Let’s Get On With This Already

January 9, 2009 at 8:06 pm | Posted in Manny Ramirez, Ned Colletti, Scott Boras | 16 Comments

Dear Mr. Boras;

I’m writing to you today to inform you that you’ve lost. Oh, don’t get me wrong; you’ve been wildly successful in your career, making millions upon millions in order to fund your army of unholy reverse-vampire orphan children. I commend you on your fine work in that regard, and I hope to serve you in some capacity in the apocolyptic wasteland that you will surely bring upon humanity in the near future. May I suggest a role as headmaster of the new learning facilities which will teach the great unwashed about your pure brilliance, such as the one shown at right? However, today I’m writing in regards to one Manuel Aristides Ramirez, better known as Manny (being Manny).

Now, I know you advised Manny to do whatever it took to get out of Boston so that the Red Sox wouldn’t exercise his clearly unfair dual $20 million team options for 2009 and 2010. “No matter that people will think you’re a douche,” you said. “You get your ass out of there and you feast upon the weaker National League, and rather than having to settle for a puny $40 million, I’ll get you six years and over $100 million, even though you care so little that you routinely stuff your uncashed checks in a box.” Kudos on that plan, because in any other year it might have worked perfectly, especially after the performance Manny put on. Did you know that in no small part to his efforts, my owners were able to buy not one, but two homes in Malibu? Shame about those kids who won’t have fields to play on, though. Looks like you might end up with some new conscripts for that bloodthirsty army of the night!

But Scott, I’m not writing to talk about the crimes you’ve committed against humanity. As you may or may not have noticed: the economy’s in the dumper. People who are losing their homes have no patience for a petulant child’s whining about millions of dollars he clearly doesn’t even need. On top of that, your usual “ooooh! there’s a mystery team!” crowing just doesn’t play here. Twenty-five or so of the MLB teams can’t even pretend to afford Manny. Of the ones that can, I’d say it’s pretty safe that Boston’s not interested, even the Yankees seem to have reached the end of their checkbook (not to mention they have far too many old “outfielders” as it is), the Angels are stocked in the outfield and have publicly declared Manny will never play for them, the Mets don’t seem to be in play, and what, are you really going to send Manny to Washington just because Jim Bowden lusts after outfielders?

“But, the Giants!” you begin to say, before I cut you off. Come on. Stop with that. Just because Jon Heyman’s either on your payroll or completely deluded doesn’t make it true. (Seriously, what is with that guy? I can’t even count the amount of sportswriters who are refuting his claims, yet he continues to crow about how he’s “confirmed” the discussions. I can’t wait for his new book, No Really: I’ve Confirmed WMD in Iraq!) The Giants are at their payroll limits, already have too many old and busted outfielders, and you’d think they’ve had their fill of controversal old left fielders, no? What does that leave? That’s right. It leaves us.

So here’s my point, Scott. Let’s knock this bullshit off. Spring training starts in just over a month, and you’ve received two legitimate offers – both of which were from us. Now, I never really expected you to accept either our two-year, $45 million proposal nor or offer of arbitration. I did kind of expect you wouldn’t be a total asshole and at least drop me a text message to turn me down – I mean, even a “LOL NO WAI KTHXBYE” would have sufficed. But that’s fine. That’s the way you roll, as the kids say, and I get it.

However, here’s the thing: I’m bored with this. I have the attention span of a gnat. How else do you think I got suckered into giving Juan Pierre a five-year deal? I heard that my old friend Brian Sabean was giving Slappy a four-year deal, and all I saw was “oooh: shiny! and speedy!” and I signed him up right then, OBP, throwing arm, and common sense be damned. I can’t keep going on with this “will he sign? won’t he sign? will he sign? won’t he sign” crap forever. Hell, I read the simply brilliant live-blog of your supposed discussions with the Giants over at the McCovey Chronicles, and it’s so ludicrous that I actually thought it was true! I need some activity on this front. I’m bored with the constant non-speak and lack of activity. The fans are impatient. And the bloggers? You better believe they’re sick of this.

So Scott, I implore you. Take the boatload of money we’re offering you. No, it won’t be $22+ million/year like you’d hoped; it won’t even be as much as the 2/45m deal we offered originally. With the way things have gone in the economy since that offer, with the deals other players are going for, and with your complete lack of a Manny market, why should it be? Manny might be a better hitter than Pat Burrell, but when Pat’s getting $8m/year, there’s no way that Manny deserves three times as much. We’ll still offer Manny way more than we reasonably should considering we’re his only bidder, but still – when I said way back at the beginning that you’d lost, it’s true. You’ll look like a jackass for getting Manny to force his way out of Boston in such a manner and publicly demanding a six-year deal, while having to settle for only a two-year pact. I won’t pretend that the thought of your public humiliation doesn’t make me laugh so hard that I shake in my cowboy boots, because it does. But you can at least offer up some crap about how you “decided that money was less important than your client’s happiness, and Los Angeles was always where he wanted to be.” I won’t call you out on it. For all I care, you can even say that the $60 million or so fewer that you settle for is going towards 28,000 new fields for children.

Manny Ramirez. An obscene amount of money. Los Angeles Dodgers. It’s match.com, baby.

Yours,

Ned Colletti

16 Comments »

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way too funny, and in all likelihood also true.So much fun to see Boras hit the wall.
train

Comment by bluetrain— January 9, 2009 #

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Manny Ramirez is most certainly worth three Pat Burrells, and if you didn’t clue into that last summer, go on dreaming that I’ll let the best right-handed hitter who ever lived sign for relative chickenfeed. Yes, Heyman is on my loyalty payroll, but at your own risk try to outbluff me. The Red Sox did and Teixeira is now in NY.
For the record, Manny called ME, not vice versa, and what McCheap needs to realize is the player, like me, won’t blink. He’ll take a one-year over-loaded contract in SF rather than accept the two year crumbs from the ingrate table. Then come back in a hopefully ‘better economy’ and score the longer term contract next season. In the meantime, the Giants will have a trophy, and you the satisfaction of denying him and me.
He who laughs last, brother..it ain’t over yet.
Signed,
Scott

Comment by SB— January 10, 2009 #

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That’s right, Ned. When I called Scott last December and asked him ‘how did I get in this mess?’ over the two Boston options, he assured me I’d be fine because my old agent Genske had been told the Sox weren’t picking up the option anyway.
That was later confirmed by craphead Epstein when I left Boston, a farewell orchestrated by none other than me. I may have lost some goodwill, but they lost another championship.
Scott was going to be my agent no matter what, and I trust him to handle everything. Now things aren’t looking too good gas price wise, I might have to take that one year in Frisco, but I’ll do my best to make sure my two months plus postseason in LA are capped off by an even greater effort. If I can make Andre Ethier look llike Papi, I can sure do the same for the clowns up north.
I’ll leave it to the new president to fix the eeconomy. Maybe he can ever bail out McCheap so he can get Saito back for a song.
As for me, MY OUTLAW HEART is the one constant you refue to consider and it does not beat for ingrates.
I’ll send you guys another Christmas card.
Manny

Comment by MBeingM— January 10, 2009 #

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Dear Future Former Employee:
I can take it from here. I will sign Manny with my fans hands tied behind their backs. I will perform your final Act via puppet strings, as I am the Puppeteer and you are merely my marionette. I could just axe you right now. After all, we feature the most loaded Front Office in baseball here at DodgerWorld™, but I loathe paying the unemployable without first getting the fulfillment of their contractual obligations dissolved, er, resolved. In any effect, fix what you broke and leave me a low payroll in your wake because after your contract runs out at year’s end, JT will take the reins if he feels up to it or, like I said earlier, I have some in house candidates.
“Sincerely”,
‘The Signature on Your Paychecks’

Comment by joshburke2— January 10, 2009 #

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Dear Boss Man (and Boss Lady),
I can’t wait til the day I am a former employee and can catch on with an owner with deep pockets. You’ve forced me into one mistake after another with the Schmidts and Jones and their ilk because you won’t sign a top tier fee agent but expect production out of has-beens. Now a real producer is in our sights, you will drive him to the enemy.
Your cheapness is both innate and circumstantial. My hands are tied by your tight purse strings and a fanbase that won’t allow me the luxury of gambling on a Penny or Saito now. They want CC, and I can’t even talk to Lowe. I can only risk sure things like Manny but you won’t pay him what he’s worth. You want a Marlins payroll in LA because you bought a team you could never afford to correctly run to begin with..a pox on you Sox wannabes.
I envy Depodesta who is well rid of you Malibu frauds. Continue to scapegoat me. In the end, everyone will see who’s the real joker.
Signed,
One More Year in Hell

Comment by Neddy— January 10, 2009 #

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At this point, I’ve realized that there is nothing to do but sit back and wait, and have some patience. Everyone knows how Boras operates. Yes, he is forcing another team into this. And yes, the Dodgers are doing the right thing now by waithing it out. Boras will drag this out. And that is that. It is just a matter of time before Manny is wearing Dodger Blue again.

Comment by Bluboy— January 10, 2009 #

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It’s just a matter of time before Manny switches uniforms again. Lincecum and Cain won’t be allowed to waste their good stuff in a losing effort. Sabean is sitting like a cat playing the same waiting game the Yankees did over Teixeira.
A lot of money is coming in with the local tv deal and the stadium is already half paid for. Now a big big big splash will be made by signing Manny.
But first we’ll let you stew and sweat a bit more, waiting for your skinflint owner to pizz Manny off some more. By the time we come in, he’ll be telling Boras ‘anybody but those cheapskate losers’, and we nail him for 3 @20.
Get used to it.

Comment by Ghost of Barry's Past— January 10, 2009 #

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No, Manny, I am afraid I will not be able to bail out any of your past or future employers, and it’d take another 700 billion to re-steer Frank McCourt. So no sports mogul handouts; the bankers are my priority even above fixing the BCS. But maybe if I pardon Madoff, the Wilpons will have enough to sign you.
Another thing – if I invite you to the White House, please be considerate enough to show up this time. I promise to have Lil Wayne’s ‘Sky’s the Limit’ in lieu of Hail to the Chief. My predecessor already used up all the dead grandmother jokes, so I’ll have no recourse but to assume if you’re a no-show again, you want your US citizenship revoked.
Sincerely,
Barack

Comment by PresidentElect— January 10, 2009 #

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That great unwashed of slobbering ‘Doyers’ fans, that unruly drunken Pavilion horde Frank and I have stuggled so mightily to keep free of the better customer..that mob seems to be unhappy that their dreadlocked champion is down like the Lion of Narnia, shorn and about to be humbled.
Better they hail ME, the Exalted Patronress of 46 baseball fields to come, than worship at the altar of a player who dissed our beloved RED SOX!
Sure, the Friedman Foundation is matching funds, there are no time lines on the renewals (we’ll probably do two or three more, max, and only the ones that just just need a bench and a mow), and it’s the biggest tax break Frankie and I lucked into in eons, but as long as I look like Queen of Kindness and the photo ops pour in, I am willing to bear the outrageous sting of the scurvy fanbase.
As I look at the sunset from the football field sized oceanside window of one of my Malibu palatial estates, all I can say is “Thank you, Manny! Those dreads sales and the postseason turned the trick!”
As for Dodgersnation, let them eat cake! It’ll be available this season for $18.50 a slice.
A SMALL slice.
With all my love,
Jamie.

Comment by 1/2 a Power Couple— January 10, 2009 #

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All right, enough of this nonsense. I informed Ned he’d have a ceiling of $71,002,738 this year and he should deal accordingly.
How did I derive this number? It is the average of the payrolls of the two teams that played the World Series in 2008: the Tampa Bay Rays, ($43,745,5970) stocked like me with cheap and good young players, some not yet arbitration eligibl), and the Philadelphia Phillies, ($98.269.880) a ‘large market’ team with several vet stars, like our own Casey Blake and Rafeal Furcal.
This is an emminently fair payroll, imo, and in truth, the Dodgers should be able to easily make the postseason in this godforsaken division, with the Moores divorce savaging the Padres, the Diamondbacks ousting Dunn, et al, and the Rockies minus Holliday.
I don’t know what all this hoopla is about San Francisco – it’s not like they’re the dreaded enemy – the Yankees, you know.
Currently ’09 payroll stands close to the 71 million, and thanks to the gracious deferment (choke) of that mugger Andruw Jones (I’d prefer to see him in court, the thought of those hotel suites he and Boras insisted on on the road make me ill… the next thing you know they’ll want membership at the Yellowstone Club), Ned MAYBE gets to sign another Vargas or Loretta. And we can always sell a few more tickets off another ‘trade deadline miracle’, as well.
Anyone who doesn’t LIKE IT can root for the Giants. Manny?!? I’ve got a mall and a marathon to worry about, not to mention Ned charged me for his room at the Winter Meetings. My creditors are breathing down my back so hard that the cries of the Dodger fan mob feel like caresses to me – let them rip Ned limb from limb when March rolls ’round and they think we’re the Marlins.
Nothing like a filleting a sacrificial lamb before he’s canned.
Frank McCheap

Comment by her better half— January 10, 2009 #

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Wow – kewl.
I’ve never seen a blog within a blog before.
That SOB MSTI comes up with something new darn near every day !!!

Comment by kennerbuggy— January 10, 2009 #

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Hilarious stuff!
You’re quite the inspiring writer, msti!

Comment by firefligh— January 10, 2009 #

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I would like to say, once again, that those of you who read and comment here really make my day. Some of the reply letters have been hilarious, and once again I have the top two recommended articles across the entire MVN site.
You rule. Thank you.

Comment by Mike Scioscia's tragic illness— January 10, 2009 #

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Brilliance, my friend, brilliance.

Comment by Rob McMillin— January 11, 2009 #

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Great Fun MSTI. Check out what they’re saying in SF on this whole topic. Everyone is guessing.
http://www.sfdodgerfan.comhttp://sfdodgerfan.com/the-lesser-of-two-evils-to-take-manny-or-let-him-go/

Comment by SFdodgerfan— January 14, 2009 #

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Manny is one of the greatest hitters of all time…HR/RBI/AVG…the Dodgers better sign him or it will be a long time before they make the NL Championship Series again…There is no better hitter last 15 years (except maybe A.Rod)…but Manny has two WS rings…A.Rod none

Comment by Mark Smith— January 24, 2009 #

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Mike Scioscia's tragic illness