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Post by Oregon Norm on Feb 20, 2014 22:46:56 GMT -5
...and some people can't fathom how Tampa Bay wins as often as they do.
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Post by rjp313jr on Feb 21, 2014 8:28:03 GMT -5
FTHW the 10/300 contract you threw out, I think most people here are fine with. It's the 12-15 years and 500m+ lunacy that others threw out that people are balking at. Manny Ramirez is one of the best free agent moves this team has ever made and you're right, it's because he's truly elite. HOF worthy performance. People can be on board with spending big on a player, but think its dumb to do it at all costs. And if that philosophy prevents you from ever signing the top free agent on the market, then so be it. You can acquire top talent other ways and lock them up longterm. It's also a sport where you don't need top 10 players to win a WS.
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Post by fenwaythehardway on Feb 21, 2014 8:50:56 GMT -5
FTHW the 10/300 contract you threw out, I think most people here are fine with. It's the 12-15 years and 500m+ lunacy that others threw out that people are balking at. Manny Ramirez is one of the best free agent moves this team has ever made and you're right, it's because he's truly elite. HOF worthy performance. People can be on board with spending big on a player, but think its dumb to do it at all costs. And if that philosophy prevents you from ever signing the top free agent on the market, then so be it. You can acquire top talent other ways and lock them up longterm. It's also a sport where you don't need top 10 players to win a WS. If he keeps playing like he has I guess anything's theoretically possible, but I don't think that's realistic. He'll get the biggest contract in baseball history by a healthy margin but I can't see him DOUBLING that number.
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Post by rjp313jr on Feb 21, 2014 8:58:30 GMT -5
Agreed
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Post by honkbal on Feb 21, 2014 9:21:51 GMT -5
...He'll get the biggest contract in baseball history by a healthy margin but I can't see him DOUBLING that number. Why not? In 1997, the highest free agent deal by AAV was Pedro's $12.5 million per. A-Rod's deal, signed three years later, doubled that exactly.
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Post by joshv02 on Feb 21, 2014 9:26:09 GMT -5
...He'll get the biggest contract in baseball history by a healthy margin but I can't see him DOUBLING that number. Why not? In 1997, the highest free agent deal by AAV was Pedro's $12.5 million per. A-Rod's deal, signed three years later, doubled that exactly. But ARods deal has only been topped once in the more-than-a-decade since -- and that was by ARod.
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Post by James Dunne on Feb 21, 2014 9:44:59 GMT -5
A-Rod in 2000 was also the last time the best player alive hit free agency in his mid-20's.
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Post by rjp313jr on Feb 21, 2014 10:38:42 GMT -5
There are two components:
1. Percentage of a teams budget (which no one knows what that will be)
2. Number of years in the deal.
I can see taking the risk on a player of his caliber for up to 10 years. You lose me at 11-15. Simply because he can't have that great an effect as one person on a baseball team to justify the risk.
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Post by rjp313jr on Feb 21, 2014 10:41:50 GMT -5
I'm not so sure we should be using ARod as a good example either. First he took up so much of Texas's payroll it was hard to build a winner. More importantly, he was a known steroid junky so it's unknown whether he could have actually stayed healthy and productive for the contract.
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Post by patrmac04 on Feb 21, 2014 11:07:46 GMT -5
Interesting timing for this thread and this article: www.providencejournal.com/sports/content/20140219-john-henry-confident-about-red-soxs-status-and-direction.eceOne intriguing thing Henry said on Wednesday was that the Red Sox may not be as respectful of the luxury-tax threshold as they have been in recent years. Under the new collective bargaining agreement, surpassing the threshold — $189 million for each of the next three seasons — appeared more punitive than in the past, while staying under it could reap significant rewards.
Henry implied — albeit cryptically — that those perceptions might not be 100 percent accurate.
“There’s some reason to believe that [staying under the threshold] may not be as important as we thought a couple years ago,” Henry said. “There were certain incentives built into the season that at the time I doubted they would really carry the day, and that appears to be the case. They probably won’t.”So I am trying to wrap my head around the new rules that go into affect in 2016... is this saying that if the Sox were to go over the luxury tax, that it would be best to do it before 2016? The tax rate would be low and they only get a partial rebate currently of the revenue sharing. That goes up to the full 100% in 2016 to increase the penalties for going over the LT... but does this mean that since we are one of the 15 largest market teams that we don't get this back? This article is old... but this is the info I understand. Can somebody please explain to me in English how the rules are changing and how this affects the Sox if they go over the LT in the future? How will the Dodgers and the Yanks get penalized once the rules change... will it be more penalty or less? I am confused right now because I thought the penalties increased... but I could also read this to mean that the largest 15 markets don't get a refund no matter what so there is no more penalty to go over than just the increased tax rate for multiple offenses. m.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Daily/Issues/2011/12/20/Franchises/Red-Sox.aspx
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Post by taftreign on Feb 21, 2014 11:07:53 GMT -5
I imagine if it becomes apparent that Trout is going to have a reasonable possibility of reaching free agency a few teams will try to "clear" or open up budget space to make a run at him. Others may just not care about budget by then and go after him anyway. Thing is with most free agents how many real suitors are there for them? 6 or 7? I imagine Trout would have 14 or 15 by then with the new TV deals in effect. If enough teams are in the deal has the potential to escalate quickly. Truth is though I bet most of us don't really think he will get to free agency. No way they let it happen. They'll find a way.
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Post by patrmac04 on Feb 21, 2014 11:31:54 GMT -5
I'm not so sure we should be using ARod as a good example either. First he took up so much of Texas's payroll it was hard to build a winner. More importantly, he was a known steroid junky so it's unknown whether he could have actually stayed healthy and productive for the contract. He is a known steroid junky now, but not then. How can any of us as fans know who is and who is not a steroid guy? I have to have my doubts about every player in the game right now including Mike Trout, Pujols, Cabrera, Verlander, Sherzer... absolutely everyone is suspect. The reason why is that professional cyclers have gotten away with this stuff for so long that they prove that you can get around the system for a long time. Look... the more money is at stake the more likely that people will do anything at all to get the most money. Looking back, we can question every player who were amazing players like Ken Griffey Jr., Bonds, Andrew Jones, Pujols, Cabrera, Beltre, Sizemore. There is nobody in the game that is immune to suspicion. Even old timers should be questioned IMO and is why the whole steroid thing is a farce. Let's not limit this discussion to recent players. I could even question players like Ted Williams because steroids were around then and were readily available and legal. Anabolic steroids were first made in the 1930s by Dr. Ruziicka. It is a dirty little secret that most competitive sports have been abusing steroids since the 40s when it was discovered that the Russians were dominating sports by administering them to their athletes. They got the idea from the Germans who used to give them to all their soldiers in WWII. You would be a fool to think that competitive sports figures did not use them in the meantime just because baseball had not rules against it. www.steroidabuse.com/steroids-101.htmlwww.steroid.com/History-of-Steroids.php#
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Post by patrmac04 on Feb 21, 2014 11:33:55 GMT -5
Sorry to derail into a steroid conversation... I will refrain in the future. It is not the point of the thread.
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Post by patrmac04 on Feb 21, 2014 11:48:56 GMT -5
Question: would the Red Sox get in on signing Mike Trout? Do you believe this would be the time to break the bank for a player?
To answer the first question by the OP. I don't think the Sox get in on signing Mike Trout. The reason is twofold.
1. The Yankees and the Dodgers have proven that they are not limited by the luxury tax payroll limits and could easily outspend us
2. The Sox are not giving out huge long term deals to players because it carries too much risk. Even if the player is the best player in the game today, he could get hurt and hamstring a team for a decade or at the least limit the team severely. I can give many examples off the top of my head in Helton, Crawford, Hampton, Santana, Fielder, Wells, ARod (twice), Howard, Tex, Pujols, Kemp.
I think Trout does break ARod's record and we could see a team pay for that contract dearly in the future. The team will only have two options to get out from that contract and I think he would eventually be traded to either the Dodgers or Yankees if they do not sign him initially.
Until MLB baseball gives teams the ability to void contracts from steroid usage, signing a player to a long term guaranteed contract makes absolutely zero sense and the Red Sox are ahead of the curve on that one IMO.
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Post by jmei on Feb 21, 2014 12:36:09 GMT -5
First he took up so much of Texas's payroll it was hard to build a winner. This is a complete myth. The problem wasn't that the Texans didn't have any other money to spend, it was that they spent the rest of their payroll on awful players. Here's Dave Cameron with the details:
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Post by James Dunne on Feb 21, 2014 12:48:41 GMT -5
In fairness, Rusty Greer was a pretty sensible signing at that money at the time. He went downhill fast. And Rogers was really good in 2000 and 2002, just totally ineffective (and hurt) in 2001. Through the course of his three year, $22.5 million deal his WAR was 10.2.
But the overall point is correct - the idea that Rodriguez was eating up all of the Rangers payroll and they filled the rest of the roster with minimum-salaried scrubs is a totally insane myth. A combination of bad luck and bad moves are the reason the Rangers failed to win with Rodriguez.
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Post by jimed14 on Feb 21, 2014 12:53:13 GMT -5
You could say that between Pujols and Hamilton, the Angels are in that situation now.
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Post by Chris Hatfield on Feb 21, 2014 13:31:12 GMT -5
You could say that between Pujols and Hamilton, the Angels are in that situation now. Years/money remaining on current deals: Pujols: 8/212 Hamilton: 4/110 Wilson: 3/56.5 Weaver: 3/55 Kendrick: 2/18.85 Aybar: 3/26.5 Etc. So no, I don't think you can say that about LAnaheim.
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Post by Gwell55 on Feb 21, 2014 13:40:16 GMT -5
The problem is that Rodriguez more than held up his end of the bargain, and if the Rangers front office had behaved with even moderate competency, they could have put some good teams together. The blame for the failure of the 2001 to 2003 Rangers does not lie with Alex Rodiguez’s large paychecks, but instead with the total wastes of cash that they surrounded him with. You want to know why those teams failed? Look no further than Park, Gonzalez, Everett, Oliver, and Rogers. In their attempt to surround Rodriguez with talent, they brought in a never ending series of terrible players who had name value but lacked ability. It didn’t have to be that way. They had enough resources to put good players around Rodriguez – they just failed to identify which players they should actually be giving money to. One problem my brother brought out about Rodriguez. It seems to him observing Arod locally that he had a bad problem of getting his Hr for the day and a couple of rbi's then he packed it in. He seemed too aloof to the fans down there when that was happening at home. I won't say my Bro is right but he was there and I wasn't so take it for what that is worth but it does consider some thinking.
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Post by James Dunne on Feb 21, 2014 13:49:55 GMT -5
Rodriguez was in the top two in the AL in each of his three Texas seasons in offensive WPA+. Especially impressive when you consider how often the Rangers staff was giving up huge numbers of runs. The whole "he only cares about his stats" criticism comes up when any player does very well on a team that stinks. They used to say that about Ted Williams.
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nomar
Veteran
Posts: 10,825
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Post by nomar on Feb 21, 2014 14:00:19 GMT -5
I could easily see trout burning out. It's a pessimistic view, but he's the type of player I always worry about. Strong, fast, exciting, but risky. I'd rater play it a little bit safer and go after Stanton when he hits FA. He's already been more injury prone, but worst case scenario hes a damn good DH like Ortiz.
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Post by jimed14 on Feb 21, 2014 15:51:18 GMT -5
You could say that between Pujols and Hamilton, the Angels are in that situation now. Years/money remaining on current deals: Pujols: 8/212 Hamilton: 4/110 Wilson: 3/56.5 Weaver: 3/55 Kendrick: 2/18.85 Aybar: 3/26.5 Etc. So no, I don't think you can say that about LAnaheim. More along the lines that they have no depth because they spend it top-heavy.
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Post by James Dunne on Feb 21, 2014 16:32:02 GMT -5
The Angels have over $100 million in payroll not going to Hamilton and Pujols. They are bad contracts because the players aren't performing, but the Angels still have plenty of money.
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Post by soxfan06 on Feb 21, 2014 17:53:29 GMT -5
And, no I'm not talking about doing what tYankees did. I'm talking signing guys who are still constantly producing a 5.0+ WAR, not guys who used to do it like Beltran and McCann, or a guy like Ellsbury who seems to bounce between awesome WAR and barely above average WAR due to injury. Also, the most important part is not letting a guy who has consistently produced said 5.0+ WAR walk in favor of other, less productive guys. Uh, there aren't exactly a lot of players reaching free agency who "consistently produced 5.0+ WAR" as you define it above. There are exactly 6 position players who have produced 5+ fWAR in each of the last three years: Cabrera, Votto, Beltre, McCutchen, Cano, and Zobrist. Very few of these guys reach free agency for obvious reasons. There certainly aren't any in the FA class of 2015, for instance. Even if you got lucky and there was a run of true superstar free agents, good luck trying to sign three of them for less than what you'd give Trout. Oh, did I mention that you'd be getting four prime Trout years if you signed him in free agency, while you'd likely only get the decline years of most other free agents? Why is it so hard to understand? This entire thread is hypothetical. Thus my scenarios are hypothetical. Not realistic at all. I stated that numerous times in my posts in this thread.
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Post by rjp313jr on Feb 21, 2014 18:14:39 GMT -5
No one said they didn't have any money to spend, but he took a huge potion on their payroll which makes things more difficult no matter how you care to slice it. Even if not, it shows that one player doesn't make that much of a difference on a baseball team.
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