alz wrote:

Max, 198/9 is not a lowball offer when you're the only one on the field. That's basically a "you can wait until FA and grab every dime, or we can give you 22 million a year now" deal. The benefit for the Cardinals is getting Pujols off the market before other clubs offer him what we can't give him. Benefit to Pujols is he doesn't wait another year to get paid, doesn't risk any career killing injury ending his salary, etc.

I'm not excusing DeWitt for Pujols leaving, clearly he had a hand in this, and next time we have an iconic player, I hope he doesn't dick around. However, Pujols is a grown man who has made well over 100 million here, and should have been the icon that he's been broadcasting himself as. You can't portray yourself as the knight in shining armor, and then stick it to your faithful fans while you "go get yours". Seriously, go get yours, but don't feed me that bullshit about you caring about more than money. You clearly don't.

"If the Cardinals were serious about having a limit to what they were willing to spend on retaining Pujols, they should have put it on the table instead of dragging this out. They should have told Lozano something along these lines: Look, we're sorry, but this is the best we can do given our economic models; we'd like to go higher but we can't.
Instead, the Cardinals' incremental approach to these negotiations — five-year offers, seven-year offers, nine-year offers, 10-year offers — merely fed Pujols' considerable paranoia. But this team was also trying to perform a tricky balancing act. Other than hand over a blank contract and telling Lozano to fill it in, I'm not sure what could have been done.
In the end the team's offer of 10 years, $210 million was fair. It was enough to keep Pujols here if he truly wanted to stay here. But Pujols obviously didn't feel like giving the Cardinals another discount after his agent signed him for short money in a seven-year (plus an option) Cardinals' contract in 2004."


Read more: http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/bernie-poor-albert-had-no-choice/article_6baf3c37-03d7-59ef-9d98-e93cfd81a9e9.html#ixzz1gMnbKrTs

artie_fufkin wrote:

And one last thing before I either move on or become completely obsessed. If Pujols signs that 10-year deal with the Cardinals, his legacy is secure. He's allowed to finish his career gracefully, he retires with numbers exceeded by no other player in the history of the franchise and, as was pointed out earlier, lives out the rest of his life as the Cardinals' most iconic figure.
What happens in Anaheim when he's 41-years-old and still hanging on? Will AngelFan be as forgiving, knowing that he's accounting for $25 million of their payroll?
Either way, he was going to earn more money than he could ever spend in his life. The price tag of Pujols' integrity was $34 million.

No, it was stickin' it to the man, and saying, "take this job and shove it."  And I hope he never forgets that it was DeWitt that made this unworkable.

This is really very simple, and Fors laid it out already, and I agree completely.  Passed success could be attributed to Jocketty, or La Russa, or Pujols.  Now it's completely DeWitt's team, and success or failure gets hung on his shoulders.  OK.

But . . . where else in sports do we value a megalomanical owner like that??? This is like Jerry Jones on steroids, basically chasing his franchise player away to feed his own childish and egotistical need to prove that he can do it all by himself.

tkihshbt wrote:

First, the Cardinals did not have the lowest offer. Florida's exaggerated offer of $275M was completely untrue.

Um, care to share with us the evidence upon which you make this assertion?

tkihshbt wrote:

St. Louis offered Pujols a 9 year/$198 million offer, which was one year and $3 million less than what he got from the Angels.

Uh, again, what I read is that it was one year and $56 million less than the Angels offered, so your it would be helpful if you backed up your assertion with some explanation.

tkihshbt wrote:

That was a completely fair offer from a mid-market team that has maxed out what it can make in revenue.

tkihshbt wrote:

And stop saying they lowballed him, Max. A $210 million offer over 10 years is not a lowball.

Read the argument carefully, the lowball offer was the $198/9, which the Cards themselves outbid!  That's called a lowball offer.  LOL!

"And stop saying . . . " are you now pretending you can order what I am to do and not do?

"1) why wasn't the offer made in November?"

Obviously I don't know the reason, but why does it make a difference, other than Pujols' self-imposed deadline?  It was made at least 8 months before he became a free agent.  Why didn't Pujols make a counter-offer?

"2) why did they ultimately up their offer, after first reducing, to $210/10?"

The term increase is contextual.  It's more money, but less AAV.  It sounds to me like the Cardinals had several variations, ranging from 5/130 ($26M/season) to 10/210 ($21M per season).

Having said that, why would they open with their best offer?  Pujols clearly didn't.

Max wrote:

tkihshbt wrote:

First, the Cardinals did not have the lowest offer. Florida's exaggerated offer of $275M was completely untrue.

Um, care to share with us the evidence upon which you make this assertion?

Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald.

clarkspencer clarkspencer
#marlins final offer to albert pujols was $201 million, NOT $275 mm

Uh, again, what I read is that it was one year and $56 million less than the Angels offered, so your it would be helpful if you backed up your assertion with some explanation.

9/198 is one year and $3 million less in AAV than what he received from the Angels.

Read the argument carefully, the lowball offer was the $198/9, which the Cards themselves outbid!  That's called a lowball offer.  LOL!

Their final offer of $210 million over 10 years was less in AAV. 9/$198 million is $22 million per year in AAV.

"And stop saying . . . " are you now pretending you can order what I am to do and not do?

When something is factually inaccurate, such as the Cardinals lowballed Pujols, you should probably stop saying it.

alz wrote:

Max wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

"I think the rumor mill has settled on $198/9 for the offer"

If it was about committment and not money, doesn't a 9 year deal worth almost $200M that continues until he's 40 years old demonstrate their committment to keeping him a "Cardinal for life?"


"it was a lowball offer"

Can you actually make a lowball offer to someone who doesn't care about the money?

These are fair points.  My response is to ask two questions:

1) why wasn't the offer made in November?
2) why did they ultimately up their offer, after first reducing, to $210/10?

To get the best price they could, as much as ego's take it to be offensive, if you're buying anything, you haggle....

When you're buying a blanket, yes.  When you're buying a person's services, no.

When you are buying the services of a person who has a service that no one else in the world offers, you're demeanor is of uncontested deference . . . unless you don't really want the service.  That's what I think about DeWitt.  he didn't want Jocketty's service, if he could find a reason to ditch it.  He didn't want La Russa's either, if he could find a pain-free way to ditch, but the clever La Russa never gave him the chance.  He didn't really want Pujols's services, not on Pujols's terms, which would have required DeWitt to treat him with deference.

Last edited by Max (12/12/2011 8:26 pm)

forsberg_us wrote:

Max, the more I read this, I think we're falling off on the definition of "low ball."  When I think "low ball," I think a ridiculously low offer that is outside of the realm of reasonable.  For example, if they had offered 10/$150, that would be "low ball."

As I read what you are writing, you seem to be saying it's "low ball" because they were willing to increase it (although decreasing the AAV).  If that's the definition you're using, so be it, but I don't think that's a conventional use of the term.

I've got a "Christmas cookie exchange party" that I must run off to.  I have prepped myself with two glasses of wine.  It's possible that I am being duplicitous about my use of the term "lowball".  I'll drink it over and get back to you.

APRTW wrote:

artie_fufkin wrote:

I don't understand. Are you suggesting Bernie is the one who has been disrespectful, or he's compiled a list of people who have been disrespectful to LeBron? It's not Bernie's job, nor is it DeWitt's job, as Bernie says, to wash LeBron's feet.

Max likes Burwell because the rest of the board does not.  Therefor Bernie is wrong.

remind me again what it means when someone writes in all lower case.

"When you are buying the services of a person who has a service that no one else in the world offers, you're demeanor is of uncontested deference . . . unless you don't really want the service.  That's what I think about DeWitt.  he didn't want Jocketty's service, if he could find a reason to ditch it.  He didn't want La Russa's either, if he could find a pain-free way to ditch, but the clever La Russa never gave him the chance.  He didn't really want Pujols's services, not on Pujols's terms, which would have required DeWitt to treat him with deference."

Max, do you really think DeWitt thinks that little of Pujols? At the end of the day, the difference in your opinion and my opinion comes down to whether an offer to be paid $20 million a year for the next 10 years for in a city where he was revered and for a team that would compete for championships, which was the player's stated primary goal, is unworthy of his consideration, and - incredibly - and insult. I submit that there are only a handful of people on the planet who would think so.

"Because there was no longer sufficient time?"

Pujols' camp had 8 months or more to make a counter proposal to the 9/198. Why didn't they?


"Why they would open with their best offer is for the very reason that Windy noted, anyone on this board would say "take this job and shove it" if we had the ability to dictate contract terms AND had a boss whom we found to be disrespectful."

It's called a negotiation. It involves back and forth. Now you're saying Dewitt should have told Pujols "here's our best offer take it or leave it."  You'd have blown a gasket had they done that.


"Not sure about the "Pujols clearly didn't." Don't know what you mean."

Lozano wanted 10/300. They ended up taking less. Why should Dewitt offer his top dollar if Pujols wouldn't offer his bottom line?

Last edited by forsberg_us (12/12/2011 11:05 pm)

"I recall a menu of options for Holliday, and protracted negotiations.  My wine-addled brain does not recall the same for Pujols.  Was the 10-year, $210 M, option on the table before the season?"

There were no negotiations for 8 months at Pujols' insistance.  Pujols jumped on the Angels offer within 48 hours or less.

As far as a menu of options, we've heard about the following offers

5 years/130 ($26M AAV)
9 years/198 ($22M AAV)
10 years/210 ($21M AAV)

I thought I read there was a 7 year offer that came after the 5 year offer, but I won't swear to that.  But looking at the numbers, and applying the complex logic my 8 year old calls "finding the pattern," we can suspect the Cardinals would have agreed to any of the following:

6 years/150 ($25M/AAV)
7 years/168 ($24M/AAV)
8 years/184 ($23m/AAV)

artie_fufkin wrote:

APRTW wrote:

artie_fufkin wrote:

I don't understand. Are you suggesting Bernie is the one who has been disrespectful, or he's compiled a list of people who have been disrespectful to LeBron? It's not Bernie's job, nor is it DeWitt's job, as Bernie says, to wash LeBron's feet.

Max likes Burwell because the rest of the board does not.  Therefor Bernie is wrong.

I don't read Burwell for anything but the Cardinals, but I don't reflexively have a problem with him. He seems to be a contrarian, which is fine. Different points of view, like Max's.

For what it's worth, my views are dead center, or too conservative, in my circles, with my most unusual opinion being that I give a shit about baseball.  So, the idea that I'm contrarian is humorous to me.  If there's anything unusual about me, it's that I'm an odd sock in baseball fandom, particularly Cardinal Nation.