Today, Shaughnny offers one of those columns that illustrates the perfect way for an employee to address his boss: He poses
a question instead of stating his concern. It’s headlined: “Has Sox offseason
been too quiet?” Shaughnny does the obligatory cooing over the Redsock brain trust, and waxes his dolphin with last year's championship ring, but
then - for the first time in 2014 - does something much more Shaughnny-like. Or even Lupica-like. He starts asking why his team is playing
cheapo ball.
“The local glee when the Yankees overspend has always
perplexed me. Does it put any money in Sox fans’ pockets if the Yankees exceed
the luxury tax threshold and the Red Sox hold the line? If you want to be the Yankees, why are you
thrilled to see them land good players at exorbitant costs?”
He even suggests the Redsocks view 2014 a “bridge year,” moving
young talent into key positions for a future run. (Translation: Not this year, folks... not... this... year.)
Listen: It’s never been "Boston Strong." It was Boston
Smart. They've been smart enough to know the wisdom of a rebuilding year. Two summers ago, they took everything
apart and then started putting it back together. They won a ring. They now have three in this millenium. I personally believe a lot more Yankee fans
would understand and support the team, if the Steinbrenners adopted a similar strategy. But it doesn't matter, because that won’t
happen, (unless we hit an apocalyptical meltdown, which IS still a possibility.) There is too much YES Network money
involved to have the Yankees crawling into a season without hope. (As they did last year.)
So, comrades, here is what we must do.
RELEASE THE KRAKEN.
Sign Stephen Drew. Yep. I opposed it last month. It made no sense. I opposed it on Monday. No sense at all. I didn't support it on Tuesday. Or Wednesday morning. But today, everything has changed. Now, if we're in this for a penny, we are in it for a pound. SIGN STEPHEN DREW. He can play 2B. He can play 3B. And if Jeter tweaks a gonad, he’ll play SS. The Yankees have a huge, gaping hole on the infield, and the $189 million payroll threshold - the concept that guided us last year - is now a certified glitch of history (Definition: Never discuss this again. We sucked last year for nothing, nothing.) SIGN STEPHEN DREW. It will:
a)
Piss off the Redsocks more than ever.
b)
Give us an everyday 3B without having to trade Brett Gardner.
c)
Give us a
player with something to prove to Boston.
Listen: No GM is going to hand the Yankees a solid 3B without demanding a blood ransom. The Redsocks are playing their penny-pinching strategy, and the Steinbrenners have now settled on their plan, which is to spend the moon. OK, let's do it. Drop the bomb. Release the Kraken. Send in the clowns. The canary in the mine shaft is wobbling. In for a penny, in for a pound. Let's go, Mr. Steinbrenner. This is no time for cheapo baseball.
Posts
15 comments:
as a certified el duque minion (TM), I cannot argue with our leader's impeccable logic. I doubt my costs of attending games will rise if the steinspawn open their wallets for Drew. a better reason to travel into the Bronx can only help this team make money.
KD here parrots the MSM media that ticket prices are a function of players' salaries. Ticket prices reflect consumer demand; if the Staten Island Yankees could get $500 for each bleacher seat, they would charge it, irrespective of the payroll.
Likewise, when the Mets found their new baseball emporium mostly empty, they slashed ticket prices.
No surprise to see mindless conventional wisdom finding a ready conduit in KD.
el duque comes off here less as a fan than as a junkie--he knows the overspending for over-thirties gives a short-term high followed by long-term devastation, but he begs for more every time.
Alphonso, where is thy sting?
Hi Anonymous and thanks for the attention. makes me feel an equal. sorry to say, however, that you slipped up this time. let's see if you can figure out your error.
tschuss!
I didn't slip up--you're a moron who regurgitates every morsel of rotten misinformation purveyed by the corporate media. So the poor owners just HAVE to raise ticket prices because of those greedy players and their bloated salaries--not because they're profiteering pigs.
We get it, KD. YOU are the mistake. And you're bluffing. If you had the chops to take on my argument head on, you would> But you don't--so you won't.
But as an act of charity, I can refer you, the economic illiterate, to article by Joe Sheehan of Baseball Prospectus:
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=1345
In it he states, "The price of tickets is not set to recoup costs, but to maximize revenue.
If you take nothing else from this column; if you think I'm a blithering idiot unfit to spend time in the company of humans; if you'd rather I be carved up and sold for pennies a pound... believe the above statement. Send it to two friends. It's the single misconception most damaging to the public discourse on sports economics.
Prices are set by teams to maximize revenue, and are based on anticipated demand. They are not set to "make up" whatever rise in payroll is anticipated, no matter how many teams send out letters to season-ticket holders claiming this to be the case. Rising player salaries do not drive ticket-price increases.
There are countless examples that show this, but the two I like best are major college sports--where the players are "paid" with scholarships and stipends, yet ticket prices are comparable to those in their professional counterparts--and the NBA and NFL, where a salary cap hasn't stopped a steady rise in ticket prices over the last 15 years. Baseball ticket prices are high because lots of people are going to baseball games. (I know corporate purchases, and the tax laws that drive them, are part of this equation. It's a topic for another day.)
For a salary cap to impact the price of tickets, you'd need something along the lines of a "revenue cap" to balance the scales. This would be a completely irrational solution, in part because implementation would be difficult, and in part because the market would correct for the lowered prices. There would be a huge secondary market in which tickets are priced according to demand, with the revenues going not to the teams themselves, but to the brokers in that market. There's no reason to implement a system that encourages this."
Suck on that for a while, loser. And by the way--there's additional voluminous scholarly literature on this subject if you ever have the energy to do a little research, which is hard, I know, when your hands alternate between sucking your thumb and picking up the remains of your Cheetos off your stained undershirt.
Hey, man! Ypu're harshing my buzz.
Hey, man! You need to find a pastime besides jerking off to photos of Derek Jeter and watching reruns of Cheech and Chong movies.
Nope. you're still clueless. But keep trying, my little friend. Your petulance is rather charming.
BTW, I eat my Cheetos with a spoon. Less mess on the shirt and no orange fingers.
Anonymous, we do agree on one important sentiment although it pains me to admit to any commonality with a mean-spirited blowhard like you. I miss Alphonso too.
Boy, all I can say is, sign Drew and everybody else we can get our hands on. What the hell.
I wonder when the Yankees are going to lower prices on all those empty seats we saw last year.
OK, KD, you're omniscient. Everybody has been taken in. Nobody feels that you have to justify your oafish association between signing an expensive free agent and the cost of attending a game. You made that association, it was refuted, and now all you offer is your empty rope-a-dope. Why? Gee . . . maybe it's because you're a moron who has no idea what he's talking about. We all know that if you could go toe to toe on this you would. But you can't. You've been exposed as a mindless cipher and impotent bluffer. Now deal with it . . . because you're fooling nobody, not even yourself.
Anon, you had your chance. From my original post: "I doubt my costs of attending games will rise if the steinspawn open their wallets for Drew."
You see, I do NOT equate players salaries with ticket prices. (I aced econ 101 at Big Stat U but did enjoy your refresher).
An honorable man would extend an apology but I expect none from the likes of you, for obvious reasons.
I love you KD, honest, I really do. Unfortunately my BPVR ( BiPolar Vortex Reflex) has flared up and I'm compelled to blast frigid arctic retorts toward any and all of your thoughts, theories or queries. It is a curse to be correct all of the time, A CURSE! Paradoxically, I always end up alienating those who I'm more closely aligned, someone like you, a fellow brethren of the IIHIIFIIC Order. KD, please keep this in mind during times like this, when my pendulum has swung toward the dark side. Always know that I ( secretly) honor your passion, intelligence and ease of jovial wit,,, we are in this together my friend, our common commitment to Yankee excellence.
" I always end up alienating those who I'm more closely aligned . . . ."
Does someone smell a rank illiterate in the vicinity? The kind of malevolent creepy insect that can do nothing but compulsively licks its wounds in public?
YUCK! Someone get out a can of Febreeze--or better yet, a can of Raid.
KD--Your comment shows that you DO equate player salaries and ticket prices; your demurrer applied only to the cost of THIS particular contract, not to player costs in general
In fact, here's another example: In the "Yo, Adrian . . ." thread, you dribbled, "Those $11 beers now seem worth the price!" Once again you equate prices paid by fans with salaries paid to players.
Let's face it, KD--trying to hide a stupidity as outsized as yours with a few transparent ratioanlizations is like trying to cover the Empire State Building with a plastic grocery store bag.
Your comments on this blog are, in no particular order, witless, trite, predictable, uninformed, and thoroughly superfluous.
You can now return to biting your toenails.
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