Sunday, December 04, 2005

Doesn’t Everyone Like Money?

The more I think about it, the more I don’t blame Furcal for taking the highest per season offer. If someone offers you $3 million more per year than anyone else, then why not choose to sign with them. But signing with the Dodgers at this point in the off-season is a bit surprising. Surprising because of the uncertainty surrounding the Dodgers organization with a new GM and a vacancy at the Manager position and the way in which the former Manager and GM were dismissed. With the Braves or Cubs, you know you're going to play for Bobby Cox or Dusty Baker, and you know who all the coaches are, but the Dodgers haven’t hired a manager and they just hired a new GM two weeks ago. A former front-office employee puts it this way:

“Every time I see some of the decisions being made or some of the people that have been fired or some of the people that were brought into positions who have never spent one hour in baseball, I want to throw up.”

Frank McCourt must have done one hell of a sell job in convincing Furcal that the Dodgers were the place for him in spite of all the uncertainty and turmoil. I wonder if Furcal and his agent really took enough time to make this decision after meeting with the Dodgers’ delegation (which included fellow Dominican Manny Mota) last Thursday. Here is his agent’s take on the meeting:

“Frank McCourt was really impressive. Raffy really liked what he had to say. They want to turn their franchise around, and Frank McCourt has a real passion for the game. Raffy was really impressed.”

This reminds me of the meeting that Tom Hicks had with A-Rod in which the owner made the sell based on the notion of turning the franchise around. For Raffy’s sake let’s hope McCourt keeps promises better than Hicks. Let’s hope that Raffy can co-exist in the same clubhouse as Jeff Kent and Milton Bradley, a far different atmosphere from the Braves’ clubhouse. And, as Baseball Musings points out, let’s hope that Furcal can figure out how to hit at Dodger Stadium.

1 Comments:

At 8:54 AM, Blogger Steven said...

Great points, but the thing that bugs me so much about the whole situation is Furcal's insistance on playing "in the right situation...yadda, yadda, yadda"- and then he signs with the Dodgers. The organization is in a jumbled mess, there's no manager, and nothing special about the roster. After playing for Bobby Cox and winning year after year, Furcal's in for some serious culture shock. Even in Chicago, he'd at least have had the luxury of playing at Wrigley in front of their fans.

 

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