Link of the Day: Royals Sign Manny Ramirez
…well, they didn’t really. But theoretically they could’ve, if they hadn’t blown the GDP of an island nation on five completely useless players. Consider this post by Dave Cameron today at USSMariner.com, after the Royals gave Willie Bloomquist a guaranteed two-year deal for $3 million(!!!).
Imagine being a Kansas City fan this winter. Your team has now spent $11.5 million of the 2009 budget to acquire Kyle Farnsworth, Mike Jacobs, Horacio Ramirez, and Willie Bloomquist. That’s a replacement level reliever, a replacement level first baseman, a replacement level reliever, and a replacement level utility player. Even if you give them extremely optimistic forecasts, you’re looking at something like +1 win over what it could have cost to grab guys for the league minimum.
The Royals have spent about $11 million on free agents, and they might not even get one win out of it. Toss in Jose Guillen’s big salary from last year to be slightly above replacement level, and the Royals are tossing about $25 million down the drain.
Not that Manny would ever sign with the Royals, of course, not even in this horrible market. But the next time some chucklehead starts yelping about the need for baseball to adopt a salary cap to even out the playing field, remind them that some teams are beyond help.
Better yet, the next time some chucklehead starts yelping about the virtues of a salary FLOOR, present them with Exhibit A: $25 million flushed down the toilet for the services of Jose Guillen, Mike Jacobs, Horacio Ramirez, Willie Freaking Bloomquist, and the legendary Professor Farnsworth.
This is a depressing winter for Royals fans, or at least this one. I mean, winters are ALL bullocks but this one is the worst by far. I’m still praying it has all just been a bad dream, and I will wake up and it will be April.
Thank you, entire WORLD, for rubbing it in.
Hey, some of my best friends are Royals fans! (that defense never works, does it?)
Minda, I think when people criticize a team for throwing away money on lousy players, many of them aren’t doing it out of spite, but rather out of frustration. As someone who grew up as one of the world’s biggest Expos fans, I know too well how irritating it is for my team to make boneheaded decisions. If I’m KC grief for enriching Kyle Farnsworth’s agent, it’s only because I think the Royals can do a lot better, even on a limited payroll and with a below-average revenue stream. We’ve seen too many examples of small-revenue teams finding success in recent years to think otherwise.