Rays of Light

Shouse’s deal

The details of Brian Shouse’s deal were omitted from my post earlier today. I’ll let Marc Lancaster provide the info…

At long last, the Rays have officially added Brian Shouse to their bullpen on a one-year deal with a club option for 2010.

Shouse will make $1.35 million this season, and the option is at $1.9 million with a $200,000 buyout.

My gut reaction is that this is another solid deal by the Rays’ front office. I would suspect that the Rays didn’t really expect to add a player like Shouse a couple of weeks ago, but as the market for free agents kept going south, Andrew Friedman probably kept his toes in the water and when he saw a chance to get an above-average player at a good price, he couldn’t turn it down. This was about giving Joe Maddon the best opportunity to win games that he could.

I do think that the addition of nearly $2 million in payroll might also indicate that the front office believes it might be able to deal away some salary before the season starts (or soon after). Where’s that salary going to come from? You’ve got me. Dan Wheeler is still sitting out there, and there are a lot of GMs that might take that plunge if they feel desperate while looking at their bullpens after the exhibition season begins.

Tags: Andrew Friedman, Brian Shouse, Dan Wheeler
Posted in Transactions | 4 Comments »

Sternberg for MVP

Well, he gets my vote.

Gary Shelton has a pretty good article in the St. Pete Times today about this very thing, calling Sternberg the team’s MVP for opening up the checkbook to help make this the Rays’ most impressive offseason ever. (St. Pete Times)

They have been active, they have been bold, they have been thoughtful. And yes, they have been willing to spend. And just like that, they suddenly look like a team that is about this year, not about some year to be named later.

The Rays’ offseason got even better Wednesday when they signed pitcher James Shields to a seven-year contract. Couple that with the Carlos Pena signing, with the Scott Kazmir signing, with the Troy Percival signing, with the Cliff Floyd signing, with the trade for Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett, and it feels as if the Rays have started something.

“I think we get an A-plus,” Sternberg said by phone. “This is the first offseason I’ve had some real fun with it. When I say fun, I mean enjoyment, gratification. We got answers to questions as opposed to replacing questions with new question marks. I feel very good about our team.”

Can you really argue on this point? Maybe the Rays haven’t improved enough to contend for the division or even the Wild Card this season (keep in mind that it would take somewhere around a 30-game swing to put the Rays as serious contenders), but it’s clear that the plan is working. Gone are the days where people only came to the Rays to get state income tax breaks and a low-pressure place to play. The Rays are actually turning into a destination now; people actually want to come – and stay – here! Do you think a guy like Troy Percival would have come down here at this point in his career if he didn’t feel like he had at least a chance to pitch for a winner? Would Jamie Shields or Carlos Pena signed those contracts if they didn’t think they would be able to win at some point over the life of the deal? Don’t underestimate the power of the athlete who wants to win, and though much of it certainly comes from a certain comfort level in Tampa Bay that you won’t find in New York, Boston, or Philadelphia, Sternberg, Andrew Friedman, and company deserve a lot of credit for putting resources into the right places to turn this franchise around.

There are very few tangible effects that putting money into scouting and development will show early on – which, Sternberg says, the team has been doing all along – but within the next few seasons, you will begin to see the fruits of those labors as the products of the league’s top-ranked farm system begin graduating to the big leagues. It’s certainly not a model that works for everyone (could you imagine the Mets trying to rebuild from scratch?), and many teams never get it right (Nationals/Expos, Rangers, et al), but it looks like we’ve got a group that has gotten it right

I just re-read this whole thing that I wrote, and it sounds like I’m butt-kissing to try and get a job in the front office.

Is there a single person that reads this site that’s unhappy about the current direction of the team or the job that the management group has done? I’m seriously interested in hearing what you have to say and why you are still unhappy. I think it would make for an interesting debate.

Tags: Andrew Friedman, Stu Sternberg
Posted in General | 6 Comments »

Lunch Break – 1/18/08

I got a FANTASTIC question in my email yesterday for the Lunch Break today. Remember, send in your questions (you know, like a mailbag) or your discussion topics to scottcaruso@gmail.com and I’ll make sure that they get posted.

Today’s question comes from Sean, who writes:

I am frustrated with the fact that the Rays officials get so much crap no matter what they do. Vince screwed this franchise hard, on the baseball side of things and in the community.

What is your opinion on what do they ultimately have to do to lose this bad reputation that they have inherited? It is unfair, they have done nothing but good things here and just get so much crap. The reason Kazmir is not signed is because he doesn’t want to sign here. I look at the Rays as being only like 2 years old. When the new guys took over they got a clean slate. I don’t care if this turns into a lunch break I just kinda want you opinion.

I TOTALLY agree with what you said Sean; it IS unfair that the current Rays management keeps getting dumped on as if it is just an extenstion of the previous Rays ownership. Now, I can’t speak for everyone, but it seems to me that people who are actually “in the know” or follow the team regularly don’t have such a problem separating the Naimoli-LaMar regime from the Sternberg-Friedman one. It’s the casual fans – the ones you REALLY need to get on board in order to make money – that don’t know the difference.

That’s because, by their nature, casual fans just don’t know that much about the team. They can’t separate one ownership group from another. As far as they are concerned, it’s just one group that has continued to run the team from the beginning, and all they know is that there haven’t been any winning seasons yet. Is it fair to Andrew Friedman? Absolutely not. I think he has done a FANTASTIC job of building the Rays’ organization into one that is sustainable for future growth and success. In the American League East, where there are other teams that can afford to play up to 5 or 6 times more for players in any given year, the only way to ensure long-term success is to ensure that there is a solid foundation in the minor leagues, in scouting, and in player development. Though that’s something that LaMar never seemed to understand, Friedman definitely gets it and should be commended for the work that he has done.

Unfortunately, the only way that the team is ever going to break that stigma that you were talking about is to start winning ballgames. Once the team becomes a winner, and the national media picks up on the “surprise story of the Tampa Bay Rays,” then that history that you’re talking about will slowly begin to fade away. Until that happens, Stu Sternberg and Andrew Friedman will continue to pay for the sins of those who came before them.

Tags: Andrew Friedman, Chuck LaMar makes me cringe, lunch break, Stu Sternberg, Vince Naimoli
Posted in Discussion | 10 Comments »