Email a copy of 'Braves Notes: Maffei, Smith, Inciarte, Banuelos' to a friend
Loading ...
By Mark Polishuk | at
Email a copy of 'Braves Notes: Maffei, Smith, Inciarte, Banuelos' to a friend
MLB Trade Rumors is not affiliated with Major League Baseball, MLB or MLB.com
hide arrows scroll to top
jjdunckley
So, as long as the Braves continue to bring in a certain amount of profit, Liberty Media will continue to just keep them as an investment? That sucks for the team’s fans. I don’t expect every team to carry a payroll over 200 million but also feel like Liberty has kept the checkbook closed despite what they say. They agreed to a horrible deal with Peachtree TV and the team’s payroll reflects their regret in the deal. I know an individual owner or ownership group doesn’t mean automatic improvement but this team has been ran like it is only an investment, which it is.
k26dp 2
Don’t disagree with your general point, but the horrible TV deal was negotiated and signed by Time Warner. Liberty Media inherited the deal when they bought the team.
jjdunckley
I was referring to their renegotiated deal that they made a few years back. In like 2013 they made like 15 million for the season. They reworked their contract and signed for like 500 million between then and 2030 or something like that. Sorry, I will look it up but those numbers are close. I was working in Atlanta when it happened and it was in all the papers.
ThatGuy 2
Liberty is a publicly traded company. They’re literally obligated to make this informations public… So no, they don’t keep the books closed….
ThatGuy 2
Also, they don’t make a profit. IIRC they’ve run a net loss for the past 5 years…
jkim319
Yeah… We Cubs fans saw for 20 years what it meant to be an ‘asset’ of WGN, run by financials, with success being measured by ‘don’t lose money’ ‘increase value of the club (basically riding the coattails of the growth of the MLB).’
The only time WGN invested any money was when they were trying to bulk up the value of the team prior to sale. That translates into doing the ‘short term thing’ (free agents (regardless of value of length of the deal), trading away ‘all’ prospects (not that we had that many but we did trade away josh Donaldson, dontrell Willis), to try and win in ’07-’08.
I hope Liberty gives your leadership team (front office, MLB and minors) enough time to develop and reap the rewards of these tough times.
We Cubs fans, albeit we had been told of ‘the plan’, read about our prospects, heard about the investments in facilities/infrastructure, etc still had many many doubts after 4 years of pretty bad baseball at the major league level. There are many people on the bandwagon now, but I can tell you that it was brutal and there were many nights (as a season ticket holder) of major major frustration. ‘Believe in Theo/Jed’ was all we could really tel ourselves
Nowadays It’s easy to say ‘it was worth it’, but it didn’t help us with the 5 years prior. All I can say is if you trust your leadership team and what they are doing in terms of ‘developing’ the talent you acquire, stay with them and support them… Don’t expect too much when rookies are brought up and they struggle… Don’t boo, even when you might be pulling your hair out (and the product might deserve it)… If allowed to execute a vision/plan it can be worth the wait.
Your baseball operations team has shown it ability to identify and acquire talent (you all know the trades). But one of the most import a things theo/Jed brought to the Cubs was Jason McCleod and jaron Madison (player development). Good luck to you guys. The plan looks good from the outside (I don’t know enough to know the inner workings).
One Fan
Jkkim does not really get it. Donaldson was traded in the Rich Harden deal which had nothing to do with the Tribune Company selling the team at that time. I agree corp ownership sucks but get it right
Also what is that crap about 4 years of losing? It was 3. Then he says it was 5 long years …. How dramatic. This is Theos year 5. Year 4 was last year and 97 wins was pretty good. Year 3 showed much promise in the second half which obviously was real.
Real Cubs fans did not doubt like he did since real fans followed the minors and it was well know and no secret that Theo had rebuilt the farm brimming with top prospects. Many sports shows said look out for the Cube even when they were losing but I guess Jkkim just watched the box score and now wants to speak for all Cubs fans and his crap about many doubts? I guess he never heard of guys like Bryant Russell and Schwarber until they were called up to the majors. What a shame he did not understand what was happenning when real cubs fans did and all of mlb did.
chop
I suppose Mallex could remain in the majors as long as Olivera is out.
k26dp 2
He could get sent back down when Inciarte comes off the DL.
steelerbravenation
I think it may be best served to let Mallex stay up until Oliveria comes back. If Mallex has turned the corner than he is our CF. If he continues to struggle send him down to gain some confidence. But if we are truly trying to compete next season we have a lot of things that have to be sorted out. And see who is ready to take that step next year.
olereb
Anyone like to speculate when Olivera will be back?
k26dp 2
Going to guess “never”.
olereb
Anyone know what Olivera is doing now? I for one say he’s out until June
coachfred64
Keep Smith in the majors and send FrediG someplace else
steelerbravenation
I hope ManBan gets healthy. I can really see him playing an important role in the future. I can really see him as a lefty coming out of the bullpen. More than a LOOGY. I am actually hoping for him to turn into a left handed Ramiro Mendoza type. Somebody that could go multiple innings when needed.
TDKnies 2
I respect that Liberty doesn’t seem to be treating the team as a piggy bank ala Loria and the Marlins, but the lingo Maffei uses to refer to them isn’t comforting. But then again I also respect that he’s at least honest about the fact that the team is nothing but an asset. Still looking forward to the day we get a real owner though!