Greed is Good
I got my first contributor. I went to the Pistons debacle on Friday with Vayacondios and we talked about J.D. Drew. I asked him if he wanted to write about it and luckily for us he agreed. As you can see, he had a lot to say:
J.D. Drew: Life Lessons for the New Millenium
By Vayacondios
Last week I was making dinner for myself. I had some frozen taquitos in the oven, a piece of bread in the toaster oven, and a chicken breast on my Foreman Grill. All of a sudden, the oven, toaster oven, and grill stopped working, along with my television. Since my food was already done, and I have another TV, I simply took my food out and watched TV in the other room. Dealing with the core issue was not an option for me – I simply wanted the problem to go away without me having to do anything. Since I’m sitting here 5 days later without my Foreman Grill, this might have served as a lesson about how no problem goes away without you taking action. However, given the saga of J.D. Drew that has played out this week, I’m still holding out hope that inaction equals happiness.
The short recap: Armed with the ability to opt out of the last 3 years of a contract slated to pay him $11 million per season, and aided by Scott Boras, Drew exercised his contractual option and decided to leave town. Never has a single action produced such contradictory reactions.
Reaction #1: Yippee! Let’s be honest – no one who is a Dodger fan thought giving the injury-riddled outfielder a 5 year, $55 million deal was a remotely good idea at the time the contract was signed. Typically, people whose career high in RBIs do not exceed 100 don’t get money like that. Everyone emphasized how J.D. was a “5 Tool Player”. That seems hard to fathom. Drew stole exactly 3 bases as a Dodger. In 2006, one of his best seasons, he hit a home run every 24.7 at bats for a whopping total of 20. A partial list of players who hit more than that includes players you’ve never heard of such as David Ross and Lyle Overbay and others you’d die before giving out $11 million to at this stage of their careers such as Mike Cameron and Moises Alou. Of course, none of those guys are All-Stars like Drew has been. Actually, check that. Cameron and Alou have been All-Stars. Drew? Not so much.
It’s not that Drew’s a bad player, simply that when you have a team that has won 1 playoff game in the last 18 years (such as the Dodgers) with a payroll over $100 million (such as the Dodgers), it’s probably time to try looking for something different. Drew’s a nice player, but can you envision him being the piece that helps put anyone over the top, or the centerpiece of a winning team? Anyone who says yes is either lying or delusional. Drew is probably not part of the problem, but he’s also not part of the solution, and maybe that’s even more damning. The Dodgers didn’t get too far with him, and neither did any other team he’s been on. The Cardinals have been to the Word Series twice since he left. The Braves made the playoffs the year after he left. This is not to suggest that he was somehow a cancer holding those teams back, merely that losing Drew didn’t seem to make much of a difference one way or another.
Therefore, Dodger fans should be thanking their lucky stars that he is gone. This is an opportunity to use the newly freed $11 million, put in a couple of more dollars, and get a true difference maker into the line up. It’s the equivalent of upgrading from the solid but limited Saturn to the do-it-all Lexus for less than you thought it would cost. All this at a point when you were positive you couldn’t even afford a Lexus. Yippee, indeed.
Reaction #2: Wow, what a disloyal jerk. The spin is that after publicly stating for months that he would stay, JuDas immediately put his finger in the wind, tested the market and decided to leave. The weird part about this is that there was never a reason for Drew to announce that he was staying at all. The state of the free agent market is precisely what everyone thought it to be. It seems odd that Scott Boras needed to wait until the end of the season to figure out that this was not a fantastic year for free agents, and realize that Drew might get more money than he was presently making. One assumes Boras should have had a decent handle on the free agent market long before the season ended. In light of that, when asked about his contract situation, Drew could have simply given the old “I’m not thinking about my contract or the offseason at all right now. My focus is on getting this team to the playoffs, and what happens will happen”. Everyone would have been fine with that, so why even say you want to stay at all? It seems a tad disingenuous.
[Side note – I’m not going to challenge the assumption that Drew may get more money on the free agent market, but there’s one thing to consider. NO team overpays and overbids like the Dodgers do. If you don’t believe me, ask Darren Dreifort, Kevin Brown and Rafael Furcal. The point is, without a dummy like the Dodgers in the market overbidding and pushing the price for Drew up, Boras may not be able to get what he thinks he can for his client. On the other hand, Boras’ other clients should all see extra money since the Dodgers will now undoubtedly be out there overbidding for every mediocre free agent they can.]
I’m troubled, though, that I’m judging Drew harshly for this. What did he do wrong? He bargained for this right in the contract, and simply availed himself of the same in a timely manner. That’s called business. It’s strange that fans knock the disloyalty of athletes and how they’ll go anywhere for an extra dollar, while ignoring that (a) they’d do the same thing and (b) their teams of choice do the same thing. First case in point: The Dodgers blew out Eric Gagne’s arm by pitching him way too much in 2004 and recently declined to exercise his $12 million option. No one said a word about it, although one could argue the Dodgers totally mishandled him and really owe him a heck of a lot.
Second case in point: Recently, the Lakers message boards lit up with the news that the Lakers might want to sign Jalen Rose. When some posters pointed out that the Lakers might be loathe to do so since it would require extra money to buy out Aaron McKie and his $2.5 million contract, others (many, many others) seemed to take the myopic position that McKie should accept a buyout of well south of the agreed upon price, since he hadn’t played or produced much as a Laker. Huh? Since when do people give up valuable rights because they feel a little guilty about their good fortune? This should be like one of the Donald-isms from the “Apprentice” – “RIGHTS ARE VALUABLE. DON’T THROW THEM AWAY. MY HAIR IS REAL.” Please! Like any of these people likely at work using company time and resources to post to a Lakers message board will go to their boss at the end of the day and give her back $1 because they took time off to post their lame views on the internet. They wouldn’t, and neither should McKie. Note that the Lakers once actually waived Brian Shaw after he produced 3 championships because they didn’t want to pay him something like $1 million. I was aghast at the time, and really thought the Lakers screwed it up. Luckily, Shaw and his people are smarter than me, since they didn’t seem to hold a grudge either way. Logical people are fun.
Fans are either stupid, or myopic, or both. There’s no loyalty here, nor should there be. Drew clearly decided that the mix of making $11 million and living in Los Angeles would not make him as happy as $13 million and living in some other city. That’s all that happened here. It wasn’t disloyalty by Drew, any more than if the option had been in the Dodgers favor and they declined to exercise it. I’d love to ascribe something more sinister to all this, but I simply cannot.
So, it’s time to sum up what we’ve learned from all of this:
1. Losing J.D. Drew is not the end of the world. In fact, it’s likely for the best.
2. Drew didn’t do anything wrong by leaving.
3. Problems sometimes go away without you having to do anything.
4. Fans are crazy.
5. The electrical wiring in my house has serious problems.
All in all, a good week. Now to close my eyes and hope my oven fixes itself. Hey, given that it can clean itself, is it too much to ask that it also take care of itself?
J.D. Drew: Life Lessons for the New Millenium
By Vayacondios
Last week I was making dinner for myself. I had some frozen taquitos in the oven, a piece of bread in the toaster oven, and a chicken breast on my Foreman Grill. All of a sudden, the oven, toaster oven, and grill stopped working, along with my television. Since my food was already done, and I have another TV, I simply took my food out and watched TV in the other room. Dealing with the core issue was not an option for me – I simply wanted the problem to go away without me having to do anything. Since I’m sitting here 5 days later without my Foreman Grill, this might have served as a lesson about how no problem goes away without you taking action. However, given the saga of J.D. Drew that has played out this week, I’m still holding out hope that inaction equals happiness.
The short recap: Armed with the ability to opt out of the last 3 years of a contract slated to pay him $11 million per season, and aided by Scott Boras, Drew exercised his contractual option and decided to leave town. Never has a single action produced such contradictory reactions.
Reaction #1: Yippee! Let’s be honest – no one who is a Dodger fan thought giving the injury-riddled outfielder a 5 year, $55 million deal was a remotely good idea at the time the contract was signed. Typically, people whose career high in RBIs do not exceed 100 don’t get money like that. Everyone emphasized how J.D. was a “5 Tool Player”. That seems hard to fathom. Drew stole exactly 3 bases as a Dodger. In 2006, one of his best seasons, he hit a home run every 24.7 at bats for a whopping total of 20. A partial list of players who hit more than that includes players you’ve never heard of such as David Ross and Lyle Overbay and others you’d die before giving out $11 million to at this stage of their careers such as Mike Cameron and Moises Alou. Of course, none of those guys are All-Stars like Drew has been. Actually, check that. Cameron and Alou have been All-Stars. Drew? Not so much.
It’s not that Drew’s a bad player, simply that when you have a team that has won 1 playoff game in the last 18 years (such as the Dodgers) with a payroll over $100 million (such as the Dodgers), it’s probably time to try looking for something different. Drew’s a nice player, but can you envision him being the piece that helps put anyone over the top, or the centerpiece of a winning team? Anyone who says yes is either lying or delusional. Drew is probably not part of the problem, but he’s also not part of the solution, and maybe that’s even more damning. The Dodgers didn’t get too far with him, and neither did any other team he’s been on. The Cardinals have been to the Word Series twice since he left. The Braves made the playoffs the year after he left. This is not to suggest that he was somehow a cancer holding those teams back, merely that losing Drew didn’t seem to make much of a difference one way or another.
Therefore, Dodger fans should be thanking their lucky stars that he is gone. This is an opportunity to use the newly freed $11 million, put in a couple of more dollars, and get a true difference maker into the line up. It’s the equivalent of upgrading from the solid but limited Saturn to the do-it-all Lexus for less than you thought it would cost. All this at a point when you were positive you couldn’t even afford a Lexus. Yippee, indeed.
Reaction #2: Wow, what a disloyal jerk. The spin is that after publicly stating for months that he would stay, JuDas immediately put his finger in the wind, tested the market and decided to leave. The weird part about this is that there was never a reason for Drew to announce that he was staying at all. The state of the free agent market is precisely what everyone thought it to be. It seems odd that Scott Boras needed to wait until the end of the season to figure out that this was not a fantastic year for free agents, and realize that Drew might get more money than he was presently making. One assumes Boras should have had a decent handle on the free agent market long before the season ended. In light of that, when asked about his contract situation, Drew could have simply given the old “I’m not thinking about my contract or the offseason at all right now. My focus is on getting this team to the playoffs, and what happens will happen”. Everyone would have been fine with that, so why even say you want to stay at all? It seems a tad disingenuous.
[Side note – I’m not going to challenge the assumption that Drew may get more money on the free agent market, but there’s one thing to consider. NO team overpays and overbids like the Dodgers do. If you don’t believe me, ask Darren Dreifort, Kevin Brown and Rafael Furcal. The point is, without a dummy like the Dodgers in the market overbidding and pushing the price for Drew up, Boras may not be able to get what he thinks he can for his client. On the other hand, Boras’ other clients should all see extra money since the Dodgers will now undoubtedly be out there overbidding for every mediocre free agent they can.]
I’m troubled, though, that I’m judging Drew harshly for this. What did he do wrong? He bargained for this right in the contract, and simply availed himself of the same in a timely manner. That’s called business. It’s strange that fans knock the disloyalty of athletes and how they’ll go anywhere for an extra dollar, while ignoring that (a) they’d do the same thing and (b) their teams of choice do the same thing. First case in point: The Dodgers blew out Eric Gagne’s arm by pitching him way too much in 2004 and recently declined to exercise his $12 million option. No one said a word about it, although one could argue the Dodgers totally mishandled him and really owe him a heck of a lot.
Second case in point: Recently, the Lakers message boards lit up with the news that the Lakers might want to sign Jalen Rose. When some posters pointed out that the Lakers might be loathe to do so since it would require extra money to buy out Aaron McKie and his $2.5 million contract, others (many, many others) seemed to take the myopic position that McKie should accept a buyout of well south of the agreed upon price, since he hadn’t played or produced much as a Laker. Huh? Since when do people give up valuable rights because they feel a little guilty about their good fortune? This should be like one of the Donald-isms from the “Apprentice” – “RIGHTS ARE VALUABLE. DON’T THROW THEM AWAY. MY HAIR IS REAL.” Please! Like any of these people likely at work using company time and resources to post to a Lakers message board will go to their boss at the end of the day and give her back $1 because they took time off to post their lame views on the internet. They wouldn’t, and neither should McKie. Note that the Lakers once actually waived Brian Shaw after he produced 3 championships because they didn’t want to pay him something like $1 million. I was aghast at the time, and really thought the Lakers screwed it up. Luckily, Shaw and his people are smarter than me, since they didn’t seem to hold a grudge either way. Logical people are fun.
Fans are either stupid, or myopic, or both. There’s no loyalty here, nor should there be. Drew clearly decided that the mix of making $11 million and living in Los Angeles would not make him as happy as $13 million and living in some other city. That’s all that happened here. It wasn’t disloyalty by Drew, any more than if the option had been in the Dodgers favor and they declined to exercise it. I’d love to ascribe something more sinister to all this, but I simply cannot.
So, it’s time to sum up what we’ve learned from all of this:
1. Losing J.D. Drew is not the end of the world. In fact, it’s likely for the best.
2. Drew didn’t do anything wrong by leaving.
3. Problems sometimes go away without you having to do anything.
4. Fans are crazy.
5. The electrical wiring in my house has serious problems.
All in all, a good week. Now to close my eyes and hope my oven fixes itself. Hey, given that it can clean itself, is it too much to ask that it also take care of itself?
posted by The Pocho at 10:38 AM
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