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Yes. This. Paying Utley $15m now is ok for the Phils bc they were paying him to be really good when they were contending for and winning the WS. I'm perfectly on overpaying some guys if we get real talent when we have a strong chance of contending. (Note I don't want to be the Phils, SSR brought them up and I've been running with the comparison). Even Upton is questionable to me. Would we want to pay him $15m when he's 31 in 2016? Maybe. Maybe he didn't want to sign knowing we'd suck for a year or two.

Try what?

No. I was being somewhat facetious. I don't really care where we rank in payroll right now. I like the idea of adding bargains and former top prospects and guys coming off injury, etc. You get the inside track to resign them if they pan out or flip them for future value. Whether those players add up to $85m or $102m isn't significant to me at this stage. I think looking purely at revenue from 2 years ago v payroll today is unfair. I don't think we could add $150m to be in the top 2. And spending another $50m to catch the Phillies wasn't going to make us a strong contender and risked saddling us with bad contracts. There's a time when having a bad contract or two to get a top tier player is fine. When you're finishing with maybe 75 wins is not that time. Signing nothing but reclamations and bargains is a good way to ensure your team sucks for a long long time. This kyle imitation is getting scary. Probably time to crawl out of his character before you get stuck that way. I wonder how your posts would look lined up side by side with davearm from November 2011. The 18 months ago selves of you pro-tankers would be slapping the [expletive] out of your current selves. How much money would we have to spend to realistically contend this year? Do we have that money? Who would we spend it on (or should have spent it on)? How would that impact our ability to spend when some of the kids are ready to contribute? What assets could we not add bc we aren't selling off pieces with no future here? The answers to those questions lead me to prefer tanking in 2013 than spending an additional $50m to hope we get a WC. I don't know what exactly my posts said in 2011. I know I have a better idea of how fucked this organization was now than I did when Hendry was running it (and I was very much for firing Hendry well before it happened).

No. I was being somewhat facetious. I don't really care where we rank in payroll right now. I like the idea of adding bargains and former top prospects and guys coming off injury, etc. You get the inside track to resign them if they pan out or flip them for future value. Whether those players add up to $85m or $102m isn't significant to me at this stage. I think looking purely at revenue from 2 years ago v payroll today is unfair. I don't think we could add $150m to be in the top 2. And spending another $50m to catch the Phillies wasn't going to make us a strong contender and risked saddling us with bad contracts. There's a time when having a bad contract or two to get a top tier player is fine. When you're finishing with maybe 75 wins is not that time. Signing nothing but reclamations and bargains is a good way to ensure your team sucks for a long long time. This kyle imitation is getting scary. Probably time to crawl out of his character before you get stuck that way.

No. I was being somewhat facetious. I don't really care where we rank in payroll right now. I like the idea of adding bargains and former top prospects and guys coming off injury, etc. You get the inside track to resign them if they pan out or flip them for future value. Whether those players add up to $85m or $102m isn't significant to me at this stage. I think looking purely at revenue from 2 years ago v payroll today is unfair. I don't think we could add $150m to be in the top 2. And spending another $50m to catch the Phillies wasn't going to make us a strong contender and risked saddling us with bad contracts. There's a time when having a bad contract or two to get a top tier player is fine. When you're finishing with maybe 75 wins is not that time.

Total revenue. It is, however, an estimate because the books are not open. http://www.forbes.com/mlb-valuations/#p_1_s_d5_ Then all this talk about woe is us we can't put up enough ads on our scoreboard and we're getting screwed on tv deals has nothing to do with why we're suddenly a mid-market team. My whole point is that I don't buy that we're #3 in total revenue given those facts. Is our advantage in attendance/ticket prices so great that we're overcoming this huge edge that so many other teams have on us? How badly do you think Forbes [expletive] up the calculation? We're 13th in payroll by BR's estimator These are BR's payroll estimates for opening day: LAD $217.2M NYY $211.6M PHI $157.9M BOS $151.7M LAA $149.6M DET $148.5M SFG $140.0M TEX $121.5M CHW $120.4M TOR $114.8M WSN $111.7M STL $111.7M CHC $102.0M CIN $98.5M NYM $90.0M BAL $88.2M ATL $87.3M SEA $83.9M ARI $83.0M CLE $80.9M KCR $79.3M MIN $78.8M MIL $73.4M COL $73.2M SDP $63.1M PIT $60.8M OAK $60.7M TBR $59.9M MIA $45.5M HOU $25.7M Going to have to explain to me why the difference between Philly and us is greater than the difference between us and everybody but the [expletive] Marlins and the worst MLB team ever assembled. We don't have to pay Ryan Howard $20m? ETA - or Michael Young and Chase Utley $30m combined. I'm 100% ok with saving several million in years that we aren't going to be close. I don't care if we spend $100m or $80m this year. If our payroll is $80m in 2015, then I'll be pissed.

Fans that question Theo aren't eligible for the discount.

Are we getting full price for all those tix? Aren't season tix and partial season tix at something of a discount? Or is that figured into the average?

Look at it this way. When you guys won't have this argument with me, I have to go over to BCB and have it there. Do you really want to put money into Al Yellon's pocket over Tim's? We'll take up a collection to make up the difference.

Disagree with Theo about what? That he should take several years before trying to make the team any good. I'm ok with the plan even if it means being terrible this year and probably even next. I don't think everyone that disagrees is stupid though some people on the other side are being quite ridiculous. I'd rather tank another season and add assets with value after this year than hope to make the playoffs and not add those assets or, worse yet, give up others. I don't want to try to imitate the '06 cardinals.

I wish we'd went after Cherington instead. I think running a baseball team is one of those jobs where you have to be really hungry, and it's hard to maintain that drive after you've already had success. I want someone young and fresh. Epstein doesn't deserve me. No one does

Disagree with Theo about what? Anything. Yes. Anyone that disagrees with Theo about anything is stupid. Is this where you wanted this question to end up?

Agreed. This is such a stupid point of view. You have to be for tanking multiple seasons or you don't deserve the front office that is tanking multiple seasons. Trying to ridicule any fan who has the audacity to want his team not to suck for multi-year stretches. Don't draw such broad conclusions from a simple statement. Kyle doesn't deserve Theo. I haven't made my mind up about you yet.

Disagree with Theo about what?

That isn't a plan, that is a goal. I disagree. The goal is to win the WS in year X (my guess is 2016-ish). The plan is to build an organization capable of contending for a WS on an annual basis (probably beginning in 2015/16) through a number of things, not all of which we're privy to, but some of which seem clear. I don't want to get into the mess of the details but wanted to focus on whether kyle actually believed that the long-term big picture plan was what Theo keeps saying it is. Kyle doesn't believe that and apparently thinks Theo plans to run an elaborate keeper league. Possibly a new level of ridiculousness, I can't keep track, but hopefully it makes it easier to ignore this sort of thing. And if it's not by 2016, and instead is 2022, who cares? Yes Kyle that's exactly what I said

Sure there is. The Marlins and Braves both had a goal of winning a WS in the 90s. They had different plans for doing so. Both were effective. You can argue which was more effective or which is more likely to be effective, I suppose. I know which I prefer for the Cubs.

That isn't a plan, that is a goal. I disagree. The goal is to win the WS in year X (my guess is 2016-ish). The plan is to build an organization capable of contending for a WS on an annual basis (probably beginning in 2015/16) through a number of things, not all of which we're privy to, but some of which seem clear. I don't want to get into the mess of the details but wanted to focus on whether kyle actually believed that the long-term big picture plan was what Theo keeps saying it is. Kyle doesn't believe that and apparently thinks Theo plans to run an elaborate keeper league. Possibly a new level of ridiculousness, I can't keep track, but hopefully it makes it easier to ignore this sort of thing.

I maintain that you don't deserve Theo and should be a Marlins fan.

No it's not. I'm not attempting to gloss over anything. Nor is this a question about the goal. The plan is to build an organization capable of being a strong WS contender every year. That's my strong belief. That it might be 2015 or later before they contend is a matter of timing. You may think the details of the plan are flawed, but I'm asking if you even agree that that's the plan.

You don't believe that the Cubs are trying to build an organizational structure to strongly compete for the WS? I don't care about timeline for the purposes of this question - think of it as near or far in the future as you like.

Probably not. Doesn't seem like the Cubs are. Maybe passively trying. So the plan is to be a strong contender for the WS, just not on your schedule.

yee haw!

Zibby joins the Bears http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/breaking/chi-chicago-bears-tom-zbikowski-20130324,0,3928759.story

It would be NCCF's if he traded a second round pick next year to add Russell Martin to his squad.

@celebrityhottub is just killing it right now on twitter