YFSF

Take a Hike, Redux

Lest we be charged with being a partisan hack, we thought it important to offer the Boston version of Phil Mushnick's cost-comparison.

For the same cost of sitting in the cushiest spot at Fenway, one could catch a Greyhound bus to Cleveland, sit in the Diamond Box at the Jake , and have a meal at Beard Prize nominee Michael Symon's Lola. No hotel, though, you need to get right back on the bus to Beantown.

Take a Hike

Kottke points us to some math, via Phil Mushnick.

Bottom line: it's cheaper to fly to Seattle, rent a car, watch the Yanks lose at Safeco, enjoy some tasty Pacific Northwest grub, and live the high life in a four star hotel than to go to a game at YS2.5.  Click through either link for the math.

Identity Theft?

  

Last week Topps sued Upper Deck for supposedly stealing designs from the 1970s for their current crop of cards.  Wax Heaven has some images of the UD set, we've used a shot of their Ichiro card, the nerdish Roger Nelson is representing for the 1975 Topps set. You be the judge.

In the world of architecture, derivative works are very hard to litigate, even the slightest change to a design inoculates the derivative from charges of plagiarism. In another hot-button case going on right now, the AP is famously embroiled with Shepard Fairey over his (fair?) use of one of their Obama images. This Topps suit will be interesting to watch, though if the same standards regarding derivations are applied to these cards that are used in architecture it would seem that Topps has little to no case, even as the similarities are pretty obvious.

Overpriced

Numbers

Hal Steinbrenner spoke about costs at the new Yankee Stadium today, ESPN has the story here.  Some interesting data is contained in the article:

• Average ticket cost at Yankee Stadium rose 76% over 2008, from $41.40 to $72.97, no doubt skewed by the crazy prices for the Legends Suites.
• Second place for average ticket price is Fenway, at $50.24.  Prices at the Fens rose 0.3%. 
• Major League average: $26.64, up 5 percent. 
• Premium seats at Yankee Stadium average $510 (1st), at Fenway they average $162 (5th).
• The TMR "fan index" (measures cost of a game for four tix - 2 child, 2 adult, plus refreshments and souvenirs) is $411 at YS, $326.45 at Fenway.  Ouch.  Soxkid Isaac is most definitely getting A-ball in Coney Island for his first ever game, we're excited to say.
• Cheapest seats at Yankee Stadium are 5 bucks, and bonus! They come with a free wall.

Oh, That Manny

Maybe the Dodgers will eventually sign Manny Ramirez on his terms (whatever those are). Maybe the Giants or some other team will swoop in and sign him. But it's hard to imagine Ramirez receiving any more than the $45 million, two-year deal he rejected this week, and if that's all he gets, consider this:

Assuming Ramirez were to exercise the 2010 player option for $20 million (I think he will because anyone who thinks the teams will be in any position to pay players more money next offseason is kidding themselves), he will have received a whopping $5 million more than he would have gotten if he had simply stayed in Boston and put up his big numbers (thereby assuring that the Red Sox would have picked up their two options on him). 

Except he changed agents, and Boras now gets a commission for whatever deal Ramirez accepts. Everything I've read assumes Boras gets a 5 percent commission (though no one actually quotes Boras or a player saying this). Five percent of $45 million is $2.25 million -- leaving Ramirez a net profit of less than $3 million over staying in Boston. If Boras' commission is 10 percent, Manny would have agitated his way off the Red Sox for all of $500,000.

No wonder Ramirez is holding out for more money -- no matter how slim his actual chances of getting it are.

Working-Class Heroes?

I liked it better when our millionaire baseball players could pay their bills. Ken Rosenthal shares the following bit of news about two Yankee outfielders:

Johnny Damon, earning $13 million this season, cannot pay his bills. Xavier Nady, earning $6.55 million, cannot purchase an apartment in New York.

The Stanford Financial Group scandal extends to Major League Baseball.

The issues facing Damon and Nady — both New York Yankees outfielders and both clients of agent Scott Boras — stem from the alleged $8 billion fraud scheme involving billionaire financier Robert Allen Stanford.

Damon, 35, and Nady, 30, told FOXSports.com on Friday morning that their finances are frozen because of money they have with a Stanford company.

"I can't pay bills right now," Damon said at the Yankees' spring training facility in Tampa. "That started on Tuesday. I had to pay a trainer for working out during the offseason. I told him, 'Just hold on for a little bit and hopefully all this stuff gets resolved.'"

Nady faces similar concerns.

"I'm affected in some ways. I have the same (advisor) as Johnny," Nady said. "He said I didn't have money with Stanford (investments). But all my credit card accounts are frozen right now because of that situation. I'm trying to get an apartment in New York. I can't put a credit card down to hold it."

I'm no economist, and all this talk about financial collapse is confusing to me, but maybe this is an indicator of sorts, even more telling than the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Is that the sky falling?

Take Your Seats

We have a follow-up on our post earlier this year about frustration over the prices of seats at the new Yankee Stadium.  As we detailed in that missive, our decades-long season ticket holder friend was asked to make a substantial, decade-long multi-million dollar commitment to seats costing, for 2009, more than triple what he paid in 2008 in the old stadium.  He refused to re-up at that time and decided to wait out the situation since the numbers being bandied about were preposterous.  His patience has saved him a great deal of money. 

Late in 2008 he was able to re-up with the Yankees, albeit one section back from the rails, at 2008 prices ($220 a seat) and with no long-term commitment.  Not an insignificant indicator of where the economy stands at the moment, he is also able to pay in four installments as opposed to an up-front payment of more than $200K.  Our question about how the state of the economy has affected, and will affect, baseball teams remains to an extent unanswered, though we have an inkling this season ticket purchase is an indicator of some difficulties to come.  And, these difficulties will likely be endured all across the league.

Monetary Policy

Baseball attendance from 2000-2008, according to the site "Ballparks of Baseball":

• 2000: 72.7M
• 2001: 72.6M
• 2002: 67.8M
• 2003: 67.6M
• 2004: 72.9M
• 2005: 74.4M
• 2006: 76.0M
• 2007: 79.4M
• 2008: 78.6M

Does anyone else wonder how the economic meltdown is going to impact 2009 attendance numbers?  I certainly do.  As a business owner I know about cutbacks in staff and reductions in general operational costs, how it is trickling down from the overall world to me and then to my employees, how it impacts disposable income and spending habits.  A big question, which all baseball owners must be considering, is how much and for how long this might impact their game, financially speaking.  Based on the magnitude of the financial problems facing our country, growing unemployment, and other factors, I don't see how this won't have a substantial impact on next season and perhaps 2010.  Though baseball (and major sport) is certainly an escape and a form of entertainment that has an ability to distract us from reality, it isn't immune from a contraction in spending.  Going to a baseball game, at this point, is certainly a luxury, even when sitting in the cheapies.

I further wonder how this might be impacting free-agent signings -- not just the big name free agents but moreso the upper-middle, middle, and lower tier players. 

Thoughts welcome in the comments of course.

Sox Sign Tazawa

It's official, the Sox have signed Junichi Tazawa to a major-league contract.  The deal, worth $3M, places Tazawa on the 40 man roster.  This is the route the Sox took when signing Craig Hansen, for historical reference.

A few representative signing bonuses (ML status could not be determined, but typically most players, even first rounders, do not get Major League contracts) that were meted out to middle/low first round pitching draft picks in the 2007 and 2008 amateur drafts, used for comparison.  Tazawa has been compared to a draftee at this general position.

    2007:

• Blake Beavan, RHP, Texas Rangers, pick 17/30, $1.5M bonus
• Nick Schmidt, LHP, San Diego Padres, pick 23/30, $1.26M bonus
• Rick Porcello, RHP, Detroit Tigers, pick 27/30, $3.58M bonus
• Andrew Brackman, RHP, New York Yankees, pick 30/30, $3.3M bonus.

Porcello and Brackman are outliers, to an extent, high first rounders who dropped on salary expectations. 

    2008:

• Andrew Cashner, RHP, Chicago Cubs, pick 19/30, $1.53M bonus
• Christian Friedrich, LHP, Colorado Rockies, pick 25/30, $1.35M bonus
• Daniel Schlereth, LHP, Arizona Diamondbacks, pick 26/30, $1.33M bonus
• Gerrit Cole, RHP, New York Yankees, pick 28/30, unsigned.  Cole somewhat famously rejected the Yankees.  Rumor had it that Cole was looking for $3M as a bonus but "family sources" insisted he was going to choose UCLA no matter the dollars offered.

Cole was another guy who slipped down due to puported salary demands.