FINALLY!!!!

Someone Finally beat the damn Yankees!!!Wooohooo it was so sweeeeet! Bottom of the ninth, just like what happened in NY last week. Gottta love–deflate that bloated New York egos! Way to go D-Backs!

ARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!! @%%$#@!%$#$

Yeah, I was pulling for the D-backs, since they are in the same division as my beloved Dodgers. Now we can claim that the champions had to go through us :wink: I’m glad it ended in the 9th. My nerves can’t take another extra inning game. I was also glad Byung-Hyun Kim was off the hook. What a burden it would have been to be “blamed” for your team losing the world series. A lot of pressure for a 22-year old. Go Dodgers in 2002!

Gotta love it! To see the Yanks with the long faces in to dug out was worth it. The D’backs beat my team, the Braves (who stunk and probably did not diserve to be there it the first place), but I rooted for them the whole way anyway. Not only did they beat the Yankee’s , but what a great series to watch! It would he been great even if the D’backs lost, but it is so much better that they won. Now that the Yankee’s look human again, maybe other team will take the cue and end their domination.

That’s all right, the DBACKS can look forward to following in the Florida Marlins’ championship footsteps after they rid themselves of a huge chunk of their key players to get themselves out of the massive debt they dug themselves in. Instant gratification has its penalties.

I don’t think there will be any “fire sale” witht the D-backs. Colangelo wants to keep winning there. People in Phoenix support the team, unlike the Marlins who avg ten thousand fans a game. Many of the Arizona players are near the end of their careers as well. Johnson is 37,Grace ditto. Others were castoffs that other teams gave up on like Louis Gonzalez and Craig Counsell. They may be one time champs but at least they are champs! Personally I’m sick of NY and Atlanta dominating every year because their multi-millionare owners simply buy the best players. Lou Pinella said best after one of the M’s defeats: “…they have great pitching…they should–they spent a lot of money on it…”

For teams like Milwaukee, Montreal, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Minnesota, etc. there seems to be no point in showing up. They’ll never see the playoffs. This is not good for the sport. All these teams with the exception of the Expos (who made the playoffs in '81 because of the strike split season-and who in '94 were some 30 or 40 games over .500 until another damn strike hit and cancelled the rest of the season) made the world series in the 70s, 80s or early 90s.
And Montreal drew over a million a yr up until the strike. Even in their crappy stadium. Now they avg 5 thousand a game or less. So baseball did sell at one time in Quebec. Greed and labor disputes have killed the sport.

From today’s news in baseball I wouldn’t be surprised if the draw at Olympic stadium is 0 for next season. With contraction in the works it doesn’t make any sense to keep a losing ball club, especially one in Canada. I’m gonna miss paying 4 bucks for a ticket and then sitting wherever the hell I wanted. Go 'spos!

SW, who are these pitchers the yanks spent all the money on? are you talking about the pitchers that they brought up and re-signed (rivera, pettite,hernandez, etc…)? or the pitchers that they traded other players that they signed and developed for (clemens, hitchock,etc…)? or the pitchers that took LESS money to play for the yanks then they could have gotten elsewhere (mussina)? just want to know because I hear that shit about the staff and the players all the time from fans of other teams that don’t develope talent or pay to keep any talent they do develope. look at the yankees and who came up thru their system and you would relize that they are not a “bought” team.the biggest free agent that they have had in their line up has been tino, everyone else came up with them or was gotten thru a trade, but not as free agents. the pitching staff has ONE “big” free agent and thats it. I bet pinella wished his org. would develope the same talent and pay to keep it.

? for George S. What can you buy with 110 million dollars. Uh… Second place… Better up the payroll to at least 120-130 million next year that way you will have a few more superstars and likely be unbeatable. I think it’s time baseball has a salary cap. Teams like the yankees are bad for the game, My poor twins spent less than 30 million on salaries last season - they simply can’t compete with teams like NYY, Dodgers, Braves, REd Sox etc. And now there is talk minnesota may be one of the teams that is contracted along with montreal… Sad, Sad,…

cyman, if the twins can not compete why should the be in business? if I had a bar and someone else down the street had a better bar I could not cry and ask them to give me some of THEIR money. if a business can’t survive too bad!! george has won 4 out of 5!!!bad for baseball? tell fox that!! george is a business man, he spent about 20 mill. on the yanks and turned them into a club worth between 500 mill. and 1 bill. dollars, he doesn’t “spend” money, he invests it. peace hetyey225

hetyey…The Yankees still have the largest payroll by a long way. Many of the D’backs gave up a chunk of thier sallary to keep the team afloat. As for the Braves, they don’t have that large of a payroll as evidenced by shit players they got this year, Gilkey?, Franco? Giles? They either have one foot in the grave or are rookies, hardly the sign of a big spender. Atlanta does need to spend some money, I am tired of watching them choke in the post season. I heard Bonds is a free agent, we could use him. I’ll trade chipper, jordan and madox for him. We also need to spend some dough on pitching, we are losing our edge in that dept…btw I am a Braves fan if you couldn’t tell, but this season, they sucked.

hetyey…The Yankees still have the largest payroll by a long way. Many of the D’backs gave up a chunk of thier sallary to keep the team afloat. As for the Braves, they don’t have that large of a payroll as evidenced by shit players they got this year, Gilkey?, Franco? Giles? They either have one foot in the grave or are rookies, hardly the sign of a big spender. Atlanta does need to spend some money, I am tired of watching them choke in the post season. I heard Bonds is a free agent, we could use him. I’ll trade chipper, jordan and madox for him. We also need to spend some dough on pitching, we are losing our edge in that dept…btw I am a Braves fan if you couldn’t tell, but this season, they sucked.

pat, they have the biggest payroll because they signe the players they develope. the braves have spent more on free agents then the yanks and for what?? stienbrenner is a buisnessman, he INVESTS his money and it pays off. peace

The Yankees opening day pay roll according to Sports Illustrated:
Yankees
Opening Day Payroll: $109,791,893 (1st)

Braves
Opening Day Payroll: $91,851,687 (6th)

That’s over a 17 million dollar discrepency. So, yes, the Yankees have the highest pay roll in baseball. The Braves, as you can see, are 6th. So, no, they do not have the highest payroll.
These facts are verifiable at www.cnnsi.com

I can see heytey’s point that George S. is spending money to turn the yankees franchise into something more valuable. That would be a prudent business move. However, do you think that having the yankees dominate every year is good for baseball? Even some yankee fans i have talked to admit that the glory of yankee victories is fading as they continue to play against weaker and weaker opponents. You could make the argument that for other teams to compete with the yankees, their owners simply need to spend more money. How well do you think this would work? Not well i think. A rods contract would be a thing of the past if every owner was willing to spend 110m/year. In that environment whoever was willing to spend the most would still be most likely to have success.
As for contraction i do not think it solves any longterm problems. In 3-4 years the owners of large market clubs will again push to rid themselves of more small clubs. Also since the owner of the Rockies (McNorris)sp? seems to be the primary force behind contraction, why not start with his team and see how it works out. What about Selig’s team, Brewers, yea they are a “great” team in a “great” market aren’t they. If they didn’t have a new stadium the brewers could on the block. Ultimately i predict Twins and Expos will be lost. Montreal is a no brainer prediction but why minnesota and not Tampa, Florida, or Oakland. Because the people of minnesota will not build the twins and new stadium. TB has a 26 year lease with the city of Tampa so cutting them would be a legal fiasco and would result in a costly buyout of the lease. Florida won’t be cut simply because owners hope someday baseball will catch on in south florida. Oakland is a team on the rise therefore they are likely to be protected.

Consider this hypothetical. If 30 bank owners got together and decided to buy out several banks for the sole purpose of increasing market share and antitrust lawsuit would be instantly brought forth. According to a 1922 Supreme Court decision baseball is a sport not a business and is therefore exempt from antitrust laws. However, Sen Wellstone of minnesota said, get the wrong people angry and baseball just may lose the exemption. Do you think today's supreme court would be naive enough to think baseball is a sport and not a business. I think you all know the answer.

you don’t get my point, the braves have spent more ON FREE AGENTS!! I am not talking about overall payrol, do that and you are holding it against the yanks that they re-signe their own players (which I think the fan of any team would be in favor of, look at the expos)

Heytey–I don’t know who specifically Pinella was referring to. I was just quoting him. But how many teams could afford to pay Clemens, Pettite, El Duque and Rivera and have anything left to pay their field players? Not many. Most teams can afford maybe one or two marquee pitchers at most. Sure, the Yankees are great franchise–very successful with a winning tradition and a superb farm system. It’s not difficult to draw a million or two fans a yr when your potential fan base is a tri state mega million resident urban area of some 20million or more. Cities like Minneapolis or Kansas City or Pittsburgh have maybe one tenth the potential fan base as NY. It’s a catch 22–you don’t win, people don’t show up. (Unless you’re the Cubs–they draw a million no matter how bad they are.) Nobody shows up, you don’t get the necessary revenue to be able to pay, develop, or attract quality players and free agents. Montreal has had one of the best farm systems in baseball. Look at the great players they brought up–from Guerrero, Raines, Gallaraga, Tim Wallach, Larry Walker, Pedro, Moises Alou, Gary Carter…could go on and on. But they don’t have the payroll to retain them. And many players don’t want to play in Canada where the tax rate is enormous. So they book.
I think the death knell for the Expos came when Dan Duquette left for Boston. The team then imploded. Poor management. I’ll miss the Expos, I thought baseball in French Canada was a neat experiment-which lasted over 30yrs. I remeber as a kid wathching the Cubs play in “Parc Jarry” hearing the French p.a. announcer when the Expos catcher came to bat; “John Boca -BELLLLL-AAAA”.

As far as the Twins, this franchise is one of the founding teams in the AL from 1901. They were the original Washington SEnators. And so was Oakland dating from when they were the Philadelphia Athletics. Personally I think baseball overexpanded. It was fine with 24 teams. The Expos could have relocated to Phoenix or Denver and gotten their new ballpark. Same with the Twins. Putting teams here in Fla was a mistake. No one goes to the Devil Rays games.

yes, it is a business, and survival of the fittest is the rule. But it is a sport too. You NEED competion. I’m sure many businesses would LOVE to have monopolies. This would not work in sports. The Yankees may not even make the playoffs if they didn’t play the Devil Rays 19 times a yr.

What pisses me off about this is they are totally ignoring the fans (ie the consumer) in this. And if all this results in another strike, as the union will fight it tooth and nail, as they are eliminating at least 50 jobs, it will kill the sport for sure. People are sick of greedy assed ballplayers who thumb their noses at the fans and simply blow off the team for the highest bidder. Wait and see who signs Jason GIambi—either the Yankees or the Braves, who both need a power hitting first baseman. I doubt Jason is gonna seek a contract with the Royals or Brewers.

Heytey hit the nail right on the head.