After the White Sox pulled their offer to Johnny Damon yesterday, Braves' GM Frank Wren indicated to MLB.com's Mark Bowman that "Nothing has changed on our end," perhaps meaning that they weren't preparing a last minute offer. At the moment, it appears the only offer Damon and his camp have is from the Tigers, who reportedly offered a deal worth up to $7.5MM with some money deferred.
ESPN's Buster Olney reported yesterday that Scott Boras wanted one of two things from Tigers' owner Mike Ilitch: a one-year deal that doesn't include any deferred money, or a legitimate two-year deal.
Once again a team is bidding against themselves. The Tigers just might as well stand pat and take back the offer if no other team is in on Damon. If they wait until March 1st for example, Damon’s price could have dropped $500,000.
This is really the time that the Braves and Yankees should just hop back in either to make the Tigers jump or to get Damon themselves.
I agree with you on this one. I am a Tigers fan and I want them to sign Damon but it doesnt look like the White Sox are serious about him any more. If I was Dombrowski, I would just stand pat with my offer and have it take it or leave it because right now there are no teams that seem real serious about signing Damon besides the Tigers.
Right, Absolutley. And I’m not sure if there is any need to rush things either. I suppose that if Damon lowers his price eventually, other teams may hop back in. But I expect Dave Dombrowski to pull the trigger before it gets to that point.
And if Damon doesn’t lower his price it shouldn’t break anybody’s heart if he stays without a job this season – or most of it. Let him serve as a warning to others. Even Boras “Almighty’ has his limitations, and in this economy, so does greed.
Damon should pull a Felipe Lopez on Boras.
Yes – except that no other agent out there will be able to get him the $$ he’s after either.
When he wanted to return the Yanks, he didn’t have money on his mind. He had a guy names Scott Boras hovering over him wherever he went.
At this point if I’m Damon, Dye, Washburn, Lopez, Blalock…I want to be signed by a Major League Baseball team to a Major League Contract!!!!!!!!!!!
I am SOOOOO sick and tired of reading about Johnny Damon this, Johnny Damon that…every frickin day it’s something else. I am SOOOOO glad that he’s gonna finally sign for about 1/3 of what he thought he would get. He’s half the player he used to be and SOOOOO over hyped because he was a Yankee. Johnny just frickin sign a contract so we all can move on to the next guy.
here we go again
Braves will get him. He’s waiting for them to up their offer a tad, I bet. However, I still feel he’ll except their $4m deffered contract regardless because he simply wants to play for Atlanta and the fact he really has no other alternatives besides playing in Detroit which he doesn’t seem to want to. This will happen sooner rather than later.
Poor Damon…
He wanted to be a Yankee, didn’t work out.
Now he wants to be a Brave, but not enough money offered
He doesn’t want to be with the Tigers, although, they are probably offering the most money, whether it is actually 7.5 or not…
Good stuff. My version is: “Poor Damon…he wants to be paid in excess of his market worth and… SURPRISE!….not happening!”
lol he never said he wanted to be a Brave
yes he did
link to markbowman.mlblogs.com
8th paragraph
well since I can’t post a link, i could direct you to the necessary source that says he did express genuine interest in coming to the braves
Truth be told he acted like he wanted Detroit as well, Boras and him were trying to build some leverage
No…
“Johnny believes the addition of him to Detroit’s lineup would make the Tigers a winner,” Scott Boras said
Damon himself has never directly said that he wanted to be a Tiger.
His wife also doesn’t want to go to a awful place like Detroit.
If he goes, it’ll be for the money.
he’ll express interest in anywhere just to raise the price. Remember a few weeks ago when he said he loved everything Detriot.
…Damon’s reply to the possibility of an offer from the Braves:
“I hope. They are definitely a team that is on top of the list.”
link to ajc.com
So incredibly wrong.
Yeah poor damon…lololololololololol
Damon is probably the stupidest player i have ever seen at this point. When you realize your demands are not even close to reality, it’s time to switch agents, or do the negotiating yourself. 2 years will never happen. And asking for 7 million with none deferred, that will almost definitely not happen either.
As for the tigers, why not just pull that offer back, and drop it down to 4.5 million. Save some money, he has nowhere else to go anyway.
“At the moment, it appears the only offer Damon and his camp have is from the Tigers…”
Incorrect, Mike. Braves never pulled their roughly $4.5 million dollar offer. What Wren means by “nothing has changed” is that we haven’t pulled it nor increased it. This has been the major offseason news story going for weeks now. You gotta get your facts right.
Somebody’s crankyyyyy.
Way to go Mike … you’re really getting the hang of using Tim’s “Johnny Damon Rumors: *day” template.
Did this writer not read that the Sox offer is through Sunday? C’mon, get with it Mike! If the Tigers give in to Boras demands, he goes there. If not, who the heck knows. Maybe Damon will want to be in on the Sox reality show and get himself more exposure that way, and turn down the extra mil+ that Detroit offered for one year.
Actually, MLB TV reported this morning that the Sux officially pulled that offer.
“the Sux” – wow, that’s hilarious! HAHAHA!
Anyway, while they did pull their offer, Kenny Williams said he would be willing to revisit it within the next 24 hours should Damon lower his demands. That seems unlikely at this point, but the Sox are still interested in his services.
Kenny should go back to Damon and tell him he will give him 6.5 million if he signs on the line right now, no debating no negotiating signs now
ooohh, that must have been an unintentional typo, (sorry Chi sOx fans) Yeah, until full squads report, I think anything is possible. I really look for him to sign in Detroit, although, I would rather pass…but whatever. I could think of better ways to spend that 7 – 14mm
Like maybe on your city’s police force…
You’re so 1990. We would need residents in order for a police force to be useful.
lol good stuff
“Sux”? Isn’t that the sound of people leaving the Motor City? Last one out of Detroit, please turn off the lights…
Only for the weak. A true Detroiter knows how to hang, even when we hear lame comments that aren’t original like the one you just made…
Yeah! The Lions, the auto industry, the housing market, the commercial vacancies in downtown Birmingham. Kwame Kilpatrick. Feel the revival!!!
meh, you guys gotta do better than this…
We’ve said this about Detroit for quite some time…
ok…
Seriously. When was the last time you even *thought* about Kwame Kilpatrick? Is a little effort too much to ask for when people revel in Detroit’s misfortune for some reason? Next up on the Oddly Spiteful and Very Topical Anti-Detroit Comedy Hour: the 1967 Detroit riots!!! I mean, those were just crazy rite??!?
Also, you really should kick your own ass for writing “White Sux.”
Haha… all you guys rippin on Detroit are hilarious. Do you think that its a news flash or something to us that the city isn’t doing very well? Wow, thanks for letting us know! Plus you haven’t got much room to talk. Read a list of top 10 most undesirable places to live in the US… Detroit-7th, Chicago- 4th
I don’t know what silly person has made these out-of-towners think we’re offended by this stuff, but they act like “Detroit iz poor lol” is some kind of trump card. I find the spite directed at Detroit by the rest of the nation puzzling and fairly interesting from an academic perspective, but otherwise it’s entirely passe.
Just more poor reporting, this time by MLB TV. Shocking I know. White Sox weekly radio show is on here in Chicago and its common knowledge for everyone involved that the offer is open till Sunday. Seems like Damon’s situation has set a new record for BS coming out.
“that the Sux”
Are you 4 years old?
Seriously, aren’t all of you sick of this day after day nonsense? Honestly I wish her would sign in Chicago, Detroit is definitely not a good fit for him or his family. We’re too tough here.
And Please accept my apologies all White Sox fans I made a bad joke at your expense. I sincerely apologize. But don’t anyone act like they’ve never made a bad joke regarding us or other division rivals, because we all know that’s just the way it is in BB
You will have to forgive billmelton Detroitchik, he needs to make up for his lack of baseball knowledge with sorry versions of Detroit knocks!! Quite sad if you ask me, but expected. So now for you who are actual mature fans, lets figure this out. As for Dombrowski, he needs to just lay back and not change a thing. Kenny Williams has already caved in and commented, although just yesterday he wasn’t going to say a thing about Damon until Sunday. Just keep your $7.5M offer with defered $$$ on the table and if he goes to the Sox, the Braves, the Rays or the SCLSU Mud Dogs who gives a ****. No matter what anyone in here says, be it a Tigers or Sox fan, your team can live without this guy. Could he help both teams, sure he could. But right now both teams have bigger fish to fry anyway. Focus on the guys that are on your team and getting ready for the season into shape and ready to go. I like the way DD is handling the whole situation. Here is the offer, if you like it sign it and if you don’t then use the heal-toe express somewhere else. And as far as Kenny Williams is concerned with his BS statement yesterday, it makes no sense. So if Johnny Damon calls Monday and wants to except the $6.5M offer, it won’t be there? He should do the same thing, offer what you can and wait to see what happens, not “We will talk about it Sunday”, then “The offer is off the table”, then “But it’s still good till Sunday”. Make up your mind there Ken!
The White Sox did NOT pull the offer no matter what MLB TV is reporting. Damon has until Sun morning to accept the Sox final offer.
It may be his best offer because he would be able to generate bigger numbers in the Cell and thus set himself up for another nice deal next year. If he gets 6 from the sox this year and 7-8 next year he will have equaled the yankees two year deal.
Quoting from ESPN.com:
The Chicago White Sox have pulled their offer to free-agent outfielder Johnny Damon off the table. “It became clear to us in our recent negotiations that the money that we were offering was not going to be good enough for Johnny at this time,” White Sox general manager Kenny Williams told ESPNChicago.com. “At this particular point, we feel it’s necessary to withdraw our offer.”
So, unless you have a valid source that Kenny Williams followed that direct quote up with “PSYCHE!!” or “HAHA! I HAD MY FINGERS CROSSED!!” then I’d say it’s pretty official that the White Sox’ offer is pulled.
That is old info, Kenny said afterwards that the current offer is on the table until Sunday.
ESPN’s sources are about 12 hours behind. Please do your homework…
link to sportingnews.com
“White Sox general manager Ken Williams told the Chicago Sun-Times that he will give free agent outfielder Johnny Damon until Sunday morning to accept their latest offer.”
Get your facts straight as that last sentence combined with quoting ESPN basically had double face palm written all over it.
Via the sporting news & and numerous other sources.
“White Sox general manager Ken Williams told the Chicago Sun-Times that he will give free agent outfielder Johnny Damon until Sunday morning to accept their latest offer.”
Get you facts straight as that last comment while quoting ESPN basically had double face palm written all over it.
Damon to sign with the White Sox tomorrow morning. Clauses & deferred money in the contract are the only thing the Sox and Damon are working on at this point.
Yes I’m surely gonna believe that when Mike Ilitch operates in the red year after year to post 12 straight seasons without a central division title. He’ll likely overspend to sign Damon and cruise to a third place finish.
I see you’re familiar with our business plan.
Funny hearing this from a guy who supports a team that just a year ago “cruised into third place” and arguably has the weakest line-up in the Central. And don’t bother commenting on how your starting rotation is amazing, yes it could be but before you count your chickens why don’t you wait and see IF Peavy and Garcia can stay healthy and pitch an entire season in the Cell. Sorry, I’m not a big fan of the 3 or 9 game sample size.
“and arguably has the weakest line-up in the Central.”
The stupidity of people on this site never ends
Tell me about it on top of Peavy being a question mark in the AL considering Petco Park is responsible for Peavy averaging over a strikeout per inning over his career.
It’s not like commentators here are alone in their concern about Peavy. Every projection system I can find is projecting him for a pretty substantial drop. He’s a fun guy to watch when he’s on, though, so I hope he really *is* as good as you hope.
I like the way you think, I do think there is some sort of chess match going on between him and Sox or he would have already signed with the tigers
For a guy (Damon) who has earned over $100 million during the course of his career,publicly bickering over 1 extra million to go here or there should be very embarrassing to him and Boras.
At this point, wouldn’t you just decide which team is the best fit, where will your family will be happiest, sign the contract and get to camp.
Damon and Boras are really getting a lot of bad pub trying to suck and extra few bucks out of someone.
Damon to the Tigers is in-suite according to Tim Brown.
So tired of this… as much as I didn’t want him around before, this is going to make me hate him even more if we sign him. Inevitably if he’s on our team I’m going to have to root for him to do good during the games and stuff, but I’ll hate that he’s on our team