Honestly, I think the "build it up for a run and tear it down" method of team ownership is probably the most efficient in terms of putting your team in a position to take a shot at the championship every few years. JUst because the fans don't like it doesn't mean it's a bad idea.

Yea well it's kind of important to give the fans something to hold on to

 

I know, I just wish the fans would understand that there's a reasoning and a method behind the madness besides "omgomgomgomg loria hates teh baseballs and only loves moniez". I mean, yeah it sucks having to deal with a couple of crappy seasons after the world series, but it's worth it if you don't have to wait another 80 years for one.

Even for the fans that understand what's going on like myself, I absolutely hate firesales of any sort and I loathe the day when Cabs' nears free agency

 

I also loathe the day Cabs reaches free agency just because there's no way we get equal value for him. But I have no problem trading away Dontrelle, even though he's the face of our franchise. We should keep the good young players and trade the overvalued ones.

 

Trading away Dontrelle would be seen as a "mini firesale" but it would make us a better team now and in the future.

Oh noez. Dey iz traiding cabz. I doesn't likes it when we traids away cabs.

 

 

EDIT: In case you didn't gather why I wrote this, I'll explain. You frequently trivialize other posters' reasoning when you don't share it. JonDigital has a very valid point, yet you mock him. One could easily make the argument that not signing Cabrera is the smart business move for Loria, but you don't want to see him traded away. The structure of the Dolphins Stadium lease makes it virtually impossible for him to make money with a payroll over $35 Million (supposedly). If you mock people for not liking how Loria prioritizes profit over competitiveness, then you have no room to be upset when they don't sign Cabrera to a long term contract.

We just need a new owner, one who can stomach less profit. Dont be mistaken, Loria, due to revenue sharing, is making $$ hand over fist every year. But little if any gets put back into the team.

Honestly, I think the "build it up for a run and tear it down" method of team ownership is probably the most efficient in terms of putting your team in a position to take a shot at the championship every few years. JUst because the fans don't like it doesn't mean it's a bad idea.

Yea well it's kind of important to give the fans something to hold on to

 

I know, I just wish the fans would understand that there's a reasoning and a method behind the madness besides "omgomgomgomg loria hates teh baseballs and only loves moniez". I mean, yeah it sucks having to deal with a couple of crappy seasons after the world series, but it's worth it if you don't have to wait another 80 years for one.

Even for the fans that understand what's going on like myself, I absolutely hate firesales of any sort and I loathe the day when Cabs' nears free agency

 

I also loathe the day Cabs reaches free agency just because there's no way we get equal value for him. But I have no problem trading away Dontrelle, even though he's the face of our franchise. We should keep the good young players and trade the overvalued ones.

 

Trading away Dontrelle would be seen as a "mini firesale" but it would make us a better team now and in the future.

Oh noez. Dey iz traiding cabz. I doesn't likes it when we traids away cabs.

 

 

EDIT: In case you didn't gather why I wrote this, I'll explain. You frequently trivialize other posters' reasoning when you don't share it. JonDigital has a very valid point, yet you mock him. One could easily make the argument that not signing Cabrera is the smart business move for Loria, but you don't want to see him traded away. The structure of the Dolphins Stadium lease makes it virtually impossible for him to make money with a payroll over $35 Million (supposedly). If you mock people for not liking how Loria prioritizes profit over competitiveness, then you have no room to be upset when they don't sign Cabrera to a long term contract.

 

When did I mock JonDigital in this thread? I'm assuming you mean my "omgomgomgomg..." post. That wasn't aimed at anyone. Calm down.

 

The reason I don't want to see us trade Cabrera is because we probably can't get equal value for him. He is a 20 million dollar a year player making like 8 million, 12 and 15 over the next three years. That has a lot of value to a small market team, and I'm not sure any package of prospects, short of any team's top 5 is going to be enough to make up for Cabrera's on the field value relative to his cost.

 

Though, looking at it from the baseball side, if we could get 2 pitchers who could step up right now and be a 1 and 3 in the rotation, along with another positional prospect, I'd probably be ok with trading Cabrera. But since we wouldn't be able to get that kind of package from anyone, it's hard to justify it.

 

And for the record, I would prefer if we could keep our team together instead of doing a firesale, but with our current situation (the Dolphins Stadium Lease, the lack of revenue, a cheap owner), it is the best business model for us, in terms of remaining relevant in the league and building up a cheap talented team.

Honestly, I think the "build it up for a run and tear it down" method of team ownership is probably the most efficient in terms of putting your team in a position to take a shot at the championship every few years. JUst because the fans don't like it doesn't mean it's a bad idea.

Yea well it's kind of important to give the fans something to hold on to

 

I know, I just wish the fans would understand that there's a reasoning and a method behind the madness besides "omgomgomgomg loria hates teh baseballs and only loves moniez". I mean, yeah it sucks having to deal with a couple of crappy seasons after the world series, but it's worth it if you don't have to wait another 80 years for one.

Even for the fans that understand what's going on like myself, I absolutely hate firesales of any sort and I loathe the day when Cabs' nears free agency

 

I also loathe the day Cabs reaches free agency just because there's no way we get equal value for him. But I have no problem trading away Dontrelle, even though he's the face of our franchise. We should keep the good young players and trade the overvalued ones.

 

Trading away Dontrelle would be seen as a "mini firesale" but it would make us a better team now and in the future.

Oh noez. Dey iz traiding cabz. I doesn't likes it when we traids away cabs.

 

 

EDIT: In case you didn't gather why I wrote this, I'll explain. You frequently trivialize other posters' reasoning when you don't share it. JonDigital has a very valid point, yet you mock him. One could easily make the argument that not signing Cabrera is the smart business move for Loria, but you don't want to see him traded away. The structure of the Dolphins Stadium lease makes it virtually impossible for him to make money with a payroll over $35 Million (supposedly). If you mock people for not liking how Loria prioritizes profit over competitiveness, then you have no room to be upset when they don't sign Cabrera to a long term contract.

 

When did I mock JonDigital in this thread? I'm assuming you mean my "omgomgomgomg..." post. That wasn't aimed at anyone. Calm down.

 

The reason I don't want to see us trade Cabrera is because we probably can't get equal value for him. He is a 20 million dollar a year player making like 8 million, 12 and 15 over the next three years. That has a lot of value to a small market team, and I'm not sure any package of prospects, short of any team's top 5 is going to be enough to make up for Cabrera's on the field value relative to his cost.

 

Though, looking at it from the baseball side, if we could get 2 pitchers who could step up right now and be a 1 and 3 in the rotation, along with another positional prospect, I'd probably be ok with trading Cabrera. But since we wouldn't be able to get that kind of package from anyone, it's hard to justify it.

 

And for the record, I would prefer if we could keep our team together instead of doing a firesale, but with our current situation (the Dolphins Stadium Lease, the lack of revenue, a cheap owner), it is the best business model for us, in terms of remaining relevant in the league and building up a cheap talented team.

I don't care who or what we get, nothing will come close to how much Cabrera is worth. I don't care if we were offered something like Verlander, Andrew Miller and some other prospect. You do not trade this kind of once in a generation talent.

 

Anything short of a new stadium in exchange for Cabrera would simply be a steal.

As frustrating as it may be for a fan base to see its talent shipped out to other ball clubs, the Marlins front office is probably one of the organizations whose strategy best approaches an optimal strategy from the perspective of economic efficiency. I actually did a study last semester on the free agent market, and the results that came out really demonstrated how smart our front office is even though I didn't even have the Marlins in mind when I began the study. If anyone's interested, I can delve into it a little more later. (The statistics and concepts are easier to comprehend than the OPS analysis I did yesterday)

 

As fans, we're very eager for our team to sign our favorite players to long-term deals so that we can have the peace of mind that they won't be going anywhere anytime soon, especially with the past experiences that are unique to Marlins fans. However, let's consider certain things before we jump on the front office for not getting these things done. Our team has expressed a commitment to the idea that they're willing to pay more for performance in exchange for not being on the hook for players underperforming their contracts. After 2004, Dontrelle looked like a franchise type player, and many people said that he, along with Cabrera, needed to get signed to long term deals before their asking prices went any higher. Isn't it safe to say that our front office made the right move by not getting Dontrelle locked in to a long-term deal given his performance this season and in 2006? Additionally, the ownership made a decision in the interest of the fans by getting Mike Lowell to sign an extension with us. He too underperformed and we had to include picking up his contract in deals we were trying to make to trade Beckett. The ONLY players that I feel the front office should be willing to deviate from this principle for is Miguel and Hanley because their talent is best-at-their-position, unprecedented, truly unique talent and there's almost no possible way you can equal value from a trade. In all other cases, I think the smart move is to get young talent that can adequately substitute those roles at a much lower price and let some other team overpay for talent.

 

Moreover, I think that the Marlins are forced into being more cautious than other teams because of their financial situation. Suppose you're a middle-income individual whose investing $20,000 (let's say it's 1/3 of your yearly income). If that investment doesn't pan out, it's a really big hit on you. Now, suppose you're a millionaire and you make the same $20,000 investment. If it doesn't pan out, you're still upset but you're also far more likely to exclaim "Oh well. Sh*t happens. Cost of doing business." Mistakes are far costlier to us as an organization than say the Yankess. Can you imagine how far back we would've been set if we had signed a guy like Pavano to a long-term deal? The Yankees barely batted an eye before dropping million on other talent to replace the performance they expected to get out of him. We would've been royally screwed.

 

I'm not in the camp that believes its reasonable for fans to expect their team to operate at a loss, which seems to be a prevailing opinion among a lot of people on this board even if it's not explicitly stated. Now, how much money this team can spend on payroll while still making a profit once revenue sharing and other factors are thrown in is debatable. I happen to think that we have a tendency to focus solely on our big league payroll when judging how much we need to spend in order to operate a ball club. While our existing payroll may be lower than revenues, there's still the matter of front office salaries, minor league systems, signing bonuses for draftees, international scouting, and other expenses that we don't immediately think of when factoring in how "cheap" our owner may be. I'm not personally informed enough about these things to know how much they cost to run, but I'd like to give our ownership the benefit of the doubt when Loria essentially lost millions of dollars to subsidize our entertainment in 2004 and 2005.

CrimsonCane, I'd like to see the results of the owner study.

Honestly, I think the "build it up for a run and tear it down" method of team ownership is probably the most efficient in terms of putting your team in a position to take a shot at the championship every few years. JUst because the fans don't like it doesn't mean it's a bad idea.

Yea well it's kind of important to give the fans something to hold on to

 

I know, I just wish the fans would understand that there's a reasoning and a method behind the madness besides "omgomgomgomg loria hates teh baseballs and only loves moniez". I mean, yeah it sucks having to deal with a couple of crappy seasons after the world series, but it's worth it if you don't have to wait another 80 years for one.

Even for the fans that understand what's going on like myself, I absolutely hate firesales of any sort and I loathe the day when Cabs' nears free agency

 

I also loathe the day Cabs reaches free agency just because there's no way we get equal value for him. But I have no problem trading away Dontrelle, even though he's the face of our franchise. We should keep the good young players and trade the overvalued ones.

 

Trading away Dontrelle would be seen as a "mini firesale" but it would make us a better team now and in the future.

Oh noez. Dey iz traiding cabz. I doesn't likes it when we traids away cabs.

 

 

EDIT: In case you didn't gather why I wrote this, I'll explain. You frequently trivialize other posters' reasoning when you don't share it. JonDigital has a very valid point, yet you mock him. One could easily make the argument that not signing Cabrera is the smart business move for Loria, but you don't want to see him traded away. The structure of the Dolphins Stadium lease makes it virtually impossible for him to make money with a payroll over $35 Million (supposedly). If you mock people for not liking how Loria prioritizes profit over competitiveness, then you have no room to be upset when they don't sign Cabrera to a long term contract.

 

When did I mock JonDigital in this thread?

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

 

Yeah, I didn't think we'd had any problems since that one night on the game thread. I thought that was odd.

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

 

Yeah, I didn't think we'd had any problems since that one night on the game thread. I thought that was odd.

Since you meant no rancur, I withdraw my statement. You win this time Bob, but I'll get you yet!

 

*shakes fist*

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

 

Yeah, I didn't think we'd had any problems since that one night on the game thread. I thought that was odd.

Water under the bridge man. Your a cool cat

I try.

 

But all this niceness is getting old. Somebody call somebody a douchebag, quick!

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

 

Yeah, I didn't think we'd had any problems since that one night on the game thread. I thought that was odd.

Water under the bridge man. Your a cool cat

 

YOU'RE

 

douchebag

 

:mad

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

 

Yeah, I didn't think we'd had any problems since that one night on the game thread. I thought that was odd.

Water under the bridge man. Your a cool cat

 

YOU'RE

 

douchebag

 

:mad

Damn!!!!!! You can't hide from the Festa. Sneaky little bastard.

So now if Bob tells you to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge, you'll do that too? You're the douchebag, Festa. You're the douchebag.

Just for the record I never thought you mocked me. I've learned to have rubber skin on this board. I'm actually getting used to you bob

 

Yeah, I didn't think we'd had any problems since that one night on the game thread. I thought that was odd.

Water under the bridge man. Your a cool cat

 

YOU'RE

 

douchebag

 

:mad

Damn!!!!!! You can't hide from the Festa. Sneaky little bastard.

 

:mad :mad :mad :mad :mad :mad :mad :mad :mad

 

:mischief

 

:lol

Dude, Festa lives in like Wyoming or something. Why would I tell him to jump off the Brooklyn bridge.

Dude, Festa lives in like Wyoming or something. Why would I tell him to jump off the Brooklyn bridge.

 

More like Canada!

Dude, Festa lives in like Wyoming or something. Why would I tell him to jump off the Brooklyn bridge.

 

More like Canada!

isn't that a suburb of Wyoming?

Dude, Festa lives in like Wyoming or something. Why would I tell him to jump off the Brooklyn bridge.

 

More like Canada!

isn't that a suburb of Wyoming?

 

I was joking. Wyoming isn't even a real place.

Dude, Festa lives in like Wyoming or something. Why would I tell him to jump off the Brooklyn bridge.

 

More like Canada!

isn't that a suburb of Wyoming?

 

Don't tell them that. Canada has a whole inferiority complex. They see themselves as completely independent of Wyoming. It's like Germany and Nigeria.

CrimsonCane, I'd like to see the results of the owner study.

 

I'll see if I can get something up tomorrow. The info and write-up are somewhere on my computer, but it'll take some time to synthesize the information into a readable post for a thread. For some idea of what I'm talking about, you can check out my first clumsy attempt at trying to explain what I did here: http://www.marlinbaseball.com/forums/index...t&p=1418023

The team needs a whole new image lets get away from the teal and change the team logo...lets move our triple A team to the florida area...I don't know maybe to Fi Lauderdale or even Orlando

The team needs a whole new image lets get away from the teal and change the team logo...lets move our triple A team to the florida area...I don't know maybe to Fi Lauderdale or even Orlando

 

The Orioles and Braves might object to just spontaneously moving into Orlando and Lauderdale.

I've never posted before. I do lurk all the time and read some interesting stuff in my daily trips here. Whether they win or lose I never fail to find something I haven't considered yet. Please excuse me but I don't know how to exactly use the features of this site so I'm sort of responding to some of the things I read. Not to anyone in particular really.

 

To me, trading Miggy is totally different from trading Mike Lowell, Derrek Lee, even Dontrelle. Although I think if they were gonna trade Willis, they missed their best window of opportunity. Yes those guys were important players and had strong ties to the community. But with Miguel we're looking at a once in a lifetime player here. I cannot imagine anyone that has the best interest of the franchise in mind would trade Miguel Cabrera at this stage in his career. No matter the money situation. Unless it's for a package of players that is so astounding it knocks you on your rear. Even then I'm not sure. Unless I'm really off base or he becomes Doc Gooden, he will be a HOFer. Even better, the guy is just starting to figure out stuff. Look at what he accomplished on ability alone and look at the past couple of seasons as he's gotten more at bats under his belt. I watch him hit and I'm in awe of what he can do. Yeah he's overweight but I was listening to Tony Gwynn the other day and he said he got better as a hitter as he got heavier because his hitting base/center of gravity became more solid. That made him much more balanced and less susceptible to slumps. It makes sense when you think about it. Besides, how could you argue with Tony Gwynn on hitting? Now I'm not sitting here thinking he should become the Florida version of Prince Fielder. Believe me I would much rather see him about twenty pounds lighter. For defensive purposes alone. But you cannot argue with the results. Growing up I always heard this. If you can hit, they'll find a place for you in the field. That was also before the DH. Yeah, I?m dating myself. The problem with the way I think on this subject is it doesn't matter what I think. No matter how much I convince myself of it's logic. They are going to trade him anyway and the Yankees, or the Red Sox, or the Mets (God forbid) will get the best years of his career.

 

There's something else I've been thinking about. Especially in the past couple of weeks. The fact that Hanley is doing what he is doing right now only gives Loria the crack he needs to trade Cabrera. Hanley's amazing success somehow diminishes Miggy's accomplishments. It cheapens the "once in a lifetime player" statement I made above. Not in my mind but possibly in Loria's. I won't even get into the thought process of our beloved club President. If you think about it there could be the opinion in the front office that it would be okay to trade Miguel because we always have Hanley. As scary as that may sound.

 

As far as the Marlins being unrecognizable, I'm not so sure about that. I do know they sure have had quite an interesting and eventful fifteen years. The Rockies came in at the same time. Compare the histories. They don't come close to the buzz the Marlins have injected into baseball history. Two titles, two fire sales, well one and a half. To my knowledge the only team to have an All-Star game taken away. Three owners, all a detriment to the franchises existence for one reason or another and yet all had a hand in the two titles. Two seasons of threatened contraction, eight managers (if you don't count Cookie Rojas one game) with nine managerial stints, firing a rookie manager of the year without giving him another season, the ballpark issue from Blockbuster Park to the Governor on opening day through the annual sales tax defeats the last few years. It just seems like an unending roller coaster ride. One that, for many reasons make me debate my sanity. Still, I don't ever want to get off no matter how much the people that run this franchise try muck it up. Just call me a masochist I guess.

I've never posted before. I do lurk all the time and read some interesting stuff in my daily trips here. Whether they win or lose I never fail to find something I haven't considered yet. Please excuse me but I don't know how to exactly use the features of this site so I'm sort of responding to some of the things I read. Not to anyone in particular really.

 

To me, trading Miggy is totally different from trading Mike Lowell, Derrek Lee, even Dontrelle. Although I think if they were gonna trade Willis, they missed their best window of opportunity. Yes those guys were important players and had strong ties to the community. But with Miguel we're looking at a once in a lifetime player here. I cannot imagine anyone that has the best interest of the franchise in mind would trade Miguel Cabrera at this stage in his career. No matter the money situation. Unless it's for a package of players that is so astounding it knocks you on your rear. Even then I'm not sure. Unless I'm really off base or he becomes Doc Gooden, he will be a HOFer. Even better, the guy is just starting to figure out stuff. Look at what he accomplished on ability alone and look at the past couple of seasons as he's gotten more at bats under his belt. I watch him hit and I'm in awe of what he can do. Yeah he's overweight but I was listening to Tony Gwynn the other day and he said he got better as a hitter as he got heavier because his hitting base/center of gravity became more solid. That made him much more balanced and less susceptible to slumps. It makes sense when you think about it. Besides, how could you argue with Tony Gwynn on hitting? Now I'm not sitting here thinking he should become the Florida version of Prince Fielder. Believe me I would much rather see him about twenty pounds lighter. For defensive purposes alone. But you cannot argue with the results. Growing up I always heard this. If you can hit, they'll find a place for you in the field. That was also before the DH. Yeah, I’m dating myself. The problem with the way I think on this subject is it doesn't matter what I think. No matter how much I convince myself of it's logic. They are going to trade him anyway and the Yankees, or the Red Sox, or the Mets (God forbid) will get the best years of his career.

 

There's something else I've been thinking about. Especially in the past couple of weeks. The fact that Hanley is doing what he is doing right now only gives Loria the crack he needs to trade Cabrera. Hanley's amazing success somehow diminishes Miggy's accomplishments. It cheapens the "once in a lifetime player" statement I made above. Not in my mind but possibly in Loria's. I won't even get into the thought process of our beloved club President. If you think about it there could be the opinion in the front office that it would be okay to trade Miguel because we always have Hanley. As scary as that may sound.

 

As far as the Marlins being unrecognizable, I'm not so sure about that. I do know they sure have had quite an interesting and eventful fifteen years. The Rockies came in at the same time. Compare the histories. They don't come close to the buzz the Marlins have injected into baseball history. Two titles, two fire sales, well one and a half. To my knowledge the only team to have an All-Star game taken away. Three owners, all a detriment to the franchises existence for one reason or another and yet all had a hand in the two titles. Two seasons of threatened contraction, eight managers (if you don't count Cookie Rojas one game) with nine managerial stints, firing a rookie manager of the year without giving him another season, the ballpark issue from Blockbuster Park to the Governor on opening day through the annual sales tax defeats the last few years. It just seems like an unending roller coaster ride. One that, for many reasons make me debate my sanity. Still, I don't ever want to get off no matter how much the people that run this franchise try muck it up. Just call me a masochist I guess.

 

Thanks for posting. Have you been lurking for 5 years?

 

Anyway, I think Ramp summerized it best. The fans need something to hold on too. My original post expanded this not only talking about players, although thats the biggest piece, but location, and themes (AKA your screen name). The constant roller coaster is the problem in my opinion. The only constant in life is change, but who says that applies to sports. Right now the team is known if anything, for not having anything stick. Imagine if after the yankees won a few titles in the twenties, they gutted ruth and gherig and plyers like em every half decade. Changed out managers. You see that white and navy blue on the crossing NY cap the entire world knows its the yankees, its right up there with Coca Cola on the most recognized symbols, what if they changed even that every 5 years.

 

When i think of Cabrera i think of Arod. Texas would surround him with a winning team. Heres a star attracting. come see him soar and the team finish in last. Eventually he does for a whole lot of money and more prospects. Just look at yesterday. Literally GAVE away one of 3 starters that has been somewhat consistant. Maximize profits, becausebaseball is a business, i know. But it all goes into the same point.

 

Right now this teams identity is Train and Cabs. Everyone her seems to have accepted Willis going. Which leaves us like the rangers. Here is our \attraction, he cn do anything. See him in florida while you can. If he goes, HanRam get the star treatment and goes the same way.

 

Something about the team needs to be solidified. We need some consistancy as a franchise.