December 13th, 2006 → 1:51 pm @ Seth Mnookin
From Gordo’s Globe blog: “A source close to the negotiations confirmed that the Red Sox contingent in Southern California is flying back to Boston with pitcher Daisuke Matsuzka and his agent, Scott Boras, on board. ‘You can assume that a deal is done or close,’ said another source with direct knowledge of the talks.” (Who is this mysterious “source with direct knowledge’? Besides, I mean, someone who’s close enough to the actual negotiating room to know what’s what and who also has enough time to put in calls to reporters whenever anything happens.) Not to rain on anyone’s parade, but the Herald‘s Michael Silverman stresses that “negotiations are ongoing” and that “the final language of a long-term deal has not yet been struck.” In fact, “[o]ne source said it is too early to say that a preliminary agreement has been reached. However, it is safe to conclude that Matsuzaka and Boras did not board Henry’s private jet if both they and the Red Sox were not, at the very least, hopeful of striking a deal.”
I was covering Bush HQ in Austin, Texas, on election night in 2000…and honestly? I don’t think there was this level of minute-by-minute coverage back then. Of course, that wasn’t nearly as important a story.
Post Categories: 2006 Hot Stove Season & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Gordon Edes & Michael Silverman & Red Sox front office & Scott Boras
December 13th, 2006 → 12:30 pm @ Seth Mnookin
ESPN says that the Herald is reporting the Sox and Boras are about $3 million apart — the Sox are at $8 million per, Boras is asking for $11 million per — on a deal that’s supposed to be in the four-to-six year range. (I can’t find Michael Silverman’s Herald report — although the Globe is also acknowledging Silverman in its latest dispatch — or I’d link directly to that.) At the high end (in terms of years), that’s a differnce of about $18 million; if you add on the luxury tax and assume that’ll be somewhere around 40 percent of the Sox, the total figure is a bit over $25 million. At most, this should figure to be about 2.8% of the Red Sox’s annual payroll (if you include the luxury tax, although this would also add some money to the projected $150 million payroll…but whatever. You get the picture).
There are lots of ways you could look at this. The Sox, as many people are sure to point out if the deal falls apart, paid the Braves more than $3 million a year to take Edgar Renteria off their hands. Three million is about a third of what Matt Clement’s making a year. It’s approximatelty 20 percent of J.D. Drew’s annual salary. Etc.
All that’s all valid, but it’s also kind of besides the point. That kind of thinking can rapidly lead to profligacy. One of the Red Sox’s models has been to decide what a player’s worth and not pay above that amount; if you give everyone a couple of million bucks more than you think they deserve, you’ll end up with an out-of-control payroll. (The A-Rod deal, after all, fell apart over a similar amount of money. Well, a similar amount of money and Larry Lucchino’s squabbles with the players association. If you want to know more…yep, it’s in the book.
On the other hand, the marginal value of any one player to the Red Sox is potentially more than it is to a team like, say, the Royals…who are about as likely to make the playoffs as Paris Hilton is to win the Nobel Prize in physics. A win or two could be the difference between an October full of playoff games and an October full of finger-pointing. What’s more, the psychological impact of going all out on RSN is huge.
If Boras is really asking for $11 million at this point — and who knows if that’s truly the case; he was said to be asking for $15-$20 million per — then I think more than ever it’ll happen. But if it doesn’t, I’m not sure where the public’s reaction will fall; already Bob Ryan is saying the Sox should know what they were getting into while Nick Cafardo says Boras is batshit insane. (That’s not a direct quote.)
When this is all done with, I’ll have some more observations about Henry’s, Lucchino’s, and Epstein’s negotiating styles…at least as I observed them last year.
Post Categories: 2006 Hot Stove Season & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Red Sox Fans & Red Sox front office & Red Sox ownership & Scott Boras
December 13th, 2006 → 10:42 am @ Seth Mnookin
George Mitchell has some impressive credentials — he served two terms in the Senate, he’s acknowledged as the prime force in getting the Belfast Peace Agreements signed in 1998, and he served as a co-chairman of the U.S. Task Force on the U.N. He’s also the director of the Red Sox. If he can negotiate peace in Northern Ireland, surely he can find a way to bring the Sox and Scott Boras together on the international crises known as Dicegate.
If he’s not holed up in Southern California yet, it might be too late. Today’s Herald reports the deal has to get done by this morning, Pacific Time, when the Trans World Henry heads back to Boston. If the Diceman ain’t on the plane with plans to take a physical, there won’t be a deal. (Of course, the parties could negotiate throughout the day and Matsuzaka could still, conceivably, be on a plane tonight. It’s also not out of the realm of possibility that MLB tells the Sox and Boras that if they have a deal by tomorrow’s midnight deadline, it’s alright if it’s conditional on a physical.)
Meanwhile, the Globe‘s indefatigable Gordon Edes has a three AM update from his ubiquitous “source with direct ties to the negotiation” saying the “dialogue continues.” “That would appear to leave open the possibility that a deal could still be struck before the Sox make their scheduled departure this morning,” Edes writes. “But nothing appeared imminent.”
I figure the next updates will come around noon or 1 EST, when the business day starts out in L.A. Of course, I’ve assumed lots of things that’ve turned out to be wrong.
Post Categories: 2006 Playoffs & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Gordon Edes & Red Sox front office & Scott Boras
December 13th, 2006 → 12:55 am @ Seth Mnookin
No, really: go to sleep. Your wives and girlfriends and husbands and MySpace buddies miss you. Here’s all you need to know: JWH’s plane leaves for Boston tomorrow morning (unless it doesn’t); the deal needs to get done by sometime in the AM so Matsu can fly to Boston to take a physical (unless he doesn’t); Dice hasn’t had any direct discussions with the Red Sox (unless he has); and the real reason Andy Pettitte left New York a couple of years ago had nothing to do with…oh, wait: wrong forum. Both the Globe and Herald websites have up to the minute updates about the fact that there’s nothing to update anyone about.
I’ve been through this before. Several times, actually, and each time I tried to convince myself that I absolutely had to sit in front of my computer screen hitting refresh until my finger cramped up and I had to soak it in ice water because of my professional obligation to chronicle every last second of The Story. I was wrong: right now, the story is in a windowless office somewhere. (OK, fine: the Boras Worldwide LTD offices have windows. But I like to imagine it all Death Star-like.) The next news we should care about will either be, yes, we have a deal or fuck, the deadline just passed and now we’re all screwed. Whatever the case, we’ll all be okay taking a few hours off. Even if Theo, et al, can’t sleep, we can. Whatever happens, we’ll all have plenty of time to obsess and discuss.
I promise. Nighty night.
(Obligatory, self-promoting plug: if you really need some tension building material relating to the Red Sox, try this. Oh, and did I mention a signed and personalized copy makes a great gift?)
Post Categories: 2006 Hot Stove Season & Daisuke Matsuzaka & Red Sox front office & Scott Boras
December 12th, 2006 → 4:34 pm @ Seth Mnookin
OK, so it’s not the earthshattering RS-related news you all were waiting for…but the man playing right field on October 27, 2004 has hung up his cleats, saddening those New England women who like their men muscley and hairless.
Just because Kapler won’t be on the field doesn’t mean he’s leaving our lives; in fact, he’ll remain with the Red Sox (albeit in a less hunky capacity) as the manager of the Sox’s A-ball team, the Greenville Drive. (That’s Greenville, South Carolina.)
Also, I don’t want to be a conspiracy theorist or anything…but I’m pretty sure Adam Stern’s departure and Gabe’s retirement means, much to Denis Leary’s consternation, there’s only one Jew left on the roster. Don’t let us down, Youks.
Post Categories: Gabe Kapler & Super Jews
December 12th, 2006 → 3:08 pm @ Seth Mnookin
Insider of my trying to comment on/summarize this, you really should just read Buster Olney’s column on ESPN.com; it’s great. Here are some pertinent sections:
“‘If I represent you,’ [Boras] has told some players in so many words, ‘only I do the negotiating.’ Their impression is that he wants 100 percent control. ‘Why would I do that?’ one player mused, looking back on the day that Boras tried to sign him as a high school senior. ‘It’s my life.’ When Boras negotiates, club executives sometimes wonder whether all the facts — whether every piece of every offer — gets through to the player. They never know, and it scares the hell out of them; Boras is the funnel through which all the information is channeled. This is why Theo Epstein and Larry Lucchino flew to California late, why they rode on John Henry’s private plane, why they’ve become so open and outspoken about their negotiations.” …
“And you’d have to wonder: For Scott Boras, when does this stop becoming a chase of dollars and start being about his clients’ doing what they love in their work and playing baseball?” …
“Matsuzaka has never pitched a day in the major leagues, and it could be that when Boras is finished haggling, the pitcher could make $10 million in his first year in the majors, and more after that. Much more.
But with every passing day, with every delay, with every insistence upon more dollars, Boras is effectively placing more pressure on the shoulders of his client, who already is facing an enormous adjustment if he signs to play in Boston. And if Boras/Matsuzaka don’t sign, if the agent’s filibuster continues and they try to make the pitcher the Curt Flood of the Japanese posting system, you have to wonder whether it really will be worth it, in the end, for Matsuzaka.”
Post Categories: Keith Foulke & NESN & Nomar Garciaparra & Roger Clemens
December 12th, 2006 → 3:01 pm @ Seth Mnookin
Remember last week, when the Times‘s Murray Chass wrote an anonymously sourced article that claimed Dodgers officials were considering filing tampering charges against the Red Sox because of the J.D. Drew signing? (I sure do.) Here was Chass’s proof: an “executive of one club” said the “Dodgers’ owner, Frank McCourt, was certain tampering had occured.”
Now, Chass got a truly shocking number of things wrong in the piece, including whether or not Theo and Dodgers GM Ned Colletti were talking (they were). Now it seems as if the entire premise of the piece was, in fact, made up out of whole cloth.
No joke. Check out this story in today’s Los Angeles Times:
“The Dodgers hadn’t seriously considered asking Major League Baseball to investigate until a column last week in the New York Times suggested tampering had occurred, leading General Manager Ned Colletti to say Friday, ‘We’ve looked into’ filing charges.'” (Emphasis added to stress just how insane this whole thing is.)
To review: Murray Chass writes one in a series of his bizarre, vitriolic rants directed at the Red Sox in which he quotes anonymous “executives” as saying the Dodgers are considering filing tampering charges…while, in reality, the Dodgers weren’t considering any such thing until Chass wrote his column!
We direct Chass to the relevant sections of the Times‘s guideline on ethics:
p. 9, paragraph 23: “[I]t is essential that we preserve a professional detachment, free of any whiff of bias.”
As well as the paper’s policy on anonymous sourcing:
“In any situation when we cite anonymous sources, at least some readers may suspect that the newspaper is being used to convey tainted information or special pleading. … Confidential sources must have direct knowledge of the information they are giving us — or they must be the authorized representatives of an authority, known to us, who has such knowledge.”
Not only did the source not have direct knowledge of the information, the article actually created the exact situation it purported to report — that there was “talk of misconduct” swirling around the Sox.
It’s kind of impressive, if you think about it.
Post Categories: Media ethics & Murray Chass & New York Times
