Mack’s Morning Report – 8-14 – Jay Bruce, Fig on Jay

Good morning.

Jay Bruce –

            I’m just going to try and help you, and I, make more sense out of this deal                  last week.

Sandy Alderson convinced the Wilpons to let him go all in by raising the 2017 salary above the $150mil/yr. total 

We thought we would never see  a level like this again. 

Staying on money issued, Alderson participated in a spending spree in this past International bonus baby day, which included dishing out $2.5mil to two top prospects, more than they ever have done before.

More money for now… more money for later.

For reasons not worth discussing again, it didn’t work. All the money spent on players like Neil Walker, Astrubel Cabrera, Yoenes Cespedes, David Wright, Curtis Granderson, and Juan Lagares didn’t give the all-star pitching staff the kind of bats needed to win the pennant. 

Oh, they hit, but the one thing no one expected happen. The pitching went south.

The dream was over. Alderson was not going to get his World Series and he had to return to doing the one thing General Managers are first paid to do… stop spending excess money to either eliminate debt or increase profit. That’s their job.

I have no idea if Alderson is coming back next season, but I’m sure he wouldn’t be invited back if he didn’t follow The Board of Directors desire to build a winning organization while, at the same time, operation within the confines of the budget approved.

Thus, the salary dump that is going on now.

Look, I know no one is happy at the return in the Bruce deal. Ryder Ryan is a 30th round pick with a 4.79 ERA in the minors. But, he’s a converted outfielder that hardly threw a pitch in school. Teach this kid how to control his 95+ fastball and you have an arm that has very little wear and tear on it.

And let’s remember that only two teams were interested in an August trade for Bruce… Cleveland and the Yankees, which was on Bruce’s no trade list.

No, this was a good deal for Alderson and the Mets. They got rid of the entire salary, made room for Juan Lagares to return to the 25-man, and get a chance to  play Brandon Nimmo more for the remainder of the year. 

Was it a good deal for the fan base? Definitely not. I don’t expect those of you that only follow the parent team to ever hear from Ryan again, but the team gets immediately younger, the draft picks will be done high up the calling order, and the decent prospects in the pipeline will have room to move up come spring.

Yes, it’s sad, but I was taught early on when I became a ‘workout’ General Manager given the task to create a resale of a radio property that had failed to meet its obligations to the bank… you have to stop losing money before you start making any.

I took over two radio stations that were operating at over one million dollars over their budget. They had defaulted on their payments to GE Capital and I was hired to clean it up. I asked the business manager to give be a copy of the monthly profit and loss statements for the past year and took them to my hotel room. Previous management was spending twice what that should be spending while, at the same time, the stations had ratings lower than Megyn Kelly.

This was an easy one.  I fired 22 native Texans and replaced them with five people that had worked for me in the past that weren’t afraid of doing double duty. Overnight, the stations were at the breakeven point.

What did the city of Austin think? Well, the media community actually threw a party for the fired employees (no, I wasn’t invited) and had my face on dart boards throughout the bar.

But… my bosses in Connecticut loved my ass. We sold the stations to Clear Channel Broadcasting (first stations they ever bought) and I got out of Dodge with my end of contract bonus.

I expect a similar exit for Sandy in the off-season. 


Fig on Jay -

Nelson Figueroa/SNY had this spin on the Bruce trade, in particular, and the Hot Stove season, in general - 

Over two years, the Mets got the equivalent of a full season from Bruce: 574-AB, .245-BA, 37-HR, 94-RBIs... for Dilson Herrera.

Cleveland gave up a power arm who hasn't pitched much and upside OK... plus five million dollars for 1.5 months of Bruce.

$5mil nearly pays for Conforto, deGrom and Syndergaard this year.

A qualifying offer is now a 3rd round pick who, if they ever make it, is 5-7 years away.

Three trades, five power arms, mostly relievers that hasn't proven much in their past organization and nearly $10 million dollars to use next year on three guys that could have signed elsewhere next season.