Princess Dye

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 01:06 PM) I'm saying you should only be willing to pay the player for what you think he is capable of over the life of the contract. Not what he did last year or the year before that. PK's home runs from last year will achieve nothing for the 2011 team. And yet teams pay for past performance all the time. Well honestly I would respect a GM that runs their team that way, but do you want to have a respectable strategy, or have a strategy similar to those of several consistently winning organizations? I have to look at winning teams that stray from the bargain spending philosophy and still win. They pay what it takes to keep their target from going to another team. I want to be one of those organizations. I'd side with you if I doubted JR was committed to winning and paying, but right now he's possibly going to set our payroll record, so I am hopeful for 2011-2013. We're not a bunch of over the hill guys. There's a lot of in-their-prime on this roster.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 01:00 PM) Derek Lee is a career .315 hitter with a .915 OPS against AL pitching. Fair enough. Last year vs. AL .221/.299/.382 (68 AB). I guess we'll see which way his career goes from this point on.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 12:48 PM) Last year gets you NOTHING in this contract. Get that through your heads, people. If Paulie's year last year means nothing then I guess it's impossible to combat your point. I'm basically saying that the extra 6M in 2013 is worth it to me if it means I'm getting the better player. PK does his damage against AL pitching. Lee should do better against NL pitching if he's going to be my 1B on a championship team. Great organizations very often have to pay a guy an extra year who may be past his prime. If you are a team with a dedication to winning-level payroll year in year out, that is one of the risks. I'm not saying you pile up crappy contracts, but as someone said earlier, right now we have this 2014-2020 payment and the money we're on the hook for regarding Linebrink. Over time, that's not a lot for someone like JR.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 12:41 PM) You shouldnt give a contract over $30 mm because the player isn't "bad." JR paid because of loyalty, not because of a baseball decision. The way you tell it, Lee had the MVP caliber year last year, not PK. And Lee was in the NL. I'd have been all for Lee if the price were going to be super cheap. But what Lee put up stats-wise is clearly below PK's current functioning level. Also, again, jersey sales are of worth to the Sox. That's basically advertising for them. They want tons of Sox jerseys all around the city. Dumping PK means these jerseys are no longer worn out and about, starting conversations around the city (and north side). Jersey-wearers are walking commercials for the White Sox, and this is an area they want to improve to help buzz for their team. Lee's worth in creating buzz for the team to me is lesser than what it means to bring this core from last year back, plus adding Dunn. To create optimum excitement in the fanbase, you want the team leader staying (obviously foremost is that he's still effective on the field). Teams do care about getting their logo out there, they go through pains to present it in various ways for a reason.

Every year there are tons of young kids buying new jerseys. Paulie is the team's leader, one of the most likely jerseys for these new consumers to be into. Lee would be coming in as an unknown. Lets also remember this -- even though I'm not one of them, there are those people out there who will run out to buy the new Sox road grey simply because the sleeve change on the old one is now unauthentic.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 11:44 AM) Jersey sales are part of league revenue sharing, so really no change. Attendance depends on if this team wins, pretty simple. Tickets are sold before the year starts as well as during the year. Also minor point, but having your team's jerseys all over the city is part of getting your brand out there and winning the battle of Chicagoans' entertainment dollars. It indirectly brings in revenue. A new Lee Sox jersey would sell, true, but the excitement created by Konerko/Dunn as having monster potential together is going to have its impact as well. I think we're about to see it.

White Sox looking for one lefty, one right for bullpen. But may have to trade to create $ space. Dave Van Dyck twitter Unique closer/setup man with Thornton/Sale. They'll apparently carry a third lefty who will be more of a situational guy and Sale will be that shutdown guy setting up perhaps.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 11:38 AM) YOu just helped his argument then you know. Having another contract that expires along with others next year gives you flexibility to re-up with players or to blow it up. And with everyone leaving, these extra draft picks wouldve been nice to help rebuild the system. Plus, as you mention, Dayan would be ready to fill in after a year. DLee was just a flatout better option. On the surface we can say this, but in truth we have no idea right now what creates flexibility or doesnt. Does having Konerko jerseys to sell create payroll flexibility for next year? Does increased 2011 attendance create flexibiliity more than Derrek Lee contract savings do? Those are possibilities. Paulie gets paid because he builds on last year's team to create excitement (read: ticket sales) for next year. Bringing in Lee alienates the silly no-Cub-should-ever-be-a-Sox people, as well as hampers excitement about the 3-4-5 in our lineup a bit. People with those beliefs buy tickets, as well as the people who consider PK their hero and their kids' hero. In JR's world payroll flexibility is more complex than just saying, oh crap, that's 6M in 2013 that we won't be able to spend. Right now he has to create excitement for the 2011 ballclub and sell a bunch of tickets. This Paulie move is a way of infusing some buzz into the fanbase. Signing D-Lee would be saying: come buy tickets for our Rios/Dunn/Lee 3-4-5. That's good but not sending the message that this is a clear improvement on last year. EDIT: and if you're talking about increasing payroll flexibility for 2012 to have some huge spending spree...i dont even know what to think about that. I'm happy getting away from the world of trying to nab the Torii's/Fukudome's year in and year out and being passed up. I'll miss our compensatory picks, but I wont trade all-star 1Bs for possible Kyle McCullochs.

I wish Brandon Hynick was awesome. That would be great.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 11:31 AM) The key to me is $27.5 million dollars, not 10 versus 13. Is your concern that he'll be unable to play 1B and produce in year 3? Or that there are going to be tons of holes we can't fill by year 3 and will want that money? The way I see it, there is a decently aged core and some money coming off the books by then that will mitigate that. And our best prospect is a 1B.

To compare, freaking Michael Cuddyer signed a contract (in 09 or something?) for 2yr/24M with option for a 3rd. Paulie's mother teresa if he went up to his old team and said "pay me like Michael Cuddyer." instead his agent took a hard line approach so they could end up at that point anyway. Perfectly fine with that.

Above all, we can't really judge this until we actually see what they do with the bullpen.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:57 AM) I want JJ Putz as my damned closer. PK precluded that from happening. This is the same Putz that hasn't put a complete year together since who knows when. Last year he was close to doing it but wasnt available down the stretch. With relievers you're better off trying to catch lightning in a bottle with quality young arms. If we had signed Putz, you can just turn around and say signing Putz precluded us from signing Rafael Soriano. At some point you have to pick a direction and fill out payroll with a combination of guys that involves some sure entities and some risk. I'd rather take gambles with the bullpen than with 1B.

Also if you ask me, PK knew the Sox wouldn't overpay for bullpen arms, but probably realized that if he caved some, they could get Dunn and really have a special offense. Bullpen arms, no matter how much you plan, are a chaotic entity (ie Cotts/Politte)

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:54 AM) The White Sox are NOT the Yankees. Not even close to a fair example. True, but we're known leaguewide i'm sure as a team that pays up.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:51 AM) I guess I am naive then. I thought PK, our captain, wasn't every guy in the league. I mean, they hire agents with different reputations. Joe Crede seemed like the most down to earth guy in the world, but he perhaps got Scott Boras to handle all this ugly stuff for him. It's quite possible PK told his agent: "I want to be at least near my market value but give them a hometown discount of x-dollars so they can get relievers" And then his agent may have taken this direction and decided the way to get it is demand 15M for days on end until the Sox caved on a final 1M or something. Agents separate their client from the negotiations so they dont have to go on that messy path to get to where they want to go. It still may mean PK was understanding of team needs from the beginning. Did you want to pay PK something along the lines of 2 yr/20M?

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:47 AM) Then you and your agent try to hold us up for $15 million a year. Nice Pauly. Every guy in the league does this. If you don't hold out for the highest price you can, someone else will. If PK knew from the onset he'd be giving us a hometown discount, then it was in his best interest to play hardball until the last possible second. It seems like the wall of 1B free agents is about to break. I can remember McGwire giving like this gigantic hometown discount to the Cards in free agency, but I suppose we can look back and think he had steroid guilt or something.

To draw a perhaps useless parallel, PK has perhaps known JJ Putz a year. I dont think i'd give any coworker of mine 50% of my next raise (after I had a productive year) much less one that's been working here a year. "give a million to your grandkids' kids" vs. "give JJ Putz an extra million"

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:37 AM) What angers me is that these ballplayers who are already incredibly wealthy, and claim that their number 1 priority is to win, seem to forget about that come contract negotiation time. Couldn't the guy survive on $10 million a year so we could have signed Putz? Or some other bullpen arms? PK's demands have the potential to hamstring us a bit here, and it frustrates me to no end that the guy doesn't care about that. I'm happy the guy is back. His bat is definitely going to be needed. But I'm also going to look at him in a much different light now then I did just a week ago. Players have seen other players get killed on investments. Lose all their millions b/c of some jerk they trusted. Then think about what he's paying agents etc. and how this deal is supposed to set up his grandkids and his extended family, in-laws...it's actually not as black and white as "he's greedy." We have no idea how many cousins he has that just got laid off or have gigantic debts. I'm sure a big part of it is he wants the Sox to respect him with the final $ amount, but another part can be family related stuff that of course we'd all relate to, albeit in a distant, non-millionaire way. We don't know for sure that PK's deal affected Putz. Putz was signed cheaply, but PK or no, I have a feeling we're going to be spreading the rest of that remaining $ over several arms.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:29 AM) It's not complaining. It's showing legitimate concern for the possible long-term ramifications of the deal. I was on the fence about all this Lee/PK stuff, but basically it comes down to how much cheaper DLee was going to be. I dont know if we can knowingly complain until we see what Lee gets, from who, and what the 1B market was like. One thing I won't listen to is people pretending that LaRoche's career .339 OBP in the NL was something for me to drool over.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:24 AM) Because before you know it, you're paying out a bunch of money to players that are no longer on your baseball team. As long as Jerry is willing to pay for a winner each year, we can't really complain about payroll restraints. He's shown he's willing to consistently pay like winning teams do (KW's streaky decision-making fully aside from this). We have no idea what JR's thought process is. It may be that they've calculated Konerko makes so much money for the organization based on ticket sales/merchandise that perhaps having him here the next two years pays for that deferred money ahead of time (and then some). Point being, without inside information like this, we can't know how to judge how much it does/doesn't restrain us. Maybe they figured PK's popularity will pay for our bullpen arms moreso than D-Lee's supposed discounted price would have.

Another thing to consider is that contending teams very often give multiyear contracts to aging, still-producing players. That's just one of the responsibilities of being a winning organization these days. Yankees don't get 1 year of Andruw Jones for 500K, and they dont get 1 year of Carlos Peña to be Andruw Jones like at 10M. They pay their older past-allstars a multiyear contract. If Konerko had taken one year, there's also no guarantee we would've been able to sign some all-star 1B the following year. Looking at our pre-Dunn FA record of late, I'd say it's actually very unlikely.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:14 AM) DLee contended for more MVPs than Konerko. In the NL. I was all for DLee at like 2yr/16M. But something tells me he gets more than that now.

Last year Peña was a bad version of Andruw Jones, but with a full year of at-bats. No thanks. We're here to contend. Also, Peña fits the roid profile, and while not young to begin with--we all know those guys do not age well unless they continue treatment.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Dec 8, 2010 -> 10:07 AM) Why can't people be concerned that Konerko will regress big te, or that his hip comes back and haunts him, or his chonic thumb problem that he gets shots for throughout the year starts to get much worse? I think there is a ton of risk in this deal and I think DLee will be better than Konerko. Throw in the draft picks and setting up an opening for Dayan and signing DLee just made to much sense. Great point about the draft picks. But how often do you get a chance to sign a guy who contended for the MVP at this price? Other teams surely were not given this sweet deal for the third year deferring. If GMs are to take advantage of unique situations and pounce, then I'd call this deferring a little more advantageous than getting boom-or-bust-very-often-bust MLB draft picks.