For one is making such statement, why don’t you address the specific questions and points that I just raised with actually counterpoints instead of sidestepping the issues.

Those points being what Sandy said in December of 2010::

1) Does the following imply either 1) a tough period of two to three years ahead or 2) specifically referring to limited payroll spending pertaining to 2011?

“So, the problem is not that we don’t have resources, the problem is that we have limited additional resources to spend this year. So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years.”

2) Does this imply that the situation he was facing that day was going to force him to make him operate on a small, very tight budget?

” I wasn’t hired to apply a Moneyball approach to the New York Mets. I would not have accepted the position were I required to run the Mets on a shoestring budget.

3) Does this then infer that he had no money or recognized that he would not have the flexibility he wanted in order to spend what he felt was proper?

On the other hand, I did come in with my eyes wide open. I did recognize that there would be some payroll restrictions this year, keeping in mind that when everything’s said and done our payroll will probably be somewhere between 130 and 140 million dollars. We’ll probably be in the top four or five in all of baseball.

3) Does this infer that he did not have the resources but rather that he was going to be limited in what he could do regarding the use of additional resources in 2011 due to specific payroll obligations THIS YEAR that he would not be subjected to in 2012 and 2013?

“So, the problem is not that we don’t have resources, the problem is that we have limited additional resources to spend this year. So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years. But we do have to get through a somewhat difficult period from a standpoint of our payroll because we already have most of it committed.”

4) Now for your opinion – was Sandy telling the truth during that conference call with bloggers in late 2010 or was he lying?

A) If he was telling the truth, then did the Mets financial woes come under his command?

B) If he was telling the truth, then that also means he didn’t anticipate about additional suits being filed against the Wilpons interfering with his operations after that first suit was reported on July 30, 2010 – three months prior to his taking on the role of general manager

http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/07/30/us-madoff-wilpon-idUSTRE66T56U20100730

5) Was it not true that official records – not inuendo – showed that five teams with small attendance figures and in some being in small markets still made profits and also did not use the money obtained through revenue sharing to re- invest in the team roster?

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=5492093

6) And when Sandy Alderson was quoted as saying he was only an observer and could not offer an opinion about what was wrong with Ike Davis is it not true that Rusty Staub was then quoted as saying he had no idea what was wrong with Ike Davis and could not offer an opinion either while what he said was completely the opposite and in such detail that he could not have been misconstrued? And that all he said was that he did not know what the Mets thought was wrong with their player?

Now based on what the information I provided and the points I raised, how does that show one is not in touch with reality, wants to see and hear only what one wants to and forces himself to believe things that are so far from reality it’s not worth the effort.

And in turn, who would be harder to convince than a doorknob when to make a point one did not use second hand information or make up something that wasn’t true but rather

1) used exact quotes – and the entire text and not just a few sentences – to put in perspective what was being said to the public and then

2) to prove that general managers have also been hired not to build competitive ball clubs but make money for the owners by using leaked, official financial figures from other teams to prove that was an actual reality.

If one wants to say another is coming to an incorrect conclusion based on other factual evidence, that is fine. Am waiting for that first hand evidence – not an article referring to third hand information and unsubstantiated inference – however, to prove that what was presented was just fabrication or twisted to make something appear different that it was.

I just did as you were writing back!

Bourn about to sign with Cleveland? Hope we get some inside information on just how serious the Met offer was – and if it was indeed just the draft pick that stopped them from going further.

There is no trail to show that Sandy was unaware of how bad the situation really was. And what I quoted came two months into the job. He continued saying that when spring training opened – which was four months into the job. If he was truly unaware at the time – which is speculation and not fact (remember in the past I put forward many points to speculate how much aware he could have indeed been aware of what he was getting into) – then what we have is one who decided to take the hits for his employees and in doing so then lost all credibility with what he says with the public.

That blogger conference from December, 2011 he was quite explicit about the Mets financial situation and that it wasn’t so much a matter of resources as it was being tied down by certain obligations not allowing him as much flexibility which he saw less of a problem the next year and the year after that.

And he said that with the possibility of that billion dollar lawsuit hanging over the Wilpons head.

So it is valid to question how much better the financial situation is now – even taking into account the re-financing of those loans – when in 2010 he gave such an upbeat picture on the financial status and since then the Mets have lost at least $70 million more in revenue and a year later needed that extra $40 million bridge loan so not to default on their end of the month payments.

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20111212&content_id=26153368&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

The selling of the minority shares went to paying off those two loans.

Read TJ’s post. He said it more eloquently.

Oh and CBS is reporting that Bourn is going to sign with the Indians.

I enjoy your enthusiasm but that does not excuse taking a sentence out of context.

You say: “What he promised is that we would have to go through a tough period of 2 to 3 years. ”

What he said was: ” So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years.”

Nowhere did he imply a tough period of two to three years ahead as you profess he did. He was specifically referring to limited payroll spending pertaining to 2011 – as stated on the two sentences precluding your quote which was not referred to:

“So, the problem is not that we don’t have resources, the problem is that we have limited additional resources to spend this year. So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years.”

The rest of the quote – which I posted in it’s entirety so to keep it in it’s full context – opened with him saying he would not have accepted the job if he was hired to operate on a “shoe string budget”. That was also said two months into the job, enough time to know the full extent of the financial situation – if he was unaware of it beforehand.

Again, Boomer, I know you want to see the glass half-full but at the same time please know it is quite upsetting when the exact words said by the general manager are so twisted out of context that it takes away from an otherwise enjoyable conversation. Like the issue I raised before about Sandy’s credibility (which is shown by the contradiction in statements he had since made after the above in that blogger conference call) doing so only creates doubts about the validity of what else might be being referred to down the road.

Nobody is being rushed. And until i hear/see it in print about a certain player than i stand firm that nobody is being rushed. It’s all imaginary in the minds of some fans.

Hey guys…

I see your points but have to disagree.

The bullpen, as it stands right now, has no chance to be great, little potential to be good and will probably suck. In my opinion, it is even worse than last year’s bullpen.

As far as finishing fourth four years in a row – when did the Madoff scandal hit Fred Wilpon? If you say December 2008 – you win the Kewpie doll. Oh, and that happens to be four years ago – what a coincidence. My point is that all decisions since the Madoff scandal have been geared toward preventing Fred from having to sell – not improving the club.

Not re-signing Reyes was a result of Fred wanting to hold on to the club – it was a decision that will cost the Mets the ability to compete this year and next. We really have no standout position players in the minors who are major league ready right now. Yes, we have better pitching prospects but that is a result of getting rid of Beltran’s contract and trading Dickey. How many homers and rbi did Beltran hit last year? How many wins did Dickey get? Is the club more competitive with or without Dickey, Beltran and Reyes for this season?

Just dealing with common sense here guys.

Sandy is probably doing the best he can – but the team has gotten worse for the two seasons he’s been with the club and will be worse yet this year. I also believe that he’s being disingenuous to the fans but telling us repeatedly that he’s building for the future. His job is to financially stabilize the club – not to build for the future. Of course you will get good prospects if you trade great major leaguers.

I see. So nothing at all has changed with the Wilpons’ finances since December of 2010. No billion dollar lawsuit. No deteriorating of their finances. Not a thing.

What he promised is that we would have to go through a tough period of 2 to 3 years. From your own article:

>>So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years. But we do have to get through a somewhat difficult period from a standpoint of our payroll because we already have most of it committed.”

It’s now been 2 years and 2 month since December of 2011. Its pretty weak sauce to have people come on here day after day after day after day and try to make everything about the failure of Alderson when by the quote even you published the Mets are still in their tough times.

In any case, I’m happy with the general direction of the team. I don’t like all of Alderson’s moves but I don’t like all of anyone’s moves. But for the first time in a long time we seem to have an adult in the GM’s chair who is interested in building a winning, sustainable franchise. I’ll take it for now.

Sorry, but I just provided you proof of teams making profits without spending much on roster moves – and in fact, not using the money from revenue sharing to do so, either.

I have said all the time that Alderson was here to bail out the Wilpons so it didn’t matter who was the GM – no moves were going to be made.

And most important – Sandy never said anything like his goal was not to improve the Mets immediately? He said he might not have all the financial resources in 2011 but that was it:

“So, the problem is not that we don’t have resources, the problem is that we have limited additional resources to spend this year. So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years.”

His entire quote at that December, 2010 blogger conference call:

” I wasn’t hired to apply a Moneyball approach to the New York Mets. I would not have accepted the position were I required to run the Mets on a shoestring budget. On the other hand, I did come in with my eyes wide open. I did recognize that there would be some payroll restrictions this year, keeping in mind that when everything’s said and done our payroll will probably be somewhere between 130 and 140 million dollars. We’ll probably be in the top four or five in all of baseball. So, the problem is not that we don’t have resources, the problem is that we have limited additional resources to spend this year. So, what you see today or what you’ve seen over the last two weeks shouldn’t necessarily be representative of what you see over the next two or three years. But we do have to get through a somewhat difficult period from a standpoint of our payroll because we already have most of it committed.”

- Sorry Boomer, but there goes the theory that he wasn’t promising anything for a while and that we were going to be restricted with money. From Sandy himself.

I couldn’t respond to the other comment, site wouldn’t let me so I’ll put this here.

I’m sorry but if you think that owners expecting their GMs to make the teams money or that some owners care more about money than they do players or winning is a new thing I got news for you, it ain’t ( See the Curse of the Bambino vs No No Nanette).

As I said earlier, ML baseball is as much a sports entertainment business as it is a sport. Same for every major league team. This has been true as long as there has been professional sports but it took on a whole different dimension with the advent of TV money.

It would be kind of naive to think Alderson doesn’t understand this as he has been in the game for decades including a stint in the Commissioners office. I’m sure he would love to have a $200 million budget like the GM of the Angels but he doesn’t. He doesn’t because the team can’t afford it. They can afford slightly less than half that.

Which brings me back to my original question, how would you have gone about taking the team Alderson inherited, a cut in salary from $150 to less than $100 million and build a team to win now?

Frankly, if anyone can answer that question they should send their resume to the Wilpons tout suite because I have yet to see anyone solve that particular riddle.

You are forgetting, however, that the new breed of general managers are indeed hired to run the baseball time like a business and the bottom line of business is to generate profits. Many make money without trying to produce competitive teams on the field and that has been documented.

In fact, attached is an article about the five teams in which their official financial statements were released so there can be no dispute about the validity of the figures. Note that even though they turned a profit and received revenue sharing at the same time, the money was pocketed and not used to re-invest into the team. Loria’s excuse with the Marlins was that the money was needed for the new ball park which we all know is “fishy” considering the loans he got and the tax payer money that was used.

This is not like it was decades ago when teams depended upon building up winners to make profits (between 1953 and 1971 eight losing teams had to move because they were losing money – St. Louis Browns, Philadelphia Athletics, Kansas City Athletics, Boston Braves, old Washington Senators, new Washington Senators, New York Giants (Brooklyn not included in this group) and Seattle Mariners. In the forty years since that time only only franchise has uplifted it’s roots – the Montreal Expos. Texas and Los Angeles that went bankrupt were gobbled up quickly by new owners.

It was not a bilion dollar industry like today. In 1964 CBS purchased the New York Yankees for $11.2 Million. In today’s world that comes up to $80 million. Any baseball team you know that can be purchased for that price today?

So unfortunately, it is not just a case of “The GM gets paid not just to sign players but to fill seats.” It’s the GM’s job to make money for the owners and that has been done with empty seats as well.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=5492093

I think a lot of things get twisted on blogs with the written word that probably wouldn’t in a verbal conversation. In the time I have been reading this blog I have never seen one person or one comment claiming that the moves Alderson were making would result in a better team immediately. Not one. If you can show some to me great but otherwise its just a strawman argument that too many here make with this nonsense about Sandy lovers or the Firm.

How could the moves Alderson made make the Mets better immediately? How could anyone say trading Beltran for a minor league pitcher would make the Mets a better team immediately? Same with Dickey? Letting Reyes walk? Alderson has said repeatedly that his vision is not to build a team that booms and busts as we have experienced over the years but one that is built to be competitive every single year. You do this by building a team with a strong young core focused around starting pitching. These are the pieces he has been adding.

I just don’t get the unfocused anger of some people who keep trying to make it appear that this is a black and white issue when its anything but. The Mets had to be torn down to acquire the pieces necessary to build with young talent. Now you may not agree with building with young talent for a team that has a solid core year in and year out and thats fine. But if you are in win now mode then you have to show how this team was going to accomplish that with the financial constraints that were placed on it.

Pretend you are Alderson and you inherited this team when he did including all the players and the contracts and show me how you cut the payroll to under $100 million from the $150 million it was when he took over and win now.