Baseball is beautiful for oh so many reasons. From watching a game on a warm summer night, to the history of the game, to the mano-a-mano-ness of batter vs. hitter, baseball has many reasons to love it. For a bit of a nerd like me, VLookup Vince, baseball is great as it is one of the closest things to a transparent market. For a number of reasons that suit me just fine, teams feel the need to share every detail, every minutiae of their contract negotiations with fans. The Dodgers have been a prime example of this behavior over the last 5 months, which makes the Manny negotiations and contract quite confusing. The Dodgers knew they were the only significant player (pun was intended) in the running for Manny. When they ‘restarted’ negotiations after last weeks 2 years for $45m fell through, it would seem to me that they had to ask themselves the following two questions:
1. At what price will Manny refuse to play at all and wait until next season?
2. At what price will some other team come in and sign Manny?
It would seem that for a player turning 38 this season, the first option does not seem particularly appealing, nor financially preferrable (which is all that really matters). I can’t imagine many teams offering $20m/season for a player who will be 39, and oh yeah, missed the whole last season, and oh yeah, might be a bit of a headache in the clubhouse. Plus, $20m wouldn’t even be a better outcome than the current contract anyway!
Thus it had to have the second questions above that had the Dodgers worried (and rightly so, as I don’t think they win the AL West title without Manny). But its March! Spring Training is almost a month underway. Most teams at this point in the season just don’t have $20-$25m of payroll space to toss around. Case in point Abreu & Dunn, who seemingly signed for less than they would have earlier in the offseason. In fact, I’d guess that only the Yankees could even fathom spending $20m+ at this point. Sure a handful of teams could have found a way to make $15m work, but $20m+? Only the Yanks.
When you look at the Yankees offseason, they had a few goals, all of which have been achieved: Make your team a lot better. Check. Bolster the pitching staff. Check. Bring in some big names for the new stadium. Check. And finally, keep the payroll around the same as last year’s. Check.
Enter Scott ‘the magician’ Boras. He, again, must have pulled off some wizardry only he a few select others are capable of (call for Drew Rosenhaus, line 3). The only way I can see the Dodger’s being convinced they had to spend $25m this season to obtain the super-amazing hitting abilities of Manny, is by Boras convincing them that he had other teams lined up at $22.5m-ish (or the prorated share, if Manny were to sign after the season started). Boras either used that negotiation tactic, or simply that the Dodgers would be best served by tossing money to Manny that they didn’t really need to, instead of pocketing it themselves.
The Manny negotiation really has been a prime example of Scotty being Scotty. Great work, Scott, you earned your payday.
For those interested, the below link is to Manny’s apartment now up for sale in Boston for $8.5M.
http://www.citylifeboston.com/bostonfeaturedproperty/?fpid=63&fpname=Ritz%204bedroom,%20Palatial%20Penthouse%20Oasis,%20w/4,500SF,%20$8,500,000
[...] however, I actually felt Simmons had undertaken an impossible task. As the last 5 months of Manny’s contract negotiations have played out, I find the man only more mysterious, difficult to figure out, and most of all [...]