December 2007 - Posts
Ten things I’d like to see in 2008:
10. Marvin Miller receives his due. I know well and greatly respect several members of the new Veterans Committee. But their thinking on this topic escapes me. And it is so out of touch with the vast majority of those around the game, so much so that even Fay Vincent believes Miller was wronged by not being elected to the Hall of Fame. In an emotion-charged op-ed piece for the New York Times, Vincent wrote that the decision to overlook Miller for election was “an act of ignorance and bias.”
9. The National League wins the All Star Game. Despite the influx of good young talent in the NL (just look at the shortstop position alone), it remains far behind the AL at the top. The imbalance only worsened when the Marlins traded Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis to Detroit. So, if the NL could somehow win the All-Star Game at least the league's champion would open the World Series at home.
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Read enough reaction to the Mitchell Report and here’s some of what you find:
“Baseball can’t move on until it apologizes. Baseball, specifically Bud Selig, owes Barry Bonds an apology. Sorry, Barry, for hanging you out to dry; for allowing the news media and the public to make you the vilified face of baseball’s steroid era.”
--William C. Rhoden, New York Times, Dec. 15, 2007
A passage so stunning in its blatant agenda requires yet another repeat of this basic primer: The federal government investigated Bonds. Why? Because of BALCO. Oh, and the fact that Greg Anderson, a man whose sole reason for any access to MLB was Bonds, a man whose presence in the clubhouse of the San Francisco Giants was demanded by Bonds, a man who was given a NL Championship ring by the Giants when the club was threatened with public humiliation by Bonds, is a convicted felon for steroid distribution. Until Kirk Radomski’s case is settled, Anderson is in a class of one. And he is one of Barry Bonds’ closest friends. Yeah, sure sounds like MLB owes Bonds an apology.
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Quick hits from one who has yet to read the full Mitchell report:
WHY IS EVERYTHING A SCORECARD?
Much of what I heard and read on Thursday was about winning and losing. Who won? Bud Selig earns huge points for commissioning a report that could only bring bad news to an otherwise wildly healthy sport. But the details were bad for everyone, players were publicly humiliated, staff members were tossed about, and even an owner was exposed. Nobody won, not even former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, whose lack of subpoena power and cooperation from the Major League Baseball Players Association led to little new information.
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First, a word on the Mitchell Report that comes out tomorrow. And the most volleyed word in association with the pending release of the report is blame.
Nothing could be worse for the game. If the purpose of the report is to hold someone accountable, then it should have fallen to a body with the power of subpoena. If the purpose is to document the era in hopes of avoiding a repeat, then blame should be so widespread as to be irrelevant.
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The standard has changed for general managers. No longer is it just about throwing money at agents, listening to lists of diva demands, and playing poker with millions of Monopoly dollars.
Now a general manager's role is about reaping the benefits of one’s player development system, deciding which players are to be kept and which are to be used in trades. Placing a value on talent -- a trait that seemed archaic just a few years ago -- is suddenly back in demand.
With that in mindt, which general manager would you want running your team?
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The general managers are meeting in Nashville and we know that super agent Scott Boras is not the show.
The puppeteer lost major credibility when A-Rod listened to Warren Buffett. How must Boras have felt when the New York Times promoted his winter meetings appearance as representing David Newhan?
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