Dodgers cheat Diamondbacks

after suckering the Dbacks into paying Garlands' salary for this year AND his buyout, the player they are sending the Dbacks is going to cost them much more than they thought.

5 months ago rxmeister 6 comments 0 recs |

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First, let me say that I can’t believe that the Dbacks agreed to pay up to $3.5M to get rid of Garland’s contract and pick up Abreu. It’s just another shocking example of how much Sabean got snookered by the Pirates in the F. Sanchez trade. The Pirates were certainly as desperate to get Freddy’s remaining ~ $3.5M contract and buyout off their books as the Dbacks were with Garland, but Sabes got not 1 penny out of them even when he had the upper hand. He could have used the $1-2M he could have gotten from the Pirates to allow him to get a guy like Jermaine Dye or Jim Thome off the waiver wire at the end of August to bolster our offense for the stretch drive. Or, if he had wanted to go in a different direction, Billy Wagner would have been awesome to have in the pen as a setup man – we had priority over the BoSox on him. What a maroon Sabean is!

As for the Fodgers-Dbacks deal, I see 2 flaws in the logic that weren’t fully explained or researched by the reporter:

1. I believe that Abreu played some games in the minors during the 47 days between July 18 and Sept. 3 of 2007. That undrcuts his argument that he was injured and should receive all 47 days of major league service time back. It seems to me that, at best, he would only get credited back the amount of time between when he was sent down and when he played his first game in the minors that year.

2. All the Dbacks have to do to ensure that he doesn’t reach Super 2 status, and start his arb years early, is to send him to the minors to play for at least 30 days some time next year. That shold be no problem if the Dbacks aren’t in contention next year (as they almost assuredly won’t be due to Webb’s injury and their lack of pitching). If they are in contention, and Abreu his a key cog, then they should be happy to pay the extra $$$ in arb to Abreu and keep him in AZ all year. They should make up the money in increased attendance alone if they are in a pennant race.

"There ain’t much to being a ballplayer, if you’re a ballplayer." - Honus Wagner

by Fla-Giant on Sep 6, 2009 7:43 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs

“That should be no problem if the Dbacks aren’t in contention next year (as they almost assuredly won’t be due to Webb’s injury and their lack of pitching)”
The Dbacks were favored by many to win the NL West this season. You really want them to concede 2010 while we’re still in 2009? I’ll bet even the Nationals aren’t conceding 2010 yet. They want Abreu to be their starting second baseman from day one, and don’t you also think it’s going to create bad feelings between Abreu and his new team if they start him in the minors next year to ensure that he makes less money? FInally, I think the Dbacks expect Webb to be healthy next year and wouldn’t agree with your diagnosis at this point.

proud father of Edgar (Grandslam) Renteria

by rxmeister on Sep 6, 2009 8:19 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

this just in, nationals concede 2010 season

by HOLDEMUPwuzzBANNED on Sep 7, 2009 1:58 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

You're putting words in my mouth

1. You’re the one that jumped to the conclusion that I implied the Dbacks would have to start Abreu in the minors next year. I clearly stated that they would only have to send him down at some point:

send him to the minors to play for at least 30 days some time next year.

I also clearly stated that they would be able to see if they were a legit contending team before they made the decision. If the Dbacks are in playoff contention, then they should be happy to pay Abreu the ~ $5M extra he’ll receive by being a Super 2. If not, then they should do what other teams have done (Brewers with JJ Hardy & O’s with Weiters) and manage their roster to avoid early arb status.

2. You also didn’t address my point that getting back the entire 47 days from July 18 to Sept. 2 in 2007 seems like a stretch. Abreu must have played some games in Las Vegas during that stretch, because he played for the Fodgers immediately upon being recalled on the 3rd. He also played for 3 weeks in LA in Sept. before finally shutting things down on Sept. 23 and having surgey in the Fall of 2007. How do you make the argument that you were so injured that you couldn’t play, when you actually played for more than 3 weeks with said injury?

3. Either the Dbacks just want to whine, and the reporter did no fact-checking on his own, or the reporter just pulled the main theme of the story out of his butt. I’m guessing it’s the 1st option, and he’s just another lazy reporter. To buy the storyline that Abreu’s grievance was a closely-held secret is just naive. I did a 5 second search on “Tony Abreu grievance” and came up with dozens of articles and posts on this grievance going all the way back to August of 2007! I’ll share 2 with you now, and it’s not like they’re some obscure sources that the Dbacks couldn’t easily check – these come from MLB.com and the LA Times.

First we have an article from Oct. 2007 clearly stating that the union had filed a grievance for Abreu against the Fodgers.
http://dodgers.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20071003&content_id=2248100&vkey=news_la&fext=.jsp&c_id=la

Secondly, we have an article from March 2008 in the Times clearly stating that:

The Dodgers didn’t put Abreu on the major league disabled list, which led to the union’s filing a grievance on his behalf.

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/mar/28/sports/sp-dodrep28
Now I know the Dbacks are cutting back on costs, but to do no research on Abreu’s contract is really amateur hour.

4. If the Dbacks expect Webb to be healthy and to significantly contribute next year then they’re dumber than Sabean. He won’t even start to throw until October at the earliest. He hasn’t been able to pitch for 99% of this season, so even if everything goes perfrctly he’ll need to be babied early in the season just to get his arm strength and endurance back to where he can pitch as much as 5 innings every 5th day. Whenever you have a shoulder surgery, all bets are off.

Best-case scenario for Webb is that he is able to pitch out of the pen for the first few months of the season and then get back into the rotation for about 12 starts at the end of the year. Most likely scenario is that he starts the year in extended ST camp, then transfers to the minors sometime around May/June to slowly build his stamina and arm strength in a guarded environment, and then is strong and fresh enough to come up around the end of August and give them 6 or 7 starts down the stretch. Worst-case scenario is that he continues to have pain and problems with the shoulder and has to have more surgery and never pitches for the big league club at all.

I know that the Dbacks are unsure about what they will do, since they have already reported they will wait until close to the deadline (10 days after the end of the WS) to decide whether or not to pick up his 2010 option.

"There ain’t much to being a ballplayer, if you’re a ballplayer." - Honus Wagner

by Fla-Giant on Sep 7, 2009 9:35 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs