch Josh Hamilton hit a home run when the ball is down the middle of the plate, but what kind of slugger is he when the pitch is not perfect? I know that's what the fans want to see, home runs, but it just slows the whole thing down for me and ruins the flow when a hitter hits a home run and then takes 4 pitches waiting for the perfect one. This is the same reason I don't watch the Slam Dunk Contest during the NBA All-Star Game weekend. If you can't get a dunk on the second try, sit down, you shouldn't be in the competition anyway.
I am sure halfway through writing this I am going to think of more reasons I don't like the Home Run Derby. Mike Celizic likes the Home Run Derby, in fact, he seems to think it cures all the ails that Major League Baseball has including the steroid problem. As you have read or skimmed through above, I disagree. Have I ever mentioned that I find him to be an idiot?
It’s the only day on baseball’s calendar when no matter how many home runs fly ridiculously long distances, you’ll never hear anyone talking about steroids.
Celizic wrote this on Sunday and the article was posted Sunday night and everyone most likely read it on Monday...the same day as the Home Run Derby. So basically by writing this article, Celizic has negated his opening sentence because he partially talks about steroids.
For that reason alone, Home Run Derby deserves its reputation as the best part of the All-Star break.
Am I the only one that doesn't like the Home Run Derby? It's like watching paint dry for me. I have watched it before but only because there is nothing else on and generally I end up changing the channel several times about thirty minutes to an hour into the "contest."
There is nothing great about the All-Star break in my mind. A boring contest and an exhibition game are all that go on. I miss real baseball, I miss seeing my favorite team lose baseball games to teams they should beat, and then complaining to everyone about it.
I might have missed a snide column after some bygone derby, but I can’t recall ever seeing anyone complain the next day that the winner might have been cheating. Not when Mark McGwire participated or when Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi won it.
Here's another reason I hate the Home Run Derby...I hate steroids and their effect on baseball. Through the years the HRD has become a contest that is like a Who's Who of users in the Steroid Era. I would expect the players to be able to hit a baseball far when they are taking batting practice, especially if they are on some sort of PED.
The reason no one complained the winner may have been cheating is because many times no one knew the winner was using steroids when they won the Home Run Derby. Just because it is a pointless contest that has no bearing on the Major League Baseball season doesn't mean I am going to ignore the fact many of the players participating were cheaters. Let's look at the Who's Who of steroid users and suspected users, but have not been caught yet, who participated in the HRD (I am only going back 15 years to 1994):
1994- Albert Belle, Jeff Bagwell, Mike Piazza
1995- Belle, Manny Ramirez, Sammy Sosa
1996- Mark McGwire, Brady Anderson, Barry Bonds, Jeff Bagwell, Sammy Sosa
1997- McGwire, Anderson, Bagwell
1998- Rafael Palmeiro, Alex Rodriguez, McGwire, Javy Lopez, Vinny Castilla
1999- McGwire, Bagwell, Sosa
2000- Sosa, Ivan Rodriguez
2001-Luiz Gonzalez, Sosa, Jason Giambi, Bonds, Bret Boone, A. Rodriguez, Troy Glaus
2002- Giambi, Sosa, Bonds, I. Rodriguez
2003- Giambi, Gary Sheffield, Boone
2004- Miguel Tejada, Palmeiro, Sosa, Bonds
2005- I. Rodriguez
2006- Tejada, Glaus
2007- None
2008- None
2009- None
I am sure there is someone in the last 3 years who participated who will be busted for steroids at some point and I even left some names that I am personally suspicious of but there is not too much proof of steroid use. Guys like Lance Berkman and Jim Thome who are more guilty by association if anything, so I would not include them.
Hat Guy's point about how we all forget about steroids during the HRD may be entirely true but the HRD is the one time we should be paying attention to who is participating because a good majority of those guys in the past have been caught using steroids. For me, the HRD in the past is like a steroid exhibition, and yes I realize it is an exhibition, but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth to watch these guys hit home runs when they are using PEDs. The only person in the 2001 contest who hasn't been busted or suspected yet is Todd Helton.
I know the HRD is an exhibition but I also think it has in the past been a display for steroid users to show off what the drugs can do for them. So Celizic is wrong, I will complain about the past winners were on steroids. If these writers and columnists are going to get on their high horse and complain Manny Ramirez, Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa and A-Rod have used steroids so they should be out of the Hall of Fame, then they should also have a problem with their past participation in the HRD and not celebrate the event, but hold it in suspicion. Just because it is an exhibition, the same public health concerns the columnists have don't go away, they just get conveniently ignored so everyone can watch baseballs get hit very far.
The subject wasn't even whispered last year when Josh Hamilton lit up Yankee Stadium with 28 homers in the first round and Justin Mourneau beat him in the finals.
That's because the story was Hamilton coming back from being a druggie, which got mentioned 8,000 times, as if getting addicted to drugs and ruining you and your family's life, then finally getting back on track makes him a stronger and better human being than Justin Morneau (can Hat Guy not find the spell check for Morneau's last name?) or anyone else. Inspiring? Yes, it is inspiring and I am glad he turned his life around, but he almost ruined his and his family's life due to his addiction. He had an obligation to everyone who stood by him to try and beat his drug use and addiction problems. He can be inspirational to many, but to hear how everyone held him so high was a little vomit inducing after a while. I guess Morneau sucks as an inspirational athlete because he was never addicted to any type of drug...that and he is from Canada and plays for the Twins, where apparently there is no media.
Home runs hit during the season count in the game’s sacred record books. But dingers hit in HRD don’t count for anything other than bragging rights.
Obviously, but don't be absolutely blind to the fact that despite the home runs not counting in the record books, it is an exhibition display of what PEDs can do for baseball players. At least it has been in the past. The HRD doesn't put away the steroid and PED problems for the night, it makes me remember baseball having those problems and the HRD in the past has been a perfect example of the media turning a blind eye so they can be entertained...as they have done so many times before.
The object is to hit as many out as possible.
Thank you for clearing that up. I thought the point was to induce a mass suicide through hearing Chris Berman speak for over two hours.
So why would anyone even think about steroids?
Because about half of the participants in the past have been busted or are seriously suspected of using steroids. That's why. You are stupid if you can't see the connection between past participants and steroids.
Say I held a fundraiser every year to fund research for prostate cancer and I got different donors and people to speak at the fundraiser. What if it turns out that many of the speakers at the fundraiser were trafficking illegal narcotics and almost 50% of the money that was raised came from people who had some connection to organized crime? Could I try to get others to participate in the future by saying, "It's just a fundraiser, we raised good money for prostate cancer. Ignore the fact the results in the past came from illegal sources, why would you even worry about donating money? You won't be suspected!"
I am sure I could get some money but most people are going to be reluctant to attend or contribute because of the past affiliations. They aren't just going to ignore the past because it "doesn't count" because it is for charity. For me, the HRD is a similar thing. Celizic can't ignore the history of the participants in the HRD and pretend it is a night where steroids don't matter.
This is part of the hypocrisy of the media. These idiots have really no problem with steroid use in baseball. They don't like to see baseball records messed with and they want an opportunity to throw an athlete under the bus or rip him a new asshole in a column when he is caught using any PED. That's what they enjoy. In a situation where the records aren't going to be messed up, they have no problem with steroids and could care less about the sanctity of the game or what message this sends to kids. As if kids watching Barry Bonds in the HRD aren't going to be as influenced as they are when they watch him during a regular season baseball game. As much as Mike Celizic would like to, you can't ignore the past.
The totals don’t go into the record books. They don’t occupy a special niche in Cooperstown. They don’t even result in huge new contracts for undeserving cheaters
It's doesn't count so it doesn't matter! This is a wonderful example of MSM and how they have been culpable and willing to turn a blind eye to steroid use. I don't believe anyone in this year's Derby is using and I am a little questionable on the actual effects of steroids on a person, but if the MSM is going to hand A-Rod his ass for using PEDs, they can't willingly turn a blind eye to the same possible PED use in situations where it doesn't count.
It’s a night to suspend disbelief, an that’s what we d.
Seriously, asshole. Get an editor. Be a professional, not a lousy writer with a hat on. How do you have typographical errors this bad in a column? You almost have to try and make them this bad.
Despite all the agonizing about Manny’s suspension and the pre-season angst about Alex Rodriguez’ dalliance with performance-enhancers, the season has been clear of rumors and suspicion.
Other than two of the best hitters of this generation and sure fire Hall of Fame players being caught as PED users, this season has been pretty quiet on the steroid front.
Having a testing policy will do that for you, and Manny’s suspension actually helped the game’s credibility. Once he was forced to take a 50-game unpaid sabbatical, we could no longer issue blind accusations about how baseball must be protecting its superstars and the testing program must be inadequate.
Fortunately, the media is still around to do what they always have and protect the superstars...until they get caught using PEDs at which point they recommend the death penalty for those users...unless it is an exhibition, in which case it doesn't count, so carry on!
The program probably is inadequate, if only because all such programs are.
Take it from Mike Celizic. All programs are inadequate. His Hat-Wearers Rehabilitation Program was a complete failure.
This year, all that really matters is that Albert Pujols, who is on a pace to break Roger Maris’ 61-home run non-juiced record, will be going for the fences in front of his hometown fans in America’s best baseball city, St. Louis.
I don't think Pujols is on steroids. Of course neither does Jay Mariotti and he wrote an entire article about it today.
Let's do an article in an article and quote Mr. Mariotti about Pujols. Let's see if we have heard this stuff before in from a sportswriter in concern with a player not being a PED user. I will ruin it before we start, we have heard ALL of this type stuff before in the form of a denial or reason why said player is not using PEDs.
But I like how Pujols has spent his finest personal hour on a proactive mission to shoot down the reckless but unavoidable innuendo.
Denials. Those are a first. No steroid user has ever denied it initially...clearly this one denial is enough to convince Mariotti Pujols has never used PEDs.
His training regimen is too dedicated.
Much like A-Rod, Gary Sheffield and Barry Bonds' workout was grueling huh?
His past is too humble.
Much like Sammy Sosa was humble?
His soul, on and off the field, is too grounded. His diet involves too much chicken and rice.
The double whammy! McGwire loved his kid so much and Bonds never let anything in his body that could hurt him.
His monstrous numbers haven't wavered since testing kicked in six years ago.
Neither did Manny or A-Rod's.
And his words are too powerful -- attacking suspicious whisperers and bloggers the way he crushes pitches, volunteering that he passed six drug tests last year and vowing to take a test every day if necessary.
Like Palmeiro pointing at a Congressman denying steroid use or like Sammy Sosa volunteered to take tests until he was called on it by Rick Reilly (of all people)?
If he fails, he says he'll return the entirety of his career earnings with the Cardinals, tens of millions of dollars over nine seasons.
I believe he will sell his houses and cars. I sure do believe that.
"If anybody can do it, Albert can," Milwaukee's Ryan Braun said. "I just marvel at his consistency. I think he's the best player in baseball. He's like Barry Bonds in the regard that he often only sees one pitch to really hit, and you see what he does with it."
What an interesting comparison.
I am not saying Pujols is on steroids and I don't believe he has used in the past either, there is no proof, but I still am going to remain suspicious especially when I have heard all the reasoning why a player is innocent before and it turned out to all be lies. Not to mention the comparisons to past steroid users and their accomplishments are mentioned by Ryan Braun in reference to Pujols makes me nervous. I hate it more than anyone, trust me.
Ok, back to Hat Guy and how Pujols is all that matters...
Actually that was it, he just kind of threw that out there and then ignored why Albert Pujols is all that matters.
As long as you had a couple big names in the lineup, it was actually more fun watching a guy like Hamilton come out of nowhere and steal the show.
If you follow baseball on a regular basis...did he come out of nowhere? He was the #1 pick in 1999. This is how I feel about Adrian Gonzalez as well. He is finally getting some publicity but he was the #1 pick in 2000. He should be a good hitter when drafted at that spot and those who follow baseball know who he is.
The players usually say that HRD is exhausting and trying to hit home runs for the contest can screw up their swings for months.
A format tweak or two might help. I’d make the first round nine outs instead of 10 — nine is a baseball number and 10 is a Bo Derek number.
What the hell does this mean? How is one less out going to make the participants any less tired? One less out per round, there's the fix, that should give them plenty of rest. That's three full extra outs of rest.
I’d also have the hitters rotate in three-out turns. That may ruin continuity, but it would fight fatigue.
Another great idea. Make a slow event even slower.
The players already fight fatigue by taking 4 pitches in between each swing.
And when the last hitter passes everyone else, let the guy sit down and move on to the second round.
Finally, a decent idea.
No matter how they run it, the show is pure fun for everyone, from the kids who get to run down the outs on the field
And get to watch their favorite PED using slugger, but not be affected negatively because it is an exhibition and doesn't count.
to the hand-picked BP pitchers many of the players bring to serve them up for them,
And then take 4 straight pitches per at bat, lulling me to sleep.
to the hitters and most important, to the fans.
Who if they are like me are completely bored with and over the event after the first round.
Bottom line: I find it insane to think the Home Run Derby is a way to get away from the steroid rumors when many of the participants in the past have been caught using PEDs. It doesn't make sense to over react to steroid use during the regular season and think about "the kids who idolize the players" then but ignore it during the HRD simply because it is an exhibition.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)