Acta News Team
Manny, we hardly knew ye. Actually, check that.
I hardly knew ye.
But that's a good thing. As Sip's nemesis TSG has pointed out several times, you only really get to know third base coaches if they're screwing up. Boston's Dale Sveum was a textbook case of this phenomenon a couple years back.
All I know about Acta is that he never made it to the Show as a player, everyone seemed to like him, and he's only 37.
Bingo, and godspeed.
Next, a list of names rejected by the boys in marketing up at 399 Park:
Citi Stadium
Citi Colliseum
Citi Polo Grounds
Citi Shea
Citi Pavilion
Chipper Jones Park
The House That Smart Corporate Governance Built
Sandy Weill Don't Work Here No More Field
Straight Cash, Homey, Stadium
Salomon Smith Barney's Fun-Time Queens Bigtop
Jackie Robinson Field at Mile High
Estadio Minaya
The Metropolitans' Opera House
Art Howe Memorial Stadium
Chuck Prince Park
Sarbanes-Oxley Place, w/ Spitzer Rotunda
I think it was Clyde Haberman in the Times who especially appreciated the mayor telling everyone that the name of the stadium was too valuable to be sentimental with. Hizzoner, needless to say, didn't play those type of games with the name of his company.
It's only a little more dignified with the space in there, despite the needed boost of even a little bit of added dignity. Without the space, if you had been treated to a purely corporate, language-rending title - "CitiField" - you would really feel like you were at the top of a bank statement.
Now, you can picture yourself on the second page of the statement, down with the transactions and the threats from the branch manager. Only marginally more civilized, but every little bit helps.
Finally, the holy shit take on Matsuzaka.
Let's be frank -- $52 million can buy a lot of baseballers. For $51.1 million, you can sign every minor-league free agent in the Northern Hemisphere, add in a crapload of Taiwanese prospects, build a couple of academies in the DR and buy off the Pirates of the Caribbean.
With dollar bills left over to tip your waitress, who just loves how much money you're throwing around.
The stuff on ESPN about the staff you could pay with the $50 mil. figure (Santana, Carpenter, Webb, Halladay, Oswalt, etc..) is amusing, and a fun way of hitting ourselves in the face with the enormity of the dollar figure.
Still, it doesn't help the Mets much at this point. Whether the Sox are going to ever pay that amount, or are engaged in a risky and potentially counterproductive blocking mechanism, is not known at this point. TBD, as they say.
Daisuke is either going to Fenway, or back to Pacific Rim for another year. Not to the site of the future Citi Field.
"I'm very comfortable with the bid that we made," Mets general manager Omar Minaya said, sidestepping whether he would have topped Boston's offer now that he knew what it was.
I imagine. The Mets and the Sox are in different situations, with different priorities, and a straight comparison isn't fair. Boston loses out far more under a Yankees-get-Matsuzaka scenario than the Mets would, and they have a different obligation there.
Even though, at $38 mil., the Amazins were clearly in it to win it.
Gammons sez the Sox want the Japanese marketing boost. I'm sure there's money there, notwithstanding Bill Madden's idiotic contention that there's no room left in Fenway for Japanese-language signage. Good god, the signs aren't Mount Rushmore, Madden. They can be, you know, altered and moved around. Like posters.
Still, the Mets clearly didn't see enough marketing money coming in to justify an over-the-top, monsted bid. They've already had a second-tier star from the land of the rising sun, and they may know something about the ancilliary revenues that the Sox don't.
Maybe there's a virgin ground boost, given that Boston's never had a Japanese star and New York has. Clearly, we out here in the public aren't in the know.
As I've said in the past, I think that you're looking at a Nomo-quality debut from Matsuzaka in 2007, should it happen. Possibly a season for the ages. There's scads of risk involved, but everyone who looks at this guy comes away raving.
All the same, it's a a lost opportunity, and one that narrows the Mets' focus to Zito, Schmidt, Zito, and Zito. Damn.
New panicky, subjective and totally unimposing projected rotation for 2007, given that I have zero faith in Glavine re-signing – Zito, Maine, Perez, El Duque and Pelfrey, with Humber, Bannister, Zambrano and Dave Williams looking in over the window sill.
Drink up.
posted by Cheddar Ben at 9:04 AM
2 Comments:
Hey Ched - This is the thinking behind throwing boatloads of sweet moolah at a quote-unquote unproven prospect, sorta kinda.
The idea is that, if pay the posting fee, even if you come to terms, the dude signs with them, and they do not get the $$ back, they will CERTAINLY get a lot of promotional and marketing $$ from Japanese sponsors, TV, etc.
It's a smart move, even though I agree $51mm is a little bonkers. But if this guy is as a good as everyone says and thinks - Red Sox will be laughing all the way to the proverbial bank.
I think it's a good move and not a "bush league" move like some people think, to block to Skanks.
Was talking to my barber Franco, today.
The Sox are going to sign this kid for 5 yr 50-50.
Turns into 5 yr 100-100.
Someone is going to sign Zito for 5 and 75.
Matsuzaka is going to make the Sox a ton more than 25-35 mil in revenues overseas.
Economically it seems like it works out. The Sox must have done the same math.
Not to mention, the value of blocking him from the Yankees only takes a player off the field for the Banks but it also takes away the same revenue.
Sip
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