I'm a simple guy. If I was a bank that was loaning a baseball team millions of dollars, and that team's stadium was named after another bank, wouldn't you as the loaning bank make a condition of the loan to get yer name on something. We are live at B.O.A. Citifield...for one season. I'm just saying.
The Wilpons have really become lepers to me. This inane selling off of 20 million dollars' worth of the team here and there. Let me introduce you to WalMart brand "Great Value" line of groceries...can you be blander, whiter, more generic than Sandy Alderson and Terry Collins? I know a man, a big man, who loves the Bobby V resurrection in Boston, and wishes his Mets had those kinds of balls. I really don't think he's alone.
It's really such a study in Bud Selig's way of doing things. Bud talks about "his legacy" and he's right and I'm appalled that he's been in the game going on a half century, and had this long a run as commissioner. He's made himself a modern Ban Johnson. There's not even a National Committee. It's just Bud deciding Frank McCourt can't destroy a brand like the Dodgers, while Fred Wilpon gets to
grasp and squeeze and hang on to the team he bought, paid for with the same kind of illusory money McCourt bought his team with.
I don't like interference in my commerce. Frank McCourt wants to purchase the Dodgers, he's approved to buy the Dodgers, Bud takes his money. What an industry that operates with one man deciding, "for the good of the game, historically, and financially" (can't you hear Bud saying that?) that an absolute ass like Frank McCourt isn't allowed to squander his money, transact a bad marriage publicly, and run the now more than half a century old Los Angeles Dodgers right out of the baseball business?
Major League Baseball, that's who. Bud Selig, on your side.
Is it a coincidence that it's the Mets Fiftieth Anniversary Season? Season long celebrations of the past. In a stadium dedicated to the Brooklyn Dodgers. Bud says, let Fred milk the 50 year thing, he'll get a little more on his feet, pay off some more debt. Sandy will stockpile them with prospects and they'll sell the homegrown can't wait to see 'em only a couple years away line.
It's a disgrace. It's a dirty shame that you couldn't have offered Jose Reyes a decent contract and acted like you wanted him. It's true, what Jose,josejosejose said in his Miami debut. The Mets showed him no love. Now, I don't think Jose deserves the money and years he got in Miami. I would have offered him four years, 52 million, with bonuses that could raise it to sixty. That wouldn't have kept him in New York, either, but I would have tried to pitch loyalty and team a little. The Wilpons are a little distracted, we already know Fred said Jose wasn't going to get "Crawford" money Sandy has other directives he's following.
But Jose did alright. And which of these clowns, Podesta and Ricciardi, get Sandy's job when Sandy makes the club solvent, in talent, if not an 80 million dollar budget?
I want Wright. I'll wait til July if I must. Just please, please, please don't have Brandon Inge the opening day third baseman. I'm almost ready to say the team will never win it all until he is completely off the team. Wouldn't that be a lovely swap in Tigers karma, if by June the boys were playing well, leading, pushing, but Inge was Inge and just finally just obviously the lamest he can be, and he just faded away with Bobby Higginson and Joel Zumaya? And at the same time, ol' Dave, that crazy ol' Dombrowski, who seems to have a good year then a bad year, which means Dotel, Laird, these signings, this construction of a 2012 Detroit Tigers, is headed down an Edgar Renteria trimmed road, but ol' double-d pulls a fair one and gets David Wright.
He's half a head case, his throwing is awful, I never thought I'd say it about m.l.g. third baseman, but I'm not counting on his defense, he's not much better than Inge these days. But I'll take a chance on that bat, hitting sixth, and maybe even second if he's resurrected. I'm tipping my hand as to my off season reality constructions and wish list constructions of the Tigers 2012. I'm not going to worry about it now, but suffice it to say, Sleepy Austin Jackson can bat ninth, or he can ride the pine, or he can get me Wright for the fourth of July festivities.
I'm revealing no secrets as well when I join the chorus in singing "what ridiculous contracts have we". Pujols and Wilson. If yer C.J., California living, California dreaming, wow, man, I'm chilling for life. And big, fat payday Albert. I'm still waiting for the steroid revelation, I'm still waiting for physical breakdown resulting, and he keeps raking. How old is he? Well, however old he is, I wouldn't have even offered him seven. Five with a sixth, four with a fifth, twenty five per.
Again, that wouldn't have gotten him. So the Marlins and the Angels get their men. Aramis went to the Brewers. Prince is still waiting. What if suddenly, no one wanted him at the price of Pujols, or anywhere in the neighborhood thereof? What if Seattle suddenly put an offer of six years, eighty million on the table and no one else bid? Does Prince take his girth to Japan? Does Prince sit on his laurels? Does Prince bite?
I guess I'll take Gio Gonzalez if he comes my way, but I always want to see what these touted pitchers have before I just send them away. I thought Andrew Miller was going to be something; him and Verlander, one-two, in short, thought he would be having a Verlander career by now, and double-d was right about him. (The Phillies just signed Dontrelle Willis. They're talking about a left handed specialist. Dontrelle. That is special.) Jurrjens has been good and often real swell, but he's young to be breaking down, so I guess Detroit didn't miss much of him in the end. But let's see Turner or Oliver or even Below or Crosby, let's see one of 'em every fifth day.
I'm not making any rash pre-Christmas predictions, but watch Chien-Min Wang this year. I've always been for this guy, even as a Yankee, as fan general manager Eric Clark of the Detroit Tigers, I would have taken the chance Washington has. And I think you are going to see the payoff this year. If ever there were a pitcher you said 'he throws ground balls'....can't think of a guy I've ever said that as consistently about. You remember his original decline was precipitated by interleague play? Pitcher versus d.h. in lineups?
There's a debate long settled and still being debated. The d.h. means jobs and the pitchers already have one, so the d.h. is not going away. Purity or not, you are not going back to a full league of hitting pitchers and a creep back to small, strategic baseball. So please, Bud, "for the good of the game", and since season long interleague play is right around the corner, institute the d.h. in the National League.
Maybe if you already have, poor Albert wouldn't have been so happy to leave St. Louis.
I wonder if in any of his thinking, Albert considered the eventual guilt by association feelings in having McGwire as hitting coach. Albert's at a point where some are talking of his decline, and he's got to be thinking about HIS legacy, and hall of fame chances. Even though he's only been with the Cardinals a couple years, people won't remember the chronology, they will mash Pujols' career with McGwire as hitting coach.
I've been trying to avoid it, but here: LaRussa winning the series, leading his team from way back, to even making the playoffs, to once again being the benefactors of a flawed post season system and an opponent willing to throw away a world series opportunity, well, it almost makes me respect Tony. Cause, ya know, he likes dogs. But, yeah....no.
Will the real Rick Porcello please stand up? Cause the Chisox will absolutely give you Danks. Joe Saunders is another guy someone should grab with both hands.
Oh, that reminds me. So long bad,bad Brad "Bad" Penny. See ya later you cupless piece of crap.
And farewell to Magglio and Carlos. Your service in the name of Venezuela and 2006 will always be noted. Don't let the door hit you on the way out. If only I could say that to Brandon Inge. Though I will hasten to add, in fairness, Wilson Betemit's swing didn't inspire me at all. Try San Francisco.
I'll address one more item this time round. The lovely Yankees/Red Sox world. Oh, the fun, the fun.
I'm always hoping for the best, that the Yankees return to their 1980s irrelevance, but don't it just seem lawk it's gon' be a lo-onnnng season fo' the bommas? And by long, I mean enjoyable and eventful and unsuccessful. Cashman wants to act the small market architect, when it is simple fact he can have what he wants when he needs it. Do you expect to see Betances or Banuelos have long Bronx careers? Do you expect A.J. Burnett or Ivan Nova to leave NY first? Cashman hangs on to a guy only as long as he has to? Is he hanging on to Montero too long?
Is Jorge Posada really going to play for someone else? Are the Yankees really going to do a Bernie Williams on him? I guess they already have. Bernie for the hall of fame. Oh but jesus sweet baby jesus at christmastime don't get me started on the hall of fame. As a dozen thoughts about my loathing of the hall of fame, its procedures, its choices, its exclusions, its bullshit, and yeah even its exhibits! I been there! I can say it! Yankee haters love to hate Posada, but Jorge rakes on a good day, I love his swing, and yes, the story of his son is compelling and moves me greatly. Does that make him more of a hall of famer than Bernie? I'm just saying, what, other than sentiment, puts Ron Santo in the hall of fame? He was a productive hitter playing half his games in Wrigley Field. What did he ever win?
Alan Trammel, Lou Whitaker, Jack Morris. I told you not to get me started on the hall of fame.
And so we come to the end. And the best, for last. Bobby V. BOBBY FRICKIN' V! is back from Asian exile and Connecticut public service to lay down the law on the Bosox. Take Beckett in hand and get him to fly right. I like Bobby V. with Dustin Pedroia and Jacoby Ellsbury and even Carl Crawford in I have to believe will be a better year 2012. Bobby gonna let Big Papi set the tone of veteran austerity and leadership.
Ah, um, yeah, by the way, was there a minority interviewed for Francona's job? Other than Ozzie Guillen getting his dream job, which, I believe, will totally get away from him rapidly , (and aside: Heath Bell. Who cares about San Diego relief pitchers? Ever?) I must have missed all the minority candidates that went "through the process" in St. Louis, Boston, and Chicago.
But mostly, I love the naming of Bobby Valentine manager of the Red Sox, because it makes for a nice harbinger that 2012 really will be the end of the world.
If I don't write before, have a nice, really nice, holiday season. Bye bye, 2011, you were rotten and in the end exposed for the flawed product you were, just like my Detroit Tigers. I expect more in 2012. You should too.
art and flowers,
eric clark
Baseball and Everything Else............
