That's probably true.  

"I got rid of all my good players and cleared up 550k in cap space!!!   World Series, here I come!!" should have been a big enough hint.

I think alarm bells started for me after reading he was removed from Joey Belle for tanking.... but has a worse season to his credit.

So your rebuild project you went 66, 76, 75 wins, and then started making the playoffs. In mine (with what I felt was the worst of all the teams in ABU when I joined it), I went 49, 73, 72 and then started making the playoffs, all the way up to 106 wins by my 5th season (while you were still at 90). I see that I won 15 less games then you did in S1, but 16 more than you in S5...in fact through 5 seasons I have 1 more total win than you..through 6 you had 2 more total than me, both with 3 playoff appearances (though me with one more division title than you).

In other words, I did equally as well in my rebuild in ABU with the crapped up team I took over as you did in Vegas through 6 seasons. Yet I am a tanker for only winning 49 games in my first year with a 30 million dollar payroll, compared to you spending 100 million to win 66? I call it a complete waste of 70 million dollars to get from 49 to 66. 70 million to take you from 85 wins to 100 may be worth it...thats borderline playoff spot to first round bye...49 to 66 is out of the playoffs to still out of the playoffs.

Posted by bbwinnow on 9/16/2010 2:19:00 PM (view original):
My rationale for trading Ledee isn't this year's salary, it's next year. Ledee was declining a bit and he wouldn't have been worth the 8.6mil for seasons 18 and 19. This is exactly the kinds of trades real GMs make if they aren't going to be a contender. Plus, I underestimated Vazquez' arb salary by about 1mil, and Vazquez is every bit as good for my team as Cooper.

By the way, I made two more trades:

El Paso gets 4.6mil (2 years) C Juan Urbina and 343k pitching prospect William Jackson. Santa Fe gets pitching prospect Jose Pineda and shortstop prospect Marcus Armstrong. I figured there would be a cheaper replacement for Urbina in FA, plus this clears a bit of salary for a pitcher.

Norfolk gets 1B Ahmed Ramirez' 5mil/3yrs contract (ok, he can still hit a bit) and 500k 2B Douglas Malone. Santa Fe gets 327k LF Rabbit Hudson, who hasn't played in the majors since season 7 and is basically a scrap heap find that can get me through the season.

These are exactly the kind of deals csherwood made all those seasons ago: a huge multi-year contract and another player for a player similar to the other player.

No, your rationale is what real GM's used when they want to get fired.

If Ledee was on the open market, he would get so so so much more than 2/17.  Even with a decline, his contract was ++ value and you somehow got a negative return for him.

Baseball Almanac presents the Major League teams who have lost more than one-hundred ten games in a season in order by most games lost (with links to rosters, stats & schedule):

Team	Lg	Lost	Won
1899 Cleveland Spiders	NL	134	20
1962 New York Mets	NL	120	40
2003 Detroit Tigers	AL	119	43
1916 Philadelphia Athletics	AL	117	36
1935 Boston Braves	NL	115	38
1904 Washington Nationals	AL	113	38
1952 Pittsburgh Pirates	NL	112	42
1965 New York Mets	NL	112	50
1889 Louisville Colonels	AA	111	27
1898 St. Louis Browns	NL	111	39
1932 Boston Red Sox	AL	111	43
1939 St. Louis Browns	AL	111	43
1941 Philadelphia Phillies	NL	111	43
1963 New York Mets	NL	111	51
2004 Arizona Diamondbacks	NL	111	51

Source: http://www.baseball-almanac.com/recbooks/games_lost_records.shtml

Posted by csherwood on 9/14/2010 4:49:00 PM (view original):
you should have taken my old franchise to do this. Plus, while your team is worse record-wise then the one I took over, you have tons of payroll room. one of my goals in WKRP was to find a team with huge salary commitments too (I started with almost 100 million committed due to bad contracts by the prior owner). And in the end, my WKRP thread was more about giving advice to people about how to get through a season than about how well that team actually did, though I didhave it turned arond heading in a verygood direction when I left the league (though subsequent owners trashed it again)

I repeatagain the difference between what I did and what you are doing - I moved prospects to move huge long term bad contracts BECAUSE I HAD A HUGE PAYROLL. Moving a good player with a big salary when you have payroll room just to clearthe contract is a bad idea - you can move the guy but do it for value, not for payroll clearing. If you have a lousy team with 100 million in payroll you need to clear the books. If you have a lousy team with 40 million in payroll, moving contracts should not be the reason for any deal.

If we're going to have a d*ck measuring contest over who's the best at rebuilding, I'll just go ahead and throw this out there:

6	cardsfan	ML	34-128	.210	4th	No	No
7	cardsfan	ML	50-112	.309	4th	No	No
8	cardsfan	ML	52-110	.321	3rd	No	No
9	deanod	ML	82-80	.506	2nd	No	No
10	deanod	ML	95-67	.586	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
11	deanod	ML	98-64	.605	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
12	deanod	ML	91-71	.562	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
13	deanod	ML	93-69	.574	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
14	deanod	ML	108-54	.667	1st	No	Yes	yes	no	no
15	deanod	ML	98-64	.605	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
16	deanod	ML	79-64	.552	-	-	-	-	-	-

And I inherited a team with no discernable farm system because all of his prospects had been trade raped away for dregs.  I think I inherited 3 usable pros, and none of them were spectacular.

Posted by csherwood on 9/16/2010 2:28:00 PM (view original):

Posted by csherwood on 9/14/2010 4:49:00 PM (view original):
you should have taken my old franchise to do this. Plus, while your team is worse record-wise then the one I took over, you have tons of payroll room. one of my goals in WKRP was to find a team with huge salary commitments too (I started with almost 100 million committed due to bad contracts by the prior owner). And in the end, my WKRP thread was more about giving advice to people about how to get through a season than about how well that team actually did, though I didhave it turned arond heading in a verygood direction when I left the league (though subsequent owners trashed it again)

I repeatagain the difference between what I did and what you are doing - I moved prospects to move huge long term bad contracts BECAUSE I HAD A HUGE PAYROLL. Moving a good player with a big salary when you have payroll room just to clearthe contract is a bad idea - you can move the guy but do it for value, not for payroll clearing. If you have a lousy team with 100 million in payroll you need to clear the books. If you have a lousy team with 40 million in payroll, moving contracts should not be the reason for any deal.

I'm glad you reacted like this when he's using your thread to "defend" these indefensible moves.  :)

Posted by deanod on 9/16/2010 2:29:00 PM (view original):
If we're going to have a d*ck measuring contest over who's the best at rebuilding, I'll just go ahead and throw this out there:

6	cardsfan	ML	34-128	.210	4th	No	No
7	cardsfan	ML	50-112	.309	4th	No	No
8	cardsfan	ML	52-110	.321	3rd	No	No
9	deanod	ML	82-80	.506	2nd	No	No
10	deanod	ML	95-67	.586	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
11	deanod	ML	98-64	.605	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
12	deanod	ML	91-71	.562	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
13	deanod	ML	93-69	.574	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
14	deanod	ML	108-54	.667	1st	No	Yes	yes	no	no
15	deanod	ML	98-64	.605	1st	No	Yes	no	no	no
16	deanod	ML	79-64	.552	-	-	-	-	-	-

And I inherited a team with no discernable farm system because all of his prospects had been trade raped away for dregs.  I think I inherited 3 usable pros, and none of them were spectacular.

um no, my comment to Mike was about him calling me a tanker, not about how small his d*ck is....

dino has ***** on the brain... again.

Posted by iain on 9/16/2010 2:31:00 PM (view original):

Posted by csherwood on 9/16/2010 2:28:00 PM (view original):

Posted by csherwood on 9/14/2010 4:49:00 PM (view original):
you should have taken my old franchise to do this. Plus, while your team is worse record-wise then the one I took over, you have tons of payroll room. one of my goals in WKRP was to find a team with huge salary commitments too (I started with almost 100 million committed due to bad contracts by the prior owner). And in the end, my WKRP thread was more about giving advice to people about how to get through a season than about how well that team actually did, though I didhave it turned arond heading in a verygood direction when I left the league (though subsequent owners trashed it again)

I repeatagain the difference between what I did and what you are doing - I moved prospects to move huge long term bad contracts BECAUSE I HAD A HUGE PAYROLL. Moving a good player with a big salary when you have payroll room just to clearthe contract is a bad idea - you can move the guy but do it for value, not for payroll clearing. If you have a lousy team with 100 million in payroll you need to clear the books. If you have a lousy team with 40 million in payroll, moving contracts should not be the reason for any deal.

I'm glad you reacted like this when he's using your thread to "defend" these indefensible moves.  :)

My payroll was so bad my first season in WKRP that I had to budget too low for coaches and make trades in order to clear room and transfer money to coaching. Having to transfer money into coaching 99.99999% means you screwed up royally from Day One.

tankerwood, you don't play in a vaccum.   When you're losing 114, someone is winning those games.   You aren't competitive.   Teams that aren't competitive are bad for a world.  If 90 wins puts you in 1st place, you're in first place and the playoffs.   Winning 10 more or 20 more doesn't matter except for playoff seeding.  A bye is nice but not necessary. 

The difference between us is simple:  I think you should try to win BL games whether you're a contender or not.  You think it's only necessary if you can win enough to be a contender.    I'm sure I can win 70 today and 90 next season.  You're a lot more comfortable winning 50 today and 100 next season.  

Your way is fine.   Just don't think it's some noble way to build a team.  It's just tanking.  It's the easy way to build a team. 

Some people might be concerned with the fact I have only four ML pitchers at the moment (NL teams usually need 12) but I have two pitchers in the minors that can be called up, and I'm consistently claiming two players on waivers each real-life day to fill my roster. My waiver claims so far:

P Roger Miller (minors)
2B Tuck Walsh (potential backup making ML minimum)
RF Rafael Tarraga (projected starter, making 343k)

My currently pending waiver claims:

LF Angel Mendoza (projected to play at AAA)
P Julio Cordero (projected SuB)
P Brian Michalak (projected starter #3 or #4)

As you see, my roster will be full by spring training at this rate assuming 3 or 4 Rule V picks.

Oh, and about Ledee's contract: Yes, he'd get about 2/20 on the open market. No, his 2/17 over the two seasons following this one was not a good contract considering the state of my team. You're confusing what he's worth and what he'd get. Most free agents are overpaid.

EDIT: You don't know how I'll use the salary I cleared in seasons 18 and 19. I can probably get a better player in FA for 2/17 than Ledee. The top FA this season is demanding 4/36. A player like Ledee would not be demanding nearly as much.