We had a big discussion about it today. If Pujols made no attempt to resign an extension before this round, I would call him greedy. He offered 5/125 and was scoffed at. When the market proves that was a deal, you don't catch a break afterwards. There's no "do-over". You look stupid for scoffing, and you pay the price. I don't mind people saying AP is now too expensive, but I get a little testy when they dump it on Pujols lap for being greedy. He's not being greedy. Dewitt gambled with him, lost, gambled again, dumped a buttload of ins money on Holliday which concreted the need to sign Pujols, and then farted around to the point where Pujols is fucking pissed, and wants every dime. No discount on money or years, pay me, or I'm leaving, and you're not going to be able to trade me. So the Cardinals are left with draft picks for the greatest hitter in the game as their only consolation for a series of terrible mistakes. This situation is not cool, so if "Joe-casual-fan" walks in and says, "whoa 10 years is crazy, no way!" I can happily agree. It's 10 years because of Cardinals mismanagement and bungling of epic proportions. As a Cardinal fan you're faced with Albert costing a WORLD of cash, or letting him walk. Sure call him greedy, let him walk, and say he's being unreasonable. In my mind he should be on year 3 of a 5/125, and the Cardinal management have negotiated themselves so far off the fucking table here they need to be impeached... In my opinion this is not forgivable. I don't care how many World Series rings the Cardinals get post-Pujols. In my opinion they will be the group that pushed the greatest baseball player ever off my favorite team.

I will not spend a penny on the Cardinals until Pujols has a contract extension with the Cardinals. That may turn into "never", and so be it, and good riddance. The next time you get the opportunity to have an Albert Pujols, don't ass-fuck him on an extension, and alienate your fans.

So back to the question, should the Cardinals pony up 30 million for 10 years? I think they would be stupid to do so, but it would keep me as a fan. At this point, I don't see that as a possibility. Dewitt was balking at much lower sums, and I don't see him swallowing his pride, and putting a deal like that on the table. He made this bed, and he's gotta lie in it. The situation is already beyond saving.

Pujols leaving will start a cascade of things, I'm going to predict right now.
1) The 2011 Cardinals will rally as a team behind Pujols in a contract year, and this will be one of the greatest years the team has ever had.
2) Tony LaRussa will not stay past 2011.
3) Dave Duncan will not stay without Tony. This is what will seriously hurt. Far more than losing LaRussa, Duncan is a master and far above any other pitching coach in the game.
4) St. Louis will struggle to find an identity, despite spending money, and will tailspin back to the ranks of non-contention.
5) "The Curse of Prince Albert" will last for a very long time. I may not be alive to see it end.

alz wrote:

We had a big discussion about it today. If Pujols made no attempt to resign an extension before this round, I would call him greedy. He offered 5/125 and was scoffed at. When the market proves that was a deal, you don't catch a break afterwards. There's no "do-over". You look stupid for scoffing, and you pay the price. I don't mind people saying AP is now too expensive, but I get a little testy when they dump it on Pujols lap for being greedy. He's not being greedy. Dewitt gambled with him, lost, gambled again, dumped a buttload of ins money on Holliday which concreted the need to sign Pujols, and then farted around to the point where Pujols is fucking pissed, and wants every dime. No discount on money or years, pay me, or I'm leaving, and you're not going to be able to trade me. So the Cardinals are left with draft picks for the greatest hitter in the game as their only consolation for a series of terrible mistakes. This situation is not cool, so if "Joe-casual-fan" walks in and says, "whoa 10 years is crazy, no way!" I can happily agree. It's 10 years because of Cardinals mismanagement and bungling of epic proportions. As a Cardinal fan you're faced with Albert costing a WORLD of cash, or letting him walk. Sure call him greedy, let him walk, and say he's being unreasonable. In my mind he should be on year 3 of a 5/125, and the Cardinal management have negotiated themselves so far off the fucking table here they need to be impeached... In my opinion this is not forgivable. I don't care how many World Series rings the Cardinals get post-Pujols. In my opinion they will be the group that pushed the greatest baseball player ever off my favorite team.

I will not spend a penny on the Cardinals until Pujols has a contract extension with the Cardinals. That may turn into "never", and so be it, and good riddance. The next time you get the opportunity to have an Albert Pujols, don't ass-fuck him on an extension, and alienate your fans.

So back to the question, should the Cardinals pony up 30 million for 10 years? I think they would be stupid to do so, but it would keep me as a fan. At this point, I don't see that as a possibility. Dewitt was balking at much lower sums, and I don't see him swallowing his pride, and putting a deal like that on the table. He made this bed, and he's gotta lie in it. The situation is already beyond saving.

Pujols leaving will start a cascade of things, I'm going to predict right now.
1) The 2011 Cardinals will rally as a team behind Pujols in a contract year, and this will be one of the greatest years the team has ever had.
2) Tony LaRussa will not stay past 2011.
3) Dave Duncan will not stay without Tony. This is what will seriously hurt. Far more than losing LaRussa, Duncan is a master and far above any other pitching coach in the game.
4) St. Louis will struggle to find an identity, despite spending money, and will tailspin back to the ranks of non-contention.
5) "The Curse of Prince Albert" will last for a very long time. I may not be alive to see it end.

Well said.  5 stars.

My only point of disagreement is that this is not beyond saving.  At this point it is almost certain that Pujols will reach free agency and that is what both sides want.  DeWitt is gambling that $300 million contracts will not be forthcoming, or even anything close.  Pujols is gambling that he will not get injured, suffer a downturn in his stats, AND that those offers will be forthcoming (if anyone has big . . . nerves, it is Pujols).  Once those gambles play out, the Cards and Pujols will talk again and there is still a chance that they find enough common ground for a new contract. 

I especially agree that Pujols is not doing this out of greed, but out of pride, for having been dicked around by DeWitt after Pujols was nothing but princely in his behavior on and off the field.

[btw: who be we?]

Last edited by Max (2/17/2011 4:00 pm)

Max wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

Max wrote:

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bryan-burwell/article_83b51d6e-1dc7-5b30-b665-6e01f19a74e3.html

OK.  And???

You called him a hack.  I thought it was a nice piece, definitely not hack journalism:

"In journalism, the term is used to describe a writer who is deemed to operate as a "mercenary" or "pen for hire", expressing their client's political opinions in pamphlets or newspaper articles. So-called "hack writers" are usually paid by the number of words in their book or article; as a result, hack writing has a reputation for quantity taking precedence over quality."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hack_writer

That description pretty much sums up my opinion of Burwell.  Very little substance.

Last edited by forsberg_us (2/17/2011 4:28 pm)

forsberg_us wrote:

I would agree with Max

Yo DO care, after all! 

"And according to Joe Strauss, DeWitt apparently offered Pujols an equity stake in the ballclub."

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/article_1026eb40-3ab3-11e0-b3f5-00127992bc8b.html

If true, it could throw a bit of a monkey wrench in the theory that the team tried to low-ball him (depending on the size/value of the interest).  I would also agree with Miklasz that it shows the team is trying to be a little creative without completely blowing out the payroll.

Last edited by forsberg_us (2/17/2011 6:26 pm)

forsberg_us wrote:

I would agree with Max, and to be clear I do not consider him greedy.  I believe that Pujols is entitled to ask for every penny he can and I believe Dewitt is entitled to try to sign Pujols as cheaply as he can.  But I don't think it's unsalvageable, and I don't think Pujols is nearly as emotional about this as some people want to believe.  Pujols is smart enough to understand the business component of this and I believe he is more than capable from separating business from personal.  I also agree that both side want (and perhaps need) to see this thing reach free agency.  It's beneficial to Pujols to know what options are truly out there, and Dewitt probably needs to see what the market really commands. 

Alz, I would agree with you that if Pujols leaves this likely TLR's last season.  I seem to remember Duncan pushed pretty hard for a 2 or 3 year deal and I would expect him to honor that, but leave when it expires.  I disagree about the death-spiral you seem to be predicting.  One of the ironies of the situation is that if they don't resign Pujols, they probably bring back Carpenter, and I would have a difficult time predicting that a team with Wainwright, Carpenter, Garcia and Westbrook, along with about $20M to spend can't compete.

That and the flip side is if they resign Pujols they have to find someone in the system to replace Carp or dumpster dive.  The rotation could be pretty weak.  Say Loshe keeps sucking and Garcia cant be expected to be as good as he was last year.  Without Carp the Cardinals lose the one/two punch that make there rotation really good.  Then again Carp might not be usefull in two years either.

APRTW wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

"And according to Joe Strauss, DeWitt apparently offered Pujols an equity stake in the ballclub."

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/article_1026eb40-3ab3-11e0-b3f5-00127992bc8b.html

If true, it could throw a bit of a monkey wrench in the theory that the team tried to low-ball him (depending on the size/value of the interest).  I would also agree with Miklasz that it shows the team is trying to be a little creative without completely blowing out the payroll.

Yeah that is impressive to me if true.  If Pujols really wants to be a Cardinal for life that would do it.  He would always have a strong tie to the club.

We really have no idea what's what.  I said I tend to trust Strauss to be more accurate and more complete than, say, ESPN, but even so, what does an equity stake mean?  How MUCH equity?  And how will equity be determined since the books are private?  I was recently offered an 8% profit sharing deal, is that good or bad?  How will they calculate profit?  Even with an exact figure, 8%, there's no way to know if it's a good deal or a bad deal without a lot more info.  What we know is that Pujols turned it down.  I don't infer that he is cheap or a liar, I infer that the deal wasn't good enough.

Max wrote:

APRTW wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

"And according to Joe Strauss, DeWitt apparently offered Pujols an equity stake in the ballclub."

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/article_1026eb40-3ab3-11e0-b3f5-00127992bc8b.html

If true, it could throw a bit of a monkey wrench in the theory that the team tried to low-ball him (depending on the size/value of the interest).  I would also agree with Miklasz that it shows the team is trying to be a little creative without completely blowing out the payroll.

Yeah that is impressive to me if true.  If Pujols really wants to be a Cardinal for life that would do it.  He would always have a strong tie to the club.

We really have no idea what's what.  I said I tend to trust Strauss to be more accurate and more complete than, say, ESPN, but even so, what does an equity stake mean?  How MUCH equity?  And how will equity be determined since the books are private?  I was recently offered an 8% profit sharing deal, is that good or bad?  How will they calculate profit?  Even with an exact figure, 8%, there's no way to know if it's a good deal or a bad deal without a lot more info.  What we know is that Pujols turned it down.  I don't infer that he is cheap or a liar, I infer that the deal wasn't good enough.

You crack me up Max.  About 9 pages back you were insisting that the Cardinals needed to do something "splashy."  Now we find out that the Cardinals offered to make Pujols the first player in the modern era to own a portion (albeit undoubtedly a small portion) of a team, and it appears that the Cardinals went so far as to approach the league about what they needed to do to do it correctly, and you find a way to be critical of the effort.

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/article_0a8e4e27-15b7-5fef-88d6-424dc6967453.html

I don't think I ever said Pujols was being greedy.  All I said was that if the report was true, which it appears to be, then the reports that Dewitt had low-balled Pujols (plenty of which are being reported) may not be entirely true if based on solely on speculated monetary amounts.

You were the one who suggested that the Cardinals needed to be "splashy."  Well, it appears they tried that.  At the very least, I think they deserve a little credit for being willing to explore an area into which no other player contract has ventured.

forsberg_us wrote:

I would have a difficult time predicting that a team with Wainwright, Carpenter, Garcia and Westbrook, along with about $20M to spend can't compete.

That's easy Fors. Take the current team, take out Pujols and LaRussa. Then add Jason Werth, then tell me how that team competes?

=)

forsberg_us wrote:

I don't think I ever said Pujols was being greedy.  All I said was that if the report was true, which it appears to be, then the reports that Dewitt had low-balled Pujols (plenty of which are being reported) may not be entirely true if based on solely on speculated monetary amounts.

You were the one who suggested that the Cardinals needed to be "splashy."  Well, it appears they tried that.  At the very least, I think they deserve a little credit for being willing to explore an area into which no other player contract has ventured.

If true, that is splashy and they deserve credit for being creative.

That Pujols turned it down implies to me that the cut offered was too small to make him want to sign. As I mentioned, I was offered a contract that had little up front money, but with 8% profit sharing.  But unless I understand what revenue streams will generate profit, then I could be getting 8% of nothing and basically exchanging earning power for the right to attach a fancy "co-owner" label to my resume.

Max wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

alz wrote:

That's easy Fors. Take the current team, take out Pujols and LaRussa. Then add Jason Werth, then tell me how that team competes?

=)

By outpitching other teams.  The exact same formula that the 2010 World Champion SF Giants used with a lineup that was much less intimidating than the one you just mentioned.

Pardon me, Fors, but that is a ridiculous argument even for you.   (grin)

They had that rotation last year and they lost ground in the divisional race with it.  So your argument is that Jayson Werth for Pujols and La Russa would make us better???

No, but the lost ground argument is based on small sample size.  They stunk for roughly 2 1/2 weeks after the Cincinnati series, losing 9 games in the standings.  I don't consider that 2 1/2 week period representative of how the team would perform over the course of 162 games.  However, if you want to dwell on those 17 games, I would point out that the Cardinals were 4-13 with Pujols in the lineup.  Maybe he was the problem  (lol) (lol) (lol)

But, in all seriousness, Alz's argument presumes I'm spending that extra $20M on Jason Werth, which I'm not to begin with.

Last edited by forsberg_us (2/18/2011 4:23 pm)