Rally Gorilla

3 minutes ago, Inside Pitch said:

Are you sure you're disagreeing with me?   I mean yes I fully believe he's committed more in the last 18 months and that he'll point to that but I'm not trying to validate him.

I think you're under the impression I'm making excuses for Arte, I'm not.  What I am saying is that when it's Arte's turn to cry poor he's going to talk up the stadium and his recent investments in players.    Not sure if you've seen my other posts on this but, I'm the guy arguing the players can't trust the owners given their history of turning profits into losses.

Like I said... Are you sure you're disagreeing with me?  

Take it easy...

Maybe.   Where do you stand regarding commercial paper towels?

3 minutes ago, Lou said:

That didn't answer the question.

Also, I didn't get mad at you, I merely suggested a smarter alternative.

I did answer the question in an edit.    And I'm still loving the commercial paper towels!   Can get 'em delivered anytime from Amazon, often next day.      They make me happy.

25 minutes ago, Lou said:

How would him acquiring debt help our playoff chances?

I doubt he would need to go into debt to pay scouting salaries....but, if he did, that might have been a good move.

You're not going to get mad at me for the commercial paper towels again, are you?  

1 minute ago, Lou said:

Arte doesn't do debt. 

Arte has a lot of little rules that seem to help his net worth more than our playoff chances.

5 minutes ago, Lou said:

 

You can't pay salaries with equity. 

But, if you are cash poor, you can get low interest loans to get by...using equity.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

I'm not trying to convince you of anything, but it's pretty obvious he's opened up his wallet more than just about any owner in MLB in the previous 18 months...  To argue otherwise is foolish.  

    Like you said yourself, salaries are pretty much the same for big market teams.   So that leaves the stadium purchase.   Even if he had paid up front for the stadium and land...he would have increased his equity by more than he paid.    Not exactly a sound argument for pleading hardship.   BTW...This LA Times article from May 12th makes it seem like Arte are the city are renegotiating things and that Arte will be on the hook for paying $30M this season.      https://www.latimes.com/sports/story/2020-05-12/angels-anaheim-stadium-sale-arte-moreno-deal-city-council   Not exactly a huge amount for a team worth nearly $2 Billion.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

1 -- the team's value isn't realized until it's is sold or borrowed against.  He's still going to have to come out of pocket or add debt in the deal with Anaheim.   More importantly -- every owner in MLB has seen their values rise.

Which is why I said that, if he is cash poor at the moment, his $2B in equity will make a low interest loan very easy to obtain.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

2 -  I missed where the city of Anaheim signed over the deed and said it's yours.   There have been a wide range of values depending on whether or not the stadium was demolished but again first he would have to PAY for the land, then he would have to sell it (or borrow against it) to realize it's value.      

I had heard from a few places  it was agreed that Arte would pay cash up front.   Turns out it is payments over time...beginning with $30M by Oct 2020.   Perhaps some people referred to it as a cash deal because Arte won't be seeking third party financing?  Perhaps I imagined the whole thing?  Don't know.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

 3 -- So, would having paid cash as you claim (he hasn't yet BTW), then mean he's out more money than owners who didn't spend the off-season buying land and a stadium -- because that was my point. 

Even if he had paid in full up front....the city gave him an amazing deal.   Arte's net worth goes up from that deal, not down.   Not really a hardship.  That was my point.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

4 -- Trout actually did get an upfront payment of 20 mil https://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/compensation/cots/al-west/la-angels/   Doesn't matter really...  Player salaries would actually be the weakest argument Arte could make because every team has them.   

Oh come on.   Ok, he gave Trouty $20M of a $400M contract up front.   Like you say, it doesn't matter.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

 Lastly.... while you were busy dismissing all the reasons why Arte couldnt make a "convincing" argument for being hit harder than most did you consider that given the Angels have a top 3-5 TV deal the would theoretically be one of the teams hardest hit by the lack of baseball games?   I mean, those are the sorts of revenue streams that Manfred was yapping about when he talked about the owners "losing money".

I wasn't really all that busy.  I just didn't agree with you and I said why.   Is that ok?    I'm already afraid to post about buying commercial paper towels because Lou disapproves

I would guess that all teams will lose big bucks on TV revenue.   Bigger markets have bigger contracts, so they lose more.   But that doesn't convince me that smaller market teams wont suffer more.     The big market teams near the payroll tax threshold will also save more in salaries than smaller market teams.

2 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

I'm not in Arte's camp on this -- the owners have been turning massive profits for years -- but when they line up to lie about their costs and all they money they are losing, Arte's going to have a bigger line of BS to spew than most.

I do believe Arte excels at peeing on legs and telling people it is raining.   So, no doubt, he'll be spewing along with the best of them.

6 hours ago, Inside Pitch said:

So, you don't think having to pony up for the land is eating into his pile of cash?   If anything he's one of the owners that can argue is being hit hardest by the timing of all this.  He's been investing heavily into the team and then boom....  Trout, Rendon, Stadium, ....The rona... booom!

I don't think there is a convincing argument to be made that Arte is being hit hardest by the timing of all of this.

1)  Arte paid $184M for the team in 2003.   It is now valued at close to $2Billion.      https://www.statista.com/statistics/194619/mlb-franchise-value-of-the-los-angeles-angels-of-anaheim-since-2006/

2)  To keep Arte from moving to another city, Anaheim just let him buy the Big A and 153 acres of surrounding city land for $325M.     The land itself is valued at over $300M.    https://www.foxbusiness.com/sports/angels-arte-moreno-stadium-anaheim-deal

3)  Arte and Co. paid CASH for the stadium and land.    If that made him cash poor, then it should be pretty easy to borrow (at today's extremely low interest rates) when you have $2B in equity.

4)  The Rendon and Trout contracts weren't a huge one-time cash hit for him....they are paid over time.   And, if I understand it correctly, players will not  be getting their full salaries this season anyway.  

At the end of his tenure, I think Sosh was a bit burnt out and held the reins a bit too tight.    But there is no question in my mind he was a fantastic, dynamic and innovative manager in his prime.   The ring speaks for itself.

22 hours ago, Tank said:

you can also go the beach, but only to swim. you can't play in the sand, take a picnic with you, or sunbathe. so there's that.

We walk on the beach every morning....and a group of 30 or so young people have started meeting most days to play volleyball....no social distancing worries for these folks and apparently no worries about fines, etc.    They seem like a nice enough group, but we're still being careful until more is known, so we just smile  and wave as we go by and hope that it works out for them.   

2 hours ago, True Grich said:

I wonder if the "purists" who hate the DH still wear suits to baseball games like in the old days... 

Do they also hate night games?

It was beyond time to make this change...

I can't speak for everyone who doesn't like the DH....but, I'm pretty ok with night games.   Some of my best memories are of low scoring extra inning games that go very late.   

I wonder if those who favor a DH are just stimulation junkies that wouldn't know what to do with themselves if they had to just hang out and talk with friends while a pitcher warmed up.   The same type that needs the game to go quickly so they can get home to their video games.   

I've never liked the DH.   To me, baseball isn't about constant stimulation and rushing to get the game over as soon as possible.     So, I'm ok with pitching changes, watching a pitcher strike out,  low scoring games, extra innings,  etc.   

I'm fond of the Big A and I think everyone will be fine if we just give the old girl another facelift......but now that the Rangers have a new home, our park will be the fourth best in the AL West....and that's only because the A's play in an f'ing dump.    A nice new high tech park with tons of old school style would certainly work for me.     I'd even be in favor of a retractable roof....we could leave it open most of the time and close it for those toasty afternoon games that I find myself avoiding as I get older and the climate gets warmer.

19 hours ago, Sully151 said:

Oh, and teaching improv classes on Zoom suuuuuuuuuuucccks

My wife uses Zoom for her job and she and her colleagues are really starting to hate it.    I've tried asking questions to figure out why it is more tedious on Zoom, but I still don't understand it.    You would think all the time saved from not having to travel to a meeting  (and being able to interact with others during the lockdown) would make it a positive thing.    I'll have to watch from the sidelines sometime to see if I can understand why they aren't liking it.

I don't think I'd be comfortable avoiding the news altogether these days.   I usually put it on first thing when I wake up and my daughter and I watch/listen during our morning routines.   Then it goes off.    I might check the website headlines later in the evening just to see if anything truly new is going on, but that's it.        

The news networks, of course, would love it if everyone watched 16 hours a day....that's how they make their $$$.    And it is very big $$$.   So they try to sensationalize every bit of information to make it seem like you don't want to miss a minute of coverage, but most of the stories are just rehashed all day with very little new news in the mix.       

I think it would be cool to have the Angels and Dodgers in the same division for one season.   Lots of SoCal pride at stake.   Lots of MVP contender pride at stake.

I'm still wondering how they are going to make things work around the Phoenix heat.   Remember how hot mid-summer Rangers games would get in Arlington?    July temps average 10 degrees hotter in Phoenix.    Maybe super-early starts with repeat broadcasts throughout the day?    

FYI...My wife has been on a moderated neighborhood area discussion group for some time.  Recently,  a fairly new person started posting all kinds of stuff designed to trigger people about Covid-19 issues, such as bragging about hording protective gear,  driving political wedges, etc.    Apparently, one member of the group has professional knowledge of how overseas troll farms work and he said this is right out of their playbook.   The trolls want to stir up anxiety and create conflict in what would otherwise be a healthy online community.   Of course, they have all kinds of new buttons to push while we're dealing with a pandemic.   

10 hours ago, Slegnaac said:

With no fans they could play very early, or very late (probably early) to avoid some heat.  Also 6 teams would be indoors at the Diamondbacks park.

9 AM start is Noon for the Eastern fans.  Everyone is at home so why not morning games.

I've lived in Phoenix area.   The average high temp in July is 106 degrees.    Obviously, some days are much hotter.  And it doesn't cool off as much  in the evenings like it does in SoCal.   I don't see how they could make it happen.

On 3/30/2020 at 6:38 PM, Angelsjunky said:

Spending time with my daughters and girlfriend (we all just started playing Dungeons & Dragons) 

I don't play D & D...but if it brings the group together, keeps the minds active, allows healthy competition, and provides a break from worry...then it's a winner IMHO.   My 20 y.o. has a board game based on the CIV VI video game that he always wants us to play....then he proceeds to completely destroy us.   It is not fun.    I gotta dig out the Monopoly game so the rest of us have a chance.

40 minutes ago, ettin said:

And these are equally as valuable, perhaps more so:

Studies have shown that those hand dryers disperse the water droplets from your hands (and anything you didn't wash off your hands) into the immediate surrounding air, filling an enclosed area in mere seconds. Coronavirus droplets everywhere.... 

It's also hard (for me anyway) to pull out my hands w/o touching the machine.    At least Dyson is being a hero by designing an easy to produce ventilator and rushing to produce 15,000 of them.   Hope they work better than the hand dryers.

Just now, st1ckboy said:

What's your Febreze stockpile looking like?

Sorry, I don't speak cryptic.   Is there a point you are trying to make?

16 minutes ago, Lou said:

rich guy alert! 

Yep,  dropped $60 on paper towels/dispensers that will last my family-of-four two months or more during a pandemic.   Had to post about it, under the pretense of sharing ideas, so I could flaunt my big bucks.  

12 minutes ago, Lou said:

Individual towels.

Bam!  Next.

Or, I could just use commercial paper towels that are cheap and readily available right now....   and then not worry about it.

48 minutes ago, Tank said:

you should have gone with one of these super sanitary beauties that all of us like to use in a public men's room:

That would be like a beginning fisherman starting out with a Van Staal reel and St Croix rod....I'm not at a point where I appreciate this kind of performance yet.  

1 hour ago, st1ckboy said:

Just buy a washable hand towel. 

Yeah, I've got a teen and a 20 y.o. at home that I frankly don't trust to always do a great job washing their hands before drying or changing out the hand towel when needed.    I feel a lot better using paper.    But, if it were just me at home or if paper became unavailable....then obviously I'd go that route.

19 hours ago, Blarg said:

Time for that fun, cheap, project car.

I love this idea.    I don't have the space to work on a project car.   But, I'm going to see if I can figure out a major project of some kind.    Like the project to land on the Moon, but on a family level.