Hey, my taxes pay your salary, so get off my lawn!

THE BOOT OF THE FASCIST OCTOPUS STOMPS ON THE YANKEES FOREVER

RAYS/ROYALS/TWINS DOMINATION OF THE AL HAS GONE ON TOO LONG

Most brilliantly (and daringly), the Rays have wrapped up most of these guys through about 2015 or so. (Slight exaggeration I'm sure).

But in case Matthews hasn't noticed, the Yanks problem is not just doling out millions to struggling franchises but also that the Red Sox, Mets, Angels, Dodgers, Cubs, etc. seem to have decided (at least for now) that they are no longer mid-market franchises and are happily (and often foolishly) signing FAs to huge contracts. Even franchises in backwaters like Houston seem to think they can carry 4 players making about $15 M AND still have money left to spend on Kaz Matsui.

That is, the idea that the Yanks have their pick of even the over-priced aging FA market just isn't any longer true. Sure, this offseason they're highly likely to walk off with one of the major prizes but I'd wager they don't get two.

Or, with the new ballpark, they'll just pump it up to a $250-300 M payroll.

Actually, with the economy all topsy-turvy, it could be we're in for another baseball labor market "correction" and the Houstons of the world will find themselves desperate to move the Carlos Lees -- lucky day for the Yanks! :-)

(actually, although Lee has been good so far, his contract was light upfront, heavy on the back and his salary jumps from $12 M to $18.5 M next year -- Houston would love to move him I'm sure. Hello Mets!)

I think seeing the Yankees win all those WS during the late 90's and early 21st century has almost been worth it for the amount of completely retarded MSM articles written about their failure since. Baseball is a fickle ####### game, especially when played in 5 and 7 game chunks.

The Yankees' success was the coming together of luck and a whole hell of a lot of money thrown (sometimes well) at the problem of winning baseball games. Well now luck has left them (as it's prone to do) and too much of their money has been ill spent as well.

The fact that the Rays rode a decade of high picks to success this year is hardly surprising. It's how the system is supposed to work: even mildly competent small market clubs can have success sometimes over a large enough time frame. The Rays aren't particularly well run, but they have had quite a few advantages thrown their way and eventually they paid off and they got great years from most of the roster and it came together.

There isn't anything mind blowing NARRATIVE NARRATIVE SMALL MARKET COMMIES NARRATIVE going on. In fact, the fact that the Cardinals, White Sox, Red Sox and Angels have dominated the post-season recently kinds suggests that if anything spending money is still better than not spending money and that small market clubs are a concern for the Yankees, but only one of many concerns.

Here is something random: why don't the Yankees hire Beane: seriously, pay him 20 million a year. Imagine what he could do with a payroll nearly 10 times what he works with in Oakland.

The fact that the Rays rode a decade of high picks to success this year is hardly surprising. It's how the system is supposed to work: even mildly competent small market clubs can have success sometimes over a large enough time frame. The Rays aren't particularly well run, but they have had quite a few advantages thrown their way and eventually they paid off and they got great years from most of the roster and it came together.

I'd disagree with the idea they aren't particularly well run. They were terribly run under the previous regime, but I find it hard to find fault with anything the current management team has done. They inherited some nice pieces from the previous administration, acquired a bit more, than made the necessary moves this year to turn that talent into a genuine ballteam.

Yes, they had a number of high draft picks. But it's been far more than fortuitious drafting that has put the Rays in this position.

Here is something random: why don't the Yankees hire Beane: seriously, pay him 20 million a year. Imagine what he could do with a payroll nearly 10 times what he works with in Oakland.

Yankee fans demand they get back to first round playoff exits and he's the man who can deliver them!

Do the Yankees have a $600M payroll now?

Wallace Matthews: not just stupid columns on the Mets anymore

Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Matthews: Yankees have created a monster in Rays

"A few short weeks ago, coming from a background -- believe me -- as conservative and traditionally grounded in scientific fact as any of you, I began an experiment in -- incredulous as it may sound -- the reanimation of dead tissue."

Imagine what he could do with a payroll nearly 10 times what he works with in Oakland.

I think that Beane would be miscast as the GM of a high-payroll, high-pressure team. I think he believes that as well; that's why he turned down Boston.

There's no guarantee that Beane would spend more money wisely.

-- MWE

I disagree with the premise of this article, because by the time the Rays start losing their young core, they will almost certainly not be drafting in the first spots of the draft.

What I'm saying is that Tampa is reaping what they sowed, but they won't be able to reap that much longer (I'm referring to the draft). Yes, a good organization and wise expenditures will help them keep their core together (and be successful), but once the current kids can leave, things are going to be mighty interesting for Tampa.....

I think that Beane would be miscast as the GM of a high-payroll, high-pressure team. I think he believes that as well; that's why he turned down Boston.

I agree here. An example from the movie industry is that Kevin Smith was the king of the low-budget movies fifteen years ago. They gave him a big budget for a couple of projects in the last few years, all of which were horrible.

The fact that the Rays rode a decade of high picks to success this year is hardly surprising. It's how the system is supposed to work: even mildly competent small market clubs can have success sometimes over a large enough time frame. The Rays aren't particularly well run, but they have had quite a few advantages thrown their way and eventually they paid off and they got great years from most of the roster and it came together.

Ugh. I'm getting sick of this fallacy. The team was poorly run until new management took over three years ago. Since then it's been well run. As for stockpiling high picks, the only high picks on the postseason roster are BJ Upton (who was disappointing during the regular season), Evan Longoria, David Price (who's been a bit player) and Rocco Baldelli (also a bit player). Even if you want to stretch it into including Garza and Bartlett, for whom Delmon Young was traded, that's still only a fraction of the roster attributable to high picks, and probably 25 of 30 GMs wouldn't have had the cojones to pull off the Delmon deal to begin with (consensus at the time was generally that Minnesota won the deal, at least long-term).

In the meantime, other key contributors like Crawford (2nd), Sonnanstine (12th) and Shields (16th) were later-round picks, Pena was picked up off the scrap heap, Iwamura was signed through the posting system when most of the other teams ignored him, and Kazmir, Aybar, Gross, Navarro, Jackson, Wheeler, Howell, Balfour, Bartlett and Garza were all picked up in trades. And of all those moves, the only ones made by old management were the draft picks and the Kazmir trade (which, frankly, was a deal that any idiot would have made). Plus, current management gets credit for drafting Longoria, who most scouts didn't anticipate being nearly this good, yet the new management took anyway, even though at the time the system wass loaded with bats and lacking good pitching. It's not like other teams haven't completely botched their high picks in those same draft years (hello Greg Reynolds and Daniel Moskos).

poised to do what not even the Yankees have been able to do in nearly a decade, namely run the Red Sox out of Fenway Park and right out of October

- The Yankees swept the Red Sox in a five game series at Fenway August 18-21 2006, knocking the Sawx 6.5 games back in the division, 4 back in the WC, effectively running them out of Fenway and October. They also knocked them out of the playoffs in 2003. The last game was at Yankee Stadium because the Yankees were the better team that year, so I guess that doesn't count for Mr. Matthews.

something the Yankees haven't been able to give their fans since the end of the last millennium: a real run.

- Does this guy even follow baseball? Two AL Pennants, 6 division titles, and 1 Wild Card in 8 years since the end of the last millenium isn't a real run?

An example from the movie industry is that Kevin Smith was the king of the low-budget movies fifteen years ago. They gave him a big budget for a couple of projects in the last few years, all of which were horrible.

I think you (and Hollywood) wildly overrated Kevin Smith then. He was never the king of low budget because low budgets cannot excuse his worst skill, putting together a well structured and paced film with a consistent tone. He wrote a bunch of scenes and strung them together. When he was given a larger budget, it was just a license to go further off the rails in terms of his writing and structure without ever developing a good directors sense that a bigger budget might allow.

There's no guarantee that Beane would spend more money wisely.

He certainly hasn't done a good job when he has spent it (Dye, Chavez, Piazza, etc.).

He's been great at tying up young players to bargain arb buyouts and have almost none of them tank on him and he's been good at drafting and developing and seems able to find league-average starting pitching under every other rock he checks.

But big money investments? Nah.

Here is something random: why don't the Yankees hire Beane: seriously, pay him 20 million a year. Imagine what he could do with a payroll nearly 10 times what he works with in Oakland.

They said the same thing about Glen Sather when he was in Edmonton.
He then landed the top job with the NY Rangers.

That didn't work out so well.

to pull off the Delmon deal to begin with (consensus at the time was generally that Minnesota won the deal, at least long-term).


I dunno where you got that impression. On BTF, it was almost split, with a slight bias for the Rays. Check out the TO thread and the Newsblog thread.