We will definitely need a Loney power boost.

Loney for Dodgers team captain for 2009.

We should all pass out C's to the the bestest person ever.

2
Ray Durham will be our team captain next year by veteraness.

Loney is the #5 1st baseman under 25:

http://www.projectprospect.com/article/2008/11/24/top-10-first-basemen-under-25

A look at the numbers would suggest that baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees and Mets are good candidates. So are the NFL's Indianapolis Colts and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and the NHL's Pittsburgh Penguins and New York Rangers.

Why these teams? All are at or near the top of their respective leagues in ticket-price increases over the past three years. Combine that with each city's 2009 economic prognosis for unemployment and income, and it's tough to see current ticket prices being sustained much longer. The Dodgers, for example, have jacked up the average cost of a game 44 percent since 2005, to $229 for a family of four, according to Team Marketing Report's Fan Cost Index. Meanwhile, Moody's Economy.com projects unemployment in the L.A. metro area will increase by two percentage points by the end of next year, to about 10 percent.

http://sports.yahoo.com/top/news?slug=ys-forbesticketslash112008&prov=yhoo&type=lgns

No one is going to pay a lot of money to watch Jon Garland pitch. Dodgers better do something significant if they want people to pay a lot.

5
Good candidates for what...?

7 To cut ticket prices.

Is it true that the Dodgers were way behind in ticket prices for a while? In other words, before McCourt, ticket prices were near the bottom ten in MLB. Kind of unusual to see that in a major market.

Angels Tickets are ridiculously low for the kind of payroll they have. I believe they rank 19th in MLB for average ticket prices. I've even been surprised how cheaply I can get to an Angels game, were it not for the commute :)

5 - I don't think articles like that are sophisticated enough, because a number like "average ticket price" at Dodger Stadium is essentially meaningless when the range is so broad.

The question - and I'm not denying it's legit - is whether the Dodgers will continue to sell the number of seats they have available at each price level. I could see the Dodgers offering more specials next year, but I wouldn't expect they'd have to roll back prices on a widespread level.

9 - I believe when we got our season tickets in 1982, the most expensive seat at Dodger Stadium was $6.

11

I wonder who led MLB in payroll in 1982?

12 Yankees.

The first sporting event I ever went to was a baseball game. For those you old enough to remember back then you paid the same price based on level not on where the ticket was. For example you would have paid the same price for a field box ticket behind home plate as you would have for field box ticket near the foul pole. Even at 11 years old I didn't understand why that was so. Isn't it amazing that was how pricing was based? It still boggles my mind how much revenue Baseball used to leave on the table with this arcane method of pricing.

When was the last year the Yankees didn't have the highest payroll?

With the Dodgers non-pursuit of Manny and their lukewarm foot dragging on CC I have to agree with Toycannon on the probability of Frank's financial insolvency.

When he purchased the Dodgers he did it by mortgaging his parking assets along with loans from other parties. Considering the current financial climate, things may not be so rosy for Frank's finances. The Dodgers may be living from paycheck to paycheck with an eminent layoff gaining in the rear view mirror.

Foot-dragging, or the usual:

Recent free-agent signing dates:
Andruw Jones: December 12
Jeff Kent: December 15
Jason Schmidt: December 6
Nomar Garciaparra: December 19 (2005), November 20 (2006)
Rafael Furcal: December 19
Juan Pierre: November 22
Derek Lowe: January 11
Hiroki Kuroda: December 16

Boras sure was talking a lot about Manny before. Maybe the market for him is not that good.

Sweet, we can expect a Juan Pierre type of signing soon!

The Warren Commission should look into the Juan Pierre signing.

17 I said that last night, in 2007, the only major signing prior to the last day for teams to offer arbitration (December 1st, same as this year) was Torji Hunter.

Most of the signings took place after the winter meetings and after the last day to tender contracts.

Now, this doesn't mean that the Dodgers won't spend any money but unless you are going to indict every MLB team, I don't think you can single out the Dodgers for not acting right now.

Players have all the leverage until the first few contracts fall.

15 wasn't meant to be merely rhetorical, in case anyone actually knows the answer...

I would rather have CC go to the Yankees than the Angels.

17 or, re-ordered by date:
Juan Pierre: November 22
Jason Schmidt: December 6
Andruw Jones: December 12
Jeff Kent: December 15
Hiroki Kuroda: December 16
Nomar Garciaparra: December 19
Rafael Furcal: December 19
Derek Lowe: January 11

It's clearly best to wait until Dec 16th!

I also think McCourt needs to hoard some cash and be careful, but that doesn't mean there won't be at least 1 big FA signing. There really haven't been any big singings yet by any team...

17 Furcal signed on December 4, 2005.

25 - Hmm, I wonder why I typed the other.

B-R said 12/19.

The obvious answer is to move the winter meetings to July.

27 I just did a press clipping search.

15 Per USA Today - 1998

Baltimore had a payroll of $70.4M, the Yankees were second with a $63.1M payroll

http://content.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/salaries/totalpayroll.aspx?year=1998

And this link will give the payrolls from 1988-2008.

2:56pm: I exchanged emails with Yancen Pujols, sports editor at the El Caribe newspaper. He reminded me that the author of their article, Rafael Fellito Ortiz, quoted Furcal himself regarding offers from the A's and Mets. So the unanswered question here is why Furcal said these things.

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/

29
Thanks. The Yankees were all the way down at 8th in payroll in 1991.

27 From the Dodger Official Release Archive -

12/7/2005 Dodgers sign Furcal to three-year contract

The Los Angeles Dodgers announced today that the club has signed All-Star shortstop Rafael Furcal to a three-year contract through 2008, according to Dodger General Manager Ned Colletti.

So will the Yankees or the Red Sox ever have a under $110 million payroll again?

33 I think the better question is, why should they with the revenue streams that they have in place?

34 Because there's no reason to pay a mediocre player $10 million when you have up and comer players who can work for the league minimum? Basically is what I'm asking if Hughes and Kennedy are ever going to get a chance with the Yankees, or they'll just sign Burnett, and C.C. instead.

30 Gee, should I believe the player or the agent? Agents are so trustworthy and all.

35 I'd rather have CC and Hughes instead of just Hughes. In all but the most bizarre situations, the six and seven starters are going to get tons of starts. Viable major league starters you can stash in the minors are incredibly valuable.

I can still vividly remember the SI cover with all the baseball players and their salaries. And, thanks to the SI vault, you can too! From April 1987:

http://tinyurl.com/5t89sc

BTW, Mike Felder made $75,000 playing for the Brewers in 1987.

35

Not that I'm saying C.C. is mediocre. Burnett, I have no idea how good he is as a player.

35 You can do both. You can never have enough pitching (as the Yankees discovered when Kennedy, Wang and Hughes either got hurt or were ineffective last year).

38 Of course that was also known as the "collusion period." All of that led to the 1994 strike. 14 years later, revenue and payrolls are up, up, up, and new ballparks have been going up at high pace.

According to that SI article, Eddie Murray (woohoo!) was the highest paid player in 1987, earning $2.46m. The rookie minimum was $62,500.

The Dodgers had the highest payroll in 1987. The SI article only lists average salaries, and the Dodgers were at $580,250, which is about $14.5m total payroll (25-man roster).

31

I wish I was following baseball closely then. The World Series looked awesome.

And why was Kal Daniels pulling in over 2 million?

44
Kal Daniels was awesome...

Wait for it...

....when healthy.

Ah, Kalvoski.

I tend to be traditional when it comes to Dodger Caps but MLB has a licensing deal with this company to make a lot of different style caps.

http://tinyurl.com/5hcxbe

48
I tend to leave those caps for the Turtles of the world to wear. I choose not to crucify MLB for this, however, in the spirit of Thanksgiving.

I attended this late-season game at Candlestick in 1990, where Kal Daniels hit his 27th HR of the season, then later ran into a wall in left and had to leave the game. I remember hearing that he collapsed a lung. There was only one week left in the season, so it was his last game of 1990.

http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1990/B09280SFN1990.htm

That 1990 team could really mash. Murray also hit a HR that night.

48
Everyone is going to want the pink strawberry hats.

16
This is interesting to me.

*At present it is very difficult for companies to secure financing.

*So those companies that have relied on short term loans as a method to maintain their cash flow are all now experiencing signifigant problems.

*Companies that do not need loans in order to maintain their cash flow merely need to sell enough goods/services to cover their fixed and operating costs to weather this storm.

So the point that is interesting to me is which MLB franchises fit each model?

We Know that McCourt needs to service his debt obligations and that his collateral (real estate holdings) for the loans that he has already taken on may be experienceing a decrease in value.

The Yankees and the Red Sox have their TV Networks that produce cash for them.

Where do the remainder of the teams fit into this model and how may this influence a team's spending behavior?

Seems like we might be able to predict some behavior with this info.

45
In looking back maybe I should never give my opinion. I was giddy over Eric Davis and Kal Daniels as Dodgers. Evidently jealous over everything from the Big Red machine. Now that was a rivalry, this Giant stuff is tiny compared to the Dodger/Reds of 69-whenever they moved to the Central. Battles baby, battles.

Daniels really was an awesome hitter (now someone will probably look up stats that I was too lazy to look up and prove me wrong). I remember watching him for few years in Cincinnati and being quite happy when he became a Dodger. Seems like he also hit well for the Dodgers when healthy. Whatever happened to him? Did he ever play for another team or did he have serious enough injuries to end his career?

http://www.baseball-reference.com/d/danieka01.shtml

Kal Daniels last played in the majors in 1992.

He was 28.

53 Going to Cincinnati as a kid to see the Dodgers play was quite an experience. I clearly remember climbing near the top of the upper deck in Riverfront to our seats and that was in the outfield. By the time the Reds left Riverfront (Cinergy), the upper deck was entirely vacant for most games.

52
Final payment for season ticket renewals are due in early January but they will only be getting about 25% because most people already paid for them with the credit from the postseason package. So he better not have blown the cash infusion from Sept when everyone bought the post season package and basically paid for their 2009 tickets, cause he doesn't have much cash coming in for 2009 that they don't already have until they start selling single game tickets.

53
I liked Kal Daniels a lot. When we got Eric Davis, I was ecstatic. We headed into 1992 loaded, with the Triple Threat OF of Davis/Butler/Strawberry, and Kal Daniels moved to 1B. I was ready to push the 1-hit wonder Braves aside for the real NL West power.

Man that was such a letdown.

54

You are not mistaken. He was an excellent hitter. Too many injuries killed his career.

7 seasons: .285/.382/.479 138 OPS+

I just saw Plaschke's daughter on TV. She is actually cute. Good thing she did not get her father's looks.

She does go to Notre Dame though.

Kal Daniels is younger than Jamie Moyer.

54
Injuries, before then you remember correctly. He was the complete package, power, average, plate discipline, and speed. Had 3 seasons with an OPS+ over 140 by the age of 24. To bad he had the knees of a 50 year old by the age of 25.

60
(Heads explodes with rage)
(Checks to see if he can convert to Judaism online.)

58
Yup, 1992 may have been one of the biggest letdowns ever. All about timing, a year later we had Piazza but all those guys were done who we thought were in their prime.

Six knee surgeries by the time he was 25. I guess that tends to shorten a career.

60
When did Notre Dame allow girls? Or was I mistaken in thinking it was a balls only school at one point?

63 You do remember that at least one of Simers' daughters went to Notre Dame also.

Or was I mistaken in thinking it was a balls only school at one point?

Awesome, TC, just awesome.

66
Haven't you seen Rudy? :)

66
He used to scare me to death. The Reds were a strange team in that I hated the team but greatly admired the players that we did battle with. Except Rose, I hated Rose after Fosse.

66 Per Wikipedia

Co-educational institution

Notre Dame continued to grow over the years adding more colleges, programs, and even sports teams. By 1921, with the addition of the College of Commerce, Notre Dame had grown from a small college to a university with five colleges and a professional law school.
The university continued to expand and add new residence halls and buildings with each subsequent president until 1972. At that time, then-president Father Theodore Hesburgh made the decision to admit women into the university.

Two of the male residence halls were converted for the newly admitted female students that first year, while two others were converted for the next school year.

The first female student, a transfer from St. Mary's College, graduated in 1972 with a bachelor's degree in marketing.

70 I was the opposite. I hated them all except Rose. My dad wouldn't let me hate Rose, because he worked so hard. He said Rose should be my role model. That's one of two things I specifically remember my dad repeating to me about baseball that he was wrong about. The other is that Drysdale's scoreless innings record would never be broken.

Six knee surgeries by the time he was 25.

Someone should look into this. I don't buy it. ;)

Imagine a world where everyone's role model is Pete Rose...

69
No, I couldn't have cared less about some talentless yodel working harder then everyone else so he could play on a college football team as though that was some big deal. Good for him but it ain't movie material. It is not like he was Arnold trying to save the world from the Predator or something.

So I have a vague recollection of watching a ND game with someone years ago and they only had boy cheerleaders and I was told it was because no girls were allowed. That is my memory.

74
I bet you Supercuts would not be happy.

74
I'll give you 10,000-to-1 odds that never happens.

71
Ha

63
Maybe she's on pain-killers...

75
I hate Notre Dame with the fire of a thousand suns, but Rudy is a good movie.

76
Your joke was way better than mine!

http://www.baseball-reference.com/r/rosepe01.shtml

Kinda interesting that Pete Rose's only had one year in 1969 with a post .500 slugging. I wonder how a player like Rose would be treated today. My guess is that he would be given a shorter leash and a shorter career, due to his lack of speed, power and only playing hte corner spots.

74 That wouldn't be fair to Art Schlicter.

Rudy came to my middle school. He clearly gave up on working out as soon as he was done with Notre Dame.

My highlight oh his speech was when he asked if people knew who Sean Astin was and first people yelled, "Goonies!!" Followed by one student yelling, "Encino Man!!!"

82 I think a career 118 OPS+ for a guy, over 24 seasons, who played 1B, 2B, 3B, LF, CF, and RF would still be considered pretty valuable.

Baseball Intellect has their number 6 to 15 Dodger prospect rankings up, having already done 1 to 5 a while ago. If you want to check that out.

82 One difference is the ballparks. Back then, the NL had ballparks built for speed and range, Three Rivers, Riverfront, Busch, Veteran's, Olympic Stadium, Astrodome, Old Jack Murphy Park (high wall), and Candlestick. Dodger Stadium was still a pitcher's park. Probably the easiest places to hit was Fulton County (Atlanat) and Wrigley if the wind was blowing out.

80
I have no hatred of ND.

Movies loosely based on reality usually bug me but along that vein I surprisingly liked the "Bank Job". The idea that a guy who was hung would still have his file locked until 2050 really makes you wonder what it was he knew.

84 I went to school with one of his brothers (Sean's). Back then, his name would conjure up the Addams Family.

89
McKenzie?

Looks like the rain is finally coming.
(SFW: Doppler Radar)
http://tinyurl.com/2rfg6t
vr, Xei

90 Nope.

Mackenzie.

Even more impressive for me about Rose was that all those hits were earned. Not to many nubbies between the catcher and pitcher for him. He was an extra base machine and managed a much higher then average OB due to his high batting average. Remember he came up as a 2nd baseman and played over 600 games there. He didn't play any 1st until he was 37 years old. His ability to hit would still be welcome.

That stinks to be a not famous sibling, like being Stephen Baldwin.

Checking Rose's career stats, I notice at age 44 he had an OPS+ of 99 in 405 at bats. That seems decent for a 44 year old. Can someone with searching skills run a list of players 44 and older with 400+ at bats with an OPS+ above 99? That has to be an extremely short list.

86
I read the list earlier today. It was interesting, little surprised at how high he has Kyle Russel.

95
A friend of mine lives in Santa Monica next door to one of the lesser Baldwins, possibly Stephen. Can't remember.

96
Julio Franco is the only player since integration to have an OPS+ higher then Rose at that age.

Name OPS+ PlateApp Year Age
Julio Franco 107 265 2005 46
Julio Franco 111 361 2004 45
Pete Rose 99 500 1985 44
Julio Franco 113 223 2003 44
Carl Yastrzemsi 106 437 1983 43
Pete Rose 99 421 1984 43
Tony Perez 138 207 1985 43
Carlton Fisk 97 501 1991 43
Julio Franco 94 383 2002 43
Rickey Hendersn 92 222 2002 43
Luke Appling 124 619 1949 42
Stan Musial 101 379 1963 42
Hank Aaron 102 308 1976 42
Carl Yastrzemsi 110 523 1982 42
Carlton Fisk 134 521 1990 42
Dave Winfield 91 328 1994 42
Rickey Hendersn 95 465 2001 42
Andres Galarraa 118 293 2003 42

Julio Franco is an amazing story.

100. Did you have to have a BB-Ref subscription to get that data? Or did you mine it elsewhere?
vr, Xei

94
Would have loved Rose had he been a Dodger.
As Rose was rounding third you could see it was coming.
Wonder what the outcome would have been had he run into Scioscia instead? Scioscia absorbed some heavy hits.
Wonder if Rose would have played it the same with Scoioscia receiving the ball?

Another Catcher has his shoulder shattered the same way during this time. Was it Jerry Grote of the Mets? Didn't he come and back up for the Dodgers before hang'in 'em up?

I need one more vote to close out my Prospect number Twelve. Could someone make it happen. I wanted 50.
http://www.truebluela.com/2008/11/20/666730/prospect-number-twelve-40

102
BB-Ref
It is a pain because they don't allow you to select using age, but you can sort using age. So you have to create an descending sort by age of just about every player who ever played the game whose only criteria is that they posted an OPS+ > 90.

105. On the far left side you can filter by age. Select something like 40 for the minimum and >=46 for the max.
vr, Xei

NPUT

105
Age is one of the selectable criteria on the left side of the batting season finder page.

In defense of Rose's hit on Fosse, he didn't know he was going to seriously injure the guy. I kind of admire a guy willing to play just as hard in an exhibition game as he would play in game 7 of the World Series. In hindsight it looked like a stupid move, but if Fosse had just dropped the ball and got up uninjured, I think it's a good play on Rose's part. Whatever you think of Rose, he made a long successful career out of playing harder than those with his same skill level.