Happy birthday to Dodgers manager Don Mattingly (51) and Giants prospect Brandon Belt (24). Here's the latest from the NL West…
- Bud Selig says the league is still trying to learn some specifics about the sale of the Dodgers to Magic Johnson's ownership group, reports Mike James and Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times.
- Dodgers minor leaguer Angel Guzman has been issued a 50-game suspension following a positive test for a drug of abuse, according to an MLB press release. This is Guzman's second violation of the league's drug policy. Guzman last pitched in the majors in 2009 as a member of the Cubs, and he signed a minor league deal with L.A. in December.
- Despite Guzman's suspension, Don Mattingly still sounded positive about the right-hander's future with the club, reports MLB.com's Gene Duffy.
- The Giants have no plans to make AT&T Park more hitter-friendly, reports Bruce Jenkins of the San Francisco Chronicle. "It's an asymmetrical park with interesting dimensions, adding to the strategy and enjoyment of the game, and the overall opinion from fans has been positive," said Giants team president Larry Baer. "It's kind of our signature. It's who we are."
- Padres right-hander Dustin Moseley is getting a second opinion on his shoulder injury but told reporters (including Dan Hayes of the North County Times) that he expects to undergo season-ending surgery.
- Cole Hamels criticized the Padres, his favorite team growing up, to local media (including Chris Jenkins of the San Diego Union-Tribune) for not doing more to field a consistent winner. "It’s not the fans. They alienate their own fans by not keeping guys around, especially the guys they develop," Hamels said. "They won’t keep an Adrian Gonzalez or go get that big-name guy. That’s just hard on a fan.”
- Hamels further expounded on the subject with Tom Krasovic of Inside The Padres, praising Petco Park. "To see the Padres with such an unbelievable stadium, and to have it downtown, and to see what it's done to the city, and for them to not really want to put out a team that has to compete against the Dodgers, and the Giants, and Arizona — that's tough," Hamels told Krasovic. "I think if the organization wanted to compete, people would be here in a heartbeat — fans and players."
They were one of the best teams in baseball for the first 3/4ths of the 2010 season and the fans didn’t show up. I remember Heath Bell saying something like he was excited for the Phillies to come into town so there’d be more people in the stadium… although, typically attendance is a product of the previous season.
I agree with Cole though, if you’re not going to sign a big name player and show your fan base you care about winning… you’re not going to draw and you really don’t deserve too.
Why should fans give their hard earned money to an organization when they aren’t willing to use it on a winning product?
Fans never have showed up at San Diego. It didn’t matter if they had Tony Gwynn, Randy Jones, Dave winfield.. List goes on and on..
Used to go and see them some times when was in USN and our home port was San Diego LONG (70’s) ago.. The place was a morgue, didn’t matter that that some of those teams had Winfield, Jones and another HOF by the name of Rollie Fingers.
I’m surprised Hamels said that. Padres competed in the 90s and early to mid 2000s. Hell, they kept Tony Gwynn Jr for 20 years. Hamels fails to realize that free agent contracts have blown up since the late 90s and early 2000s. A high tier pitcher in 2002 would cost like 10-16M a year. Now? 20-24M a year WITH a minimum of at least 6 years. Some teams just can’t compete anymore.
The contract the Boston Red Sox signed Adrian Gonzalez to is more than reasonable for a player of his caliber… heck, even Heath Bell’s contract is reasonable. Tony Gwynn retired what 10-11 years ago? Who have they made a commitment too since? They were a game away from winning their division and instead of making themselves a better team in the off season, they trade their best player… great message to send.
At some point, you have to keep your superstar player. Whether thats locking them up to a huge deal while they’re under control or paying them via free agency. Chase Headley, for instance, is a guy they should be trying to extend right now.
Can the Padres even afford 22M a year on top of building a team around A-Gon and compete?
NO team can afford one player making 20% of their payroll and have any expectation of making the postseason. With a court mandated payroll in the mid-40s, there was no way the Padres could retain Gonzalez. Even with their new TV contract the Padres will not be able to afford a payroll of much over $85 million. Gonzalez or any player earning over $15-16 million would still be out of reach.
Padres will have to make it the same way Rays did. Draft well, sign budding stars while still affordable, and trade away those that wont sign for good prospects. Until baseball changes their system that is the only way small market teams can compete in MLB.
“NO team can afford one player making 20% of their payroll and have any expectation of making the postseason.”
The Giants had $18 Million Barry Zito on their $100 Million 2010 Payroll, and he was cut from the Post Season Rosters.
Zito made a small contribution in ’10, with a WAR of 1.5. But really, he didn’t come anywhere close to earning his 18% of payroll.
So, really the Giants had a player who took almost 1/5 of the payroll, AND did not contribute very much. And the Giants did more than just make the playoffs.
ALSO in 2002, Bonds was paid $15 Million of the Giants $76 Million payroll and the Giants lost the World Series. Same deal. Just shy of 20% payroll.
Those are just 2 examples on one team. I’m sure there are others.
In all fairness to the Padres, their owner went through a nasty divorce and had a sale of the team fall through. That may explain a lot of it.
It does seem odd that they traded Adrian Gonzalez…who is FROM San Diego.
Cole are you trying to say you want to be on the Padres if they were actually going to build a contending team?
Or if they put together a half-decent product. Arizona may well be looking more and more likely.
Arizona can’t afford to pay Cole, but that was some nice wishful thinking. They have enough issues to deal with considering Montero, Kennedy and Hudson all need to be signed to long-term extensions. Outside of maybe LA and SF, there isn’t a team in the NL West that has a prayer of signing Cole – and even LA and SF are reaches. It’s more likely he winds up on the east coast (Boston, NYY, PHI) or Anaheim.
Btw. Small market team with mid market attendance. Padres have great fans. They just haven’t had a good owner since Moores divorce was filed.
sure they may have good fans but not a lot of them and in milwaukee they’re an even smaller market and attend games like the big boys.
That seems like awfully high praise towards Moores pre-divorce. As far as owners go, he left a lot to be desired. His last couple of years owning the club saw the team increase their int’l budget. Never really showed the willingness to add the kind of prospects in the draft that typically signed for over-slot. Moores cheapness in that regard pre-dates Alderson’s mlb adhering ways being added to the mix.
During Moores stint as the owner the largest free agent contract given out was a 1-year deal to a past-prime Greg Maddux. Going cheap on the Bush pick (AFTER saving 2m on Stauffer’s bonus the year prior) will always be the starting point when using the tar & feather method in transforming Moores into a modern version of the SD Chicken.
It’s remarkeable that when the Padres drafted and signed Keyvius Sampson it represented the first high school pitcher picked & signed in the first TEN rounds of the draft in 9 or 10 years! I really don’t get that approach. We’ve seen numerous of those signings in recent years. YES, lets avoid the best HS arms available. Very sound approach.
Personally I was more impressed with Moorad then Moores. Adding high-end talent in the draft, and I credit Moorad’s player agent history giving him proper respect in valuing those players, is helping change the team at it’s inner-most core. I’m just glad Moores isn’t back with plans of holding onto the team. That would be hell to me.
Until the Padres get new ownership, they have to make the best of what they have, which I certainly believe Kevin Towers and Jed Hoyer did while they were the GMs of the Padres. Until Moores sells the team to someone who is willing to invest a bit more capital into the team to acquire “that big name guy,” the Padres are going to have to focus on building from within.
As for Gonzalez – however reasonable his contract looks, the Padres would not have been able to afford it long term given the current state of affairs. They did the right thing by trading him.
Already been busted. Padres still cannot draw much even when they have a roster fairly full of both current stars and multiple HOF’ers as they did in ’77 (11th attendance) ’76 (9th attendance) 78 (8th attendance) 79 (16th).
Those teams all had the luxury of major draw stars, much like the lone star AGone the Padres have had of the last decade as well as I posted earlier.. those teams had people like Rollie Fingers, Dave Winfield, Ozzie Smith, Gaylord Perry.. HOF’er each and every one and super stars such as George Kendrick, Gene Tenace, Randy Jones..
Then Padres owner Ray Kroc tried that spending money to compete big time once in San Diego and it never panned out as older baseball fans may remember.
This argument has so many flaws it’s a complete waste. For one, in the 70’s San Diego had half the population it does today. Also you throw names out there of super stars who either played with very minimal time in SD or had poor seasons who later became HOF’ers. On top of all that you claim 9th and 8th in attendance like they’re bad results.
I guess Randy Jones winning 20 games for the Padres 2 times during that span is is a “poor season” and Dave Winfield getting his start with the Padres, hitting his 1st 150+ HR making his 1st 4 AS teams etc.. were poor seasons etc??
San Diego was no small city as I recalled in 1977, maybe not as big as last time visited in 2010, but certainly it was not small, especially with the huge number of Sailors and Marines that were there on a P/T basis.
San Diego then was as big as Tampa Bay is now and THAT city am very familiar with.
If a city just cannot draw (like posted) when Ray Kroc made a concerted effort for a few seasons to throw his “McDonald’s Millions” at it to make it great.. How can they? Huizinga tried it at Miami, then tore it down, They tried it in Tampa when that franchise 1st started and tore it down.. Kroc tried it and tore it down…
You mention the two players that had the best results during that span. I can do the same and say Ozzie was just another short stop during his tenure with SD.
Tampa Bay is just as large as San Diego is today. According to MSA they are 17th and 18th in population. I think you need to look at the numbers on this one and not go with your gut instincts.
Lastly as I said 8th and 9th in attendance are not bad numbers. In 2011 8th and 9th in attendance were the Brewers and the Cubs. Those payrolls were averaging 100 million in payroll.
“Tampa Bay is just as large as San Diego is today.”
Think you just cleared things up then and more than had even figured… If SD is the same size as entire TB area (which geographically includes entire Bay area, St.Petersburg etc..) I am really at a loss as to why the Padres cannot draw and it is more alarming.
Admit this time did not go back and look up any figures, or populations as i did attendance and make sure on player stats, but if the Padres are drawing this poorly, like even worse than the Rays with equal population?
TB even averages (without double checking) around 22k per game as recall and only sellout when the NYY and Boston come to town.
What my main point in each of the above posts was, is that Kroc threw millions in FA contracts at players early on to buy a winner and it really did not have the impact he expected. the team was not the real winner and he even had a top notch skipper for awhile in Roger Craig.
The approach is going to have to be a Tampa Bay type from farm system down to work out.. Not bought FA like Hamels was blabbering about, as well as spending $$$ on 1 person that is not going to be around when the team is good.
I still have doubts that team can make it in that area, as well as even the Fish (whom i like) in Miami and even the Rays in Tampa.