Balta1701

It's such a bad concept that literally no one here would have thought of it had one of the insiders not repeatedly said it was happening.

Such as?

Welp, the other worry is Moncada. An injury in the first half to Robert and not only do they pay his whole season salary but his option is declined next offseason and they get nothing for him.

Do we actually have a good idea of what kind of money the McCaskeys are asking for? Are they asking for the full stadium? My impression was that with the Arlington Heights option they would be putting up a lot of money themselves while developing the surroundings and they ran into what seemed like moderate tax issues, am I wrong somewhere in there?

And yet, despite Pittsburgh and Cincinnati being low in MLB in attendance, those ballparks have been major contributors to urban renewal in those areas.

No one may want to trade those type of players, but sometimes getting a deal done requires hard decisions. It's on Getz to find a way to make that happen. That should potentially include...frankly, waiting until next season if required.

Just honestly, "would be okay with" is a super odd way to phrase an insider report.

Citi Field is a REALLY poor example here, because it is widely thought that the number one reason Steve Cohen bought the Mets and immediately dumped money into it was so that he could build up political good will to get one of three NY State Casino Licenses, to build a casino hotel on the site accompanying that stadium. Cohen has dumped money into the Mets in part because he wants to build the accompanying business, because the combination of the two businesses will allow him to make a fortune. These are also older stadiums. While they are #1 and #2 in attendance, they aren't the way teams are using stadiums right now. Teams like the Braves and Giants have well established how profitable it is to put a stadium in the middle of an entertainment complex, where the stadium drives revenue that supports the surrounding businesses. Similarly, cities like Pittsburgh and Cincinnati have shown how driving foot traffic to downtown areas is a way to massively boost the economic status of a downtown area by bringing in foot traffic. It works, we know this works. It is good for a city, it is good business.

I've said this plenty of times, so here goes again. When I've gone to a good ballpark, I don't just go to the ballpark. I drive in (or better yet take transit) I visit a restaurant on the way into the park, I visit a bar across the street. I have a beer or two in the park, then another after the game finishes before taking transit back assuming that option exists. If there's another shop, I might browse or walk around, god knows what I might buy. I have never done that at the Cell/Rate, because there is nothing like that to do. You park, you go to the game, you go home. Reinsdorf wanted his parking revenue, and that comes at the expense of developing surrounding businesses. If I visit the area now that I live outside of Chicago, I stay at a hotel in NW Indiana and drive in, because how many hotels are there at the Rate? The Cell is an island feeding Reinsdorf parking money but with basically no positive impact on the surroundings. The amount of money being generated by business on the 78 site right now is roughly...zero, and has been for 60 years. No one is dining at a restaurant or staying at a hotel on that site right now. Those businesses are not paying taxes because they don't exist. The fact that those businesses don't exist, and instead you have an empty lot, also impacts the businesses and communities around it, because very few people live on an empty lot and very few people stay at hotels on an empty lot to visit businesses around it. This affects land values and business revenues in the entire surrounding area. Over a period of..."60 years", which is how long this site has been undeveloped, this is easily hundreds of millions of dollars of lost revenue to the city and state by having the area undeveloped. What will happen to the Rate site is an open question, because you can't just leave it as an abandoned eyesore. It could be repurposed for a different sport or redeveloped into something else. That has to be part of any plan, but it can be. If we compare "The White Sox leading development of a community at the 78 site and something positive done with the current location" to "The 78 site has sat vacant as a polluted eyesore since the 1960s and Reinsdorf's ballpark is on an island supporting no surrounding businesses", that is a huge difference in the business climate. That is the kind of change that makes a serious positive improvement on the city and a major increase in tax dollars. If all the city does is get this site developed, that is a win - and over a 30 year stadium lifetime, that's a win that could be potentially on the order of hundreds of millions of dollars. I have zero issue with that being the city's contribution to this project, because that's a long-term investment in the quality and growth of the city. This is, in my opinion, what the politicians are asking for when they say "They want a good deal for the city". They understand that they can't expect only private money to develop this site, that's not how things work in a big project like this, but Reinsdorf has to show them why it will be a good deal. He refuses to do this. I have a problem with "vastly more money being spent than that because we don't want to lose a baseball team", which is what Reinsdorf has instead he deserves.

After his performance last season, whatever the cause, please don't rush him up until he actually looks like he can handle a promotion.

Dayton Moore's comparison points...Bruce Bochy, Ned Yost, Bobby Cox. I think there's a theme here.

Citation?

Rather than him being sick, I think that's exactly what a businessman might do while trying to sell or move the team. Even if he landed a Soto and it paid for itself in the long term, in the short term that's a lot of money to come up with for new owners, who might be cash-strapped already from buying the team. If he's got a $50 million year liability on the books already and it takes a few years for a group in Nashville to arrange a stadium, that's a few years where he might have to come up with $50 million a year himself.

If they had agreed to an international draft this guy would totally be headed to the White Sox wouldn’t he?

The people in the 2024 class are already signed, you can’t get out of those deals. That player is already a Dodgers prospect. The 2025 class isn’t allowed to sign yet, so everything there is handshake deals so far, nothing there is in writing. That allows the potential that either side could change things if they had to.

If this was a solidly coached or run organization: -big market that isn’t NY (rough media) or LA (Ohtani country) -he’s still young, so there’s always some risk that he takes a few years to develop. This actually happened for Ohtani, and Yamamoto was good this year but had questionable health. -he had a velocity drop last year that he pitched through. Having some caution with him and not immediately going to a World Series team might be smart for his arm. -supposedly people believe in the pitching coach and pitching coordinator here. If he’s dead set on LAD, none of this matters. If he has some worries about his early career performance or conditioning on his arm, somewhere else would make sense, and a smart move would be to evaluate the coaching staff and organization.

I'll admit surprise that nothing was done today. That was pretty rough yesterday.

Every press article I've read so far says some version of "Teams would renege on previously agreed upon deals for a player like this."

The question I don't have an answer to with the Dodgers would be - would it benefit him more to be a third fiddle on that Dodgers team that has a huge amount of focus from Japanese media, or would it benefit him to have some time to grow into a superstar without the immediate focus of being a Dodger? The latter worked for Ohtani - but admittedly his first few seasons were "good" rather than spectacular, in part due to having to overcome some injury issues. Would you want to hedge against that if you were this kid? Maybe?

Thats not how this works? Thats not how any of this works. This will be a big money maker for a lot of people. If Reinsdorf put in $1.3 billion and the government put in $600 million, Related puts in whatever it takes to build the rest; everyone walks away in 20 years making good money. It just won’t justify the state putting in $2 billion dollars!!!!!

Do the normal FA tampering rules even apply when a player is international and not a member of the union?

Yeah. So, is Getz going to be honest about anything any more? Nah. Everything was great.

If we were looking at an honest sport, a team coming off literally the worst season any of us have ever seen would feel compelled to make these kinds of moves, and although it might not be a playoff team next year, you have to admit it looks a lot better yes. You put a 41 win team on the field in the 3rd biggest city in the country? Yeah, your penance should be signing a $600 million outfielder and a $200 million pitcher to bring yourself back to respectability. And for reference, you said a half billion - you have underpriced just your OF addition with that amount. Talk about a billion for this roster. But no, Jerry Reinsdorf is your problem.

Well yeah, if he chooses the 2024 route it’s basically because he decided to go the Dodgers at a discount. While there’s a perception he might want that, it isn’t certain and there’s plenty of reason to question it. When Ohtani signed, there was the same “oh he will probably go to the Dodgers why should anyone else try” setup and he wound up with the Angels of all teams. If he wants $4 million from the Dodgers he can probably get that in 2024 after a trade or two. If he wants to consider multiple teams, this is a spot in a major city, where there’s clearly rebuilding but less pressure on a mid 20s player to win and be great right now as a rookie. In LAD, he’d also be the third fiddle, whereas you can make a case for More individual exposure somewhere else if he earns it. And he’s also coming off something of a down season where he lost some velocity, so do we think these coaches are actually competent at working with pitchers or not? Why shouldn’t they be on the list as at least trying?

Last years quote about how he “didn’t like their team” got put on T shirts. The team banned those shirts from the ballpark.