Soxbadger

Well some body will eventually catch it even if its hit to Jose. Otherwise wed just have 1 inside the park hr and the rest of the game waiting for some one to catch that damn ball so the pitcher can throw another pitch. SB

Colon was a good pitcher for us and will be missed. Some days his fastball was just right and it always seemed to freeze batters when it would tail back towards right handers. But 12 mil is about where the White Sox could afford him. If we are saying we dont have 12-13 mil for Maggs and All-Star, then we really dont have that amount of money for Colon who was good but not great last year. Sb

Look at his none on and runners on splits, and you will see that he was a much less effective pitcher when batters were already on base. Perhaps the pressure of coming into games with men on hurt his performance, I can only hope that starting lets him get in a better rhythm. SB

Brando, You keep repeating the same part of the test it breaks down to multiple factors: That panel must consider the player’s contribution to his club during the past season (including but not limited to his overall performance, special qualities of leadership, and public appeal), the length and consistency of his career contribution, the record of the player’s past compensation, comparative baseball salaries, the existence of any physical or mental defects on the part of the player, and the recent performance record of the club including but not limited to its league standings and attendance as an indication of public acceptance. 1) Contribution to club during past season (including overall performance, special qualities of leadership, and public appeal: 2) The length and consistency of his career contribution. 3) Comparative baseball salaries 4) The existence of any physical or mental defects on the part of the player 5) The recent performance record of the club including but not limited to its league standings and attendance as an indication of public acceptance. Now you keep repeating number 2 one of the factors but lets break it down, I will use a scale of 1-5 representing whether Gagne was high or low in that area. 1) Contribution to club: 5, Cy Young, most recognizable player, is his teams most valuable player. 2) Length and Consistency: 3, Although I could lean to a 4 because 2 years of dominance at a position has to be considered consistent this day and age, but I will give him a 3 because I want to low ball it. Although his first 2 seasons were unproductive, once he went to a new position he was outstanding. Beltre has done less and been more inconsistent and was given $5mil by the Dodgers. 3) Comparitive Baseball Salaries: 5, As shown before Gange would not even be the highest paid closer. He would be in the same area as Wagner and Percival and I doubt many would argue that they would rather have Percival over Gagne. 4) Existence of Defect: 5, Gagne has no injuries and is a converted starter. No signs of being over used, seems like he is in excellent condition and is still young. 5) Performance of Club and Attendance: 5, LA is one of the highest attendance and over the last 42 years has averaged 2.7mil (Crazy but I found it on their MLB site). It is not like they are a small market team. So out of a total of 25 points, Gagne earned 23. All Gagne would need to do is earn 13 points, or be atleast a 3 in every category, which means average in all 5 categories and the arbitration should favor him. Since the mediator had no discretion, they had to either chose Gagne or the Dodgers, I find it impossible that they thought Gagne was worth less than an average player at arbitration. The only problem with this is that lower players would never win arbitration cases because they would always rate below a 3, but they could easily impose a standard number that has to be met for a certain salary to be given out. Such as to get a 8mil salary you need to be atleast a 20, and so on and so forth. I just think the consistency argument is weak at best because 2 years of dominance, is pretty damn consistent. In fact as a closer he has never been inconsistent. SB

Thanks good article and I agree those criteria suggest Gange should win but this is even more puzzeling: Correct market effects of monpsony on players salaries by adjusting during their reserve years. Gagne's salary this year is deservedly 8mil, had he been in the open market he would of recieved 8mil or more, at 5mil he would of been a steal. This is not a market correction, this goes against what the point of arbitration seems to be. SB

Time seems fine except for either CSI or the Apprentice will have to suffer. As for suggestions... It seems there is a cap on trades and moves? I was wondering if that was necessary, as I think if we are going every day there may be times where we need something and have to make moves. SB

Brando, Do you have any knowledge of arbitration cases or have any copies of rulings, etc that would give us insight into the exact reasoning they use? I would be really curious to read about Baseball arbitration and what factors they take into consideration. I just have never seen nor heard of anything other than the proceedings happened and this is who won or lost, havent really read any reasonings. SB

Soxfan, You are right about the Supreme Court saying that excessive percentage of punitive damages may be grounds for reduction of the damages, but this does not apply to arbitration cases which are outside of the court system. We would have ot know the actual language of the arbitration agreement to know the criteria for coming to a certain result. I mean the criteria could range from: Combined statistics to one year performance, and so on. Until we know what the arbitrators are deciding on, its really only speculation as to why they ruled in a fashion that they did. Just as an outside observer looking at the facts that I have, my judgement suggests that 8mil, while a significant increase in pay, was only such because last year he was so under paid. He recieved $550k to be the best pitcher in the NL. The year before he was paid less and had comparable statistics. For 2 years he was severely under paid, and the arbitrators reasoned that he should continue to be comparably underpaid. If you were even to compare this to Gore v BMW, which is the Supreme Court Case where they looked at punitive damages as Gore recieved millions in punitive when actual damages were only $3000, it is distinguishable because the Supreme Court never even touched on the issue if the damages were deserved. As in this case, Gagens pay is deserved. He is not asking for a ridiculous raise for what he has done, he was just so severely underpaid that any raise will be some what ridiculous percentage wise. I mean a raise from $550k to $5mil is 900%, what is the difference if it is a raise of 1400%? It just seems unless that no matter what argument they use it can not satisfy how they can argue the best NL closer, let alone best NL pitcher does not derserve to be paid as much as Closers who he has been better than or just as good as the last 2 years. SB

Interesting, the only argument I could see prevailing was that the Dodgers argued the market is different than when the other contracts were signed, and that going off of what Foulke and Guardado made he did not deserve 8mil. Although that seems odd seeing as Gagne is much better than both of those, and if he was a free agent I think he easily would of gotten 8mil a year, if not more. SB

If anyone has the arbitration rules I would like to take a look at them, usually arbitraters have discretion as to what they award but the baseball agreement may be different. Regardless the arbitrators made a mistake, if it was purely a choice of 8 or 5 mil, there is no argument it is fairer to give him 5mil then 8mil. Mariano Rivera, 10.5mil: 2003 64 0 70.2 61 15 3 10 63 8.02 5 2 0 40 6 .235 1.00 1.66 John Smoltz, 10.6 mil: 2003 62 0 64.1 48 9 2 8 73 10.21 0 2 0 45 4 .204 0.87 1.12 Billy Wagner. 8 mil: 2003 78 0 86.0 52 18 8 23 105 10.99 1 4 0 44 3 .169 0.87 1.78 Troy Percival, 7.8mil: 2003 52 0 49.1 33 22 7 23 48 8.76 0 5 0 33 4 .184 1.14 3.47 Eric Gagne, 5mil: 2003 77 0 82.1 37 12 2 20 137 14.98 2 3 0 55 0 .133 0.69 1.20 So arguably the best player on the list is also the lowest paid. This is a mistake, 8mil was a very fair asking price considering he is statistcally much better than Percival and Wagner who make the same price. Not to mention he won the Cy Young, meaning the best Pitcher. So he should be compared to the highest paid pitchers, which is much higher than 8mil. LA might of won the battle, but lost the war on this one. Being paid only $5mil is not going to make Gagne happy. SB

I hope Wisconsin wins, as that was the my alma mater. But they often play inconsistent on the road and the loss of Olando Tucker will hurt against Illinois. That being said, hopefully Harris and Wilkinson can come up big. hehe Not used to being on the other side of the fence on this board, but what are you gonna do. SB

According to Espn Selig approved the deal. The greatest coup in baseball history has occurred. The headlines in Boston will already be printing, "The Curse Continues". And so begins the 2004 season. SB

I always expected that the scouts, etc did most of the leg work and provided reports. It was up to the GM's to follow those reports and to make decisions on who are good scouts, and good players. What Evan's did admirably was stick to his plans, when you are thinking prolonged success short term gain can often be long term loss. We will see how Evan's plan turns out, and we will see how Depodesta takes Evan's plan and turns it into his plan. SB

Evan's tenure will be judged when Miller and Jackson are playing in the Majors. If they become top of the line starters and anchor LA to dominance, then he was a good GM. He probably is going to get fired because he did not attain a big name bat this offseason, and the only reason he did not was because of his refusal to part with either one of these prospects. He must of thought that trading them would be more detrimental to his career than getting a big bat and probably keeping his job. If Miller and Jackson fail, Evans will be a failure, as he could of gotten great things for these prospects but it was his choice to keep them. If Miller and Jackson suceed, then Evans will be getting phone calls from a bunch of teams, because it took more guts in his position to wait on his talent than to try a quick fix. SB

Urbina is out there because of $ He is looking for $ And his price range is to much $ Otherwise hes a great free agent. SB

Rex, I understand the ultimate consequences of a strike outside of just the player / owner relations. But the reality of the situation as you aptly describe it is: If it will take much longer to crack, then we can assume that MLBPA will not just agree to a salary cap and it will indeed take a lock out. Do I wish that the owners and MLPBA could sit down and rationaly argue about a salary cap and come to the conclusion that in the best interest of the collective baseball needs a salary cap? Yes. Do I think there are arguments for why a salary cap would actually benefit the players? Yes. Do I think that MLPBA is to stubborn to ever listen to a salary cap? Yes, atleast right now. With the watershed remarks by the MLBPA about "devaluation of a contract" I doubt the organization will allow itself to "devalue" its own agreement with MLB. Therefore we come to the conclusion that the only way to get a salary cap is by a strike. Now your bring up good points, but I could conversely argue that if baseball does not lock down for 1 year, and fix itself, these people who depend on baseball may in the end lose out anyways. If Baseball was to contract (which was argued about), 2 teams worth of employees were going to be lost completely, where as a hold out employees would only lose 1 year of employment. If baseball is going down the path many say, (which I am not so quick to agree) that it is becoming uncompetitve and will eventually collapse on itself, then shutting down for a year may be a situation in which: The ends justify the means. Also i did not want to even go into the replacement player argument, my point was just that its not the MLBPA that is preventing a salary cap, it is the disunity of the owners. And it is not that I am not compassionate, just that I am trying to present the challanages that face baseball, and as you point out they are not even as cut and dry as I make them. SB

Yasny, The owners might experience a slight devaluation of their teams during the strike and perhaps a year or two subsequent after the strike. But once a salary cap is implemented, baseball will be a much more stable industry and consequently franchise values will rise. The price of franchises in baseball is lower than that of NBA, NFL, partially because of the uncertainty of owning a baseball team. Where as in the NFL the hardest thing is buying the team, in baseball the hardest thing is making sure your team is competitive. It is very hard to make a hundred million dollar investment and know that is just the starting point, and not the finish. Unlike the NFL where they have league parity, the MLB requires owners to have enough money to buy the team, and enough money to stock the team. In the NFL once you own your team, you are pretty much assured of putting a competitve field on the team as long as you are at the salary cap and make competitent decisions. Prospective owners have the chance of buying a NBA, NFL, MLB, or NHL franchise (discluding other franchise opportunities), the NHL is the least stable and has the most problems, they are currently on the path towards a lock out with a salary cap as a major concern, NHL franchises are the least valuable. The MLB and NBA are the next tier of uncertainty, with the NBA bargaining agreement coming up in 2005 (extended one year in case NHL has a year long hold out after this season), the NBA has a salary cap which means it is much more certain, and after the new bargaining agreement they will be a little less stable then the NFL. MLB is less stable then the NBA as MLB has no salary cap, and pretty much anything goes from an owners stand point. Entering into Baseball is entering into the most volatile sports market, in which the free market reigns supreme. Baseball franchises are worth less than NBA franchises on average for this reason, and this is why the Expos are still for sale. Owners are smart business men, most of them come from running successful businesses, and they can identify which situations have the best chance for them to be successful. In the short term, a strike will affect the value of a franchise negatively, but in the long term it will increase the value, except to the small few who want to buy baseball franchises so they can buy championships, but they are the owners who we are trying to protect against. SB

While I agree that I would feel my team had a much better chance of winning the world series if I was a Red Sox or Yankees fan, I do not think that I would care or want them to win anymore than I do for the Sox. The Sox are the team I root for, they are the team I grew up with, and they are the team I follow win, lose, or draw. The Sox need to worry about the AL Central, then worry about the might Red Sox and Yankees. You do your job, and you dont worry about anyone else. Who knows, when playoff time comes around, its possible that only 1 team from the AL East is there, and 2 are from the West. Sox just need to concentrate on getting their own task done, because sadly last year i thought the Sox could compete with the Red Sox and Yankees in the playoffs, but we failed to get our job done. SB

How are you basing these team based statistics? Statistics are that you take a group of stats and analyze them. Statistically the Red Sox have one of the worst/best chances of winning the world series because they have not won for 90 years. The best because statistically every team has to win some time. The worst because if you base it off their past statistics they have won 0 times in 90 years meaning that statistically speaking they have a 0% chance of winning. The Yankees and Red Sox are paper champions, perhaps if you use their players projected statistics and compare them to other teams, they are statistically favorites. But there is no true test who should win the world series, because statistically speaking the Marlins should not of been there, the Cubs should not of been in the NLCS, etc, etc. And statistically speaking, the White Sox were the AL Central champs. I guess statistics are not so cut and dry as we percieve them to be. SB

The union is so strong because the owners allow it to be. Baseball players have no more strength as a union then Football, Basketball, etc, it is just that the owners are divided amongst themselves as to what they want with baseball. If all 32 owners wanted a salary cap there would be one. But many powerful owners do not want one, and they show this with their spending and how they try and win championships. Implementing a salary cap is as easy as: "There wont be baseball until there is a salary cap" Sure we may lose 1 season, maybe more, but after a while players will start realizing where else will they get paid $1mil a year, let alone $15mil. Many baseball players gave up college, never went to college, and some never even went to high school. They are not going to find other jobs that will keep them in the style of life they are accustomed too, and when they realize that they dont have any other options to become millionaires, some will realize $10mil a year is enough. Once the union cracks, a salary cap will be imposed and the rest will be history. Its a shame that the 90's strike season did not accomplish this because the owners were not willing to risk another season with out making money, but eventually they will realize that losing money 1 year, is better than continual loss and inability to compete for the next 10 years. For the most part, owners are in a much better position than players, as they have millions, other companies, and other prospects. The true statement is, MLB has the weakest/strongest and most divided owners of all the sports. And to go into an argument about why that is the case is just to time consuming. SB

It looks like a poster, I have a very similar Frank Thomas one that says "The Hammer", seems like the Fisk one was made in the same set. SB

I thought the Yankees failed to win the WS the last 3 years even though they had the highest payroll. I guess payroll does not have a direct relationship with winning a World Series. That being said, Payroll spent well does increase the likliehood of winning, but I think there will be some devastating results to the Yankees in the future when they have no prospects. At the All-Star Break, the Yankees are going to find it hard to make moves for players with out sending away MLB talent, where as the Red Sox, Astros, etc still have great teams with prospects to spend. Baseball is all about, keeping pace until the All-Star break, and then making your move. It doesnt matter if you are 5 games up and fade away, 162 games is a marathon not a race, and if the Yankees have a few key injuries, they will be the most overpaid last place team in the Majors. Most teams can not take the risk a $200mil payroll creates, the Yankees can. SB

According to ESPN the Yankees are only going to pay about $16 mil a year to A-Rod with the rest the Rangers paying. With Maggs thinking hes worth $14mil per year, A-Rod at $16 is not even really over paid. Nomar might get more money than the Yankees are paying A-Rod, how sad will that be. SB

lol I wasnt insinuating a conspiracy, just that it was so amusing to see ATA begging Maddux to join the Cubs. SB

At about 12:06 CST Espn aired an ATA commercial that was directed at Greg Maddux saying reasons he should join the Cubs and that there are cheap fairs from Chicago to LA. If ATA would of just donated the money for the commercial to the Cubs, the Cubs probably could of signed Maddux and would of cut out "ATA" into the ivy for them. Anyways just found it very strange to see a commercial airline endorsing a team and trying to convince a player to join... SB