Sell The Damn Team Fred!

In June, for capitalnewyork.com, Howard Megdal wrote:

"So for a fan base that has already written off 2013 as surely as its owner did, the view has turned to this winter. The hope, and increasingly, the conventional wisdom, is that with a number of large contracts coming off the books, the Mets will spend money on new talent the team desperately needs, and which isn't coming through the minor league system just yet.

The problem with this theory comes from treating the Mets, and their ability to spend money, as an independent function of the team's payroll alone. This winter promises to be far more complicated than that, and ownership's ability to spend will hang in the balance while Wilpon and his partners attempt to stave off the debt reckoning barreling toward them. Remember, this is fundamentally different than paying the annual interest on their debts, which has financially crippled the team annually, and forced things like a minority sale in March 2012, and a large loan this past winter."

Despite a bevy of power arms and future aces toeing the rubber in the Mets organization, this is still a franchise in serious trouble. It has been since October 19th, 2006 when Carlos Beltran took a called third strike on a wicked curve by then Cardinal rookie Adam Wainwright. Since then it’s been a downward spiral-not into the hell of 100-loss seasons-instead we’ve endured two epic late-season collapses and the purgatory of 70 (+) win seasons since 2009. A combination of the Madoff mess, poor offseason moves since winter 2006-07, and the Wilpon’s refusal to face reality and sell the team after the Madoff scandal. These have left the Mets with a team just good enough to nab 4th place in the NL East on a consistent basis.

Of all these factors, none contribute so much to multiple season’s of Mets malaise than the Wilpon’s not selling the team. Even when considering the other reasons I listed above, or adding a few of your own, the financial crisis which struck this team as a result of the Wilpon’s involvement with Madoff has been crippling. The Wilpon’s ownership of the Mets should’ve ended around that time. But thanks to their Bud(dy) in the commissioner’s chair they still own the team.

One specific occurrence always cited was the Mets taking a chance on Jason Bay over the other two dominant FA’s that offseason, Matt Holliday and John Lackey. In hindsight, all that can be remembered was the nightmare Bay became for the Mets, and what dream the multi-World Series winning Holliday has lived in St. Louis. But at the time Bay and Holliday were viewed by many to be evenly matched players. Also, at $66 million for 4 years, Bay seemed like a steal when the Cardinals “overpaid” for Holliday, seven years/$120 million. It’s easy now to say that the Mets made a huge mistake, but at the time, and rightfully so, the Mets looked like they made out by signing Bay to the deal they worked out. No one could’ve predicted what happened to Bay after signing that deal, but that’s the inherent risk in large contracts such as that. After an underwhelming 2010, most felt Bay would bounce back in second season with the Mets. Instead, it got even worse. The Mets couldn’t rectify the Bay mistake by signing any FA’s in 2011 or 2012 because during the same period, it got worse financially for the Wilpon’s, much worse.
By December of 2011, New York’s Baseball Digest’s Mike Silva was writing:

The gig is up. No one believes MLB, Fred Wilpon, Jeff Wilpon, or Saul Katz. Not the fans, media, and I doubt most of the players. Sometimes I wonder what Sandy Alderson is thinking as he speaks on behalf of this stupidity. If you don’t care about the fans and media, then at least care about the people whose paychecks you sign- the players.

Yes, they make millions and live a life that most of us would die to have. David Wright, Jason Bay, and Johan Santana will all make $15+ million dollars this year. That doesn’t mean its fair they play for a team in a perpetual holding pattern due to the selfishness of the owners and commissioner’s office. Wright specifically will see most of his early prime wasted playing for a team that is connected more to Bernie Madoff than anything they have done on the field. Daniel Murphy, Ike Davis, Jonathon Niese, and other young players are introduced to their big league careers by working in one of the most toxic media and fan situations you will ever see. These kids are promising players; Murphy specifically yearns to win, going as far to make it the focus of his discussion with reporters during the team’s recent holiday event. Do they deserve to be playing in baseball’s version of a mausoleum? Shouldn’t R.A. Dickey be a feel-good story on a contending team, rather than the ace of a failure? I sometimes think his ascent would be taken more seriously by the national press if he were elsewhere.

These guys deserve better than what you can provide. You can’t and won’t be able to turn this around. Wave the white flag and allow everyone involved with this team a chance to turn the page to a new era.

Sell the team and stop the charade.

Strong stuff, and from the same article, Silva wrote that the team had $430 million in principal of a loan against the team due in 2014, a $450 million loan against SNY in 2015, as well as $25 million paid every six months on Citi Field. I’m not sure what the status of these loans are currently, but if they are still due then this idea that the team is “out of the woods” financially speaking or flush with cash to spend this offseason on free agents is bunk. But it also goes a long way toward this aversion to go over $90 in team payroll. What’s truly sobering is that now, nearly two years later, a dwindling fanbase disillusioned by an ownership putting its survival above the success of the franchise they run,
the fact seems to be that Wilpon’s are still in desperation mode to keep the franchise.

Now I’ve read today that they’re not really in on Granderson, or Cruz, also Choo will be too expensive and Ellsbury not even a possibility. I’m glad Byrd signed already, now his contract will be the Phillies problem for the next two years. Eliminating the top two OF FA’s the best and most realistic OF choice is Granderson, forget Beltran he’s probably Yankee or Tejas-bound. Unless you have some sick fetish for the Chris Young’s and Jason Kubel’s of the world-in which case I really feel sorry for you, but it’s ok there’s people out there to help with such things these days. Seriously, and realistically though, Granderson, even with his shortcomings is the best power-hitting FA OF out there.

If we lose out on him, then what? Delmon Young? Nate McLouth? Raul “freakin’” Ibanez? what’s left of Grady Sizemore? It’s dire, and the sad fact is someone of the milieu is probably what we’ll get. Alderson, “Well we really wanted Choo, but he was out of our price range, and you know we didn’t expect Byrd to go so quickly, and umm, then we kicked the tires on Granderson, but collectively we didn’t think he was worth losing a 2nd round draft pick. So we’ve signed Chris Young,”-insert bad Sandy Alderson joke along the lines of you knew he could pitch, but I’m here to tell you he’s a heck of an OF’er too-and then he announces the signing of the one-time can’t miss Diamondback prospect, Chris Young. Alderson wraps up with some combination of how Young is “younger” than the other FA outfielders and has a great upside because almost five years ago he was a decent up and coming player.

Is this a nightmare about to be played out? Sadly, I think yes. Maybe the names will be changed but the Wilpon’s are hiding the plain and simple fact that most of the money removed from payroll will go to pay off the debts. Why do I say this? Because despite the fact that MLB just inked a deal which will be a more than a 100-percent increase in annual rights fees to MLB over the current arrangement the Mets are still stuck fast to the $90 million dollar payroll idea, like some tired and drowning swimmer grasping a buoy in the middle of Atlantic.

The Mets are still hamstrung by the Madoff massacre. Need proof, read this article from yesterday, TV cash could lead to massive MLB contracts-except in Flushing it seems. There has been no mention or indication of how this historic TV-deal provides more cashflow for the Mets to be players for top FA’s. Instead they’re playing by outdated rules in a game that has passed them by-the Mets dressed up as paupers at the dinner table. A large portion of the money coming off the books, the TV-deal money, and the dollars, cents and plastic spent at Citi Field for tickets, merch., etc…is not being re-invested on the field. It is going to into the vaults of the banks and financial institutions, into the balance sheets of creditors, into the wallets of those the Wilpon’s owe for their involvement with Madoff.

Meanwhile, as this happens, the Mets team remains running in place as their competition laps the field flush with the influx of the new record-breaking television deal.

It’s time to give up the ghost, Sell the damn team, Fred. Enough is enough.