Counting down to pitchers and catchers

I know I've got a lot to catch up on. I still haven't finished the attendance comparison between the Nationals and Orioles and I have yet to go through my preseason predictions for each division to hold myself accountable for my rights and wrongs. That will come. For now, a few thoughts on the end of the season. And yes, the Yankees are still the last AL team to lose to an NL team in a game that "counts."

I hate Fox. I always will. They can give us crappy pregame blather, start the games at 8:30 and refuse to move up weekend games any earlier than 8 p.m. (after the pregame) and then they can take their horrendous ratings and deal with them. Fox has dumbed down baseball and it hasn't worked to draw in the viewers. Don't insult us with Scooter and over-the-top graphics and shameless promos of your own TV shows through the use of pointing out which stars who have no interest in the game were given prime seats and told to be in them in the fourth inning for the on-air shot and then allowed to go back to their hotels. It's bad enough that the network killed off the true game of the week and forces us to watch our own hometown teams on Saturday afternoons when we'd otherwise be able to do so when, sometimes, I'd just rather see Oakland and Anaheim rather than the Yankees and Blue Jays.


Bobby Valentine has a point, and I think it would drum up a lot of worldwide interest to see the champions of the two major international leagues face off in a true world series. I'd certainly watch, and I'd probably have more interest in seeing the White Sox and Marines than I did in seeing the White Sox and Astros in Games 3 and 4. A game between the Marines and White Sox that had more meaning than the untelevised exhibitions played by the Yankees and Mets on their respective trips to open the season in Japan recently would be more interesting than seeing the Mets and Cubs or Yankees and Devil Rays play games that count in the standings under the Tokyo Dome. Bob Klapisch is for it too, and he correctly posits that Bud Selig won't make an effort to at least explore the possibility. And yet, they think everyone wants to see a World Classic. It might be interesting, and I'll probably tune in, but if you were to give me the choice between an international competition every four years and a face-off between the champions of two nations every fall, I'd take the annual showdown.


Speaking of Selig, was there anything more revolting than seeing Jerry Reinsdorf fauning over his "Buddy" (Reinsdorf's term, not mine) after taking the World Series trophy during the awards presentation? Reinsdorf spewed some drivel about "the game" or whatever, and Selig stood there extending his lower lip over his upper, hands clasped behind his back, rocking on his no-doubt tassled loafers. (Speaking of the way this guy dresses, does he ever wear a suit, or does he always go with the khakis and contrasting sportcoat? No commissioner of the four major sports -- and I'm even including Gary Bettman here -- would present the championship trophy in anything other than a fine tailored suit, or at least something that looks like one.)

The owners put one of their own, Selig, into the commissioner's office the way George Bush nominates his cronies for political appointments. It's amazing how Bush runs the country so similarly to the way Selig runs baseball. Both chiefs come from the rich elite, protect their own, care more about the bottom line for themselves and their friends than the health and safety of the masses, and try their best to rule as a monarchy instead of a democracy. Between Fox and Selig, watching the All-Star Game and World Series can be as grating as it is enjoyable.


The free agents have begun to file. It's sad to see Mike Piazza on his way out of New York, but it's for the best. He was good, and maybe he'll do one of those one-day contracts, so popular in the NFL, to retire as a Met in a year or two.

Some random and not-so-thought-out predictions for free agent and other movements we'll see between now and late February:

Paul Konerko:Angels
Billy Wagner: Phillies (though I'd love to see him in blue and orange)
A.J. Burnett: Orioles (imagine him with Leo Mazzone?)
Jim Thome: Trade to White Sox
Ramon Hernandez: Mets
Manny Ramirez: Trade to Mets (something just tells me this one's going to happen this time)
B.J. Ryan: Mets or Phillies, depending on where Wagner ends up (I think he wants to close, not take closer money from the Yankees to set up Rivera)

Maybe I'll throw out more later.

29 and 1

I'm going to lay my allegiances out here now.

Well, at least a partial view.

For some reasons that are widely repeated, and not for others that are often discussed, the way I see major league baseball right now is not as 30 teams divided into two leagues. It's more 29 and 1.

And no, the one is not the Expos, owned by major league baseball and the other 29 team owners.

It's the Yankees. They're clearly playing under a different set of rules -- some of which is to their credit, some of which is further proof that Bud Selig is a spineless moron easily influenced not by the masses or his favorite fallback, "the best interests of baseball," but instead by something as small and simple as a dollar sign (and the number of decimal places that follow it).

What else would you expect from a car salesman?

It's been 29 and 1 for a while now. During the discussions that averted a strike in 2002, George Steinbrenner took exception to some of the proposals that seemed directed at restricting his ability to run his team the way he wanted. Big George seemed to cut back last season, and it resulted in another World Series loss. He clearly doesn't want that to happen again, even if his luxury tax figure next offseason will be as big as the Milwaukee payroll. (Which brings up the point that "29 and 1" can refer to at least different teams as the 1 -- Yankees, Expos, Brewers -- but for now, I'm just focusing on the Yankees.)

This doesn't just stem from the Alex Rodriguez trade. That does play a part, but not for the reasons you might think. The truth is, several teams could have had A-Rod, but they didn't want to be as foolish as the Rangers and invest so much money in one guy. The Red Sox could have -- should have -- had him in December, but in the end they couldn't pick up something like an extra $14 million. The union wouldn't agree to devaluing his contract any further, and the deal died -- though everyone from Peter Gammons on down insisted that the trade would happen and, indeed, had to happen for the Rangers, for the Red Sox, for A-Rod, for baseball.

But what really steams me about the trade that did happen -- Soriano for A-Rod -- is what Texas threw in: $67 million. Why the hell did the Rangers have to pay the Yankees to take the game's greatest all-around player (better fielder than Pujols, better -- and younger -- posterboy than Bonds) off their hands?? If the Yankees want to put together MLB's version of a real-life fantasy team, they should have to pay for it. If they want an all-star at every single position (including pitchers three or four times a week), they should have to pay for that and not get any help. The Yankees are easily the most valuable and lucrative franchise in professional sports -- with marketing and development agreements with two of the most popular franchises around the world, the Yomiuri Giants and Manchester United. No one can match the Yankees' revenue from the highest ticket in the game for a stadium with more than 40,000 seats, the unending string of merchandise (Pink caps with the "NY" logo? C'mon. The only thing more insulting than manufacturing them is that they actuall sell.) and the ownership of a network that not only shows 140 of their 162 games each season, but also those of the New Jersey Nets and Devils. Certainly, A-Rod's contract is unique and will likely never be seen in the game again. Even Pujols only got seven years at just over $100 million. (And a side note on that -- man, there are a lot of parenthetical asides today, aren't there? -- is that, should he leave the Cardinals as a free agent after the deal, he'll still only be 31! Just barely past his peak and still in his prime. You know, it pains me to think what records Barry Bonds might hold when he's all done, and I particularly don't want him to get Hank Aaron's 755 home runs. But Pujols just might hit 800, he's done so much so young.) But enough digression. I could have handled it if the Rangers picked up A-Rod's contract for this year and, maybe, part of next season. Let the Yankees have the last five years to themselves. But $67 million covers nearly three years of the average salary.

But the rules aren't different just for the Yankees in North America. Though this was only the second time major league baseball took two regular season games away from the fans in America and sent them to a country that doesn't need games that count to spark interest in the game, they did it differently for the Yankees than for the Mets, the Cubs and the Devil Rays. When the Mets and Cubs went over in 2000, each team lost a home game. The Mets were the home team for one of the games in Tokyo, the Cubs for the other. Each played only 80 home games that season. Furthermore, they came back from Japan with only three days off before resuming the regular season in New York and Chicago. But the Yankees didn't have to give up any home games -- both Tokyo games this week featured the Devil Rays as the home team. In their road spring training uniforms. The Yankees wore pinstripes, because that's what the Japanese fans would want to see, and the Devil Rays got last licks.

Take the Yankees out of the equation for a second. The Devil Rays deserved those two home games, because against any other major league team, they would've drawn about 13,000 fans (last year's average) in Tropicana Field. For a Yankees game at The Trop, they might get 27,000, so they even nearly doubled that the 55,000 per game they drew in Tokyo.

But I don't believe for a second that the Devil Rays got the home team share of the receipts and the Yankees merely got a visitors' share. First, the Tokyo Dome and other Japanese outlets must've gotten a piece. And the Yankees were clearly the draw, moreso than major league baseball itself coming to Japan, and were just as inconvenienced than Tampa Bay. I just have a hunch that major league baseball planned on the "home-and-home" split of the two games between the teams, until George came along and said, "I'm not letting the Yankees go over there if I'm going to lose a home game in the Bronx." Sure, it's a shrewd business move -- the Yankees, who averaged 42,000 fans last season, only drew more than 40,000 hosting the Devil Rays three times, once at 47,000 for the first home weekend game of the season and two more at 40,800 for two weekend games in July. But it's flat-out unfair if it came about like that.

There doesn't seem to be a foreseeable end to this business as we know it. Things will change if the Red Sox manage to beat the Yankees this year -- or if they manage to keep their free agents and build something of a minor dynasty to annually compete with the Yankees through the decade. But players get older and Steinbrenner can't run the team forever. By the time A-Rod's contract expires, Derek Jeter may very well be the only one still playing with him. In terms of prospects, the Yankees have absolutely no minor-league system to speak of and that's going to catch up with them eventually. Sure, they've developed Jeter, Posada, Bernie and Rivera, but now they don't have the Brandon Claussens and Eric Miltons to go out and make the trades they used to make. Everything is cyclical, and someday the Yankees will see this run end.

Unfortunately, they'll probably find some way to build themselves right back up.