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All quiet on the Padres front, crickets.
Holes all over the place but Preller has been give Peanuts to work with.
Rockstar GM
Believe in the process!
As a Philly native, whenever I hear or read that P word………
Since Mark posed the question about players and the Yankees facial hair policy: I’m aware of only two instances where a player said they wouldn’t shave to play for the Yankees. David Price said it but wasn’t a FA at the time he said it. The other was Brian Wilson who was a FA at the time. While I’m not saying I support the policy, I will say those were two bullets dodged.
Matt Strahm said it too, but I have no evidential proof.
Did you see Brian Wilson on the Grand Tour a few years ago? He was clean shaven. Surreal!
Wonder what happened to the family of squirrels that lived in it?
As a fan since the 1970s when George formalized the facial hair policy, I’m not aware of them losing out on someone they wanted because the player wanted to keep his beard or long hair. Johnny Damon rocked the caveman look and he embraced the clean as soon as the Yankees called. I’ve worn a beard at times during my life, and I’ve had jobs when I had to be clean shaven, and I didn’t care. I preferred the job and I wasn’t being paid tens of millions. There are positives. Alex Verdugo looks way better without the beard. Meanwhile, Harrison Bader looks like he’s auditioning for a part in a remake of Deliverance.
It’s interesting that the fan asking the question mentioned he couldn’t see Bryce Harper shaving to be a Yankee. The Yankees was Harper’s team. He wanted desperately to wear the pinstripes just like Gerrit Cole. He already had the barber lined up! The Yankees, mistakenly, never called.
RE: Free-agent signing deadline
I can smell the collusion cooking from here… and after the imposed Deadline? Then what?!? All remaining FAs must sit out the season? Sorry “A Fan” but by every stretch of the imagination, it’s not a feasible idea.
I could see some sort of idea floated that after say, February 1, no FA can sign a deal guaranteeing more than $10 million.
Spoiler: Players association would not agree to this. lol
I see no reason to change anything. If a player doesn’t want to work out a deal then stay home. The players that were represented by other agents were signed in a timely manner and were paid well.
The common problem seems to be Scott Boras. The players have to live with their decision.
…and they live quite well.
Gwynning – If MLB teams decide on their own that they aren’t going to give huge overpays as ransoms to Boras no matter what the date, by your definition of “collusion” aren’t they already guilty of it?
Fever – the act of colluding or conspiring (which is in the definition) requires more than 1 person to meet the definition.
If truly all 30 owners independently came to the same decision it is not collusion.
Don’t leave a paper trail in other words.
Long – I am certain if there was even a hint of colluding going on, Boras would have spouted about it already.
This situation is so very different from the prior three collusion cases. In those cases,
Collusion 1 – Teams didn’t offer contract to other team’s free agents, and they reduced the roster size from 25 down to 24.
Collusion 2 – Average salary declined, free agent salaries declined 16%, most free agents stayed with their teams, and 75% of all free agents signed just 1-year contracts.
Collusion 3 – A database of offers made to free agents was created and shared by all owners.
All three of those were very egregious, nothing even close is happening now. And again, it’s kinda hard to cry “collusion” when two massive, historic contracts along with several other very large contracts were negotiated with agents not named Boras.
I tend to agree with you 100%.
Joe Says… truth. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
FPG- MLB teams and their Boards of Trustee attorneys are historically known to cheat the margins and game the system. I’m not attempting an accusation here, just merely playing games with the pieces provided. Under the auspices of a deadline, I suspect you and I both know that teams would play “last minute” games with FAs and then we would find a whole lot of new things to complain about.
“Can you believe Snell is unsigned and has to sit out until September 1st? Crazy yo!”
Yes. If a deadline was established then teams would alter their signing strategy to push some players up to the deadline to drive down prices. It would the owners. The players have zero interest in it. While Boras clients have signed later in prior years, this offseason has been an anomaly driven by market conditions and flaws in the perceived value of the players. If the Yankees offered Snell 6/150 as reported, then it was Snell who rejected the deal, not Boras. There’s no need for a deadline. If Boras’s strategy causes his players to get less, then he’ll change strategy. He won’t though because this year is a one-off. We’ve seen his players sign early too.
This is my all-time favorite chat response from Mark, love it!!!
Red Sox Fan: Any idea why John Henry doesn’t want to spend any money?
Mark P: He’s spending plenty of money, but it’s just on the soccer team, the hockey team, the PGA Tour, etc.
Max Fried is a CAA client, not a Boras dude.
I really hate the bees, beeds chat thing. It’s overdone and offers zilch to those chats. I wish the writers would just start ignoring them and they will just vanish into the “no one really cares about this” netherworld.
If it bothers you so much then just don’t participate or read it. Why complain about it. If it makes people happy then fine. It’s based on a TV program I’ve never watched so I don’t get it. But it doesn’t bother me to the point of whining about it. He just spent 2 hours on a chat. If it makes him happy then go for it.
You hate it so much you type out a paragraph crying about it. Interesting. It likely takes zero time away from the chat. Takes 20 seconds max, and I doubt he ignores a question to do that. I think it’s dumb too, but I don’t cry about it.
It is dumb though, and all played out.
Sid- Maybe the Warden makes him read it.
kwolf68, you aren’t getting much support on this comment, but I agree and have said so numerous times. It’s overplayed, childish, irritating and blocks legitimate questions. I gave up submitting questions a long time ago because of things like bees/beads, what do you put on your hot dog, etc. But then a lot of people who join the chat are of the mentality that Bartolo Colon is cute and cuddly, never cheated and belongs in the HOF.
‘Blocks legitimate questions’ lol
I’m sure Mark looks at super interesting questions, is about to answer, and then a ‘Bees’ comes in, so he throws them in the trash.
This is a completely free chat. You are free not to read it.
Yep, the 20 seconds it takes Mark to post, and the split second it would take you to ignore it, are gut-wrenching.
rangers spending was done beautifully, it wasn’t throw out a crap ton of money and hope for the best. it was done in an offseason with 4 elite SS’s and we grabbed 2 of the 3 best knowing it was a 90-100 loss team. Then next year grab some rotation help, connect these two offseasons to cheap josh jungs, jonah heims, adolis garcias, nathaniel lowe, evan carter, leodys taveras, zeke duran, owen white, jack leiter (hopefully this year). wyatt langford, ridiculous.
it was a very well timed spending spree with forward looking opportunities in sight and it paid off. paying huge years and money contracts you usually hope to get phenomenal production the first year or two and the back end sucks, but you can also say we’ll get phenomenal production in years 2-5 when it intersects with a top end farm. and contention window
Yes, impressive plan. That said, for Davis to fire Daniels then promote Young in mid stream could not have been part of that plan.
I was skeptical of Young’s chops. Then this happened. He fires Woodward and gets Bochy. Wow! Without a Bochy type manager, do they even make the playoffs? When you buy that much talent, you also buy that much ego. IMO, Bochy kept everyone engaged and on the “same page”
Kudos to the owner for not going outside the org to get their GM!