“Unreasonable expectations”, “exit strategies”, “blowing it”, “disappointing the fans”, scream the headlines.
It’s that season once again – the rhetoric season – the annual pre-second-guessing of St. Louis Cardinals ownership and management. It occurs every year at this time, no matter how the previous campaign ended on the field, what the outlook for the next might be or what has transpired during the off-season to date.
Granted, this is an uneasy time for writers on deadlines, needing something spicy about which to opine during a traditional period of low activity across Major League Baseball. (For a great graphical representation of recent years’ trades and free agent signings by winter day, see this post on the Fungoes blog.)
People starving for news seem to hang on every word spoken by club officials and agents alike, as if it is the accurate and only word. They don’t seem to understand or accept that these figures are professionals that know how to leverage the media to further their own interests and negotiating stance.
The hungry public gobble up the spin as translated by the writers as if it is a gourmet meal instead of the table scraps they usually are.
Other times rumors magically leak out, unattributed to any reputable source, yet the breathless rumor-chasing world can turn on its ear as a result.
Let’s take an example.
Some are currently worked up because the Cardinals have supposedly misled their fans regarding their chances of re-signing Matt Holliday, setting expectations unrealistically high. The storyline continues that the club is now trying to let the public down easily that they may be unable to keep the free agent outfielder. That is being passed off as news.
Apparently, the Cardinals should never have said they would do their best to re-sign the outfielder because some fans cannot sort through the clutter to logically think this through for themselves.
Others more romantically inclined, previously became convinced that Holliday would fall in love with St. Louis and sign for a below-top dollar amount just for the privilege to remain with the Cardinals. Their starry-eyed logic was based on several other players having done that in the past under entirely different circumstances.
How naïve is all that?
Anyone with any knowledge of the free agent market and the consistent tactics of agent Scott Boras over the years could easily forecast how the Holliday situation would evolve from the very day in July the Cardinals traded for him. In fact, many of us did just that.
After acquiring Holliday and seeing him in action, the Cardinals expressed interest in bringing him back, but openly acknowledged some time ago that they do not want to allocate the resources to be the highest bidder if it gets to that point. That seems pretty clear.
The Cardinals have not yet made Holliday an offer likely in part because they knew no matter how good it would be, Boras would turn around and use it to try to secure even more cash from another deeper-pocketed organization. This is not surprising.
If Boras can locate another suitor with more money, he will surely take Holliday there for 2010 and beyond. No matter what Bill DeWitt, John Mozeliak, Boras or any writer says, that is most likely what will happen. Again, this is not a news flash.
Other rabble-rousers suggest the Cardinals brass only recently realized it will cost them a substantial percentage of their player payroll to re-sign Albert Pujols as well as Holliday – perhaps more than the club believes they can afford. It seems a change of tune from these inciteful (not insightful) pundits who previously applauded the organization’s efforts in acquiring Holliday in the first place.
Despite the charges to the contrary, those running the team are not stupid nor are a majority of readers for that matter. Yet the extremists – the torches and pitchforks crowd – seem to enjoy getting worked into a frenzy – even before anything actually happens.
If the Cardinals play their hand well, serious competition does not surface and a significant amount of luck is on their side, there is still a chance Holliday could return. Timing is crucial though the club is certainly not in control of all variables.
Having the best of intentions could still lead the Cardinals to undesirable results. That is a very realistic possibility that has been known for months.
Maybe it won’t be anyone’s fault, but that won’t stop those on the sidelines from identifying a black-hatted target to take the blame. It could be the stereotypical cheap owner, the overly-optimistic GM, the money-grubbing agent or the passive player. Not knowing the true facts to be able to properly assign the blame won’t stop it from occurring, including a healthy dose of the usual name-calling.
In the meantime, all the inflammatory headlines and “he said, she said” stuff being written between now and when Holliday’s decision is disclosed is just noise on the line. Some eagerly soak that up. I guess it is good to fill in the time with the talk radio crowd when the obligatory Tiger Woods jokes are exhausted, but to me it is maddening.
Taking it one step further, can you imagine what it will be like with potentially two more years, over 700 days, of Pujols speculation ahead of us to deal with each and every morning, afternoon and evening?
Bottom line, if you feel misled or confused by any part of the Holliday situation, then you just aren’t paying enough attention.
Fine essay, though I wonder if the final line could have added a “don’t” before misled? Of course there will be nutty posts by fans, because of all the provocative claims by reporters, to incite them.
Bernie has to be one of the leading hypocrites on this matter.
Like a bat out of Hell, Bernie blasted the Cards for not trading away what he contemptuously called Luhnow’s “Faberge eggs.” (This makes Bernie or Jeff or both sound tres gay). He was referring to minor league prospects.
Several years ago, Bernie blasted the Cards for not having enough minor league prospects, this past summer, he wanted them traded ASAP or something terrible was going to unfold.
As fate would have it, the Cards did give up a stud reliever in Chris Perez and a fine prospect in Jess Todd for a few months of 34 year old DeRosa. As much as 11 years of player control for a few months of DeRosa. This was only done because of the bad luck ofinjuries to Glaus and then Freese.
And then the Cards gave up thick legged 3B Brett Wallace and a couple of decent prospects for a few months of Holliday. The Cards tried to re-enact the Scott Rolen or Mark McGwire deals, in which they persuaded these guys to stay, instead of taking top dollar as free agents. Holliday was friends with McGwire and Schumaker. We hoped he could be persuaded to stay, just like Boras advised Kyle Lohse signed on last fall, instead of going free agent. It was not an impossible chance, though Holliday may have hurt the chance by playing TOO WELL. He rose to the top of an unexciting free agent pool, its headliner.
Its hard for the hottest free agents to take a less than top deal, because all the smaller fry are thought to have their salaries influenced by a trickle-down effect from the top stars. So Holliday may get a lot of Union (thug) pressure to take top dollar in an open bidding competition.
And now Bernie is howling at the moon like an idiot again, outraged to discover, apparently for the first time, the Cards to not have enough money to outbid the rich teams for Holliday, even though in late September, DeWitt expressly said in the Post Dispatch the Cards were not going to be the top bidders on Holliday. Bernie is either a hypocrite or has memory problems.
The second-guessers are everywhere. Just this morning, Chicago’s Phil Rogers came up with this juicy piece of insight:
“Downside risk: Many Cardinals fans remain in denial, but GM John Mozeliak took risks last season that could haunt the franchise for at least a few years.”
The Washington Post contributed Thomas Boswell to offer thoughtful perspectives about baseball, benefitting the Orioles after departure of the Senators, and now the Nationals. I am not sure Chicago, though a large city, has ever had a writer of significant stature on baseball. If so, too bad. Jerome Holtzman might have been ok, I forget. In any event, Phil Rogers is no contender!
St Louis fans were enriched from Jack Buck. Nowadays the franchise is served by persons of smaller hearts or minds, who consider it their jobs to incite anger or mislead.
“Despite the charges to the contrary, those running the team are not stupid nor are a majority of readers for that matter.”
Could there be a more contradictory statement?
The owners may not be stupid in their financial dealings with the team or even Holliday but they are stupid in how they deal with the fans – they do treat us like we are stupid.
If the Cards didn’t know Holliday would want to go to the highest bidder (via Boras) they didn’t do there homwork. To say they traded for Holliday planning to re-sign him and at the same time saying they will not be the highest bidder appears they think the fans can’t see through the double talk.
I don’t think the Holliday trade was necessarily a bad one but I do resent the Cardinals trying to treat me like I’m stupid.
As a side note, I don’t mind giving up Wallace as he had no where to play. However, if the Cards don’t re-sign Pujols that thinking may have to be revisited.
CC, I want to give the typical reader the benefit of the doubt in being smart enough to sort through the noise and draw their own conclusions. For example, I imagine that you have not been misled by ownership, agents, writers or anyone else, having the perspective to understand the various puts and takes in a multi-million dollar negotiation and recognizing that nothing is yet done.
If Holliday re-signs, all the wasted keystrokes will be forgotten, or should I say, the pundits will simply move on to complaining over much of the team’s payroll is tied up, fueling a major increase in the Pujols fretting.
If Holliday walks, all the silly finger-pointing will escalate. The Cardinals will then take a different direction in rebuilding the team and life will go on, but getting there will be far more painful and contentious than it needs to be.
The P-D is what you would call ‘a homer’. So the warm and fluffy Scottie puff piece did’nt just happen, especially right now. He loves art, ahwwww, I just want to give him a hug. How many hours went into the tag cluster do you think? Payment doesn’t have to be all in dollars. Maybe his kid will be a top prospect. This is all very encouraging. Hopefully, no one will feel compelled to save me from the smart people.
Nicely presented Brian. That is a tough medium to negotiate.
Realities;
There is ZERO chance of the Cardinals taking advantage of an organized collusion against Scott Boras, if one imagines such things, simple because that all organizations in said collusion would be prepared in the end to take advantage of the situation, with superior payroll flexibility to acquire Matt. …….Holiday is just as dangerous as Hallady in unbalancing the AL east………………………. I make this statement because the obvious “high ground”…….. tactically and morally/righteously, is to make a simple and reasonable formal offer, that represents your vision of his competitive value. One the the fans would recognize as his credible value to the organization. Lets say, 5/90 with a 3 million dollar signing bonus. Give a deadline of January 1……….. let everything else fall as it may. Be a proud mid market organization, one that knows the value of a dollar. Let Holiday think about that, the hell with Boras.
Its that easy. It resolves all conflict…….win or loose………….. so why not?
Because its not true!
The subject of Brian’s piece, together with today’s P-D articles and the whole Holiday/Boras/Albert thing reminds me of an historical footnote during the battle of Leyte gulf. The opponant had circled around to threaten the U.S. landing, while the covering force under Halsey had been lured far away. The desperate coded message from Pearl inquiring as the whereabouts of the absent Halsey contained ‘padding’ (a common practice to throw off those for whom the message was not intended) which in that case was “the world wonders”. A torrent of speculation ensued when media, and therfore the publc, mistook the padding for the essence and gave it deep meaning, implying high level critisism of Halsey, who in the end arrived in the nick of time to save the day.
Take for example todays Joe Straus piece. In the whole lengthy article resides only one item presented as a declarative fact which was not previously known. “The Cardinals say they have not tendered an offer to Holliday because Boras has asked them to wait.” Everyone clammors about the padding, while what should be asked is why would Boras ask the Cards to wait with their offer, and why would the Cards comply with such a request?
Boras has motive because the Cards will set the bar (price) low. The Cards motive may be trying to kiss up to Boras.
That is one possibility CC, excellent. Did you notice that amidst an article chock full of quotes and attributions, the one new fact is attributed to no-one. Straus is not that big of a hack, niether is his editor.
As I have pointed out BB, and I haven’t read that article yet, is that Boras and the Cards are not talking………..even to have him refute a statement like that. The biggest threat to Boras is his relationship to Holiday, who wants to play in St. Louis. These types of statements are aimed at undermining that relationship. The Cardinals are just BSing because Boras won’t respond. Holiday can’t help but notice the growing collusion, and he knows Boris is capable of blowing his situation.
I have to admit that the Cardinals are players, what ever anyone sees as their motivation.
Brian, if the general public is smart enough to see through any smoke screens thrown up by the team then why wouldn’t Boras and company be smart enough? If that’s the case, what’s the point of a smoke screen? Something is not adding up logic wise in this argument.
Sorry to differ Westy, the paper has been bursting with Boras responses to every peep out of Cardinal managements mouths. And vise-versa. Not long ago the Cards were going to make one offer only, and leave it at that rather than playing Scottie’s game. Then, it was they are in no hurry to provide Scottie the ‘opening bid’. Now, on the eve of the dog fight its he has asked them not to make an offer yet, and they have politely complied. I don’t claim to know what is going on, but something certainly is. It could be lots of things and one is that Scottie doesn’t want to show up without his big dog.
I may be out of touch with some of that BB…………would you mind posting some of the articles or information……thanks.
Sorry Westy, here’s the Straus piece, the O’Niell article with the big picture of cuddly looking scottie is on today’s stl.com, yesterday’s is still there too, with quotes aplenty from the BD3 speech.
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/sports/stories.nsf/cardinals/story/E904AD414CCE59468625768400064FFF?OpenDocument
Here’s my take on Straus and his editor last night:
Joe: Hey, guess what chief, amidst all the Holliday gobbledegook and wild speculation, I have learned a juicey new fact not previously reported.
Chief: Sure Joe, lets hear it.
Joe: Boras has asked the Cards not to make their offer yet, and they said o.k.
Chief(after coffee shoots out of his nose): No kidding, wow, that is new, and juicey. What are you going to do.
Joe: Well, how about I write up a lengthy re-hash piece, and discretely bury it in the middle where no-one will notice.
Chief: Sounds good Joe, but for gods sake don’t attribute it to anyone.
Joe: Hey, back off man, I went to J-school.
Part of the fun in watching this BB, is that like any game, the tactics and energy used to create action or energy can come back to bite you. While the Cardinals are dancing this way, even the wise BD can occasionally make a mistake. Watch carefully when and how the formal offer comes to light.
I’ve been pointing out all of these issue for well over a year. Do you know where the 300 mill for the stadium came from, and who holds those bonds……………guess.
I liked the articles on Boras and the article about the Cards. Its good to see all the viewpoints out there and there is more financial data than I recall seeing before.
DeWitt confirmed my suspicion that the Cards wanted to try to do a Rolen deal. Boras wants more for his client. He pushes back by saying the Cards have the same income as the Phillies. And the Cards indicate that they have higher costs associated with debt payments on the stadium, which makes sense and explains some differential. The Cards may clear $15MM or $20MM in profit, not a lot, given all their costs, which are about $100MM more than merely ML player salaries.
Boras has done a lot for players. The draft worked for very well for MLB for decades to suppress amateur signing bonuses. Boras helped to take bonuses to a much higher plateau for elite prospects. A lot of players owe him a lot. Scottie B will deserve a place in the Hall of Fame.
Its no big deal, one way or the other, that the Cards have not made a formal offer on Holliday. Boras wants to collect as many offers as he can from other teams. Then he can tell the Cards where Holliday is at and see if they want to bid at that price. I doubt they will, because the bidding may be very high. And if so, the Cards will need to be resourceful and try to find some alternatives, this winter or when-ever possibilities arise.
The KC Royals are doing a great job of recruiting amateurs. They are said to be spending $8M or so on a hard throwing Cuban southpaw. They have been aggressive on Boras clients in the past few drafts, shelling out bonus money. In due course, the Royals could build a strong team. They have added some smart personnel guys. If the Cards cant compete up at the ultra expensive veteran free agent level, they may need to go back to basics in a few years, like the Royals have been doing.
2006 and 2007 could turn out to be career years for Matt Holliday. Personally I don’t think he is an elite player. 15 million per year 4 years is fair. I realize that is unrealistic given the circumstances.
It is unfortunate that the Cardinals can’t go after other players without knowing if Holliday signs with them.
Polanco, Figgins and Wagner would be about $22 million-Holliday isn’t getting that much but maybe he goes to $18 million.
I’m still happy Mo did the trade last summer because “nuthin’s been got that hasn’t been gone for”
If Boras really wants $23 million per year for Holliday as this newspaper report states, it may very soon be time to move on. That is even higher than Teixeira. Let someone else bid the Red Sox up.
Brian– “If the Cardinals play their hand well, serious competition does not surface and a significant amount of luck is on their side, there is still a chance Holiday could return. Timing is crucial though the club is certainly not in control of all variables.”
0 chance……….. This is naive. The Cardinals never intended on keeping Holiday……..and Pujols.
The manner in which they started playing “Fast and Loose” as I like to call it, has now exposed some of their activities also revealing some of their intentions. Holiday was always a transitional move to create even a larger payroll surplus this year. Remember………it used to be called the Pujol s fund……..the dry powder, what ever. All of their wiggling right now is just PR management, later to be quantified as how many tickets they lost or gained……………………. The barb here is that Tony and Albert have put them in the public spot light. Nice maneuvering don’t ya think…………………..
While this is going on, they are busy creating excuses for why they won’t get an arm or a bat because of these distractions…………………….Franklin isn’t the solution. Tony supported his best option. Do you see Franklin closing against the Yankees. Give me a break. The Cardinals are waiting to see the early numbers on Holiday before they bail. They are being very careful that a formal offer isn’t accepted I would think.
In the style of BB…………… De Witt is a heavy wait Bush Boy. The Pr used to justify the invasion of Iraq was just that…………..Even though it is now pretty conspicuous, nothing is really becoming of that knowledge. The question of why we are there still, is dependent on the breadth of your overview or perspective. You could Jumbo your position, or you could say it had to do with special interest profits. You might look at important national interests in protecting the Gulf States favorable leadership and their deep investments in this country. Then you hit the bump. Why is Obama really there? It appears someone explained to him the necessity of keeping Russian pipelines hopes at a minimum, and best of all, restricting the Chinese access the the hi quality light industrial crude used in manufacturing. If they started openly arming the fundamentalists, as they would if we left, the Saud’s and Kuwaitis would be gone in 6 months. The Taliban would and the Chinese of have an unlimited ability to manufacture us into oblivion.
Dropped my mouse and it posted………sorry………
The Taliban would allow the Chinese full market privileges and they would have an unlimited ability to manufacture us into oblivion.
That was the life of BD until his retirement……….to become an owner/ GM. The concept of covering your real activities to hide your intentions isn’t new. It is an old and bad habit.
How many stadiums were built and funded during W’s tenure. The biggest ripoff of all was in Arlington………………….but that was when he was a baseball man………..and It also happened in Texas, which is in another country I think. Read up on the Yankee stadium investigations.
Common guys…………..But why are you bothering to say this WC?
BD has been doing business in a different arena. This arena has been mixed with the baseball business. His personal goal has to do with finance and his personal Legacy, not necessarily win at all costs. The Lugo/Holiday maneuver was a brilliant financial move……… not necessarily a sound baseball move as some could criticize. He’s bright. If we keep the pressure on, he might put off his business agenda for a while and we can play some ball. He is sweating this confrontation with Boras’s PR machine I’ll wager.
$23 Million? Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh! no thanks-
Boras is dreaming.
By the way Brian, solid post.
My god chief………I was going for Jumbo’s record of 5 straight unanswered posts. You stuck that in just before I hit submit. Kriky
DeWitt really wants to hold the payroll at $100 million-the Phillies are looking at 140 M .
Maybe the economic downturn hasn’t affected some of the East Coast owners as much as others.
Red Sox have deep pockets.
Oops, if I had realized that WC . . . . . . . . . . .
are you really going to count the accidental post when you dropped your mouse ??
Krikey……………a rules infraction,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Chief, there isn’t a way in hell that the Cardinals spend 100m this year. I had them in the low 80′s. With all the hubbub, they may reach 92m………. they will say they’re looking for flexibility to pick up salary in bailouts at the break. Watch.
Teixeira money is $22.5M from 2011 on out Brian, Chief. You’re getting stampeded by a cheap dredge of last months bluster, nothing new there. Starting tomorrow, the more folks stampeding to and fro the better for Scottie and the sports media. Big cloud of dust. No one notices if he’s just hawking schnauzers.
I understand Westy, its dark out there, and cold, but at least you’re not lonely. I’ve got the fire all to myself. The only question, shall it be Macallan, or perhaps Jameson, decisions.
Are those the pron stars………….or just that smooth , aged, oblivion?
I may have meant porn stars………….. but now I kinda want to see what some pron chicks might look like..
Just saw a promo, in a few minutes Channel 5 will have a TLR interview where he will tell us why he is disappointed with how the Holiday negotiation is going. By the way, I compromised with B&B. Bring on the prons.
Tony said retaining MH is ‘critical’. Said Boras never mentions the Cards, as if they have no chance, and that’s discouraging. Had nothing bad to say about how Cards are pursuing it.
Anyone tired of BB on MH skip this.
Here’s what I think will work:
$2M signing bonus/20/20/15/15/15/15/$1M bonus each year 600PA & 1.000 OPS
In my mind, it’s safe to assume that offers which come up dry, however impressive, do not satisfy Albert’s definition of “commitment to winning’, the reason being Albert it a results guy, not a that was a good try guy. Also, last night on the news Tony said that the Cards have known for ‘two years’ they need a bat behind Albert. He said ‘no offense to Luddy or any of the young guys but we need some stature there’. He said signing MH was ‘critical’. I can’t see him saying any of that if either Albert didn’t want MH back, Tony had any good reason to think MH didn’t want to come back, or it wasn’t a realistic possibility. I also have trouble thinking he would give Scottie such good ammo (signing his client is critical) unless discussions are a lot more advanced than anyone is talking about.
I don’t think its ammo BB. The fact that Boras is treating us bad means that we’re still being prepped against some possibilities. Sometime you have to treat her a little rough……………. who knows why.
Should Jason Bay suddenly sign with Boston, and they are playing his hold out, that leaves NY in a power position, and NY has probably guessed how low they can go against us. Angels are lurking. Boras has to keep us in the picture, and that shouldn’t be hard since everyone seems to recognize that we will use this as an excuse for less activity. In truth, we are exactly on the course talked about here for months. If you figure that there is a possibility that Albert has actually told them he was leaving, they would be acting exactly the same way, on their way to fulfillment of a transition to mid-market expectations. I marvel at teams like the Phillies that go out and pay for what they think they need. We sit around suggesting the Franklin is the man, and Ludwick might surface again, Freese is a bona fide big leaguer. Wait, no wonder Albert wants out, without loosing his squeaky clean reputation.
Minor points…
BB, bonuses cannot be based on actual results, just appearances and the like. 600 PA is fine, but 1.000 OPS is not.
WC, if Pujols had told the Cardinals he would be leaving, they would pursue trading him and the world would know in about two nanoseconds. Of course, he wouldn’t tell them that now anyway, so it is a moot point.
How about silver slugger then? Old hat for MH.
Westy, the tactics have to wait until the strategy is in place. It’s a shame to miss out though. Won’t be long at all now.
WC, if Pujols had told the Cardinals he would be leaving, they would pursue trading him and the world would know in about two nanoseconds. Of course, he wouldn’t tell them that now anyway, so it is a moot point.
Of course he hasn’t told them. He wants to be a Cardinal for life. And Holiday is our top priority? Always remember Mo’s worst moment……..” if the procedure had gotten any more involved, Paletta would have got involved”………. that has my attention to this day.
Here is one eventuality that isn’t talked about. Holiday may have told Boris he wants to play in St. Louis, and Boris said,” let me at least show you the Market, and I would say thats our best opportunity at getting the Cardinals best offer anyway”. That is a possibility.
SF looks closely at Brad Penny who performs well for them……..and yet, they won’t commit to much more than an incentive laden deal? What are we offering? How much risk is there, or is he headed for a closer roll? I can’t tell whats going on there. I know they would like to appear as aggressive. Lets see where this goes.
The flat market has a lot of teams upside down on a lot of contracts, just like it is in the housing market. More is owed on the contract than the player is worth right now. Teams have had another year since last winter to absorb that reality. Big spender teams can no longer count on an escalating market to, in effect, subsidize those big long term deals, especially the ones that don’t work out.
I have been wondering if Tony was playing messenger boy when he said signing MH is ‘critical’. Perhaps Mo and BDW hadn’t quite ‘gotten’ the message about commitment????It’s either that or the meat of a deal is already in the bag. I just can’t think of any other plausible explaination for him saying that right now with negotiation in progress. The most challenged intellect would know not to tell Boras that hiring his client is ‘critical’, while your boss is in the middle of negotiating a deal.
Could just be a move to enhance the pressure to bring home some talent BB. Twisting the knife a little if you will.