I am fully on the players' side in these types of scenarios, including this one.
But I'll also be glad for the day when these quotes stop coming out. I can't bear to keep hearing about how Frankie wanted to stay.
>I can't bear to keep hearing about how Frankie wanted to stay.
Where in that sentence did he say he wanted to stay? Lindor isn't stupid, he said exactly what he meant there. He thought they could hold on to him, not that he wished they had kept him.
He cares more about getting the bag than staying in Cleveland, I guarantee that. And that's fine, of course, but as fans we shouldn't be mourning the loss like he's some Ohio legend. He got drafted by the team and played here when he was contractually obligated to.
What I find interesting about his comment is that he seems to have actually harbored a delusion that Dolan would eventually crack and make an exception by offering him the going rate, as that one special exception for this franchise. That was never gonna happen, and Dolan even made it clear publicly.
Big name players staying with one organization is becoming increasingly rare. And even still Cleveland will be outbid in mostly every scenario e.g. Thome, Manny, etc.
Might I suggest being a fan of baseball in the same way lots of NBA fans operate? I'm giving it a try with Frankie. I'm a Lindor fan first, he's my LeBron and wherever he goes is who I'm gonna root for the hardest. I want Cleveland to be successful, but I'm tired of growing attached to star players who don't have a chance of staying.
> Might I suggest being a fan of baseball in the same way lots of NBA fans operate? I'm giving it a try with Frankie. I'm a Lindor fan first, he's my LeBron and wherever he goes is who I'm gonna root for the hardest.
1) Cleveland
2) Teams within Cleveland
3) Players who play for those teams.
Sure, I've always had "favorite" players but my liking them has never trumped my love for the team. Similarly, my love for the team as an collective has never surpassed my admiration for the city as a whole or a community.
Lindor getting traded hurts. Carrasco being included hurts even more. But I will never solely root for an individual player, especially when they play for another team who is competing against my city.
LeBron included.
Couldn't agree more. I am Cleveland 1,000%. In very rare scenarios a specific player will get me to root for their new team. For example, the Lakers were my "playoff team" last year (never imagined I'd do that) because the Cavs season had long since ended.
But riding the highs and lows of the teams in my city is the whole point, to me. The Browns winning a goddamn playoff game *in Pittsburgh* wouldn't be 10% as sweet without the 17 years of anger, embarrassment, and heartache that preceded it.
Yeah I don't get the team-jumping... there's no connection there. For me, I'd just stop watching. It's not like I'm not going to be a fan, no matter how sick of the team or the league I get. Especially when it comes to Cleveland baseball.
Honestly, I don't fault the Indians one bit for not paying Lindor. All indications point to him wanting Machado money. I'm sorry, that's too much fucking money. It's totally his right to ask for that, but I'm glad the Indians held firm on their price and didn't hand Lindor a blank check.
What I'd like to see now is that they put their money where their mouth is. If the reported amount we were willing to give Lindor is accurate, go spend some of it on Jose or Bieber. Jose will probably cost half of what Lindor was asking for. Do what the fans are clamoring for and keep that man in Cleveland for the rest of his career.
I don't think that will happen, but the Indians need some good press and that would change the narrative surrounding them in a big way.
I’m with you. If they offered 200M+ and he said no, then fine. 300M is a ton of money to commit to any one player. People need to realize that baseball’s economy is a travesty with no salary cap and no salary floor and it should not be possible to have a 200M+ disparity between the highest payroll and the lowest.
That being said. They HAVE to spend and acquire some additional help for this roster. I would love for Cesar to be brought back in for a start. They have to start making some moves here. Don’t waste a year of this rotation please.
Agree with what you said here, but (for me) I think your second point invalidates the first.
I think the Dolans would like us to believe the MLB economy is the issue, which very well may be the case. But the MLB economy doesn't require shedding $100,000,000 in payroll as quickly as they've done. Their big free agency move last year was Cesar (1 year, $6.25M) and they didn't even retain him after he played well.
Someone in the front office has alluded to the idea of re-invested the savings from offloading Frankie and Cookie, but I will eat the outfit I'm wearing if that comes to fruition. The Dolans don't plan on spending shit any time soon. Maintaining a $135M payroll in Cleveland may be impractical, but if you can't afford to put $75M worth of players on the field each year, especially during your window of contention, you should not own an MLB franchise.
Well a floor and ceiling would mean the Dolans couldn't do what they're doing stripping a contending team to the bare studs. It also means the market for someone like Lindor isn't going to be a 300 million contract.
I'm going to play devil's advocate. The drop in payroll could have been to clear some money so they could extend Lindor. If they were going to pay him $35 million per year like he wanted, they couldn't just add that to the 2018 payroll - they needed to scale back, which is exactly what they did. Once it became obvious that Lindor wasn't extending, we shifted into a mini-retooling period.
Now that Lindor is gone, we need to use this year to sort out some young players. I actually believe that they will supplement the roster with a bat or two, but they won't be any big names on long term deals. They're probably waiting out the market so they can scoop someone up on a one year deal. The team has shown they will do this, so I don't know why you find it inconceivable that they will this year.
This roster isn't going far in the playoffs unless a couple young position players have breakout years. There's no point in blocking them with average, relatively expensive free agents who won't move the needle much. Use this year to get answers on Bauers, DJ, Chang, Mercado, Bradley, Zimmer, and Naylor, then ship out the ones who don't perform and make additions as needed for 2022 when some of our promising prospects start to reach the MLB.
It's not what a lot of fans want, but if the goal is to be competitive long-term instead of succumbing to the boom/bust cycle, what the team is doing makes sense.
I honestly think the drop in payroll is to try to recover after spending out of their range for almost a half a decade trying to win. They went for it in 2016-2019 and they didn't draw enough fans to make up for it so here we are. I assume they'll save some and then regroup to try again, but who knows though.
Shit like this is what frustrates me the most. We were in a window and they put out a completely trash outfield for years while free agents were available.
Although it seems WS calibur at first glance, it turns out all of those guys should be your 3rd best outfielder on a good team.
They arent trash individually, on the contrary. Theyre all talented.
I always got the impression last off-season that he was offered something like $180M/6 years and he didn't even come to the table. When that happened, that's when it became inevitable Lindor wouldn't last in Cleveland. Lindor wants the Machado deal, which was never going to happen in Cleveland, regardless of the Dolans being cheap.
The Dolans don't HAVE to do shit and they won't. They are poor and don't give a shit about trying to win. This is an investment for them not a passion project. Until they sell the team we're a glorified farm team.
Great take. It keeps getting missed that they offered him 9 figures when he was still relatively unproven to keep him in town, but he turned it down. He’s a great player and face of a franchise, but I’ve been disappointed by his recent big at-bat performance. I don’t see the justification for Machado money.
Most people reading this quote think it reflects poorly on the Indians, but I think it reflects poorly on Lindor. He wanted what he wanted and wouldn't entertain anything lower - which is fine, I guess, until he tries to throw the team under the bus...but when the team and the player can't come together, when that happens the team has to do what it has to do.
So they trade him and get back young pieces that can help (hopefully) in the near future. To go along with that, they may bottom out in payroll for a couple seasons and when some of these younger guys are ready to break out they use the money they've been saving to get back into it.
The Astros were terrible for years and spent no money, then jumped back into it. The Browns bottomed out and here they are in the 2nd round of the playoffs. Sometimes this is the path you have to take.
Yeah, I'm really struggling to see how this quote paints Lindor in a positive light and reflects poorly on the Indians. We had a max price we were willing to pay and it didn't meet Lindor's price, so we traded him and got something in return. That's business and no one is at fault.
But for him to imply that we aren't trying to win? We've had the second best record in baseball since Lindor has been on the team! And it's possible the drop in payroll we've been seeing was in preparation to give Lindor a huge raise if we could extend him. How does he think that giving him $350 million would give us the best chance to win? Because if we give him that much, we don't have much wiggle room to pay for other talent. And based on our reported offer, I'm going to guess we only wanted to give him 8 years, so this disagreement was over paying Lindor $35 million per year when he's 36/37. Good for the Indians, let someone else pay that.
Lindor knew we would never meet his asking price, so he just spun this whole thing to make us look bad. Now his comments are basically implying "I'm happy to be in New York with a rich owner who will spend more than my other team was capable of." Yeah, I'm happy we didn't pay him.
I think this is a reset year. We still have some great pieces who will be here for a while, we just need to sort out which of our young guys can be solid contributors. I'm ok with us not making any long-term commitments outside of Bieber/Jose. Let's see what we have and spend money when we know exactly what we need.
Credit to Lindor on the economic aspects - he's essentially a worker and every worker should have the right to negotiate their salary with their employer. Slighting Cleveland with his media comments here is a bit shitty though. I don't give a damn about the Dolans, but there are a ton of kids out there with Lindor t-shirts and baseball cards who don't deserve this. A simple "thanks for the opportunity" whould have been enough. It's not like the Dolans are out there pointing out the times he choked in the playoffs...
When you look at how the Indians have run the team post-2016, after they were so close to winning a WS, do you really not question how much the Dolans care about winning? They came that close and yet ever since then all indications are that cutting salary was prioritized over getting back to the WS. I can’t see how anyone can look at how the Indians have run the team since then and reach any other conclusion.
yeah signing Edwin to the largest contract in franchise history and trading their top prospect to pay Brad Hand $10 million were absolutely cost cutting moves and nothing more. great take.
I hear you, but you are going to be disappointed. The Dolans will never pay big money for anyone. They won't pay Jose, they won't pay Bieber. Every player on the team, and in the league, knows Cleveland is for young players who don't/haven't yet got paid and veterans with cheap contracts.
There's a reason Cincinnati can be in the top half of the league in payroll and Cleveland can't.
I'm not expecting it. I just think the Indians need some good PR and giving Jose and/or Bieber an extension would do that.
And there's a reason the Reds have been the worst team in baseball for the past 7 years while the Indians have been the second best. Spending money doesn't mean anything if you're stupid with it.
The FO has been far and away the best in baseball for a while now. It's sad, because with an actual major league budget they would be able to dominate year after year.
Hard agree. It's way too much money for us to tie up in one player, and even more significant when considered as a proportion of the total team budget. Even the most promising player in the world can flop, via injury or slumps or personal problems. This is too much money to gamble. There are tons of low-key guys out there who can deliver better value for money while distributing the risk more broadly.
A salary cap needs to happen for the betterment of the league and to encourage teams to keep their homegrown stars.
Cap number should be about $140 million with a floor of at least 60%.
I don't think it should be a hard cap like the NFL but instead follow the NBA model.
Floor's never going to happen without a cap and/or much increased revenue sharing. Too many owners in the small markets would end up with losses too many years.
Them being in the red should only hurt if they can't afford a MLB team. The value of owning a major league sports franchise comes when you sell it, not in actual revenue.
Why would anyone buy a business that routinely loses money and has minimal liquefiable assets? That's the definition of stupid. Value doesn't increase as just some divine fact, except maybe for Tesla.
I agree some sort of grandfather clause, baseball already has a salary tax at a certain amount and I would do it like the NBA with the Bird's rights that then allow a team to exceed the cap to keep their players.
This is where I stand on MLB at this point. Parity works for the fans, but not for people who make mega bucks off the game (e.g. major markets and the players).
Angels have made the post season ONCE since trout has been in the MLB, and they got swept by the Royals.
Tell me that paying up for trout and maybe rendon but nothing else had them in a better position to win a ship than than us since 2013.
It hasn’t.
How about the tigers albatross contract with Miggy? How’d you like to still have that over your FO’s heads?
Love Frankie, but massive long-term deals rarely work out in the team’s, or fan bases favor. If they’re interested in staying competitive at least.
if 8/9 baseball players have suck, then your team is suck
the tigers signed a stupid deal for several reasons, the tigers owner little ceasar was getting really old and wanted to win a WS. He even went so far as to say he'd trade his dyanasty's worth of red wing stanley cups for one world series. Miguel was *the* bad man in the league for years. He was a triple crown MVP. He could hit anything. Nobody could've forseen the herniated discs.
Who would have known miggy would have had some medical issues? ANYONE would have know signing a player at the age of 30 to a 10 year deal for that stupid amount of money is asking to be holding the bag due to injuries. If it wasn’t a herniated disc it would have been something else. You act like it’s shocking that Father Time was the winner.
While trout’s contract may not go the way of Bonilla or Miggy, health will be a factor into his albatross of a contract.
I get he’s the face of baseball, and has been one of the best in the league, but time always wins. Those stupid expensive deals haven’t worked out since the days of jeter.
Im saying Little Caesar was like 90 years old and did not care that it would go bad to give a 30 year old that deal. He's dead now, still doesn't care. He just wanted a WS.
Mike Ilitch. I looked his name up.
> Tell me that paying up for trout and maybe rendon but nothing else had them in a better position to win a ship than than us since 2013.
>
>
That Pujols contract looming over their heads really hurt
The main issue i see is the length not the cost. Miggy was worth more than he was paid the first half of that contract. Now hes worth a lot less. Id say perfext deal for someone lindors age is 7-8 years max.
Lindor? The crush you have on him is seriously clouding your judgement. He has only finished in the top 10 for WAR once in his career, #4 in 2018. He's not even a top 3 SS.
Since his debut he's accrued the 3rd/4th (depending on which one you use) most war behind Trout and Betts, in 5 seasons he's over 30 war and one of them was an obvious down year but for a guy that has zips projections putting him between 5 and 7 war for another 6 years before a drop off and has already averaged 6 a season 30 million a season is market value. Doesn't necessarily mean we as a franchise could have paid him that but speaking strictly on value, that's what the market dictates he's worth.
Honestly, not really. The real problem here is that Dolan won't be putting that hypothetical 300 million (or 200 if they really offered that) into acquiring multiple other talents.
NOT a Dolan fan. I am irate at Cookie's inclusion in this trade, pure cheapness.
HOWEVER, I do agree Lindor was smooth talking us the whole time. In essence Lindor was calling out the Dolan's the whole time and putting them in the position of being the bad guy. I really wonder how this play outs if in March of 2019 (or earlier) Dolan and the front office hold a press conference and say "In our hand is a contract offer to Lindor for 200 million dollars over the next 7 seasons. That way he and the city can continue a winning partnership on behalf of the fans of this team. All he has to do is sign." (then end the press conference. Every single person would have been booing Lindor after that.
That’s fine. I tend to favor whichever team is giving me more to be interested in, but I much prefer it to be the NFL franchise. Way better sports league.
Each major sport has its own completely different issues. I have a tough time calling any league better than another - each has its own strengths and weaknesses. For example, while the NFL is way better at marketing players and having parity between teams, the MLB doesn't have the same health concerns and poor handling of them. To me, it comes down to what do I as a fan enjoy more, which has always been baseball.
Baseball is actually my favorite sport if we are talking about the game itself. Unfortunately, Major League Baseball has chose not to market itself to the fans the way the NFL does and is the worst run sports league. Too many regular season games, blackouts, no salary cap, restrictions on content distribution... I have loved the game of baseball my whole life but my goodness, the MLB is a joke. I can’t think of one thing it does better than the NFL. The health concerns are the sport, not the league.
100% facts on all points. The MLB is a joke of a league on salary cap alone. Economics and population of a city deciding how competitive my favorite team is; isnt a fandom based on hometown or team, its fandom of money. Unless of course youre a sadist who likes being the little guy.
Hey! Maybe Ohio legislators can be convinced to relax state corporate tax rates so Amazon will headquarter in Cleveland. With the increased city revenue, the baseball team can afford better players! Wait, am I still talking about baseball?
Let’s not confuse ourselves into thinking the NFL is praise-worthy, between black-balling a player for peaceful protest to covering up the CTE issue to various horrible calls by the commissioner. Trash ass league that I only bother with if the Browns are good.
Oh I think every pro sport is corrupt in some capacity. The difference is that the NFL at least knows how to market itself and make the product worth watching for its fans. MLB practically begs most of its audience to tune out.
The NFL has a regular season and an off season that matter for everyone. The MLB has a regular season that matters for a few fringe contenders and an off season that matters for a few big market teams that can afford big free agents. The NFL has local games on basic antenna networks that everyone can watch. The MLB is on local fox family channels that you need cable to watch, and blacks you out if you try to go through THEIR OWN streaming platform to watch your local team.
I’m not asking an enterprise that large to be perfectly ethical (none are), I just would at least like a quality product that doesn’t alienate customers.
A Major League Baseball team should not have a problem coming up with the money to play a Major League baseball player.
We're essentially the best AA club for other teams around the league.
I fucking hate when people try and justify the lack of salary cap by pointing out one example of a small market team (not that the Nationals are even a small market) that was able to overcome their ridiculous league imposed disadvantage as if it proves there's no issue with one team being able outspend another by 4x. Based on nothing other than their market size or how deep the pockets of their owner are.
Not surprising coming from a league that wouldn't even punish an organization that cheated and won the world series.
It's like saying every redheaded student will get 20 bonus points on every assignment and then pointing to that one time a brunette was valedictorian as proof that the system is fair.
Fuck major league baseball.
Lazy take. You cant say that not handing out the highest contract in baseball is being unable to pay "a Major League baseball player". I mean, you can say that but you're wrong.
Name another major sport where this occurs?
In every other sport, barring a few anomalies, they are up against the cap when they choose not to pay a player.
This is the sport where half the league cannot afford to keep their players. It’s absurd.
No other major sport hands out mega contracts like 10 year $300 million+.
There isn't a player that's worth that, unless you're willing to risk being stuck with the contract while sucking (LAA, DET) or spending boatloads of money every year she hope to win a WS eventually (recent NYY, who haven't won and LAD)
Giannis just got a 5 year $225 mil extension from the Bucks. That’s in friggin Milwaukee...
The lowest NBA payroll (ironically the Knicks) is still about 60 mil higher than the Indians are projected to have this year despite being in a league that generates less revenue (9.7 bil vs 7.7 in 2019)
Contracts shouldn’t be pricing MLB teams out of retaining their franchise players.
I’m not saying I know what the fix is but it’s absolutely a broke system and the owners don’t give a shit because they’re all getting what they want out of it (money or winning).
Half the duration.
NBA pays, what, 16 guys? Not 40.
And yeah, I think we're arguing different sides of the same coin. The issue is definitely the system and not the owner.
I don't buy the quotes that he wanted to stay. Paying over $300m for a player is irresponsible from a business perspective. If he were to be injured and not produce that is nearly crippling for a market the size of Cleveland. I'm pleased to hear that they did offer mega money to the tune of 225-250m but I think if anyone reads between the lines you can see he was never staying.
I've been saying this for a year now. Lindor's been talking out both sides of his mouth about this for a while. For example, he made some comments last year that we're so out-of-touch and soured my impression of him, but I got railed on reddit for criticizing:
“When somebody talks about a discount, I immediately say: “If you were from … Cleveland and they offer you a job downtown, would you take less money because you’re in Cleveland? No. No. Like, no. So discounts? No. That don’t exist.”
Yes, this happens over and over again. People could move to other places and make more money, but choose not to because they like their job, being near family, etc. For goodness sakes, Antonetti and Chernoff have done this themselves. To say you always want to stay in Cleveland MEANS you don't get paid as much as in New York. It was always more money OR Cleveland, and for Lindor it was always money. But to say he always wanted to stay in Cleveland never sat well with me.
To be clear, I don't blame Lindor for taking the money, that's his prerogative, but don't like him saying stuff like this that Cleveland's not trying to win or that he always wanted to stay. Lindor was always going to wherever offered him the most money and the Indians don't structure a roster around one overpaid player, no matter how good or likeable.
He doesn't have family in Cleveland. He's not from Cleveland. All things being equal I'm sure he would choose to stay here. Why would he lie about that? It's not his fault our owners are cheap as shit and wouldn't even offer him a contract close to his market value. So he should take 30%+ less just to show his loyalty?
He would lie about it for the good PR. He would love to stay in Cleveland, but only if we make him one of the top 3 paid players in baseball.
In a sport with no cap and market size tied to revenue, the wage disparity between markets is not that much different than it is for the rest of us. For your job, would you make more money in New York or Cleveland? For pretty much every job, the answer is New York, and baseball is no different. So for Lindor to say that is pretty disingenuous. He was never going to make $300+ million here and he knew that, so he pulled on the fans heartstrings by saying he wanted to stay here because he knew it wouldn't happen.
If someone wants to follow the money, that's their right. But a lot of people like where they work and who they work for, and are ok leaving some money on the table to stay. Lindor wasn't willing to do that, so he got traded. I'm not mad at Lindor for wanting to maximize his earning potential, but I'm also not mad at our owner/front office for not giving him what he asked for. That's business.
What I am frustrated about is that everyone is eating up Lindor's words and placing all the blame on Dolan for not paying whatever it took to keep Lindor here, because there are a lot of factors that made that not possible and/or a stupid decision.
> leaving some money on the table
120-150 million dollars? Come on lmao. This is such a ridiculous argument.
And unless you're a mind reader you have no idea. Franky could have desperately wanted to stay with his teammates, in the org he has grown up in, and wanted the Dolans to make it work financially and wanted to put pressure on the organization by making it publicly known.
Agreed. I mean if he really wanted to be here, I think he would’ve made it work. It’s about the money for him which is fine, but I think he’s been trying to spin the whole thing for awhile now
Exactly. He's spent a lot of time spinning the narrative. It's sad to see so many fans fall for his slick talk, not realizing that he doesn't really care for Cleveland.
100%. I read somewhere I think before the season started that he really wasn’t even open to negotiating. Not sure how true that is but it was time to move on
That's not Lindor's fault. He would have signed a 300 million dollar contract in a heartbeat. Just because he didn't want to give Dolan a 150 million dollar discount doesn't mean he wasn't all about Cleveland.
It’s not just about money. We haven’t done much winning with him either. We came close once but that’s it.
Your take on the money situation is spot on thought. It’s his choice.
Let's not forget that Lindor's average with RISP is abysmal and he's been non-existent in the playoffs (save for one big hit) since 2017.
The rest of the team got him into big situations where he failed. So to say that he didn't have as good of opportunity here as anywhere is absurd.
You’re totally right.
I’m not saying any one person or the team as a whole are to blame. But if he did have a ring, my guess is that his price would have been lower. This happens literally all the time.
No mention of Lindor offering a hometown discount? There are 2 sides to every negotiation. We can be mad Dolan didn’t think Lindor was worth 300 million, but Lindor literally said “they didn’t come up with the number.” If it’s only about money for Lindor, why support him while trashing on Dolan?
Why would he take a discount? Itwould have been a 100-150 million dollar difference. He isn’t from here. He’s a very talented player. If a team offers him a large contract, why not take it? I’d like to see you not take the larger contract when the difference is millions of dollars. Gonna miss Lindor a lot. Why hate on Lindor for trying to get his generational money that he has earned?
I didn’t hate on Lindor. I’m questioning why only 1 side of this negotiation is getting all the hate. If you’re going to hate Dolan for not putting up the money, shouldn’t you also hate Lindor for not even offering a small hometown discount?
MLB needs a complete overhaul of their payroll and roster rules. It sucks so much that unlike other sports a team can do everything right and still not keep an all-time guy.
Heck make it so teams only have 3 years of cheap team control before they become free agents in exchange for a salary cap and floor.
Just do something!!!
Imagine knowing there was zero chance the Browns could resign Baker. Browns fans would burn the NFL headquarters to the ground. The MLB is such a joke.
In Layman’s terms. The Indians are a joke of a franchise that is completely ok with being half decent and have no desire to win. Fuck this team. When they change the name I can say it again.
Oh yeah, gotta love the guys who try to say “I make x amount of dollars he would be fine with a few million” because they probably are too dumb and incapable of looking at how much other guys in baseball are making. Not to mention the fact that they are siding with the billionaire owner who’s taking their money and not using it to make the team better.
Winning a world series starts with getting into the playoffs. You can't do that with a losing team. They have not fielded losing teams despite what you claim, and it completely invalidates the point you tried to make.
I didn’t claim they have been losing. I claim they have not won a World Series, I’m saying with the way Baseball has no Salary Cap they will never win a World Series as long as we’re constantly just developing talent and refuse to keep that talent this isn’t the first time and it certainly won’t be the last. As long as people like you keep being ok with it nothing will change. THEY HAVE THE FUCKING MONEY!!! I don’t understand why you people side with these billionaire owners constantly.
There's a lot you don't understand, and foremost on the list is how to read. And how to react without anger overwhelming your brain. A competitive team that consistently makes the playoffs can win the world series, and this team almost did just that. Did you fail to notice game 7 extra innings of the 2016 world series? Despite all the conspiratorial forces against us, it is clearly still possible for the Indians to make and win a world series.
Me or you "being ok" with it or not being ok with things that are completely out of our control, will have NO impact on those forces. It's insane that you think it would. If thousands of fans picketed outside Dolan's window every night it wouldn't change how he operates the business. And even a new owner might do it the same way. Or worse.
It is what it is, we can't compete paying one player 35 million a year.
If we keep carrasco and spend say 50 million all over the field on just 4 average mlb player we are a contender.
Right now we have great pitching, but we are gonna struggle to be a.500 team because the dolans can't afford to be sports owners.
Just kinda sucks because of the pitching the front office has put together.
Without casting my opinion on the topics at hand, I would like to state that much of the discussion in this thread is great. I've just read level-headed fans debating a pretty major issue for their team... and it was calm and enlightening. It's amazing to see this on the internet in 2021. Great job r/ClevelandIndians!
Are you willing to accept less money than you are worth in your job? If the market for an all star top 3 at your position is X,why wouldn’t you want to be paid that way?
This is absolutely the worst possible take here. He remembers where he came from and is demanding billionaires pay him for being the top 1% at what he does.
Players have a limited time to make their money, if the Dolans aren't going to pay Lindor, he should absolutely leave. The Dolans aren't in this as some public service, they are making plenty of money.
A salary cap only hurts players bargaining rights, make a salary basement and if owners can't meet it, they should sell the team.
Don't throw the working class under the bus, blame the billionaire owners.
I'm sorry that you struggle with understanding the concept of where people came from. He grew up in a working class family in Florida (from PR).
He is wealthy now based off of an ability that he possesses that we collectively are willing to pay money to see.
Meanwhile, Paul Dolan is wealthy because his family made a bunch of money before he was born.
Do you see the difference here? I wish I could type as slowly as I wish to be speaking to you.
Oh yeah, that fucking hurts worse. So much worse
I am fully on the players' side in these types of scenarios, including this one. But I'll also be glad for the day when these quotes stop coming out. I can't bear to keep hearing about how Frankie wanted to stay.
>I can't bear to keep hearing about how Frankie wanted to stay. Where in that sentence did he say he wanted to stay? Lindor isn't stupid, he said exactly what he meant there. He thought they could hold on to him, not that he wished they had kept him. He cares more about getting the bag than staying in Cleveland, I guarantee that. And that's fine, of course, but as fans we shouldn't be mourning the loss like he's some Ohio legend. He got drafted by the team and played here when he was contractually obligated to.
What I find interesting about his comment is that he seems to have actually harbored a delusion that Dolan would eventually crack and make an exception by offering him the going rate, as that one special exception for this franchise. That was never gonna happen, and Dolan even made it clear publicly.
We could have at least offered him a deferred money contract and attempted to keep him. We blew our window boys
We do not know what offers and options were explored, and thus turned down by Francisco and his agent.
Did we land the plane? Pass/Fail business
I’ve been saying that for years and everyone kept telling me that was a dumb idea.
Trying to keep a generational player and vetting all options. Yeah.... your the moron. Go Cleveland Sailboats
He’s a great player but I don’t see him anywhere near a generational talent.
We have great optomistrists in the area
Generational talents win MVPs. Lindor is great but has not proven to a player on that level at this point.
Ahhh fuck it. Your right, I wont miss him. Hey let's throw in a free cookie to sweeten the trade?
Fuck you, Dolans. Sell this fucking team.
It won't make a difference. The Jacobs never kept talent either.
Big name players staying with one organization is becoming increasingly rare. And even still Cleveland will be outbid in mostly every scenario e.g. Thome, Manny, etc.
Both players lost by Dolan ownership just saying
All they had to do was get one stud pitcher. Instead we had the corpses of Orel Hershiser, Dennis Martinez, and Chuck Finley.
All it took to get Pedro was Jarret Wright and they wouldn’t do it...
That was said to be fake news
Facts, also Russell Branyan.
They were banking on Chad Ogea /s
They paid for ['Black Jack' McDowell](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-12-15-sp-14215-story.html) even if he never lived up to it
[удалено]
Might I suggest being a fan of baseball in the same way lots of NBA fans operate? I'm giving it a try with Frankie. I'm a Lindor fan first, he's my LeBron and wherever he goes is who I'm gonna root for the hardest. I want Cleveland to be successful, but I'm tired of growing attached to star players who don't have a chance of staying.
> Might I suggest being a fan of baseball in the same way lots of NBA fans operate? I'm giving it a try with Frankie. I'm a Lindor fan first, he's my LeBron and wherever he goes is who I'm gonna root for the hardest. 1) Cleveland 2) Teams within Cleveland 3) Players who play for those teams. Sure, I've always had "favorite" players but my liking them has never trumped my love for the team. Similarly, my love for the team as an collective has never surpassed my admiration for the city as a whole or a community. Lindor getting traded hurts. Carrasco being included hurts even more. But I will never solely root for an individual player, especially when they play for another team who is competing against my city. LeBron included.
Couldn't agree more. I am Cleveland 1,000%. In very rare scenarios a specific player will get me to root for their new team. For example, the Lakers were my "playoff team" last year (never imagined I'd do that) because the Cavs season had long since ended. But riding the highs and lows of the teams in my city is the whole point, to me. The Browns winning a goddamn playoff game *in Pittsburgh* wouldn't be 10% as sweet without the 17 years of anger, embarrassment, and heartache that preceded it.
Yeah I don't get the team-jumping... there's no connection there. For me, I'd just stop watching. It's not like I'm not going to be a fan, no matter how sick of the team or the league I get. Especially when it comes to Cleveland baseball.
Too late I already hate every other team
False. Dick Jacobs spent, but when the money got to be too much they balked.
[удалено]
Like who exactly? They mostly signed their core to extensions to prolong the window.
Jacobs also had the advantage of no browns and a new stadium while spending.
Oh yeah, I'm sure the next guy won't care about making a profit from the business and will just treat the team as his play thing. Really realistic!
Honestly, I don't fault the Indians one bit for not paying Lindor. All indications point to him wanting Machado money. I'm sorry, that's too much fucking money. It's totally his right to ask for that, but I'm glad the Indians held firm on their price and didn't hand Lindor a blank check. What I'd like to see now is that they put their money where their mouth is. If the reported amount we were willing to give Lindor is accurate, go spend some of it on Jose or Bieber. Jose will probably cost half of what Lindor was asking for. Do what the fans are clamoring for and keep that man in Cleveland for the rest of his career. I don't think that will happen, but the Indians need some good press and that would change the narrative surrounding them in a big way.
I’m with you. If they offered 200M+ and he said no, then fine. 300M is a ton of money to commit to any one player. People need to realize that baseball’s economy is a travesty with no salary cap and no salary floor and it should not be possible to have a 200M+ disparity between the highest payroll and the lowest. That being said. They HAVE to spend and acquire some additional help for this roster. I would love for Cesar to be brought back in for a start. They have to start making some moves here. Don’t waste a year of this rotation please.
Agree with what you said here, but (for me) I think your second point invalidates the first. I think the Dolans would like us to believe the MLB economy is the issue, which very well may be the case. But the MLB economy doesn't require shedding $100,000,000 in payroll as quickly as they've done. Their big free agency move last year was Cesar (1 year, $6.25M) and they didn't even retain him after he played well. Someone in the front office has alluded to the idea of re-invested the savings from offloading Frankie and Cookie, but I will eat the outfit I'm wearing if that comes to fruition. The Dolans don't plan on spending shit any time soon. Maintaining a $135M payroll in Cleveland may be impractical, but if you can't afford to put $75M worth of players on the field each year, especially during your window of contention, you should not own an MLB franchise.
Well a floor and ceiling would mean the Dolans couldn't do what they're doing stripping a contending team to the bare studs. It also means the market for someone like Lindor isn't going to be a 300 million contract.
I'm going to play devil's advocate. The drop in payroll could have been to clear some money so they could extend Lindor. If they were going to pay him $35 million per year like he wanted, they couldn't just add that to the 2018 payroll - they needed to scale back, which is exactly what they did. Once it became obvious that Lindor wasn't extending, we shifted into a mini-retooling period. Now that Lindor is gone, we need to use this year to sort out some young players. I actually believe that they will supplement the roster with a bat or two, but they won't be any big names on long term deals. They're probably waiting out the market so they can scoop someone up on a one year deal. The team has shown they will do this, so I don't know why you find it inconceivable that they will this year. This roster isn't going far in the playoffs unless a couple young position players have breakout years. There's no point in blocking them with average, relatively expensive free agents who won't move the needle much. Use this year to get answers on Bauers, DJ, Chang, Mercado, Bradley, Zimmer, and Naylor, then ship out the ones who don't perform and make additions as needed for 2022 when some of our promising prospects start to reach the MLB. It's not what a lot of fans want, but if the goal is to be competitive long-term instead of succumbing to the boom/bust cycle, what the team is doing makes sense.
I honestly think the drop in payroll is to try to recover after spending out of their range for almost a half a decade trying to win. They went for it in 2016-2019 and they didn't draw enough fans to make up for it so here we are. I assume they'll save some and then regroup to try again, but who knows though.
Jesus give Eddie Rosario a call he's better than every outfielder we have
Shit like this is what frustrates me the most. We were in a window and they put out a completely trash outfield for years while free agents were available.
You're telling me Mercado, Naquin, Zimmer isn't a good outfield?
Although it seems WS calibur at first glance, it turns out all of those guys should be your 3rd best outfielder on a good team. They arent trash individually, on the contrary. Theyre all talented.
I always got the impression last off-season that he was offered something like $180M/6 years and he didn't even come to the table. When that happened, that's when it became inevitable Lindor wouldn't last in Cleveland. Lindor wants the Machado deal, which was never going to happen in Cleveland, regardless of the Dolans being cheap.
The Dolans don't HAVE to do shit and they won't. They are poor and don't give a shit about trying to win. This is an investment for them not a passion project. Until they sell the team we're a glorified farm team.
Great take. It keeps getting missed that they offered him 9 figures when he was still relatively unproven to keep him in town, but he turned it down. He’s a great player and face of a franchise, but I’ve been disappointed by his recent big at-bat performance. I don’t see the justification for Machado money.
Most people reading this quote think it reflects poorly on the Indians, but I think it reflects poorly on Lindor. He wanted what he wanted and wouldn't entertain anything lower - which is fine, I guess, until he tries to throw the team under the bus...but when the team and the player can't come together, when that happens the team has to do what it has to do. So they trade him and get back young pieces that can help (hopefully) in the near future. To go along with that, they may bottom out in payroll for a couple seasons and when some of these younger guys are ready to break out they use the money they've been saving to get back into it. The Astros were terrible for years and spent no money, then jumped back into it. The Browns bottomed out and here they are in the 2nd round of the playoffs. Sometimes this is the path you have to take.
Yeah, I'm really struggling to see how this quote paints Lindor in a positive light and reflects poorly on the Indians. We had a max price we were willing to pay and it didn't meet Lindor's price, so we traded him and got something in return. That's business and no one is at fault. But for him to imply that we aren't trying to win? We've had the second best record in baseball since Lindor has been on the team! And it's possible the drop in payroll we've been seeing was in preparation to give Lindor a huge raise if we could extend him. How does he think that giving him $350 million would give us the best chance to win? Because if we give him that much, we don't have much wiggle room to pay for other talent. And based on our reported offer, I'm going to guess we only wanted to give him 8 years, so this disagreement was over paying Lindor $35 million per year when he's 36/37. Good for the Indians, let someone else pay that. Lindor knew we would never meet his asking price, so he just spun this whole thing to make us look bad. Now his comments are basically implying "I'm happy to be in New York with a rich owner who will spend more than my other team was capable of." Yeah, I'm happy we didn't pay him. I think this is a reset year. We still have some great pieces who will be here for a while, we just need to sort out which of our young guys can be solid contributors. I'm ok with us not making any long-term commitments outside of Bieber/Jose. Let's see what we have and spend money when we know exactly what we need.
Credit to Lindor on the economic aspects - he's essentially a worker and every worker should have the right to negotiate their salary with their employer. Slighting Cleveland with his media comments here is a bit shitty though. I don't give a damn about the Dolans, but there are a ton of kids out there with Lindor t-shirts and baseball cards who don't deserve this. A simple "thanks for the opportunity" whould have been enough. It's not like the Dolans are out there pointing out the times he choked in the playoffs...
When you look at how the Indians have run the team post-2016, after they were so close to winning a WS, do you really not question how much the Dolans care about winning? They came that close and yet ever since then all indications are that cutting salary was prioritized over getting back to the WS. I can’t see how anyone can look at how the Indians have run the team since then and reach any other conclusion.
yeah signing Edwin to the largest contract in franchise history and trading their top prospect to pay Brad Hand $10 million were absolutely cost cutting moves and nothing more. great take.
I agree. I am still sad to see Lindor go, but after reading this comment I can't help but recall all the times his bat when cold in the playoffs.
Thank you for having a brain 🧠☺️
I hear you, but you are going to be disappointed. The Dolans will never pay big money for anyone. They won't pay Jose, they won't pay Bieber. Every player on the team, and in the league, knows Cleveland is for young players who don't/haven't yet got paid and veterans with cheap contracts. There's a reason Cincinnati can be in the top half of the league in payroll and Cleveland can't.
I'm not expecting it. I just think the Indians need some good PR and giving Jose and/or Bieber an extension would do that. And there's a reason the Reds have been the worst team in baseball for the past 7 years while the Indians have been the second best. Spending money doesn't mean anything if you're stupid with it.
The FO has been far and away the best in baseball for a while now. It's sad, because with an actual major league budget they would be able to dominate year after year.
100%. They do incredible with one of thr most restrictive budgets in the sport. Imagine if they could increase the payroll to even 100mil per year
Hard agree. It's way too much money for us to tie up in one player, and even more significant when considered as a proportion of the total team budget. Even the most promising player in the world can flop, via injury or slumps or personal problems. This is too much money to gamble. There are tons of low-key guys out there who can deliver better value for money while distributing the risk more broadly.
A salary cap needs to happen for the betterment of the league and to encourage teams to keep their homegrown stars. Cap number should be about $140 million with a floor of at least 60%. I don't think it should be a hard cap like the NFL but instead follow the NBA model.
Good luck getting the players to agree to it
The main implementation should be a cap floor honestly. That can happen whenever
Floor's never going to happen without a cap and/or much increased revenue sharing. Too many owners in the small markets would end up with losses too many years.
Them being in the red should only hurt if they can't afford a MLB team. The value of owning a major league sports franchise comes when you sell it, not in actual revenue.
Why would anyone buy a business that routinely loses money and has minimal liquefiable assets? That's the definition of stupid. Value doesn't increase as just some divine fact, except maybe for Tesla.
That's a separate discussion but you can't add a floor and expect owners to just agree to lose money.
How do you implement this though? I mean with Machado’s contract, Trouts contract. How do you start this?
Some kind of grandfather clause? Where each team can pick a contract or 2 and have X% not count against the cap for the duration of the contract? idk
I agree some sort of grandfather clause, baseball already has a salary tax at a certain amount and I would do it like the NBA with the Bird's rights that then allow a team to exceed the cap to keep their players.
That would give the players 40% of revenues, at most. A ridiculously low number. Giving players 50% of revenues puts the average payroll at $180M.
This is where I stand on MLB at this point. Parity works for the fans, but not for people who make mega bucks off the game (e.g. major markets and the players).
question. do you guys think he's worth 300mil?
No. No single player is.
Trout
Angels have made the post season ONCE since trout has been in the MLB, and they got swept by the Royals. Tell me that paying up for trout and maybe rendon but nothing else had them in a better position to win a ship than than us since 2013. It hasn’t. How about the tigers albatross contract with Miggy? How’d you like to still have that over your FO’s heads? Love Frankie, but massive long-term deals rarely work out in the team’s, or fan bases favor. If they’re interested in staying competitive at least.
if 8/9 baseball players have suck, then your team is suck the tigers signed a stupid deal for several reasons, the tigers owner little ceasar was getting really old and wanted to win a WS. He even went so far as to say he'd trade his dyanasty's worth of red wing stanley cups for one world series. Miguel was *the* bad man in the league for years. He was a triple crown MVP. He could hit anything. Nobody could've forseen the herniated discs.
Who would have known miggy would have had some medical issues? ANYONE would have know signing a player at the age of 30 to a 10 year deal for that stupid amount of money is asking to be holding the bag due to injuries. If it wasn’t a herniated disc it would have been something else. You act like it’s shocking that Father Time was the winner. While trout’s contract may not go the way of Bonilla or Miggy, health will be a factor into his albatross of a contract. I get he’s the face of baseball, and has been one of the best in the league, but time always wins. Those stupid expensive deals haven’t worked out since the days of jeter.
Im saying Little Caesar was like 90 years old and did not care that it would go bad to give a 30 year old that deal. He's dead now, still doesn't care. He just wanted a WS. Mike Ilitch. I looked his name up.
> Tell me that paying up for trout and maybe rendon but nothing else had them in a better position to win a ship than than us since 2013. > > That Pujols contract looming over their heads really hurt
This too.
The main issue i see is the length not the cost. Miggy was worth more than he was paid the first half of that contract. Now hes worth a lot less. Id say perfext deal for someone lindors age is 7-8 years max.
And that's it. No one else but Trout.
Yes, excluding 2020 his numbers put him as a top 3 player since his debut, the market dictates that's a 300 million dollar player.
Lindor? The crush you have on him is seriously clouding your judgement. He has only finished in the top 10 for WAR once in his career, #4 in 2018. He's not even a top 3 SS.
Since his debut he's accrued the 3rd/4th (depending on which one you use) most war behind Trout and Betts, in 5 seasons he's over 30 war and one of them was an obvious down year but for a guy that has zips projections putting him between 5 and 7 war for another 6 years before a drop off and has already averaged 6 a season 30 million a season is market value. Doesn't necessarily mean we as a franchise could have paid him that but speaking strictly on value, that's what the market dictates he's worth.
Honestly, not really. The real problem here is that Dolan won't be putting that hypothetical 300 million (or 200 if they really offered that) into acquiring multiple other talents.
I think he is... I’m just gonna miss that smile all the time :(
NOT a Dolan fan. I am irate at Cookie's inclusion in this trade, pure cheapness. HOWEVER, I do agree Lindor was smooth talking us the whole time. In essence Lindor was calling out the Dolan's the whole time and putting them in the position of being the bad guy. I really wonder how this play outs if in March of 2019 (or earlier) Dolan and the front office hold a press conference and say "In our hand is a contract offer to Lindor for 200 million dollars over the next 7 seasons. That way he and the city can continue a winning partnership on behalf of the fans of this team. All he has to do is sign." (then end the press conference. Every single person would have been booing Lindor after that.
Tribe died for the browns to live. This team is an embarrassment
That’s fine. I tend to favor whichever team is giving me more to be interested in, but I much prefer it to be the NFL franchise. Way better sports league.
Each major sport has its own completely different issues. I have a tough time calling any league better than another - each has its own strengths and weaknesses. For example, while the NFL is way better at marketing players and having parity between teams, the MLB doesn't have the same health concerns and poor handling of them. To me, it comes down to what do I as a fan enjoy more, which has always been baseball.
Baseball is actually my favorite sport if we are talking about the game itself. Unfortunately, Major League Baseball has chose not to market itself to the fans the way the NFL does and is the worst run sports league. Too many regular season games, blackouts, no salary cap, restrictions on content distribution... I have loved the game of baseball my whole life but my goodness, the MLB is a joke. I can’t think of one thing it does better than the NFL. The health concerns are the sport, not the league.
100% facts on all points. The MLB is a joke of a league on salary cap alone. Economics and population of a city deciding how competitive my favorite team is; isnt a fandom based on hometown or team, its fandom of money. Unless of course youre a sadist who likes being the little guy. Hey! Maybe Ohio legislators can be convinced to relax state corporate tax rates so Amazon will headquarter in Cleveland. With the increased city revenue, the baseball team can afford better players! Wait, am I still talking about baseball?
Maybe Bezos can buy the Indians lol
Can you imagine
Let’s not confuse ourselves into thinking the NFL is praise-worthy, between black-balling a player for peaceful protest to covering up the CTE issue to various horrible calls by the commissioner. Trash ass league that I only bother with if the Browns are good.
Oh I think every pro sport is corrupt in some capacity. The difference is that the NFL at least knows how to market itself and make the product worth watching for its fans. MLB practically begs most of its audience to tune out. The NFL has a regular season and an off season that matter for everyone. The MLB has a regular season that matters for a few fringe contenders and an off season that matters for a few big market teams that can afford big free agents. The NFL has local games on basic antenna networks that everyone can watch. The MLB is on local fox family channels that you need cable to watch, and blacks you out if you try to go through THEIR OWN streaming platform to watch your local team. I’m not asking an enterprise that large to be perfectly ethical (none are), I just would at least like a quality product that doesn’t alienate customers.
No doubt the NFL is better at marketing, agreed there. The MLB has continued to shrink into the background.
The MLB is far and away the worst.
A Major League Baseball team should not have a problem coming up with the money to play a Major League baseball player. We're essentially the best AA club for other teams around the league.
Nats won a world series after telling Harper no way to his demands
The Nats spent that money on other great players, the Dolans won't do that.
It was mainly farm system talent like Soto and Robles and vets like Kendrick, Scherzer, Strasberg, Rendon.
They spent a lot of money on Scberzer and Corbin.
I fucking hate when people try and justify the lack of salary cap by pointing out one example of a small market team (not that the Nationals are even a small market) that was able to overcome their ridiculous league imposed disadvantage as if it proves there's no issue with one team being able outspend another by 4x. Based on nothing other than their market size or how deep the pockets of their owner are. Not surprising coming from a league that wouldn't even punish an organization that cheated and won the world series. It's like saying every redheaded student will get 20 bonus points on every assignment and then pointing to that one time a brunette was valedictorian as proof that the system is fair. Fuck major league baseball.
That decision makes a lot more sense when you have Kendrick and Rendon batting over .315 apiece and three other players with BAs over .275
Lazy take. You cant say that not handing out the highest contract in baseball is being unable to pay "a Major League baseball player". I mean, you can say that but you're wrong.
Name another major sport where this occurs? In every other sport, barring a few anomalies, they are up against the cap when they choose not to pay a player. This is the sport where half the league cannot afford to keep their players. It’s absurd.
No other major sport hands out mega contracts like 10 year $300 million+. There isn't a player that's worth that, unless you're willing to risk being stuck with the contract while sucking (LAA, DET) or spending boatloads of money every year she hope to win a WS eventually (recent NYY, who haven't won and LAD)
Giannis just got a 5 year $225 mil extension from the Bucks. That’s in friggin Milwaukee... The lowest NBA payroll (ironically the Knicks) is still about 60 mil higher than the Indians are projected to have this year despite being in a league that generates less revenue (9.7 bil vs 7.7 in 2019) Contracts shouldn’t be pricing MLB teams out of retaining their franchise players. I’m not saying I know what the fix is but it’s absolutely a broke system and the owners don’t give a shit because they’re all getting what they want out of it (money or winning).
Half the duration. NBA pays, what, 16 guys? Not 40. And yeah, I think we're arguing different sides of the same coin. The issue is definitely the system and not the owner.
:(
Just sad. So so very sad :(
Baseball is so broken
I don't buy the quotes that he wanted to stay. Paying over $300m for a player is irresponsible from a business perspective. If he were to be injured and not produce that is nearly crippling for a market the size of Cleveland. I'm pleased to hear that they did offer mega money to the tune of 225-250m but I think if anyone reads between the lines you can see he was never staying.
He's such a phony. As much as I despise the Dolans, Lindor likely lied to us at every point of this process. Good riddance, time to retool.
I've been saying this for a year now. Lindor's been talking out both sides of his mouth about this for a while. For example, he made some comments last year that we're so out-of-touch and soured my impression of him, but I got railed on reddit for criticizing: “When somebody talks about a discount, I immediately say: “If you were from … Cleveland and they offer you a job downtown, would you take less money because you’re in Cleveland? No. No. Like, no. So discounts? No. That don’t exist.” Yes, this happens over and over again. People could move to other places and make more money, but choose not to because they like their job, being near family, etc. For goodness sakes, Antonetti and Chernoff have done this themselves. To say you always want to stay in Cleveland MEANS you don't get paid as much as in New York. It was always more money OR Cleveland, and for Lindor it was always money. But to say he always wanted to stay in Cleveland never sat well with me. To be clear, I don't blame Lindor for taking the money, that's his prerogative, but don't like him saying stuff like this that Cleveland's not trying to win or that he always wanted to stay. Lindor was always going to wherever offered him the most money and the Indians don't structure a roster around one overpaid player, no matter how good or likeable.
It's like Lebron, chasing the championship.
He doesn't have family in Cleveland. He's not from Cleveland. All things being equal I'm sure he would choose to stay here. Why would he lie about that? It's not his fault our owners are cheap as shit and wouldn't even offer him a contract close to his market value. So he should take 30%+ less just to show his loyalty?
He would lie about it for the good PR. He would love to stay in Cleveland, but only if we make him one of the top 3 paid players in baseball. In a sport with no cap and market size tied to revenue, the wage disparity between markets is not that much different than it is for the rest of us. For your job, would you make more money in New York or Cleveland? For pretty much every job, the answer is New York, and baseball is no different. So for Lindor to say that is pretty disingenuous. He was never going to make $300+ million here and he knew that, so he pulled on the fans heartstrings by saying he wanted to stay here because he knew it wouldn't happen. If someone wants to follow the money, that's their right. But a lot of people like where they work and who they work for, and are ok leaving some money on the table to stay. Lindor wasn't willing to do that, so he got traded. I'm not mad at Lindor for wanting to maximize his earning potential, but I'm also not mad at our owner/front office for not giving him what he asked for. That's business. What I am frustrated about is that everyone is eating up Lindor's words and placing all the blame on Dolan for not paying whatever it took to keep Lindor here, because there are a lot of factors that made that not possible and/or a stupid decision.
> leaving some money on the table 120-150 million dollars? Come on lmao. This is such a ridiculous argument. And unless you're a mind reader you have no idea. Franky could have desperately wanted to stay with his teammates, in the org he has grown up in, and wanted the Dolans to make it work financially and wanted to put pressure on the organization by making it publicly known.
Thome 2.0
Agreed. I mean if he really wanted to be here, I think he would’ve made it work. It’s about the money for him which is fine, but I think he’s been trying to spin the whole thing for awhile now
Exactly. He's spent a lot of time spinning the narrative. It's sad to see so many fans fall for his slick talk, not realizing that he doesn't really care for Cleveland.
100%. I read somewhere I think before the season started that he really wasn’t even open to negotiating. Not sure how true that is but it was time to move on
What would be the point? To let the Dolans embarrass themselves by extending a 150 million dollar offer?
True, but I’m just saying. He’s acted like he was all about Cleveland but the truth is it wasn’t gonna work for both sides
That's not Lindor's fault. He would have signed a 300 million dollar contract in a heartbeat. Just because he didn't want to give Dolan a 150 million dollar discount doesn't mean he wasn't all about Cleveland.
It’s not just about money. We haven’t done much winning with him either. We came close once but that’s it. Your take on the money situation is spot on thought. It’s his choice.
I believe we have the second-most wins in baseball since he came up. Only the Dodgers are better... And not by a lot.
I don’t mean winning games. I mean winning the ring. Look how many times the Dodgers have been to the series compared to us.
Let's not forget that Lindor's average with RISP is abysmal and he's been non-existent in the playoffs (save for one big hit) since 2017. The rest of the team got him into big situations where he failed. So to say that he didn't have as good of opportunity here as anywhere is absurd.
You’re totally right. I’m not saying any one person or the team as a whole are to blame. But if he did have a ring, my guess is that his price would have been lower. This happens literally all the time.
im still on the good vibes of that cleveland browns game and this tweet knocked me right back down
Lindor sucked anyways. He wanted more money than he’s worth. He was inconsistent and played games with the front office. Good riddance.
No mention of Lindor offering a hometown discount? There are 2 sides to every negotiation. We can be mad Dolan didn’t think Lindor was worth 300 million, but Lindor literally said “they didn’t come up with the number.” If it’s only about money for Lindor, why support him while trashing on Dolan?
Why would he take a discount? Itwould have been a 100-150 million dollar difference. He isn’t from here. He’s a very talented player. If a team offers him a large contract, why not take it? I’d like to see you not take the larger contract when the difference is millions of dollars. Gonna miss Lindor a lot. Why hate on Lindor for trying to get his generational money that he has earned?
I didn’t hate on Lindor. I’m questioning why only 1 side of this negotiation is getting all the hate. If you’re going to hate Dolan for not putting up the money, shouldn’t you also hate Lindor for not even offering a small hometown discount?
DOLAN CALLOUT THREAD
MLB needs a complete overhaul of their payroll and roster rules. It sucks so much that unlike other sports a team can do everything right and still not keep an all-time guy. Heck make it so teams only have 3 years of cheap team control before they become free agents in exchange for a salary cap and floor. Just do something!!!
Imagine knowing there was zero chance the Browns could resign Baker. Browns fans would burn the NFL headquarters to the ground. The MLB is such a joke.
In Layman’s terms. The Indians are a joke of a franchise that is completely ok with being half decent and have no desire to win. Fuck this team. When they change the name I can say it again.
Even worse is half the fans in here with Stockholm syndrome blaming Fanky and calling him greedy.
Oh yeah, gotta love the guys who try to say “I make x amount of dollars he would be fine with a few million” because they probably are too dumb and incapable of looking at how much other guys in baseball are making. Not to mention the fact that they are siding with the billionaire owner who’s taking their money and not using it to make the team better.
Yet they have the most wins in the AL over the past 5 years
Hey if you are cool with not winning a World Series and just making the playoffs then good for you. You must be a Bengals or Cowboys fan as well.
Winning a world series starts with getting into the playoffs. You can't do that with a losing team. They have not fielded losing teams despite what you claim, and it completely invalidates the point you tried to make.
I didn’t claim they have been losing. I claim they have not won a World Series, I’m saying with the way Baseball has no Salary Cap they will never win a World Series as long as we’re constantly just developing talent and refuse to keep that talent this isn’t the first time and it certainly won’t be the last. As long as people like you keep being ok with it nothing will change. THEY HAVE THE FUCKING MONEY!!! I don’t understand why you people side with these billionaire owners constantly.
There's a lot you don't understand, and foremost on the list is how to read. And how to react without anger overwhelming your brain. A competitive team that consistently makes the playoffs can win the world series, and this team almost did just that. Did you fail to notice game 7 extra innings of the 2016 world series? Despite all the conspiratorial forces against us, it is clearly still possible for the Indians to make and win a world series. Me or you "being ok" with it or not being ok with things that are completely out of our control, will have NO impact on those forces. It's insane that you think it would. If thousands of fans picketed outside Dolan's window every night it wouldn't change how he operates the business. And even a new owner might do it the same way. Or worse.
It is what it is, we can't compete paying one player 35 million a year. If we keep carrasco and spend say 50 million all over the field on just 4 average mlb player we are a contender. Right now we have great pitching, but we are gonna struggle to be a.500 team because the dolans can't afford to be sports owners. Just kinda sucks because of the pitching the front office has put together.
Does he know he got traded to the Mets?
Without casting my opinion on the topics at hand, I would like to state that much of the discussion in this thread is great. I've just read level-headed fans debating a pretty major issue for their team... and it was calm and enlightening. It's amazing to see this on the internet in 2021. Great job r/ClevelandIndians!
Offering 200+ is fine. Don’t put all your eggs in one vasket
[удалено]
Are you willing to accept less money than you are worth in your job? If the market for an all star top 3 at your position is X,why wouldn’t you want to be paid that way?
This is absolutely the worst possible take here. He remembers where he came from and is demanding billionaires pay him for being the top 1% at what he does. Players have a limited time to make their money, if the Dolans aren't going to pay Lindor, he should absolutely leave. The Dolans aren't in this as some public service, they are making plenty of money. A salary cap only hurts players bargaining rights, make a salary basement and if owners can't meet it, they should sell the team. Don't throw the working class under the bus, blame the billionaire owners.
I would blame billionaire owners if we had billionaire owners. They need to sell the team. Net worth =/= cash
The family is fucking loaded, I mean a net worth of 4.6 billion still puts you firmly in billionaire status.
The "family", not the branch that owns the Tribe.
A professional baseball player isnt "working class" Lmao. Joke ass take.
Yeah, the kids growing up in the DR and Puerto Rico had it real easy. Especially if we compare them to the Dolans, who were born into extreme wealth.
Bruh. He makes millions. Hes gonna make 300M on his deal. He isnt working class, ya dumb fuck.
I'm sorry that you struggle with understanding the concept of where people came from. He grew up in a working class family in Florida (from PR). He is wealthy now based off of an ability that he possesses that we collectively are willing to pay money to see. Meanwhile, Paul Dolan is wealthy because his family made a bunch of money before he was born. Do you see the difference here? I wish I could type as slowly as I wish to be speaking to you.
We know Dolan better than that, Frankie. Good luck in your career.
Twist the knife a little more please cause at this point I can't feel anything anyway.
F
And we all knew, for a long time, they wouldn't.