Where have my Jets gone?  Has anybody seen them?  Anyone...?

I HATE the Redskins!!!  I HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE, HATE the Redskins!!!  I HATE their stupid, offensive mascot!!!  I HATE their stupid owner!!!  I HATE their coach!!!  I HATE hearing about the Redskins!!!  I HATE hearing about all the "offseason moves" they make - meaning paying exorbitant sums of money for past-their prime players!!!  I HATE the fact that they are the most profitable franchise in US pro sports and they can't put together a winning season!!!  I HATE, HATE, HATE the Redskins!!!

Change your name, please!!!  Get a new owner, please!!!

And NO, I am NOT a Giants, Eagles, or Cowboys supporter.

I prefer "Skins" or "Skinnies" or even "Reds" but I suppose current Congress would ban the last of these.

I remeber last year, Washington vs. Green Bay, the last weekend right before the election.  Traditionally, if the Redskins won that game, the incumbent candidate would win the election.  If the Redskins lost, his opponent would win.

I HAVE NEVER rooted for a team as strongly and as passionately as I rooted for the Packers that game!!!  And I was ecstatic when Green Bay won. 

Needless to say, everything has gone downhill since that time.

BORING!

A Yankee defender.  Ha!

"During that championship run, the Yankees seldom if ever had MLB's highest payroll"

1998: Yankees only had a $73.96M payroll to Baltimore's $74.17M.  In every other year from 1996, the Yankees have had the largest payroll in Major League Baseball.  Most years, the gap has been fairly wide.
And this from a poster who uses the phrase 'complete lack of knowledge' to decry Steinbrenner criticism.


I am constantly amused by Yankees fans that try to claim that their deep financial resources are not directly responsible for their team's success.  It is true that about half of the players from the early years of the 1990s run were from the Yankees' system.  Contrast them with the players who came through the Expos' system: Randy Johnson, Larry Walker, Pedro Martinez (though originally a Dodger), Moises Alou, Marquis Grissom, Vlad Guerrerro, etc.  It's not only being able to develop good talent, which the Yankees were able to do for a while.  It's also about being able to keep that talent when it becomes expensive, which the Yankees can do while teams like the Expos and Royals cannot. 

Watching the Yankees treat the rest of the major league as its own farm system becomes sickening after a while.  Cases in point: ARod, Randy Johnson, Roger Clemens, Jason Giambi, Mike Mussina,...the list goes on and on.  Also, the Yankees have the unique ability to take on an extra $10 million in payroll in the middle of the season, if there's a player they think might help them in the stretch run. 

Let's face it: having the most money matters in baseball.  If MLB wants to continue to lose fan interest relative to other, more balanced sports (most notably the NFL), then they can be happy to ignore how payroll disparity has destroyed competitive balance. 

As the season plays out Redskin fans will realize that the Bears have one of the best defenses in the league. The Redskins and the Bears are mirror images of each other. Great defense with offenses that have potential, but have yet to deliver on the field.

1998: Yankees only had a $73.96M payroll to Baltimore's $74.17M.  In every other year from 1996, the Yankees have had the largest payroll in Major League Baseball.  Most years, the gap has been fairly wide.

And this from a poster who uses the phrase 'complete lack of knowledge' to decry Steinbrenner criticism.

Would $2 million qualify as farily wide? In 2000, the Yankees' payroll was just over $2 million more than the Dodgers' payroll. The Yankees won the World Series that year. The Dodgers didn't make the playoffs. Obviously, payroll was not the only factor in determing how a team would finish the season.

In 1996, the Yankees' payroll was less than $4 million more than the Orioles' payroll. The Yankees won the World Series. The Orioles lost to the Yankees in the ALCS. To argue that the payroll disparity was the critical factor in that outcome would be beyond ludicrous.

I am constantly amused by Yankees fans that try to claim that their deep financial resources are not directly responsible for their team's success.  It is true that about half of the players from the early years of the 1990s run were from the Yankees' system.  Contrast them with the players who came through the Expos' system: Randy Johnson, Larry Walker, Pedro Martinez (though originally a Dodger), Moises Alou, Marquis Grissom, Vlad Guerrerro, etc.  It's not only being able to develop good talent, which the Yankees were able to do for a while.  It's also about being able to keep that talent when it becomes expensive, which the Yankees can do while teams like the Expos and Royals cannot.  

Perhaps you wouldn't be so amused if you knew anything about how the Yankee team of the championship run was constructed.

As as I have pointed out, the homegrown core of Jeter, Willams, Posada, Pettitte, and Rivera did not become Yankees because of their "financial advantages." Trading Roberto Kelly for Paul O'Neill, or Kenny Rogers for Scott Brosuis had nothing to do with money.

I never argued that finances are irrelevant, but in the absence of sound baseball decisions a financial advantage guarantees nothing.

Your point about the Expos is negated by the perennial success of teams like Oakland and Minnesota, that are able to succeed with very small payrolls. Moreover, Montreal could not support a MLB franchise.

The Royals have to take the bitter with the sweet. In the '80s, when the Ewing Kauffman subsidized the teams' operating expenses from his personal fortune, the team used K.C.'s comparatively inexpensive cost of living as a selling point to free agents. Now that they now longer enjoy his largesse, they must suffer for their poor baseball decisions.

Keep in my mind, small market owners insisted on a provision in the latest CBA that would enable them to pocket revenue sharing proceeds rather than a provision that would have compelled them to re-invest them in their teams.

Should the Yankees be penalized because other owners are too selfish to think about their fans? No way. To the contrary, Steinbrenner could similarly pocket more of his team's revenue streams rather than re-invest them to give his fans the best product possible.

It is for precisely that reason that your Snyder/Steinbrenner analogy doesn't pass the laugh test.

I would also note that payroll calculations are sometimes distorted by the fact that the Yankees tend to backload contracts, while the calculations for many seasons include yearly averages for these contracts rather than the precise compensation a player is receiving in any given year.

Also, it's worth to pointing out a pattern that troubles me as a Yankee fan. The Yankees competitive advantage has gone down as their payroll advantage has gone up. As I pointed out earlier, the core of this team was assembled during Steinbrenner's suspension. The sagacious baseball decisions that were made were far more responsible for the championship run than the payroll. As recently as 2000, the Yankees still had one of the best farm systems in MLB. Unfortunately, in recent years George's hubris has negated the advice of the team's best baseball minds.

Those facts only serve to buttress the central point that payroll in the absence of smart baseball decisions is insufficient to build championship teams.

Steinbrenner has presided over a franchise that has succeeded, Snyder has not. That is why the analogy is so inapt.

(btw, Trading A-Rod for Soriano and Arias was the best trade Texas could have hoped to make. Thank you for raising that point. It was Tom Hicks who gave A-Rod that ridiculous contract by bidding against himself. Steinbrenner has rarely broken baseball's salary barriers by grossly overpaying players. To the contrary, he didn't extend Jeter until the market had been set, which ended up costing him $70 million extra dollars.)