Kid sounds like a jerk. https://www.nj.com/yankees/2020/01/...spect-says-derek-jeter-ruined-his-career.html
And recruiting advantage. You can bet that the combination of Arena and the new training center makes the Revs much more appealing to international players.
Jiminy H. Christmas. Let's see. 2008 Drafted high enough to get a $675k signing bonus. Only played 6 games of rookie league, which means he might have stayed unsigned while threatening to enroll in college for leverage as he would've been ineligible for pro ball until the next season and the Yankees would've lost his rights. 2009 Played 75 (of 140) games in Low-A (5th division of baseball, the lowest "full season" level) 2010 At this stage must players move up are are replaced by another 18 year-old. He played only 66 games, split between his Low-A club and the even lower "short season A" club. This is likely due to either injury or lack of player progress. If it's not injury, he would likely only have been retained because the Yankees invested so much in a signing bonus that they were willing to kick the can down the road. But lack of playing time in a second full season of Low-A is not a good sign for position player. 2011 Third full season in Low-A. Again, only 64 games (less than half) played. At this point, he's roster filler and likely falling behind whoever he's competing for playing time against. It's also possible he finally started to get his shit together and was the every day player at the end as this is his high watermark at the plate. Hitting a fine .274 for the season, but without power and striking out roughly 30% of his at bats. 2012 Finally makes it to A-Advanced (or High-A) a couple years behind the progress of most players. 6BB/30SO in 24 games while hitting only .195 in 82AB. That's terrible. He's two years behind most of his work-a-day peers, and still only in the fourth division of professional baseball. He didn't earn the full-season starting position at any level he played, and his career ended with at least full-time starters, not to mention bench players, between him and Derrick Jeter - just in the Yankees organization alone. Also he blew through three quarters of a million dollars in the last decade (along with 4+ seasons of minor league salary, the first season or two possibly well above the starvation wages of his teammates due to the signing bonus he received). Yes, he's spent the last 8 years getting himself through law school, but the fact that he's broke means he probably should've studied finance instead of law. He's just looking for someone else to blame for his problems. And the other lawsuits he's filed just dig the hole deeper. With his pattern of suing any and everyone he comes across, who would interview him for a job, much less hire him?
Wow! What a piece of work! Anyway, I remember when it was a Big Deal when the players got direct deposit for their paychecks. If they happened to be away from home on payday, they didn't have any cash until they got home and physically went to the bank to deposit their paycheck. And many of these guys weren't making much ($24,000/year), so cash flow was kinda tight. Especially if they had to pay rent on the 1st of the month, but their check wasn't in the bank just yet... Simple things that most "regular people" take for granted are not always so obvious.
There's still a huge disconnect between average player salary and median. Using the data from this: https://www.thebluetestament.com/20...ague-soccer-salaries-millionaires-sporting-kc I get the average at $418k, but the median at less than half of that, a still respectable $175k That's roughly double the AAA Baseball median of roughly $80k. But to continue the earlier point NHL minimum - $700k NBA minimum - $582k MLB minimum - $564k NFL minimum - $480k MLS minimum $56k in 2018 (from MLSPA list) WNBA minimum - $42k
Also, while I'm not positive, I'm gonna go ahead and suggest that writing a cold call hail mary letter to an American League GM wherein you call him " big dawg" doesnt speak well of your common sense.
I believe the rule allows for no more than 4 charter legs per team per season: https://www.goal.com/en-us/news/exp...commercial-flights/1j774gispvk3316j51ipp0ny1y But the twist is, teams aren't required to use charter flights at all, and most teams don't use their four possible legs each year. So, if this is a CBA issue, it's not only going to be about the number of total legs allowed, but the mandate that teams actually use them. This issue, of course, disproportionately affects teams across the league. If you're the Fire, you have multiple non-stop daily commercial flights available to every other city in the league. If you're Nashville, Montreal or Columbus, not so much.
And an extreme version of what we do to child and teenager sports prodigies. Let's take another look. He was drafted out of West Forsyth High School with the 830th pick of the 2008 MLB Draft. Which put him at the 400k bonus level. Interesting that he got the Yankees more to pay more than that. 18 1/2, 6'1" 185lb shortstop, bats left, throws right. Assuming he hit well in high school, given his size, I can see why he was drafted. But looking at his Minor League record. He struck out a lot and didn't hit for power. Ah, here we go - A late 2008 scouting report. http://www2.riveraveblues.com/2008/12/prospect-profile-garrison-lassiter-6335/ In High School he committed to play at UNC. The Yankees took a flyer on him at 830, then had to pay-up from the 400k level to keep him from reporting to UNC. This is what happens when you take a teenager and treat him like the second coming of Babe Ruth/Ty Cobb/insert all-time great here. He appears to have been completely unprepared to deal with the ego-burst of no longer being the top dawg in the clubhouse. All those folks that built him up as a youth prodigy couldn't possibly be wrong, right? Good thing Danny Szetela never went to law school. Amirite?
As a mental health provider, this read like one of those cases that doesn't ever go anywhere positive.
The reality is that the players had no leverage. So I think this is what they were willing to walk out for as it is much easier to increase rights once those rights have been established in the first place. Of course the ownership group consists of a lot of really good business people. Unless he's came from outside the league and doesn't have a green card, I don't think so. I think the guy that goes is the 18 best guy who is not making all that much anyway. The players who primarily care about things like free agency and fairness are the domestic players. For most non-Caribbean foreign players, MLS is just one of hundreds of places (individual teams) they could negotiate with.
Mostly true. TAM has allowed quite a few domestic players to get big raises they would have had to leave the country to get otherwise. Not quite. Paying players already inside the league what they are worth, diverts resources that could be used to upgrade from outside The game is has more data than ever - players and management know to a very good degree what they are worth and only complete moron would believe the utter bullshit you just wrote.
@Bill Archer it’s been a long time since union guys could afford NFL tickets. Your point is probably true for the 2 strikes in the 80s. The NFL has avoided serious labor problems for a pretty long time, probably because its revenues are so high they can buy off the players. But there’s diminishing returns in that strategy; eventually the players are so rich they can afford missing a half season’s worth of paychecks. The NFL might have reached that point for their next contract, and it’s why the NBA has flourished by everyone realizing labor and management are way better off cooperating. In the context of MLS, in this labor negotiation the “center of gravity” in the players’ union is obviously still a guy who doesn’t make a whole lot of money but also lives pretty modestly. If the fat part of the bell curve is primarily players who have been penny pinching, they can hold out a pretty long time. MLS players don’t have entourages. I think Andy is mostly right in that the median player is going to focus on quality of life issues. If the owners are sensible they’ll throw enough new money the players’ way to satisfy them on that front. One last point, about expansion. Let’s talk about James Riley. He got picked in expansion drafts 3 years in a row, IIRC. Maybe it was 3 in 4. Anyway, the pay for a starter (albeit on an expansion team) is better than the pay for a backup on an incumbent team. Robust expansion is a very underrated benefit for marginal players. But it’s kind of a hidden one. I wonder how the players perceive it.
Outstanding finds. (And poor Danny; his bar exam has more to do with Iron City vs. Old Milwaukee than Habeus Corpus.) My Aunt had an old friend who grew up in baseball despite being a little girl. Her grandfather and father had both been marginal major leaguers but spent many decades managing, coaching and scouting. As a result, she knew more about baseball than anyone and several major league organizations used her to evaluate prospects. It would have shocked most of the guys on the field to learn that the matronly lady with the big floppy hat and the huge sunglasses sitting there in the stands writing in her notebook was helping decide their professional future. Anyway, she used to say that nobody outside the game understands how huge the distance is between A ball and the majors, particularly in regard to pitching. Young pitchers have young strong arms and they tend to throw flames and if you can hit them you move up a level and suddenly they see guys with movement who can change speeds and make you look ridiculous if you can't figure it out. Which few can. It's even true going from rookie ball to low A to high A. Guys who have been hitting .450 since they were 8 suddenly can't break the Mendoza line. Some figure it out, most go get a real job and now we know that at least one files a lawsuit.
The only caveat to that is that you have some players, the most notable example being Wade Boggs, who actually gets better at the plate against better pitching. Being able to not worry about pitchers getting wild, he was more dangerous. Throw in the odd Nuke Laloosh and his average drops as he has to be less focused on his hitting zone. But he's the exception. Oddly, I was like that in chess. I tie good rated players up in knots, then lose to grade schoolers because they didn't do what they were supposed to.
I think this is a totally backwards perspective on modern big four labor relations. Since the impacts of earlier victories started making rank and file players salaries jump into the seven figures (mid 90's-ish), in every single labor showdown ownership has absolutely crushed labor and enshrined massive guaranteed annual profits. The reasons being, largely, that the players live profligate lifestyles that can't handle a freeze in income and also that their careers are so short (especially in the NFL) that there's an unwillingness to sacrifice their limited years being able to earn a wage orders of magnitude higher than they'll ever get again. Perhaps different factors will start to change that calculus, but big four labor relations from, say, the '99 NBA lockout to present has been a story of a comprehensive, unqualified steamrolling by management.
Not sure your basis for opinion. What do you think players should be making if the weren't getting "steam rolled." The average salary of the 440 NBA players is over $8 million per year depending on the source. Again depending on the source, the league had $8,000 million revenue (not earnings as they have a lot of costs) shared between 30 owners. The highest guaranteed contract (virtually pure earnings minus about 5% for agent) is over $250 million. The highest paid player is making $40 million. When a guy like Harden is making enough to become a part owner, the players aren't doing that badly at the table. Basically players and owners have realized that if they share the wealth they both do better.
Shouldn't the NBA be held in a different light in these discussions? Their rosters are so small compared to other sports their players are going to make a ton of money by default once they divvy up the pot. It's practically such that if one could simply make a roster for 3-5 years and not blow your money you'd be set for life. Can't really say that about other leagues.
All major US leagues are different than MLS. The son of my sisters godfather had an offer for an investment banking job where he interned. Instead he chose a journeyman professional athlete where he earned 7 figures a year for almost his entire career. In contrast, you have guys like Brandon Vincent, Andrew Wenger, Leo Stolz and Joe Sophia who either retired early or never really seriously pursued their soccer career in MLS because the pay was so much lower than they could make doing something else.
But keep in mind all the other US leagues have a 50+ year head start. NBA is the "youngest" of the 4 at 75ish(?). MLB didn't get to a $100,000/yr min until the early 90's, most of the 80's was less than $50,000/yr min.
There were a lot of McMansions on the Superdraft this week. There's an irony that the guys in the league who are typically the lowest paid, are the guys who'd otherwise be on their way to well-compensated professional class jobs. Hell, a guy like Robbie Russell would have likely improved his lifetime income by going straight from Duke to a post-bac for med school rather than having a solid career as a pro soccer player.
My take on Big 4 labor negotiations is that the owners have successfully exercised their power to decrease labor share of revenue: NFL: 60% of net revenue (about 53% of gross after stadium credits) declines to 47-50% of gross in latest contract, targeting 48.5%. NBA: 57% of BRI declines to 49-50%, plus the players take a 20% salary haircut *in the year of the lockout*. Brutal. MLB: tougher to parse given non-transparent revenue splits, but the luxury tax line rose slower than inflation and with higher penalty rates, while the minimums for major and minor league players covered by MLBPA rose with inflation. Meanwhile, revenue rose faster than inflation both before and after the CBA, and there is pretty strong evidence that the league has figured out how not to bid against themselves for top talent, as evidenced by the low salary share in recent years (43% is most recent figure I've seen) and the slow free agency market. -Most reputable source (aka not Scott Boras) here: https://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/ct-spt-baseball-free-agency-suspicion-20190130-story.html NHL: in two CBAs, go from no salary cap (NHL claimed 75% of revenues went to salaries), to a cap at 57% of revenue, followed by a cap that is consistent with about 50%. For comparison, MLS is going in the other direction (rising salary share from below). Not sure how much to trust a statistic created from Forbes (revenue) and the MLSPA (salary), the shortcoming of which have been discussed ad nauseum, but putting that aside: ~20% in 2014 rose to ~30% in 2018. The reason labor does poorly in negotiations doesn't have to do with profligate lifestyles, IMO. It's two-fold: 1) harder to coordinate with larger set of actors, and 2) players enter and exit, while owners persist across cycles.
I don't think MLS has matured enough to get too focused on "percentage of revenues". The fixed (or very slowly scaling) costs of actually holding games, selling tickets, flying around the United States is much larger portion of MLS revenues, but has the potential to shrink (as a percentage) quickly as MLS's sponsorship and broadcast revenues continue to rise.
That was me in high school. I could throw really hard, but my control sucked. I would strike out a lot of guys, and also had a lot of walks. But sometimes they'd connect... I once got tagged for a 450-foot homer. But I was wild enough that there was always the fear I'd hit someone. It only happened a few times, and no one ever had to leave the game, but that was enough to keep the hitters on edge.. Then I blew out my arm and now I can barely throw a snowball...