User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
|
Demarini, Easton and TPX Baseball Bats
|
AllianceTickets.com has cheap MLB Tickets. Get all your Colorado Rockies Tickets, Seattle Mariners Tickets, San Francisco Giants Tickets and all your favorite baseball tickets here. We also carry cheap Denver Broncos Tickets, Seattle Seahawks Tickets and Denver Nuggets Tickets. |
For wholesale prices on baseball gifts and equipment, check these stores out! |
Page rendered in 0.9670 seconds
53 querie(s) executed
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
They signed him for pretty much the going rate for SPs who can "reliably" post ERA+s of 100-110...
Of course he was clearly in decline... His BBREF comps are scary, ALL of them (except Jason Schmidt) basically cliff-dived at the age Morris is now (assuming Jason is now in an injury induced cliff dive- he basically held on a year or two longer than the others
That explains the Phillies poor performance during that time.
I don't recall that, and I certainly wasn't among them. (If by "more than one," you mean "two," you're probably right, but I don't think it was the conventional response.) Jose Hernandez was washed up (though he had a rebound year with LA a couple years down the road), Matt Bruback was never regarded as more than about a C+ pitching prospect (and was probably about 15th on the Cubs' pitching prospect depth chart), and Hill was no longer regarded as more than, at best, an average everyday 2B in the making. Other than the dwindling chance that Hill might become a useful second baseman, there was NOTHING the Cubs gave up in that deal that there was any realistic chance that they'd miss in future.
As for what they got--Lofton was old, but he was still a reasonably productive leadoff man (and the Cubs had a huge, yawning hole in CF/leadoff with the season-ending injury to Patterson). They Cubs also had a huge, yawning hole at third with the failure of Hernandez and Lenny Harris to suffer season-ending injuries. That Ramirez was a "bust" was far from a universally held sentiment--I (and many many others) looked at a guy who'd torn it up in the minors, had an outstanding season in the major leagues at a very young age in '01, and was still clearly young enough to rebound and have a fine career, though the Bucs appeared to have screwed him up for the time being. The Cubs were in a very close division race, in which the holes they were filling were completely unacceptable.
Basically, I was ecstatic the moment the trade was announced--I was probably more excited by this trade than any other the Cubs have made in my 25 years of watching the team, including the Nomar deal.
Someone better warn Al Avila - he voluntarily left the Pirate organization to work for Dave Dombrowski in Detroit - dum dum dum.
So it's all Littlefield - which means when the Pirates hire a new CEO, he'll be in on the secret - dum, dum, dum. I bet Bud Selig knows and he allows it - that gives him one owner vote always in his pocket - dum, dum, dum.
Wow, the Masons aren't even this good.
All that propaganda about Littlefield's MBA makes so much sense now - dum dum dum.
Change 01 to 04 and you just described Oliver Perez.
Perhaps looking back on this from 2010 it will describe Duke as well...
Seriously, post 205 sucks. Just sucks.
I have to stop reading this thread now before I get heated.
I really liked the post about the Pirates being better off if they just picked up a book that ranks the top prospects and drafting based on those numbers. why go against CW if you are consistently failing when you do?
Especially when it is pretty easy and cost effective to go with CW?
No, you don't. Baseball is a business, and there is something tangible to winning: it stimulates revenue, big time.
I find the losing-on-purpose theory to be implausible for two reasons. First is simply its dubiousness as a business model. Yes, the Pirates (and other franchises) demonstrate that a consistent loser can be profitable in MLB, but it doesn't follow that by losing they're maximizing their profitability, or minimizing their risk. The premise that the ownership analyzed the situation and decided that intentionally losing would be their best business model is unsound.
The second reason is the explosive nature of the conspiracy. If this blew, it would blow sky-high. The outed conspirators wouldn't just be shamed and humiliated, they would be destroyed. They might well face criminal charges, and certainly would face a mountain of civil litigation. A pro sports franchise intentionally trying to lose games isn't merely improper, it's fraud. The premise that Nutting & Littlefield would expose themselves to such catastrophic personal risk, in a business enterprise in which profits are nearly guaranteed anyway, is extremely far-fetched.
It isn't impossible, but the likelihood of the trying-to-lose scenario being true is very, very low.
I don't think they are TRYING to lose, I don't think they are trying to WIN, at least not with any great effort.
They are profitable as it is- why mess with that?
Sure they could garner additional revenues if they won 90 or even 80 instead of 70,- but that's hard to do, it takes effort and money, and spending money means RISKING money-
1. let's say they tripled their money spent on scouting and development, instead of picking the 15th best guy when you have the #5 pick go for #3 if he drops etc. It's quite possible that you might not see any increased return for years.
2. let's say they boosted their payroll up between the Reds and A's (70-80mm) - doubling it.
Unless they had an immediate sizable revenue boost that would send them from the black to the red in a hurry. I think they'd get that boost if they launched themselves over 80 wins- but that might not happen. Plenty of teams have jacked up payroll with the INTENT of competing, only to find out that Chan Ho Hampton isn't the ace you needed and that Sexson really is the 2nd coming of Dave Kingman. From management's POV it's pretty damn risky.
For all we know Littlefield might have a bit of budget room, but he's afraid to use it. he sees three options:
1: Keep the same course, the boss gets a profit distribution and I get to keep being one of 30 MLB GMs.
2: Roll the dice, spend all I can, and with luck improve the team enough to match or exceed in revenue my increased expenditures, and I get to keep being one of 30 MLB GMs
3: Roll the dice, see no return, boss has lighter dividend distribution- if that happens again I have to work on my resume...
That's a fancy way of saying "trying to lose." If you had invested thousands of your hard-earned dollars in a Pirates season-ticket package, or had paid MLB/the Pirates for a license to sell Pirates merchandise, or had paid the Pirates a fee to operate a concession at their games, and you discovered that the management of the team had all along been deliberately choosing suboptimal strategies that reduced the overall chances of the team improving (and therefore winning), how would you feel? Defrauded, perhaps? Taken like a sucker? Would be liable to scream bloody murder, demand reparation, sue their lying a$$ for everything you could? And in your lawsuit, would you make the point that the fundamental premise under which every pro sports team operates is that it is sincerely attempting to win its games as best it can, to present an honest contest on the field?
I think they would prefer to win, all things being equal. But they're spending a certain (low) amount of money now and apparently making a nice profit. They could spend more and maybe win, but they might not, in which case they lose money, so why rock the boat?
I fully agree that the nature of the MLB cartel is such that there is minimal financial punishment for having a losing team. Clearly it's possible to operate a team in an incompetent and/or lazy manner and still turn a profit.
But that isn't the theory being presented here. Instead the theory is that the Pirates have figured out that the profit they gain from being a loser is their best course of business, and therefore it isn't merely that they aren't dissatisfied with a losing team, instead they intentionally, willfully execute a strategic plan designed to lose instead of win.
A plan that, if exposed, would ruin them, and possibly land them in prison.
I find that a very far-fetched theory.
Thank you, thank you very much. But really - how so? Reading your posts did the same to me. If any of it ever turns out to be true, I'll owe you a Coke. Your tone suggests that this HAS to be the only plausible explanation. It doesn't - and others have posted perfectly legitimate explanations that you keep turning back into the Pirates are built to lose (on purpose).
The Pirates can be that bad. They can make very stupid decisions time and time again. But you've assigned every move an ulterior motive that is interlocked into one of the better fraud schemes ever.
Actually, I should have put Kevin McLatchy in that post - he was part of it, or maybe even the spawn. If he leaves, he is in grave danger lest he blab at some point. Ogden Nutting looks like a man who knows people in Youngstown, if you catch my drift...
Ronny Paulino is trying to lose ball games - he's doing a helluva job, too.
I think it would be nearly impossible to prove that they aren't trying their hardest. And i don't even think littlefield needs to be in on it either. He could just occassionally get demands from the owner such as "trade for matt morris". he could even think that's crazy, but he goes along with it b/c he likes his job.
This would be something the so-called Irate Fans should try. Nothing like a nice class action suit to prove once and for all if this is true. I mean, they did such a great job with that Fan Walkout a few weeks back, this seems right up their alley.
If ownership came out and said "we only care about maximizing profit, so we will keep costs as low as possible", it would be stupid from a PR point of view, but it wouldn't be "wrong". It seems like the Pirates could just be one additional step away from that. That, indirectly, minimizing costs also lowers expectations, which keeps them in a safe zone in terms of media attention.
To follow up on #218, from the perspective of Pirates fans, is trying to build 70-win teams in perpetuity actually fraud?
What was fraudulent about the 1919 Black Sox was that the players weren't performing as well as they could reasonably have been expected to perform. There haven't been any allegations here that Matt Morris or Jack Wilson or Jason Bay are "trying" to lose games. The entire point, in fact, is that the 2007 Pirates are winning about as many games as one could have reasonably expected this collection of baseball players to win, and likewise in 2006, 2005, etc.
So, legally (not morally/ethically - the Baron's scheme here is clearly immoral/unethical) what would be the legal standing for fans? They got what they paid for - baseball as played by the 2007 Pittsburgh Pirates. I mean, as bad/overpaid as Cesar Izturis and Matt Morris are, they probably both improved the 2007 Pirates, right?
I'm having trouble seeing the legal risks being taken by Nutting if this is what he's doing. And maybe I'm being overly cynical toward the man, but given his treatment of Montreal/Loria/Henry, I don't believe that Selig's first instinct would be to disapprove of something like this.
You sure can. Look how wonderfully that turned out for Ken Lay et al.
Such risk is of course irrational/dangerous, but greed is a powerful motivator.
Yes it is. It often leads people to take stupid risks.
But I remain quite unconvinced of the financial incentive for Nutting/Littlefield here to take such a risk. I don't buy the argument that they're making so much more profit by losing than they would by winning.
Actually a lawsuit like this was tried at least once and it failed- some Padre season ticket holders sued after the Padres' 1993 firesale.
Ownership before the 1993 season had announced that none of the big four would be traded: Gwynn, Sheffield, McGriff, and ________ (I remember it being a "big 4" but for the life of me I don't know who #4 is)
Of course McGriff and Sheff were sent packing...
The lawsuit was tossed
I'm not a lawyer, and as I've said I'm not sure they would face criminal charges, but it sure looks a hell of a lot like consumer fraud to a layman like me.
There's a reason teams call spring training contests "exhibitions" and regular season contests "games": in the exhibition they aren't necessarily trying to win. The fundamental premise of a game is that the teams are sincerely trying to win.
If it became known that a pro sports franchise had been, systematically, with premeditation and careful planning, over a period of years, proactively trying to produce teams that lost more games than they won, I just cannot believe that it wouldn't produce a firestorm of reaction, and that legal action of some sort would be taken, against the team and/or the league.
Tony Fernandez? Benito Santiago?
But as I said above, nobody's alleging that the <u>players</u> on the Pirates aren't trying to win. It's not "fraud" if the Red Sox sweep a 3-game series with the D-Rays - anybody who bought tickets should have known that the Red Sox were the better team. Likewise, the 2007 Pirates are what they are - we should have all known that they were a lousy team, likely to lose 90-100 games, before anybody bought tickets to see their games.
If it became known that a pro sports franchise had been, systematically, with premeditation and careful planning, over a period of years, proactively trying to produce teams that lost more games than they won, I just cannot believe that it wouldn't produce a firestorm of reaction, and that legal action of some sort would be taken, against the team and/or the league.
I agree with this. From the perspective of MLB, this would be a disaster if such a thing was proven. And the Nuttings could well be stripped of the team or at least forced to sell. But then the question becomes, how likely is such a thing to ever come out - as you keep pointing out, the Pirates have a perfectly plausible alternate explanation: they're just not very good at baseball.
But whether it's players or the management that's selected them, if the intent of the conspirators is to lose, then the product of an honest game isn't being presented. This is similar to what got Pete Rose in trouble: the implication that he intentionally made managerial decisions that undermined his team's chances of winning, even though the players were trying their hardest to win.
From the perspective of MLB, this would be a disaster if such a thing was proven.
It sure would. Even if it wasn't conclusively proven, and even if the lawsuits got tossed, the allegations alone would make for a horrific scandal, would be disastrous for business.
I have nothing but antipathy for Bud Selig. But I don't think he would be so cynical as to permit a team to undertake such a plan. And if he suspected that a team was up to it, I strongly believe he would take swift action (covertly, of course, he's certainly smart enough for that) to ensure that they knocked it off right away.
The risk/reward tradeoff for the sport, as well as the team, just doesn't add up.
Andy Benes was the only other star on that team. Although it looks like they signed him to a big contract before that season so nobody could have thought he would get traded.
Greg Harris? He was traded too.
Unless the fan base had some irrational attachment to Craig Shipley or Doug Brocail.
Seriously, there was virtually nobody on that team who had been on it two years before, so it's hard to think of who it might be.
Loria was trying to extort the taxpayers of Montreal by allowing the franchise to die on the vine, and his operation stunk to high heaven. But even in that very ugly episode, one of the very worst in the history of MLB, no one accused Loria of enacting a years-long secret plan to construct a team intentionally designed to lose 90 games each season.
actually I think their explanation is that they know what they are doing but random chance has not operated in their favor.
It's silly. The fact of the matter is, the ownership doesn't know what it's doing. These aren't teams dominated by a group of stockholders who are pressuring for results right now, they're teams headed by usually one guy with a majority stake who makes the decisions. The person this guy - who probably had no experience when coming into the business - puts in charge are people that are close to him or have been recommended by people close to him. Then he develops a personal relationship with that person and probably keeps him on too often past their sell by date. Personal relationships are more important than any of you conspiracy theorists are taking into account as to who is in charge and why.
Listen, I'm a Detroit Lions fan. I don't think there's a conspiracy for the Lions to lose. The reason they suck is obvious: the owners have no ####### clue and put incompetents in charge. The same is true for the Pirates.
And if this is obviously the business model to follow, then why are the A's trying to win? Why are the Twins trying to win? Why did the Royals finally put someone in charge who knows what he's doing?
This whole debate is silly. The Pirates ownership is bad. They make bad decisions. It isn't an evil plot to make money, it's because they're bad at their jobs.
Actually, Ford is on the record as saying that being able to talk football with Matt Millen is more important to him then the team winning. I stopped watching the NFL after I read that (it's in a Len Pasquerelli column from last year). I'll start again when Millen is fired or Ford is dead.
I can't think of any legal risk to the Nutting partnership for its "drive for 75" strategy. It would be next to impossible to prove that the partnership is not now and has never tried to win. I wouldn't count on seeing "smoking gun" evidence providing that point. Nor would employees like Littlefield testify to that fact unless they were coerced into doing so.
While savvy baseball fans believe the Morris trade a debacle that won't help the Pirates win in 2008, for others Morris is a name they might know, a one-time star. Moreover, his hefty salary gives evidential support to the claim that the Pirates are trying since winning is positively related to spending. But, spending more does not cause a team to win more. Thus, when superficially considered, the Morris trade proves the Pirates are trying!
But, they aren't. They want to maximize profits while minimizing risks. For them, there was great risk in selecting and paying for Matt Wieters. He may never make it to Pittsburgh. Yet, from their perspective, there is no great risk in acquiring Morris. He only needs to perform as he has since his surgery and he’ll be an improvement over Chacon and Armas, VanBenschoten and ????. The Nutting partnership is concerned with the short-term when it comes to building a team. They won’t go overboard when acquiring prospects. But, there is more than enough money available for Littlefield’s dumpster dive finds.
So long as the Pirates take in big money from Major League Baseball and so long as the fans support the team at the level they have since 1988, the Nutting partnership will sit pretty till the moment they sell the team. Then, Pirate fans will realize the true extent that they’ve been taken to the cleaners.
Dismissing something by simply labeling it a "conspiracy theory" and calling it therefore ridiculous... I don't see the point there. Several of you have presented logical arguments against my assertions; that's good. I like those. I freely admit that it's improbable that anyone would do this; nevertheless, it's quite possible, and my opinion is that there is plenty of evidence that this is in fact happening in Pittsburgh, which I've detailed in numerous posts already. Evidence, I say; not proof. No, it wouldn't hold up in a court. But then, I'm not bringing charges against the Pirates.
And yes, it's quite possible that the lose-every-year strategy may not be the optimal way to maximize profit while minimizing risk. But for a small-market team, I can at least see that someone may think it really is the best way to go.
Just because something is absurd--and intentionally losing games IS absurd, for the many reasons Steve has already given--doesn't mean somebody won't try it. There are a lot of rich people in the world, some of whom get their high on life by doing what most of us consider to be weird and/or dumb things. Steve, you've said yourself in rebuttal to me that not every businessman that gets rich is necessarily smart.
I'm not here to tell you that losing 95 every year is the most profitable way to run a baseball team. But I am here to suggest that, nevertheless, the people who own the Pittsburgh Pirates think it is, and that's just what they're doing. Just look at the long track record here. This transcends mere garden-variety incompetence.
Well, none, of course. You have none; all you have are your suspicions.
Do you seriously doubt my assertion that the Pirates are hideous cheapskates in virtually every aspect of franchise management?
Not at all. But I find your explanation for that behavior far less plausible than the simpler one, that they're just hideous cheapskates, as are many, many other business operators in every industry.
Dismissing something by simply labeling it a "conspiracy theory" and calling it therefore ridiculous... I don't see the point there.
I'm not "labeling" it a conspiracy theory. It is a conspiracy theory. In and of itself that doesn't make it untrue. But conspiracies are, by virtue of human nature, very difficult to keep secret in the long run, and the year-in-year-out aspect of this secret plan is among the several things that make it implausible.
First, it's not an "obvious" business model. The a's ownership may have determined that, in order to be profitable, they have to win x games a year, and make the playoffs y% of the time. The difference between playing in a 4 team division vs. a 6 is pretty big when you think of small market teams that need everything to break right in order for them to make it. Maybe someone from the pirates decided that it was just too hard to win in a 6 team division. Plus, if the a's start losing, it's more likely for their fans to go elsewhere (giants) then it is for pirates fans. most importantly though, i think we can all agree that losing intentionally is morally wrong. maybe the other owners aren't as shady.
Humor me on this question: How long were many baseball players loading up on steroids before the lid was finally blown off it? 15 years is probably a reasonable guess, wouldn't you say? And many, many more people were actively involved with that particular "conspiracy" (in the sense that it was hidden from the general public) than what I suspect.
I'm not trying to pick a fight on a small subject there; just pointing out that something being unlikely doesn't make it impossible or difficult to believe (the Yankees are statistically unlikely to reach the playoffs this year).
At least 15 years. I wouldn't be shocked to learn that some players were using steroids in the 1970s, or even the 1960s. Athletes in other sports were.
But that was (and almost certainly remains) a conspiracy of a very different order:
- It was all about players gaining every possible edge to win games, not to intentionally lose them
- The underground network of steroids producers and distributors was elaborate and well-established, and was by no means limited to supplying only baseball players
- Everyone involved (dealers, players, and team management, who looked the other way if not subtly encouraging players to use PEDs) had obvious, direct financial incentive to conduct the practice
- It was simply one manifestation of a PED culture that had been pervasive in baseball (as well as virtually all other sports) for decades
- And it wasn't even really all that secret, just as it wasn't/isn't in the NFL
Really, steroid use in baseball (and other sports) is best described not as a conspiracy so much as it is an underground behavior, very similar to illicit use of recreational drugs in the broader society. It's pervasive, institutional naughty behavior, if you will.
A secret plan undertaken by the front office of a single franchise to systematically produce a losing team is a very different animal. It would be truly pathological, in the deepest sense of the term.
I think the Morris trade was ordered by ownership as a misguided attempt to make the fans feel like the Pirates care about winning. However incompetent Littlefield may be, I don't see him instigating a move that costs the team $13m at this juncture.
What would refute the claim that the Nutting partnership does not try to compete and win championships -- that is, accepts losing as a part of its business strategy? I would say that trying to win championships. That effort would have led to the Pirates taking B.J. Upton and Matt Wieters in two recent drafts, it would have meant not giving Aramis Ramirez to the Cubs, it would mean trading for real prospects at whatever level they might be instead of trading for major league ready players like Wigginton, Gerut, etc. it would mean having a strong LA program, a better and larger scouting staff, etc. The Pirates do not do or have any of these things. But, the partnership makes a lot of money from their franchise and was quite happy with Littlefield up until the losing because a problem for them. In short, the partnership runs the Pirates as a low-risk, low-cost profit center, not a sports team competing to win. To debunk the claim that the team doesn't try requires evidence that they are, in fact, trying. At best, though, persons who would criticize those of us who believe the partnership is not trying to win can rely upon deals like the Morris trade for evidential support. Let's say that this evidence is ambiguous, to put it mildly.
The NHL blew itself to the edge of oblivion (some might say over the edge) because cost certainty was more important to owners than optimization. I can easily see Pirate ownership shrugging their shoulder and telling Littlefield, "Well, you've got a green light to get somebody, but let's not get too ambitious, okay?" Get a great player, and fans'll go nuts when the FO lets him walk. Get a pricey vet, and at least when he goes, you can point to his contract and bad performance and say, "Well, it didn't quite work out like we hoped."
I don't know that the Pirates are trying to lose, but it's not hard to believe that winning certainly isn't their top priority.
As Littlefield explained to a fan when asked for his reasons for picking Bullington instead of Upton:
"I could not go to my boss, the principal owner, and tell him I want to spend $6M on a player who won't make it to the majors in five years."
"I like how the Pirates passed on Wieters for financial reasons, but have added far more salary between Izturis and Morris than Wieters could possibly demand in a bonus. Let's see, potentially the best amateur catcher since Mauer or a mediocre 30 something SS and a fifth starter, also on the wrong side of 30. Only in Pirateland could option B possibly be more appealing."
I think the "steroids conspiracy" would be even harder to pull off b/c
1) for every player using them, there was at clean player who didn't want to take them and would benefit from blowing the whistle
2) more people were involved in steroids, where this pirates thing would be a small circle
3) the evidence (circumstantial) is right out in the open and easily testable
question: if you owned the pirates, and were "trying to lose" (or whatever we are calling this theory), what would you have done in the past 15 years that wasn't already done? what other corners could be cut, or "mistakes" made that would better promote your agenda?
another question: what evidence is there that they are actually trying to get better?
Actually, I find it amusing that some writers have claimed Bonds's alleged use of steroids to have been because of jealousy. Of who? McGwire? Sosa?
But I don't want to turn this into a steroids thread.
But Steve, their choice isn't between winning and losing, it's between losing and trying to win. Losing is easy, winning is hard. They may have put together multiple strategies when they bought the team, ranging from drafting all low-ceiling college players and never signing a free agent at all to spending all sorts of money.
Using made up numbers and greatly simplifying, maybe they had this:
Plan Yearly Cost Max Revenue Min Revenue1 20 30 20
2 25 30 20
3 30 45 40
4 40 45 35
5 50 60 35
6 60 90 35
7 70 100 40
8 80 120 40
9 100 150 50
10 120 200 50
In the conspiracy theory, they chose plan 3, which is spend enough to guarantee between $10 and $15 million in profit. You want them to choose plan 8, where they could make $40 million, but could lose $40 million if they don't pick the right players or if the players get hurt. I don't think it's unreasonable for them to not choose what you think they should. I also don't think it's unreasonable for them to say, "Don't try too hard to win since that will push us up to plan 5 and I don't want to go there."
That goes to another point. People seem to think that you can build a consistent competitor by doing certain things (Latin America, scouting, etc). But every team can't be a consistent competitor. From that perspective, they may see the A's and Twins doing plan 6 and being successful, but deciding that every team can't choose the same plan, so choosing a different plan for themselves.
I don't see it as out of the question.
Neither do I. But I do see it as highly unlikely, vastly less likely than the explanation that they are trying to win (or at least not actively trying to lose), but just aren't effective at making it happen.
From 1996 - 2006 (it's easy to get a matrix of wins from BB-ref, so I stopped before 1994-95 to avoid the shorter strike seasons), the average major-league team has a standard deviation of wins of 9.
The Pirates standard deviation for wins is 5.06. The only team with a lower s.d. is the Devil Rays (4.87 but only over 9 years). The Pirates are also one of only three teams for which the range of wins over this time period is less than 20, with a range of 17 wins (62 to 79). Only the Rockies (67 to 83 wins) and D-Rays (55 to 70 wins) have a smaller range of wins.
So, if the goal of Pirates management is to build a <u>consistent</u> team, in terms of number of wins, they've actually been doing a really good job.
It's easier and cheaper to build a consistently poor or mediocre team because replacement level players are typically cheap as are low-ceiling prospects. The Pirates accumulate these by the dozen.
Also has anyone pointed out that in the wake of the contracts for Meche, Lilly, Marquis, etc., that Morris at 1.3 years/ $13.5 million is far from outrageous? In fact, considering that it is a short deal with an affordable option, and that Morris eats 200 innings a year, it's probably better than your average free agent signing of a starting pitcher.
I guess you could argue that the Pirates have no need for a good starter in their current condition. I wouldn't argue that, though. They have a thin rotation and really could use his innings to remain respectable.
1) I'm surprised that so many people see the idea of a sports franchise trying to lose games as completely beyond the pale. Didn't anybody notice the coverage of the last month of the most recent NBA season, with Seattle, Boston, and Portland all scrambling to lose enough games to get a shot at Greg Oden or Kevin Durant in the draft lottery? If you'd prefer an example from Pittsburgh, it's pretty much a matter of public record at this point that the Penguins tanked games in order to have a chance at drafting Mario Lemieux.
If teams can try to lose games in the near term in the hope of improving their long-term on-field performance, I don't see why it's so shocking to suggest that they might lose games in order to pursue a financial strategy.
2) There are numerous anecdotal examples of the Pirates' team doctors giving diagnoses that directly contradict those of outside medical experts, and even more examples of them forcing players to play hurt (which would be a good strategy for tanking games, if one were inclined to do so).
A few examples:
*Jason Kendall secretly playing the entire 2001 season with a torn tendon in his thumb. [url="http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=NewsLibrary&p_multi=APAB&d_place=APAB&p_theme=newslibrary2&p_acti>Link</a>.
*Armando Rios literally limping after balls in the outfield in 2002, because the condition of his knee wouldn't let him run. <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/sports/bbw/2002-05-22/nlcentralnotes.htm"]Link[/url].
*Aramis Ramirez playing for three months on a badly sprained ankle in 2002. Link.
*Pat Meares getting regular starts at second base in 2001, even though he was only able to grip the bat with two fingers of his left hand. Link.
There are LOTS of others; I just got bored looking them up. Pirate pitchers also routinely get second opinions regarding elbow/shoulder pain when they receive a thumbs-up from the team's medical staff, ever since the team doctors missed an impingement in Kris Benson's shoulder back in 2003.
One more thing: The whole Craig Wilson situation would make a whole lot more sense if they were tanking.
Yes, yes, this is all very conspiratorial, but even if none of this -- the bad drafts, the poor coaching, the weak international scouting, the tight purse strings -- have been intentionally placed to create an uncompetitive franchise, it at least points to an ownership that is completely negligent insofar as winning is concerned. It may be hard to tell the difference between stupid and evil, but the more I think about it, the less far-fetched it is that Nutting & Co. have no desire to strive for a winner.
Actually, you could stop right there and have pretty solid evidence the team was trying to lose.
So there goes your argument that Pirates are trying to lose. :)
Because he didn't want to keep trying to lose? Because Mickey White was improving the level of the minor league system too much? Because the whole "trying to lose" only started with David Littlefield?
One point about the difficulty of keeping the lid on a conspiracy... It's a lot easier if you only have 2 or 3 people involved. In this case it could be as little as Littlefield and however many Nuttings there are.
Without saying that anyone has written a memo detailing the Plan To Lose, I think you can say pretty easily that institutional structures have been implemented that prevent winning, and that at the same time prevent non-profitability. These structures of decision-making are far more powerful than a memo that can be refuted.
The Pirates as an organization have been "trying" to win 70-75 games and make money at low risk. I don't think that requires a "conspiracy theory." It just requires a more complex - better, imo - theory of agency and intentionality.
We have a winner!
Not true, it went up for 1 year (2003), declined the next(2004) and went back down to 2002's level the year after that (2005). Considering baseball as a whole had greater attendance in 2005 than 2002, they essentially lost market share from 2005 to 2005.
They also hiked their payroll nearly 15% from 2003 to 2004, since attendance declined in 2004 (from 2003) I assume the Royal's bottom line was less in 2004 than 2003, KC then slashed payroll about 20%, and attendance bottomed out again in 2005. They've progressively hiked payroll in the past two years and in 2007 are actually spending a respectable amount of $- still below average but 75% more than the Pirates. By Pythag the Royals are a 75 win team, unliek the Pirates who are a 65 win team...
Of course in 2005/06 Royal's ownership decided to tack a different tack- of course Glass was taking a lot more personal abuse from the MSM than the Nuttings have received- so far.
Also, Isn't it widely known that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers followed this exact strategy, and that is why the NFL salary cap has a salary floor? As I recall, the Bucs figured out that if they spent the minimum on payroll, with the NFL revenue sharing, they would make a nice profit even if no one came to their games.
And the JR House situation, and the Ryan Doumit situation. Maybe they are just philosophically opposed to the concept of a hitting catcher, and kept trying to transform hitters into first basemen, then saying "Oops, now that he's a mediocre-hitting first baseman he's lost most of his value", and then sent them back to the minors to play catcher again, and generally acted without a plan.
I think it could be chalked up to simple lack of a plan, not much different from what the Royals have done during the Allard Baird era. Justin Huber called up three years too late? Ambiorix Burgos called up three years too early? Whatever, it's not like the team is going to win anyway.
Without saying that anyone has written a memo detailing the Plan To Lose, I think you can say pretty easily that institutional structures have been implemented that prevent winning, and that at the same time prevent non-profitability. These structures of decision-making are far more powerful than a memo that can be refuted.
Exactly. I think the ownership also micromanages the payroll to the extent that they say "Ahem, we need $5 million more on the payroll real soon, you better sign someone." or "We need to drop $5 million of dead weight, you better trade someone." I would not be surprised if every deal Littlefield has ever done has been under the presumption by other GMs that he has hardly any leverage.
You hear about other teams (Braves) being subject to demands like that too, but they don't cut corners in all he other departments.
Another thing is that as soon as a Pirates player starts to make multimillions of dollars, his contract becomes the scapegoat for why the Pirates can't win, and he needs to be traded. This seemed odd to me when it happened with Aramis Ramirez, and since then it's happened with Kris Benson, Jason Kendall (even though they basically ruined his value as a hitter by waiting to treat the hand injury), Brian Giles, and now Jack Wilson.
The Pirates as an organization have been "trying" to win 70-75 games and make money at low risk. I don't think that requires a "conspiracy theory." It just requires a more complex - better, imo - theory of agency and intentionality.
Low risk is an important part of the plan. And low risk means low variability. A slim chance of a 60-win season, and a very slim chance of a 90-win season. They make sure to have mediocre rather than embarrassing players. This means precocious prospects add too much variability to the mix.
Where are these claims coming from about the "Pirates players filing more grievances than other players"? Aren't those things confidential?
But that doesn't mean they're "trying" to lose. It doesn't mean they don't draft the best players or don't try to sign quality guys or try to develop those players. I don't think they pass on players because, well, they might be really good one day, and that will mean the Pirates might win 90 games and that would be bad.
Personal relationships in the front office, possibly. Thinking they were getting better is another. But they got worse. And then they fired him. Seems to me if they were trying to lose, they would have kept him on.
You guys are all really smart. But sometimes you're too smart for your own good. There isn't a logical explanation for everything that happens in baseball (or in business for that matter).
Yes, this the the Game of Shadows version--that Bonds decided to start using after the media-fanlove fest directed at McGwire and Sosa in 1998.
A player wouldn't have benefited from "blowing the whistle," he'd have been branded a loose-canon/idiot and skewerd by the media as a jealous whiner.
Had Bonds been the hypothetical whistle-blower, then, yes for sure.
The Pirates as an organization have been "trying" to win 70-75 games and make money at low risk. I don't think that requires a "conspiracy theory." It just requires a more complex - better, imo - theory of agency and intentionality.
This is possible. However, this is an area where roto can be a useful analogy. Roto is a simulation and all simulations have huge limitations, but well-structured simulations are still useful as analogies and as educational tools. There is a guy in the roto league I have been involved in for the last ten years (me and a buddy basically trade off running the team, with the other guy as "consultant" based on our moods and work schedules). We have done OK--won the league, finish in the first division almost every year, have also been down around 9th-10th in a 12-team league a couple of times. We are far from great at it. But there is a guy in the league--a really nice guy, and from what I have heard very good at his real job--who has never finished above 9th or 10th. He tries, but he just doesn't get it and makes the same kinds of mistakes year after year. Part of it is not putting in the time--a lot of roto these days is simply paying attention, with all the info available, but he has put in more time recently, asked other guys questions, but never contends--and he has been in this league, coincidentally, 15 years.
Now, one can debate how much value this has for analyzing the Pirates, but given the infinitely greater complexity of running a real team as opposed to a roto team, I think if you combine a lot of factors--bad judgment by Littlefield/Bonifay, cheap ownership, poor minor league instruction, bad handling of young talent by field management, revenue sharing--these could interact to keep the Pirates down for 15 years without any element of "intentionality."
To win, teams in medium-small markets need to develop/acquire low-cost stars. Cleveland, Detroit, Oakland, Minnesota, and now Milwaukee have all done that/are doing it. The Pirates continue to lose mostly because they have been unable to do that. You would think they would get lucky once in awhile, but I don't think they are trying not to.
He's also written for Baseball America, FWIW. Like I said, I only went to the blog post (good blog, though) because the original article was behind the pay wall.
I wish I still had a copy of the Perrotto article about how the Pirates resented Craig Wilson for drinking too much Pepsi.
There's a limit to how long you can keep a bad GM on before you start to get public pressure to find someone else. When that became too much, they let him go and found the next guy.
Clearly there's a fine line between trying to lose and not trying to win. We all agree that it would take a whistle-blower to confirm the theory and there's no real way to disprove it.
I think that the main disagreement lies with the assertion that winning occasionally (or even once) would be worse for the team than never winning, right? I don't think baseball's big enough to find enough examples either way. The Royals are the closest, but as has been mentioned, they changed their style. Was the recent style change due to the winning followed by losing? It's possible, but we don't really know.
The state of this organization is mostly the result of the way that McClatchy was asked to manage the team (to hit year-to-year financial targets), combined with the belief that gutting the organization and starting over (the only viable solution for the on-field woes) will alienate enough of the fan base to make it impossible to sustain the operation even if that is more likely to build a winner in the long run. Whenever you hear anything from the organization about the possibility of rebuilding, you always - always - hear the word "risk", and you have to remember that when they talk "risk" in this context, they mean "risk" to their revenue streams.
-- MWE
I recently went to look up Mark Madden's fulminations about the June 30th protest and learned then that the BCT charged way too much for access to their achieves, especially when the articles I was looking for were only about a month old. It would have been annoying enough to have paid a few dollars for a Madden article, but one less than a month old!!!!
I’ve started to print as Acrobat files the BCT articles I want to keep.
The Craig Wilson Pepsi article was a classic!
This ties back a little bit with my post #253. The Pirates appear to be a remarkably <u>consistent</u> franchise - they win 66 - 76 games per year and draw 19 - 23,000 fans per game every season like clockwork. As s.zielinski said as a follow-up to my #253, "It's easier and cheaper to build a consistently poor or mediocre team because replacement level players are typically cheap as are low-ceiling prospects."
If your goal is consistency, then the best way to achieve it is to target the 70-75 win range. I think it's clear that this is what the Pirates are doing - striving for consistency. The "conspiratorial" question then is whether they're actually striving to <u>limit</u> their wins to that 70-75 range.
Personally my impression is that ownership (ie: The Nuttings- McClatchey might be/ have been another matter) do not interfere in personal moves except to impose budgetary restrains and revenue targets. Which is also my impression of how Minnesota's much maligned ownership oeprates as well.
The obvious difference being that Minnesota's uses that freedom to operate (within budget) in a dramatically different fashion than Littlefield & Co.
If this is the case, replacing Littlefield MIGHT make a substantial difference.
Even if current ownership loosened the purse strings a bit I don't think it would make any difference with DL in charge,
The article then goes on to talk about how DL tried to sign Suppan to a two (2) year deal last fall- they think Morris is significantly superior- so essentially getting Morris NOW is better than if tehy had signed Suppan to 2 years last fall.
1: Matt Morris last 4 years: 89, 104, 90, 100
2: Jeff Suppan last 4 years: 100, 120, 107, 87
Morris has been better so far in 2007 (Their peripherals are virtually identical except Suppan has about 12 more walks) Suppan has been significantly better over the last 365 days, better over the last 2, 3 and 4 years- in fact coming into this year Suppan had beated Morris in ERA+ by 17 and 16 points the last two years, and by 11 the year before that.
Do the Pirates think Morris is a significantly superior pitcher because he's been better so far this year, or because once upon a time he won 20 games?
Wheels within wheels.
The organization is disorganized and has no plan.
Dave Littlefield really thinks that passing on Weiters and trading for Morris are GOOD things that will help the team.
All of this just supports the idea that they aren't good at their jobs, not that they plan on being just bad enough to keep making X amount of money rather than trying to be good and risk making less (or more).
Oh, and it also proves Phil Rogers doesn't know what the #### he's talking about. But we all knew that anyway.
They are consistent - they win some games, but not enough to compete. They spend their free agent dollars on average-ish players in order to keep the bottom from falling out. They draft low-upside players who are likely to add average-ish production at low cost. They protect the bottom line feverishly, cutting costs wherever it might be relatively hidden from their public - as in coaching and medical staffs.
I think there's a real tendency in stathead analysis to look only to one person running a team and analyze what the team does as their personal, conscious, intentional choices. Generally, this isn't how sociologists work. It makes more sense to analyze the internal structures of decision-making and the external structures of reward and acceptable action. The Pirates have instituted a set of organizational structures which do not rule out the possibility of contention, but are at best indifferent to it. The Pirates under Littlefield have been far too consistent, year in and year out, to be called "disorganized." They're just not organized to optimize winning.
Secondly, it's not a society in that there is a single individual in charge of imposing these 'internal structures' who are therefore responsible.
[EDIT: yeah, it's kind of the same point]
Wait, the files are IN the computer?
I think it's striking, though, that people have to retreat to "incompetence" and "disorganization" to explain a remarkably consistent history of decisions and outcomes. My model, while I probably overstated how self-evidently applicable it is, predicts little to no change. Other models assume some sort of significant change will come soon, and chalk up the lack of change to luck.
Exactly right.
It would be amazing if someone inside the organization would comment on this of all threads. I have several questions for such a person. The Pirates' actions are just...so inexplicable. The only thing it can be compared to is the Royals when they were desperately trying to trade Jermaine Dye, but otherwise the Allard Baird regime's competence bestrides the world like a colossus compared to Littlefield's.
I agree. I'd say Nutting putting Littlefield on the hot seat only reinforced Littlefield's short-term focus. Hence: Moskos and Morris. Fan discontent and media criticism have also pressured the Nutting partnership. The partnership now has to worry more about winning games and giving the appearance of winning games than they normally would. In other words, the franchise relates to an external environment and that environment has changed since 2003. The partnership has responded to this change by moving McClatchy to the background and by placing Littlefield and Tracy in limbo. Littlefield and his staff responded by doing what they do. It's safe to assume that he and his people want to keep their jobs.
If the partnership fires Littlefield this fall, his fate won't necessarily come from Nutting realizing that Littlefield is no damn good; Nutting might fire Littlefield simply because his GM will have outlived his usefulness to the partnership. Life is not fair. Just ask Bobby Bradley or JR House or.... Littlefield has been a good captain. But, he's expendable.
The next key event for team critics will be the hiring of the new CEO. A change in direction could become visible then, if there is a change of direction.
Exactly right. I don't know whether they'll fire Littlefield now, but within the next year or two I think they'll finally be forced to, and then it'll be another 2-3 years after that to see what happens under whatever new leadership is appointed. If it keeps being the same story it was under Bonifay and Littlefield... well...
Assistant under Dombrowski for the Marlins.
That doesn't seem to jibe with this:
Maybe I'm confusing the meaning of an organization in "disarray from top to bottom." That says disorganized to me, but I could be confusing what was really meant.
And, again, simply because Pittsburgh is risk averse to tearing down their organization and rebuilding from the bottom up doesn't mean they are intentionally trying not to win as many games as they can, especially not for the reasons some have stated in this thread (as if winning more games will mean less money). It simply could mean they feel that the best way TO win as many games as they can is to do it the way they are doing it, and that eventually, one of these years they'll win 90 games instead of 75.
Couldn't - didn't? - people say the same thing about every organization that loses every year? Like the Cubs and White Sox? I'd be willing to bet the White Sox made more money the year they won the series and the year after than they did when they were just winning 85 games every year and finishing in second or third place.
Really?
Tell that to KC fans who are so happy the Royals hired one of JS's assistants :-)
Really really.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main