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1/19/12

Mets: Chuck James, Adam Rubin, Oliver Perez, Team Value


If Chuck James sounds familiar, that’s because you remember him as a pitcher on the Braves. Chuck James was signed to a minor league contract this offseason by the Mets and is next in line with Jeremy Hefner on the outside looking in for a spot in the rotation this season. As already described in an earlier post, the Mets rotation is probably set right now, with Santana’s mark being the current question mark. Both Hefner and James could step in for the next available role, so who ever performs better in the spring will get the spot. Chuck debuted with the Braves in 2005. He had a very successful 2006 season where he posted a 3.78 ERA in 116 innings of work. His 2006 season was OK, his ERA was good at 4.24, but he allowed a lot of homers (32) over 161 innings of work. 2008 was a bad season for James as he bounced around from the minors and the majors, while posting a 8.10 ERA in the majors. During the 2010 offseason, the Nationals signed him to a minor league deal, where he recorded his second straight season without making it back to the majors. The next offseason he signed with the Twins, where he spent time in the minors and the majors:  http://www.213milesfromshea.com/2012/01/18/get-to-know-a-mets-minor-league-player-chuck-james/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

One writer I've continued to follow is Adam Rubin of ESPN. His tweets are almost exclusively news. He rarely traffics in rumor or editorializing. His tweets generally lack the negative cast of many colleagues. In general, he seemed to exemplify the unglamorous aspects of what a reporter is supposed to do. That's why I was so blown away by a series of tweets he unleashed last night. The tweets were not only uncharacteristically emotional, but also full of mushroom-cloud details about the idiocy and incompetence the Mets displayed with regard to medical treatment of injured players, most of which had never appeared before in any forum. The tweets raised some huge questions about what gets reported when, and why. http://www.amazinavenue.com/2012/1/18/2715337/call-the-doctor

Mariners signed LHP Oliver Perez to a minor league contract. The deal includes an invitation to major league spring training. Perez showed some signs of life last year at Double-A Harrisburg, registering a 3.09 ERA and 58/27 K/BB ratio in 75 2/3 innings, but he's highly unlikely to land a spot on the Mariners' Opening Day roster.  http://www.rotoworld.com/headlines/mlb/348083/baseball-headlines?r=1

It's not that the Mets aren't a valuable commodity in fact Forbes ranked them the 44th most valuable sports team which puts them #5 amongst baseball teams ( Yanks, BSox, Dodgers, Cubs).  It seems that they're cash broke and their revenue flow wasn't constructed properly.  So even if they aren't squirreling money away for a settlement or supporting their struggling real estate entities through the Mets, if the Wilpon's stay they are constructed to be cash broke. Most teams will rank their sources of cash revenues, in order of TV, naming rights/sponsorship/merchandising and then attendance/concessions.  But just like the team maybe valuable, so is the TV station, we've all heard that SNY in it's own right is a very appealing commodity but that doesn't mean it's earning the team cash flow. Apparently the way the Wilpon's set up the contracts regarding SNY they won't receive TV revenue shares from the league the way most teams get much need infusions of cash, while the stock value of the network goes up the cash flow doesn't  http://networkedblogs.com/sTHLz

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