Phil Rogers take on the Mags contract

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Ordonez deserves best contract Sox can afford

Outfielder just quietly goes about his job, hitting game-winning homers and driving in big runs

 

 

 

April 16, 2004

 

 

Forgive me.

 

At a time like this, with the White Sox rolling and Magglio Ordonez as hot as any hitter in the majors, the popular thing to write would be that the Sox must, at all costs, lock up Ordonez for years to come. But, considering this is the Sox and not a cash-cow operation like the one on the other side of town, things aren't as simple as that.

 

 

 

 

All around baseball, teams are drooling over the prospect of Ordonez becoming a free agent at the end of this season. He's a healthy 30 years old, having averaged 157 games the last five seasons. He plays a solid right field and is an old-school pro who leads by example in the clubhouse.

 

He also can hit a little bit, as the Kansas City Royals certainly will attest. Ordonez's game-winning homer Thursday off D.J. Carrasco at U.S. Cellular Field was his fourth homer in nine games this year. He's batting .351 with 11 RBIs.

 

To tell the truth, he's just about my favorite player in the major leagues.

 

I was one of the first people in Chicago to see him play, watching (and hearing) the ball jump off his bat during batting practice early one evening in Nashville in 1997.

 

In fact Ozzie Guillen says I got him in trouble with former general manager Ron Schueler when I asked him about his fellow Venezuelan after returning from that trip.

 

Guillen criticized the White Sox for not inviting Ordonez to big-league camp the previous spring, and I used his comments in a story touting the potential of this unknown commodity.

 

"Magglio is a heck of a player," said Guillen, who then was in his last year as the Sox shortstop. "He is a great hitter and a very good outfielder. He is better than our other [minor-league] outfielders. He just does not get a chance. He is not a first-round draft choice, and he has an ugly Latino name. He has to do twice as much as someone else to get an opportunity."

 

Not long after the endorsement from Guillen, I watched Ordonez hit his first career homer off Jose Lima later that year, then saw him get his first game-winner off St. Louis lefty Tony Fossas, who called it a low point of his career.

 

One hundred eighty homers later, let's hope Fossas feels better about Ordonez making an impression at his expense.

 

When the Cubs and White Sox play every June, I get roped into selecting the Tribune's all-city team. To the chagrin of many readers, some of whom think I'm going out of the way to bash Sammy Sosa, I've selected Ordonez as Chicago's top right fielder in three of the last four seasons.

 

It never has been a slight on Sosa. It has been meant as a compliment to Ordonez, who always has been more of a team player and a tougher out than Sosa, who's going to ride his power hitting to the Hall of Fame.

 

There's nothing not to like about Ordonez—except his justified desire to get a top-of-the-line contract. That makes him an extremely tough fit for the White Sox, who every year seem to lose a little more of their market share to the Cubs.

 

It's easy to criticize Reinsdorf for not spending major-market dollars on his payroll. But the reality is that his revenue stream has not kept up with what you would consider a major market, and he has priced many of his fans out of tickets on all but half-price nights and kids-get-in-for-$1 Sunday afternoons.

 

While defending Reinsdorf is about as much fun as selling the virtues of asbestos, the reality is he and the men who have helped him keep an eye on the bottom line, the late Jack Gould and Harvard law and Northwestern MBA grad Rick Hahn, have done a great job to keep their team competitive on limited resources. The truth is they shouldn't just throw money at Ordonez.

 

Did you happen to catch the attendance at U.S. Cellular since Opening Day? The Sox, going head-to-head with the Cubs, had 11,765 and 15,150 on hand for the walk-off victories against the Royals.

 

You can argue, correctly, that these were afternoon games during a school week. But what those totals show is a perilously low season-ticket base.

 

To a significant degree, broadcast revenues have carried the White Sox in recent years. But they are in the next-to-last year of contracts that were joined with the Bulls at the end of the Michael Jordan era. What happens when those deals are up?

 

As of Opening Day, Ordonez's $14 million salary accounted for 21.4 percent of the White Sox's total payroll. This not being the NBA, it's not healthy to invest so heavily in one player. Eight teams have one player hogging a large share of the payroll—Toronto (Carlos Delgado), Milwaukee (Geoff Jenkins), Cincinnati (Ken Griffey Jr.), Pittsburgh (Jason Kendall), Texas (Chan Ho Park), Kansas City (Mike Sweeney) and Arizona (Randy Johnson)—and it's possible none of them will be playoff teams.

 

Florida and Anaheim had no super salaries when they won World Series in 2003 and '02, respectively. Ivan Rodriguez's salary was listed at $10 million last season, but the only way the Marlins were able to sign him was his agreeing to defer $7 million without interest.

 

Ordonez, who is seeking a five-year deal at about $75 million, wants the White Sox to add a year to their four-year offer and to drop their talk of deferrals, vesting options and other gimmicks. But the reality is the Sox are only being prudent, trying to protect themselves.

 

If Ordonez wants to stay where he's comfortable, they are giving him a chance. If he'll stay only at maximum value—and how does he find out what that is without testing the free-agent market?—then general manager Ken Williams must consider his options.

 

He could trade for Ken Griffey Jr., try to win with Griffey and Ordonez playing alongside and then hang onto Griffey, who has agreed to defer $6.5 million of his $12.5 million salary, which runs through 2008. He could trade for Griffey, then trade Ordonez and open an outfield spot up for Jeremy Reed or Joe Borchard.

 

He could shop Ordonez before the trade deadline. He could do the safest thing—seldom the best—and let the situation simmer until next winter.

 

But at this point, he has to consider the unpopular along with the popular.

 

Email: [email protected]

 

Copyright © 2004, The Chicago Tribune

 

 

A realistic viewpoint, unlike that s***-piece Mariotti wrote a few days ago. I want them to keep Mags, but you have to look at the situation from every standpoint. The Sox can't make the same mistake Texas did 3 yrs ago with ARod. With that being said, the 4 yr$58 million deal sounds fine and I hope they get it done. But anything more than that is too much.