2008 Baseball Thread: You're not getting Seven!

OOP, I'm not a fan of any team but it gets a little tiresome to hear you beat this topic to death four or five times a week and have the same three people tell you to get past it.

Baseball will NEVER, EVER have a completely level playing field. A very broad consensus among the people who run baseball (owners and players) prefer the existing system because it's more profitable overall and it retains strong incentive for the clubs to pursue individual market growth. This last point is important because, unlike football, baseball's revenue is primarily local. This system has helped baseball catch up with football from a revenue standpoint ($6 billion, I believe, was last year's figure) and I haven't found anyone in the game who doesn't like that. And small markets demonstrate every year that they can operate successfully within this system.

This is my last post on the topic. I'm not getting into a time-wasting debate over this with you. It's fact. I know you personally don't like it but you're not going to change it. Ever.

 

Cran, scroll up and read or check it out on the other threads. I'm not the only one beating this to death. Take it up with them.

 

The Braves did the same thing with Brian McCann -- signed him long-term after he'd played just over one full major-league season. Which is interesting, because they seem to be in no hurry to do the same with Francoeur.

Anyone on that list a Scot Boras client?

 

They're trying with Frenchy, and they have been for a while. He's not helping himself much this year, though.

 

Pretty soon, I'm going to have to stop calling him Dumpster.

Why was he ever a reliever?

 

I have responded to every one of those point more times than I can count, buckweaver, and he didn't seem at all interested in a debate. He just wanted to tell me to shut up. The day I'm having, I just don't have the patience for that.

I have always said that it is simply my point of view that a playing field that isn't level is a bad thing. You are all free to disagree.

Honestly, I'm getting tired of this crap, too, but there are a few posters who cream their pants and start it up all over again any time a team other than the Yankees, Red Sox or Mets signs a player long term. That was my point to cranberry. If he wants this debate to go away, he needs to take it up with all of the people who keep it going.

 

Just go back to 2003. Some of the those August crowds were unreal. I remember when ESPN did its ballpark tour, the guy who did it was at a Royals/Yankees game, and he couldn't believe the atmosphere.

 

Just a personal opinion. The Mets, as currently constituted, are not a playoff team. They are poorly constructed, which is the fault of the GM, and they are horrible at fundamentals, which is the fault of the manager and his coaches.

As we used to say of the Mets in the 70s and early 80s, "Back up the truck."

 

If you would have told me the Cubs would get 11 strikeouts one game from Lilly and 12 the next game from Dempster, I would have wondered how many Old Styles you've swilled down.

 

Can't fire the players, canning the coaches only works when you actually have a good team (see the '99 Mets) and the GM (inexplicably) has ownership's ear. Bye bye Willie.

 

Yankees and Mets miss the playoffs?

ESPN will weep, as will I, but that's a moot point.