December 15th, 2006 → 12:44 am @ Seth Mnookin
Ok, fine, so it doesn’t quite have the ring of Matty in the Morning, which is where I’ll be tomorrow (Friday) morning, supposedly sometime between 9 and 9:30. Talking about the situation in Somalia. No, no: talking about the Red Sox. Who cares about Somalia?
Anyway, Matty? He’s a big deal. Believe me, I know. For real: the three times more people have said they’d seen/heard me than any other have been:
1. When I was a guest on The Daily Show.
2. When I was stumbling around the field at Yankee Stadium with a glazed, dazed look in my eye after the final out of the ’04 ALCS.
3. Whenever I’ve been on Matty in the Morning.
He’s a powerful man.
* There’s just no way to ever make my name sound menacing. Believe me, I’ve tried. I even tried replacing “Shady” with “Sethy” in the lyrics to “Kill You.” It still don’t sound menacing.
Post Categories: Feeding the Monster appearances
December 15th, 2006 → 12:38 am @ Seth Mnookin
Buried at the end of today’s hilariously translated (and transcribed) press conference is this very telling quote:
LARRY LUCCHINO: “We have a few closing comments we with like to make, they are really addressed to the new Japanese members of Red Sox Nation, two or three things. First, I’d like to repeat what our general manager said at the beginning, and that is that we recognize the player that we have obtained and we will treat him with the respect and courtesy that he has earned.
Secondly, we recognize that as he’s within described, he is a national treasure. We had a national treasure here, as well. It’s called Fenway Park, and we invite, warmly, the members of the Japanese baseball world to come to visit Fenway Park, to visit Boston, to visit the great New England region. We look forward to their participation in Red Sox nation. Thirdly I would say to our friends in Japan and throughout the entire Japanese baseball world, this is a long term commitment. This is in a short, one stop, one shot venture. Our plan, our hope is to be active in Japan and expand our presence. We are proud to have Hideki Okajima joining the team this year, and we think these two young men are beginnings of a long term relationship with Japan and the Japanese baseball world and we proudly look forward to that.”
Lucchino did not go on to say, “And thirdly, it might have cost us $103 million to get your national treasure but it’s gonna cost you $12 per person to take a tour of our treasure, and we run those tours every hour on the hour seven days a week. Oh, and also, unlike international TV deals or merchandise sales that get split evenly among the 30 clubs, that’s not dough we need to share with anybody else. Did I mention it’s a national treasure? And that Daisuke will be pitching here? That’s right: 12 bucks a head.”
(Note: I’m all for new revenue streams. I love me some new revenue streams. It’s why I’ll be able to watch Matsuzaka pitch in Fenway next year. I also love calling a spade a spade. Or, as Freud would say to Dora, un chat un chat.)
Post Categories: Larry Lucchino & Oblique references to Beatles songs
December 15th, 2006 → 12:29 am @ Seth Mnookin
Headline of the day:
D-Mat strengthens Sox rotation.
Coming tomorrow: Ortiz can hit ball hard.
Post Categories: 2006 Hot Stove Season & Daisuke Matsuzaka
December 15th, 2006 → 12:26 am @ Seth Mnookin
There’s no way you thought you were going to get through a Daisuke day without someone, somewhere, wondering what this all means for Johnny Jesus — you know, the last (big-name) guy to wear #18. (Sorry, Jason and Dustan: you two ain’t big-name.) Thank god, the AP is on the case:
“NEW YORK — Johnny Damon has his own $52 million contract and no regrets that the Boston Red Sox didn’t give him that amount last winter. Boston announced its $52 million, six-year agreement with pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka on Thursday — nearly one year after the Red Sox allowed their center fielder to switch to the New York Yankees for the exact same amount.”
Now, I get asked with some frequency whether or not sports reporters are morons. My usual answer is yes and no: there are plenty of dolts writing about baseball, but there are plenty of dolts writing about politics and international relations and the media, too. But (as commenter vapodge points out),* sports reporting might very well be one of the very few areas in which writers (commentators, whatever) seem to have a fervant desire to remain ignorant.
I’ve tried to make this clear before, but for all the AP reporters and other aggressively clueless folk out there, I’ll try one more time:
I know this won’t seem like anything except another plug for my book, but man, come on already. I’ve been talking to owners around baseball over the last several weeks (for an unrelated project); every single one of them had already read FTM, as has every MLB exec I’ve spoken with. (In fact, some of the MLB execs have recommended it to other people in baseball.) Regardless of what you think about the damn book, if you’re covering the Red Sox or the Yankees, wouldn’t it maybe make sense to read it? If only to see if there are things you might not know about? You know, to help in your, um, reporting?
* Vapodge was objecting to a segment on Dan Patrick’s ESPN show in which he apparently asked Francona about the “$2 million more per year” the Sox would have had to spend to get Damon. Technically, that’s true…except Boras told them they’d need to spend that extra $2 million per for seven straight years! Aaargh! Just read the fucking excerpt. It’s linked above. In big, bright, red, shiny caps.
Post Categories: 2006 Hot Stove Season & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Feeding the Monster Sneak Peeks & Johnny Damon & Rampaging morons & Sports Reporters
December 14th, 2006 → 12:18 pm @ Seth Mnookin
(Note: I’m on a PC. I hate PC’s. For some reason, most of the links I put in aren’t working, so you’ll need to navigate around and find the articles I’m referring to on your own.)
It’s true: I made it to Boston. And waking up at 6 to get to the airport is about as physical as I’m getting today.
So…some more notes on the…now wait: what’s the big story around here? Ah, yes: D-Mat. (I will use every known nickname before the day is done.) Pretty much everyone, Jack Curry in the Times to the Herald’s Tony Mass to Nick Cafardo in the Globe to Gammo himself is saying the Sox got the best of Boras in these negotiations.
On the first hand, that’s clearly true: if the reports are correct and the Sox’s initial offer was somewhere around $6-7 mil for 4 years, $8.7 mil for 6 years is a lot closer to that than the $15-$20 mil for 6 years Boras was looking for. On the next hand, the Sox, on some level, had Boras over a barrel. Zak really couldn’t have returned to Japan (well, he could have, but not without losing so much face he would have needed a face transplant), and despite the late-in-the-game posturing from Boras about Daisuke wanting “respect,” the good folks of Seibu would not have considered $8 million a year disrespectful. (I spoke with Bobby Valentine on Tuesday about an unrelated matter, and he said that the negotiations would be tough but there was no way his players would be facing the Diceman next year.)
But on the third hand, the Sox clearly won this game of chicken, and they did it by showing the type of single-mindedness and determination that’s marked the best days of this front office. Over Thanksgiving 2003, Theo and Larry both went to Curt’s house in Arizona, which showed Schilling how serious they were and also made it clear everyone was on the same page. The same thing happened here. That can only be seen as a good sign. Whatever rifts remain between those two — and rifts do remain — they’re showing they can work together.
There’ll be plenty more to chew on as the day progresses: the $203 mil (or so) the Sox have committed to three players, blowing away every team save for the Cubs look; the reality that Fenway (and particularly the Fenway press box) is about to be overrun by Japanese tourists and reporters…and the question of how, exactly, the Sox will cash in on extra revenue. Hint: It won’t be through TV deals (which I think are worked out with MLB, meaning the Sox would only see 1/30 of that money) or through merch sales (ditto).
OK: I’m late for the Pru.
Post Categories: 2006 Hot Stove Season & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Larry Lucchino & Red Sox & Red Sox front office & Scott Boras & Theo Epstein
December 14th, 2006 → 9:10 am @ Seth Mnookin
I know — the second time I get to reference that album! If I wasn’t dashing to catch a flight, I’d even find a link. So here’s a quick rundown: yup, as some of you know, I need to get to Boston to take a physical; if not, Simon & Schuster might not agree to release the paperback of Feeding the Monster. Oh, and also, I’ll be signing books at the Prudential Center B&N today from noon until 2; after that I’ll be running around to Boston-area bookstores signing their stock, so if you don’t make it to the Pru you’ll still have a chance to get an autographed copy. (I’ll post a full list of those stores later.) And, of course, there are those book plates…
Post Categories: 2007 Offseason & Coco Crisp & Curt Schilling & Honeymoon & Jacoby Ellsbury & Kevin Youkilis & Mike Lowell & Phil Collins
December 14th, 2006 → 9:05 am @ Seth Mnookin
Well…that was fun. We had Daisuke sneaking into back doors at 3 am to get past the throngs of reporters, we had cross-country flights on private planes, we had madcap dash to the hospital…and now we have a starting rotation of:
Curt Schilling
Daisuke Matsuzaka
Josh Beckett
Jonathan Papelbon
Tim Wakefield
Man…it feels good not to need to write Matt Clement’s name in there. Sure, the pitching staff still has holes — I think it’s insane to assume Mike Timlin is going to be worth a roster spot, but then I also think it’s insane to assume Doug Mirabelli is going to be worth a roster spot. There’s no closer, or at least no obvious closer, and Craig Hansen ain’t gonna be one in the majors unless he learns that he’ll be a lot better off if he stops trying to blow his fastball by big league hitters and uses that nasty-ass slider more often.
Anyway, to go along with that pitching staff, if the season started tomorrow — and who doesn’t wish that it would? — there’d be this starting nine:
Coco, CF
Julio, SS
Papi, DH
Manuel, LF
Drew, RF
Lowell – 3B
Tek – C
Youkilis – 1B
Pedroia – 2B*
That might not be the record-setting ’03-’04 offense, but it’s pretty damn good.
Now, a lot will (and has) been made of the vast amounts of money the Sox have thrown around in the great free-agent spending spree of 2006. So let’s take a look at the $103 (or so) million Matsuzaka will cost the Sox. First off, despite the AAV of $10 million per year, the contract will end up costing the Sox approximately $14 mil/per, because of the 40 percent luxury tax (which, again, I’m assuming the Sox will need to pay). (Also, from what I can tell, the escalators in the deal will amount to a max of $8 mil over the life of the deal, so let’s leave those out for simlicity’s sake.) Let’s also assume that, as Rob Neyer points out, salaries will continue to rise at approximately 10 percent a year. That would make the $14 mil paid out to Daisuke in 2012 worth about $7 million in today’s dollars.** (I think — Neyer has the 10 percent annual depreciation on Drew’s $14 million deal worth $10 million in 2011; I have it worth $8.4. One of us is wrong, and it certainly might be me.) If you look at the pure AAV sans luxury tax, that 2012 salary would be worth $5 mil in today’s dollars.*** If Daisuke ends up being anywhere near as good as rumored, that’ll be one helluva bargain. (Another way to look at this: Manny’s contract was pretty outrageous in 2001; today it’s a relative — and I do mean relative — bargain.) Of course, he could also end up being the next Jose Contreras, circa his Yankees years. That’d make him far from the worst $100 million signing…but it still wouldn’t be good.
So, what does this all mean? Well, for one thing that the Sox didn’t get fleeced by Scott Boras — as recently as a 24 hours ago, he was arguing that Matsuzaka should be getting somewhere in the $20 million per range, which would increase the cost of this deal by $60 million bucks.
And..with that, my flight is boarding. So more later.
* As a couple of people have noted in the comments section, this batting order is likely incorrect. Unless the starting nine changes, it’s more likely to see something like:
Lugo, The Jewish God of OBP, Papi, Manuel, J.D., Lowell, Tek, Coco, Pedroia
** In my computations throughout, I used a $10 million/yr base for Matsuzaka; it’s actually (roughly) $9 mil. The full contingent of escalators would bring the AAV up to $10. Anyway, this’ll alter all of those slightly.
*** And if you add in the $51.1 posting fee, the contract would be worth approximately $24 mil, $22.6 mil, $21.2 mil, $19.8 mil, $18.4 mil, and $17 mil with the luxury tax or $20, $10, $18, $17, $16, and $15 million per. A couple of other quick notes on the luxury tax figures: the posting fee does not count towards the luxury tax and is paid out in one lump sum, which skews these numbers a bit, but not a huge amount. Also, the reason I’m including the luxury tax here is I’m assuming Dice’s contract will be one of the ones that puts the Sox over the luxury tax limit; in figuring out other AAV’s, you wouldn’t add on the 40 percent until the contracts starting going over that limit. Got that?
Post Categories: 2006 Playoffs & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Red Sox front office & Scott Boras
