Red Sox sign David Price, 7 years and $217 million

[Kin]

Right. And that would have been known at the time the moves were made, would it not? So why allow it to happen if you knew you weren't going to stay the course?

Who is the "you" here? The only person in the Jays organization above Alex was Beeston. Beeston didn't know what the Jays wanted to do long-term because he had a foot out the door, Shapiro wasn't hired until a month later and Ownership's job isn't to micro-manage the team. They set a budget and it's the Front Office's job to build the team within the parameters of that budget.

But more to the point I don't really understand the question. The Jays had a unique opportunity last summer with the Yankees looking vulnerable and Boston looking outright bad. So I don't really see why it's hard to reconcile making a move in a short window without also committing to blowing an unrealistic 30-40 million dollar hole in your long term budget.

It would be entirely reasonable for someone above AA to have said "Make the trades if you think they'll give us a shot at winning this year but you're going to have to figure out a way to make the numbers work for next year".

 

[Zee]

Hope he goes 5-17 next year.

 

[TML fan]

Right. And that would have been known at the time the moves were made, would it not? So why allow it to happen if you knew you weren't going to stay the course?

Who is the "you" here? The only person in the Jays organization above Alex was Beeston. Beeston didn't know what the Jays wanted to do long-term because he had a foot out the door, Shapiro wasn't hired until a month later and Ownership's job isn't to micro-manage the team. They set a budget and it's the Front Office's job to build the team within the parameters of that budget.

But more to the point I don't really understand the question. The Jays had a unique opportunity last summer with the Yankees looking vulnerable and Boston looking outright bad. So I don't really see why it's hard to reconcile making a move in a short window without also committing to blowing an unrealistic 30-40 million dollar hole in your long term budget.

It would be entirely reasonable for someone above AA to have said "Make the trades if you think they'll give us a shot at winning this year but you're going to have to figure out a way to make the numbers work for next year".

So, you think Beeston just threw up his hands and said "f--- it! Not my problem next year", authorized everything, and told AA "nah you're good bro, don't worry about it" and then all of a sudden out of the blue Shapiro was like "No you can't have any money"?

Everyone knew Price was a free agent and everyone knew he was going to get paid. It doesn't seem reasonable at all for AA to make those trades if he didn't think he could get the money to pay for him.

I think it's more likely that ownership wanted to catch lightning in a bottle before they clamped down so they let it happen and the reason Shapiro reportedly got so ticked at AA last year was that Shapiro probably already knew which way the wind was blowing with ownership, and unbeknownst to AA, he just royally screwed the franchise.

 

[Bender]

Right. And that would have been known at the time the moves were made, would it not? So why allow it to happen if you knew you weren't going to stay the course?

Who is the "you" here? The only person in the Jays organization above Alex was Beeston. Beeston didn't know what the Jays wanted to do long-term because he had a foot out the door, Shapiro wasn't hired until a month later and Ownership's job isn't to micro-manage the team. They set a budget and it's the Front Office's job to build the team within the parameters of that budget.

But more to the point I don't really understand the question. The Jays had a unique opportunity last summer with the Yankees looking vulnerable and Boston looking outright bad. So I don't really see why it's hard to reconcile making a move in a short window without also committing to blowing an unrealistic 30-40 million dollar hole in your long term budget.

It would be entirely reasonable for someone above AA to have said "Make the trades if you think they'll give us a shot at winning this year but you're going to have to figure out a way to make the numbers work for next year".

So, you think Beeston just threw up his hands and said "f--- it! Not my problem next year", authorized everything, and told AA "nah you're good bro, don't worry about it" and then all of a sudden out of the blue Shapiro was like "No you can't have any money"?

Everyone knew Price was a free agent and everyone knew he was going to get paid. It doesn't seem reasonable at all for AA to make those trades if he didn't think he could get the money to pay for him.

I think it's more likely that ownership wanted to catch lightning in a bottle before they clamped down so they let it happen and the reason Shapiro reportedly got so ticked at AA last year was that Shapiro probably already knew which way the wind was blowing with ownership, and unbeknownst to AA, he just royally screwed the franchise.

How is that more likely? I think it'd be easy for a GM to sell the idea that the cost of retaining Price would be tenable, especially going into a playoff run. He could schmooze Price into staying.

Figure it out later is, imo, a very likely scenario if you have a chance to win it all.

 

[Kin]

So, you think Beeston just threw up his hands and said "f--- it! Not my problem next year", authorized everything, and told AA "nah you're good bro, don't worry about it" and then all of a sudden out of the blue Shapiro was like "No you can't have any money"?

No, I think AA had fairly wide latitude to make the baseball decisions he wanted so long as he kept the team's payroll within budget. I also don't think Beeston knew what decision Rogers would make with regards to next year's payroll in late-July and so he couldn't approve or disapprove of any moves AA might have made on that basis.

 

[hockeyfan1]

Mixed reactions from the Twitterati:

http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/stroman-at-forefront-of-twitter-reaction-to-price-deal-with-red-sox/

Well, Price signing elsewhere should oome as no surprise.  I, too, was hopeful, but looking at the Price tag, it's difficult to imagine the Jays splurging a ginormous sum.

Good luck in Beantown, David Price.  Don't expect an ovation on your return to T.0. in the enemy uniform.

 

[hockeyfan1]

Some thoughts on the David Price saga: what ifs, what nots, and what can...

There is no way that the Toronto Blue Jays are better in 2016 than they would be if David Price was under contract to pitch for them

Toronto remains a force to be reckoned with in the American League, and with two months to go until Spring Training, there is time and, presumably, some money left to shore up the pitching where needed.

Outgoing Blue Jays general manager Alex Anthopoulos wouldn?t have done it any differently.

There are no amount of mid-rotation starters or bullpen help that can be added to make up for having one of the best pitchers in the sport, in his prime,

But 29 other teams ? many of them believing they could win a World Series next year ? looked at what it would take to sign Price and all of them came to the same conclusion: It wasn?t worth it.

(Red Sox President) Dave Dombrowski, decided it was. Just like Dombrowski figured breaking the bank to pay... was money well spent when he was running the Detroit Tigers.

Dombrowski was able to skip town before that bill came due. Who knows how long he?ll be in Boston.

But Shapiro just got to Toronto and, presumably, if the Blue Jays were ready to spend like theNew York Yankees of old, he would have signed Price and papered over the consequences with more money later.

...the Blue Jays aren?t and likely won?t ever spend wildly to win ? even the Yankees don?t do that anymore.

For the Blue Jays this is a wise path: They don?t have the kind of contracts that set teams back for years lingering on their books.

Don?t forget that the Blue Jays first order of business on the long road back to respectability was ridding the franchise of deals like those given to Vernon Wells (seven years, $126 million) and Alex Rios (seven years, $70 million).

Not having Price will only matter if the Blue Jays can?t find a way to get back to the playoffs and a lack of starting pitching proves to be the issue.

For the rest, click here:
http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/if-anthopoulos-was-still-gm-blue-jays-still-wouldnt-have-paid-that-price/

 

[hockeyfan1]

http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/prices-agent-david-wouldve-absolutely-gone-back-to-blue-jays/

I can't help but chuckle at the Corporate apologists here who are convinced that 200 million dollars over the course of 7 years is unaffordable for a company worth over 7 billion.

Now, that could be argued but it might not have even taken that much to lure him back. There's nothing that says we are committed to winning like not even trying.

...of which Sportsnet is one. 

Personally-speaking, I'm disappointed in Price not being back (and I assume so are many Blue Jay fans). 

 

[Kin]

http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/prices-agent-david-wouldve-absolutely-gone-back-to-blue-jays/

I can't help but chuckle at the Corporate apologists here who are convinced that 200 million dollars over the course of 7 years is unaffordable for a company worth over 7 billion.

Now, that could be argued but it might not have even taken that much to lure him back. There's nothing that says we are committed to winning like not even trying.

You're confusing two entirely separate questions. Nobody has argued that signing David Price would have bankrupted Rogers as a company and I'm pretty sure you know that. They could afford to pay him whatever he wants. In the same way, I could afford to spend thousands of dollars on diamond grills for my teeth. It wouldn't be smart financially, no, but it wouldn't force me into poverty either.

What people have argued is that it's not reasonable to expect Rogers, a publicly traded company, to run the Blue Jays as if they don't care about the Blue Jays being profitable to the larger company. Rogers' current market capitalization doesn't matter at all in that respect.

Maybe you'd like the Blue Jays to be owned by a single, ultra-competitive billionaire who didn't care about the team's profitability and would make financially unjustifiable decisions in the pursuit of a title but wanting that to be the case doesn't magically make it so.

So chuckle all you want but expecting the Blue Jays to have a payroll that is directly related to the revenues the team generates makes me a "Corporate apologist" in the same way that I'm a Gravity apologist when I drop something and it breaks.

 

[WhatIfGodWasALeaf]

Just piggybacking on this conversation, do you guys think there is a chance that some foreign money might start to pour into U.S. sports the way it has in European soccer?

Teams like Chelsea, Man City, PSG and several other soccer teams have been bought by Oil barons and have been transformed into some of the European elite.

Do you think the American owners would be receptive to foreign investment?

 

[Kin]

Just piggybacking on this conversation, do you guys think there is a chance that some foreign money might start to pour into U.S. sports the way it has in European soccer?

Teams like Chelsea, Man City, PSG and several other soccer teams have been bought by Oil barons and have been transformed into some of the European elite.

Do you think the American owners would be receptive to foreign investment?

It's already happened to some extent. The Seattle Mariners are owned by Nintendo, for instance.

Probably a better example though is the Brooklyn Nets having been bought by Mikhail Prokhorov who, like Chelsea's Roman Abromovich, is one of the mega-billionaires to emerge from Putin's Russia.

The problem with it becoming widespread though is two-fold. For starters most North American sports don't have huge international profiles the way soccer does so the sort of "buying it for bragging purposes" that seems to have happened with some of the clubs you're talking about is limited to people who actually care about the sport.

Even beyond that though, the CBA's in most American leagues prevent the sort of spending and resulting transformation that we've seen for a team like Man City, for instance. Prokhorov has spent a ton of money on the Nets but you can't just buy talent in Basketball the way you can in Soccer and, as a result, the Nets have been a mediocre, overpaid mess for years. There aren't many Oligarchs or Emirs who want to spend a ton of money on a franchise and then hope they win a draft lottery.

Honestly, I think the reverse is more likely the way we've seen teams like Liverpool, Man United and Fulham bought by American billionaires.

 

[WhatIfGodWasALeaf]

Just piggybacking on this conversation, do you guys think there is a chance that some foreign money might start to pour into U.S. sports the way it has in European soccer?

Teams like Chelsea, Man City, PSG and several other soccer teams have been bought by Oil barons and have been transformed into some of the European elite.

Do you think the American owners would be receptive to foreign investment?

It's already happened to some extent. The Seattle Mariners are owned by Nintendo, for instance.

Probably a better example though is the Brooklyn Nets having been bought by Mikhail Prokhorov who, like Chelsea's Roman Abromovich, is one of the mega-billionaires to emerge from Putin's Russia.

The problem with it becoming widespread though is two-fold. For starters most North American sports don't have huge international profiles the way soccer does so the sort of "buying it for bragging purposes" that seems to have happened with some of the clubs you're talking about is limited to people who actually care about the sport.

Even beyond that though, the CBA's in most American leagues prevent the sort of spending and resulting transformation that we've seen for a team like Man City, for instance. Prokhorov has spent a ton of money on the Nets but you can't just buy talent in Basketball the way you can in Soccer and, as a result, the Nets have been a mediocre, overpaid mess for years. There aren't many Oligarchs or Emirs who want to spend a ton of money on a franchise and then hope they win a draft lottery.

Honestly, I think the reverse is more likely the way we've seen teams like Liverpool, Man United and Fulham bought by American billionaires.

Interesting take Nik, thanks.

Some of the pro-leagues have a "soft" cap though, no?

I'd thought that some of the middle-eastern money, especially that of the younger generation that have been educated in the U.S. might make it into sports here.

A few clubs have been caught out already though by thinking they've had a white knight takeover, only to find it's some wise-guy with more chat than cash.

I think you'll see interest in soccer teams from all regions really, Russia, NA and the Middle-East. I was just interested in hearing what people thought of the potential for foreign investment in NA sports.

 

[Kin]

Interesting take Nik, thanks.

Some of the pro-leagues have a "soft" cap though, no?

They do, but there are still pretty big mechanisms in the NBA(the only sport with a soft cap) that prevent building a good team. For starters but there's still not really a system comparable to the transfer market in soccer. So while in Soccer a top flight young talent like Wayne Rooney or Gareth Bale can be developed by a relatively small club like Everton or Spurs and then simply bought by another club, you can't do that in basketball. Teams don't trade young stars unless they get comparable talent in return.

Likewise, the maximum salary for stars means that when a Lebron or Kevin Durant are available Prokhorov couldn't offer those guys any more money than anyone else.

What you can do, what Prokhorov did do, is overpay for free agents which isn't a great strategy for building a winner.

 

[Kin]

You foolishly spending money beyond your means to buy something you don't need is not the same as this team spending money well within their means to buy something they can desperately use, an ace pitcher that will help them contend next year.

Nobody is doubting that Price would be a valuable player, that still doesn't mean Rogers is going to not care if the Blue Jays are profitable just because they're a large company.

The issue is that it's possible that an offer of considerably less than 217 million might have been enough to lure him back in, at least Price's agent seems to insinuate that is the case. We don't know because they never even bothered to make an offer. It suggests they never really had any interest in re-signing him whatsoever. That's insulting to the fans as well as to David, who expressed a strong desire to come back. Toronto might have even been his preferred choice, contrary to media reports that claimed he wanted to go to the Cubs or somewhere close to his home in Nashville. 

Not making an offer is not the same thing as not making inquiries or discussing the parameters of what a player is looking for. If the Jays know they can't add 20+ million to the budget then what's the point of making that sort of offer unless your those inquiries tell you that Price is willing to take a salary that fits into your budget? It's futile effort for the sake of optics. It's something a serious person wouldn't do.

At least if it had come out that they offered him much less and he took the deal with Boston, it would have been somewhat more understandable. We could have talked about Price's greediness and the value of spending that much money for him.

Price wanting market value wouldn't make him greedy and I'm personally glad the Blue Jays didn't waste their time putting on a show. They have serious decisions to make, as a fan I don't want them trying to appease fans who have unrealistic expectations.

 

[GhostofPotvin29]

It's like some fans won't be happy unless the Jays announce they made half-hearted, never-going-to-be-accepted offers to every big SP free agent just to say they did it. 

 

[CarltonTheBear]

It's like some fans won't be happy unless the Jays announce they made half-hearted, never-going-to-be-accepted offers to every big SP free agent just to say they did it. 

It'd be like if I walked into a car dealership and offered $60k on a $100k car thinking the dealership might take it just because the car and I both had an enjoyable experience during the test drive.

Ok, not entirely the same, but you get the point.

 

[bustaheims]

It's like some fans won't be happy unless the Jays announce they made half-hearted, never-going-to-be-accepted offers to every big SP free agent just to say they did it. 

It'd be like if I walked into a car dealership and offered $60k on a $100k car thinking the dealership might take it just because the car and I both had an enjoyable experience during the test drive.

Ok, not entirely the same, but you get the point.

It's more like your most recent employer offering you $60K to stay with the company, because you enjoyed your time there, even though they know you're worth more than that. They just can't justify paying the $100K that several other companies value you at.

He might have been willing to take $28M or so a season to stay in Toronto, if he really liked it here that much, but that's likely the lowest he'd go, considering I'm sure he received multiple offers of $30M+ per season. So, would he have taken less to stay with the Jays? Maybe. Considerably less? Absolutely not.

 

[Kin]

It'd be like if I walked into a car dealership and offered $60k on a $100k car thinking the dealership might take it just because the car and I both had an enjoyable experience during the test drive.

Ok, not entirely the same, but you get the point.

It's funny though because it does bring to mind a story a friend of mine was telling me recently. He bought a new car last year and when he took it in to get it serviced this year apparently a salesman told him that they could work out a deal where he could trade in his car for this year's model and his payments would be the same. My friend, skeptical, wondered if it would still be a five year deal. The salesperson assured him it would be.

So my friend spent half an hour in the salesperson's office as they "talked to their boss" before he came back with the good news. New car, same monthly payment.

"Five year deal, right?"

"No, sorry, best I can do is eight years."

Those are the sorts of "deals" free agents usually offer teams. Maybe it would be a shave of a million or two per year or spreading out the contract over an additional year(or one fewer if term is the issue). There's really nothing in all the media since Price signed that suggests he was willing to entertain some massive discount to stay. Nobody even suggested Boston was his first choice. They offered the most, he went there.

 

[Frank E]

It'd be like if I walked into a car dealership and offered $60k on a $100k car thinking the dealership might take it just because the car and I both had an enjoyable experience during the test drive.

Ok, not entirely the same, but you get the point.

It's funny though because it does bring to mind a story a friend of mine was telling me recently. He bought a new car last year and when he took it in to get it serviced this year apparently a salesman told him that they could work out a deal where he could trade in his car for this year's model and his payments would be the same. My friend, skeptical, wondered if it would still be a five year deal. The salesperson assured him it would be.

So my friend spent half an hour in the salesperson's office as they "talked to their boss" before he came back with the good news. New car, same monthly payment.

"Five year deal, right?"

"No, sorry, best I can do is eight years."

Those are the sorts of "deals" free agents usually offer teams. Maybe it would be a shave of a million or two per year or spreading out the contract over an additional year(or one fewer if term is the issue). There's really nothing in all the media since Price signed that suggests he was willing to entertain some massive discount to stay. Nobody even suggested Boston was his first choice. They offered the most, he went there.

I feel like I should chime in here...

With rates having fallen over those of 2010-2011, at least subvented car loans rates, it is not untypical for people to get into a new purchase for a lower payment.  With the American dollar where it is, a lot of used vehicles have been bought here and shipped south of the border, which has increased used vehicle prices overall having reduced the amount of expected depreciation.  This makes it easier for people to extricate themselves from the loan, and get into something newer quicker....And especially if your friend was in a lease, we often pull people out and put them in a new vehicle for less payment and the same term as the initial lease. 

 

[Kin]

I feel like I should chime in here...

With rates having fallen over those of 2010-2011, at least subvented car loans rates, it is not untypical for people to get into a new purchase for a lower payment.  With the American dollar where it is, a lot of used vehicles have been bought here and shipped south of the border, which has increased used vehicle prices overall having reduced the amount of expected depreciation.  This makes it easier for people to extricate themselves from the loan, and get into something newer quicker....And especially if your friend was in a lease, we often pull people out and put them in a new vehicle for less payment and the same term as the initial lease.

The point of the story isn't that it was a bad deal. The point of the story is that the "deal" ended up being that he could have a newer model car in return for agreeing to pay, ultimately, tens of thousands of dollars more than he was already obligated to pay. He would be, essentially, just buying a new car.

But, that said, if someone wanted to buy the car he was being offered it was an ok deal.