Apparently the recession is finally hitting the Bronx Bombers. After spending $429 million last season for four players, the Yankees are not willing to match that number for next season. Yesterday, the Yankees GM Brian Cashman said he won’t meet with the Steinbrenner’s until next week to discuss the payroll, but that regardless, he isn’t going to spend nearly as much as last year.

Cashman didn’t say that he would totally curb spending this offseason. Even though they won the world series, there are still significant holes in the rotation, bullpen and lineup that must be filled. After speaking with the Steinbrenner’s next week, Cashman will decide whether to bring Johnny Damon or Hideki Matsui back and what bullpen changes can be made. They are also waiting to hear from Andy Pettitte on whether he’ll return next year.

With the notion that the Yankees are cutting spending for next season, I pose two questions: 1) Will the fact that the Yankees won’t be in contention for every top free agent lower the numbers on collective free agent deals and 2) Will the Yankees be involved in the Halladay sweepstakes if they are cutting spending?

1. I imagine that while the Yankees won’t be in contention for every top free agent, their name will still surface for many of them. The threat of the Yankees coveting a free agent might seem like it would raise the price of that particular free agent because teams will think they need to spend more. However, unless it is a big name free agent and a bidding war ensues between the Yankees and another big market club, it is unlikely that the Yankees will have that much of an affect on free agency this offseason, by not going after as many players.
2. I do think that by curbing spending it will hurt their chances on obtaining Roy Halladay. With virtually all big market clubs mentioned in rumors for Halladay, he figures to be one of the most coveted offseason non-free-agents in some time. Without the Yankees sign-at-all-costs approach that they took last season, it is unlikely the Yankees will land Halladay.

What this means is that at least for one offseason, many clubs around MLB have a fighting chance of signing the number one free agent or making a trade for the number one signed player on their list.

This World Series defense stems from the actions of an over eager Philadelphia fan who is using the Phillies World Series appearance as part of her defense against a misdemeanor charge of promoting prostitution from an advertisement on Craigslist.

Susan Finkelstein, a 43-year-old University of Pennsylvania graduate student, wanted to take her husband to a World Series game between her darling Philadelphia Phillies and the New York Yankees. Mrs. Finkelstein wanted to get tickets for game one of the World Series so badly that she posted an advertisement on Craigslist describing herself as a “buxom blonde” looking to meet up with someone to discuss getting tickets to a World Series game. Unfortunately for Finkelstein, an undercover officer responded to the ad and arranged to meet her in a suburban Philly bar on Tuesday, October 27^th. The two had a few beers and discussed Finkelstein’s ideas about a ticket exchange. The specific facts about what was said at the table between the two are unclear as both sides have different accounts.

According to Finkelstein’s attorney, William J. Brennan, the Craigslist ad may have dropped double entendres but never explicitly offered sex. Brennan said, “If somebody read into that posting a sexual connotation, that’s on them. There’s no overt sexual reference.” Mr. Brennan also said that his client was “a nice lady overcome with Phillies fever.”  Finkelstein told the Associated Press that she was hoping to get cheap tickets, as she had in the past.  “Maybe meet someone, and talk, and bat my eyelashes and maybe get some tickets.”

On the other side, the prosecution believes the advertisement on Craigslist and the conversation with the undercover officer at the bar clearly show Finkelstein’s true intent.  The officer said that she never offered him any money for the tickets, but declined to further elaborate on the conversation and the offer.

Finkelstein has a preliminary hearing in Bucks County Pennsylvania on December 3^rd. In the mean time, the notoriety and press, although embarrassing, has given Finkelstein and her husband some positives. A radio station and car dealer offered her and her husband a pair of tickets to a weekend game of the Phillies. Other reports have her and her husband attending game three of the World Series, but failed to mention how she got the tickets.

As noted in the piece, this is the first year since Jonah started recording figures, that the average earnings for the list, decreased.  Blame it on the economy?

Beware of the bullets:

• 5 New York Yankees players are listed, but they all make the list because of their salaries, not an overwhelming endorsement portfolio.  Maybe LeBron James (#3 on the list) notices that meeting his endorsement potential is not all about moving to NY.  Or perhaps he believes that baseball players in NY have no chance getting as much money in endorsements as he would (a basketball player).  I still hope that he stays in Cleveland.
• It’s not as if A-Rod’s contract is new to us, but just look at the difference in salary between Rodriguez and every other athlete on the list.  Unreal.
• Shaq is getting old and less productive, but still making a great amount of money…especially in endorsements.  How will his love for Twitter help/hurt his ranking over the next year?
• Teixiera and Sabathia, combined, make less in endorsements than Jermaine O’Neal?  Okay, baseball players do have some marketing hurdles to overcome.
• Steve Francis at #22 hurts a lot more than Barry Zito at #26.

Since free agency began in the 1970’s, the trend for rising contracts has skyrocketed.  In addition, there has been a continuous push towards defining sports as big business.  Just think about the deals we’ve witnessed in this past year.  C.C. Sabathia signed a 7-year, $161 million contract with the New York Yankees, who also opened their new $1.5 billion stadium in the Bronx.  This latter fact wouldn’t be as disheartening, until you remember that the New York taxpayers are picking up the tab during one of the worst recessions in American history.  A year ago we saw the Dolphins give their #1 draft pick Jake Long a 5-year, $57.75 million contract.  A player who had never stepped foot on a pro field became the highest paid offensive linemen in the NFL.  No need for more examples of the huge deals that have already been made amidst this economic crisis.

So where does this bring us?  What’s the state of affairs now?  Both the New York Yankees and the New York Mets overestimated their ability to sell high-priced seats in the newly christened Yankee Stadium and Citi Field.  Keep in mind that some of the seats in the New Yankee Stadium exceed $2,500, so who’s surprised that they aren’t filled for every game?  Both owners have now decided that they will review their ticket prices and possibly make changes.  Likewise, ticket sales are down in many places, and many teams are coming up with new, creative ways to sell seats.  The Detroit Pistons are clearly feeling the wrath of the economy, as they struggled to sell tickets for Friday night’s playoff game against the Cleveland Cavaliers.  Tickets were found on Stubhub for as low as $11, and the team’s front office even sent e-mails to Cavs season ticket holders offering tickets to those who want to make the 4 hour drive.  But the business of sports is not in a complete decline; in fact, it’s becoming increasingly impossible to make a general statement about the effect of this economic downturn on the industry.  Don Garber, MLS commissioner, said that the league’s law firm had canceled its season tickets at Yankee Stadium.  However, the large sports law firm Proskaeur Rose actually upgraded from a 20-game package to a full season ticket package in the new stadium.  Furthermore, while the housing construction industry may be in utter disarray, the Florida Marlins plan for a new $600 million stadium was just approved.

And what about the players that make these games possible?  The week leading up to this past weekend’s NFL draft hasn’t shown us that spending is down.  The Detroit Lions and the agents for Georgia QB Matthew Stafford were in talks all week to reach a deal before the draft.  Stafford was inked to a 6-year $72 million ($47 million guaranteed) which greatly exceeds Jake Long’s contract.  So the money may be getting out of hand, especially considering we are in an economic crisis.  As a future agent, these probably aren’t the words I should be saying, but it’s probably true.  But where do we place the blame?  Jeff MacGregor, senior writer for ESPN.com and ESPN the Magazine, infers that the fans are just as, if not more, responsible than those within the industry:

“Most of the men and women I’ve met over the years in professional sports would gladly go on playing their games for much less than they’re being paid now…Rather it is the market, reflecting the madness of the individuals who constitute it, that determines the relative value of that calling, whether to be a linebacker or golfer or shortstop. The athlete (and the agent and the owner) just operate within the market we allow them to create.”

At least we know that many players will take less money if the economy forces teams to do so, but probably not without a fight.  We have seen previous examples of extremely unselfish players who opted for lower contracts, despite the current trend for ever-increasing contracts.  Before the 2007 NBA season, Tim Duncan took less money so that the Spurs could create a winning team.  So maybe there’s some hope.  At least we can sleep knowing that not all athletes are only in it for the money.  For most great athletes, it’s about the game…they’ve already made enough money.  As fans we should feel lucky that it hasn’t reached the point where the money is the only factor for most players.  Imagine if the USA basketball team had to revert to using college players for the next Olympics competition.  As for sports in general, this industry may be feeling the effects of the economic crisis, but you can count on it returning to its normal form when the economy rebounds.  The Yankees will continue spending, the Marlins will still probably offer two-fer ticket deals in their new stadium, and most fans will watch ESPN waiting to hear about that next big contract with a mixed response of amazement, excitement, and disgust.  Hopefully I will be negotiating it.

I am going to go ahead and throw something out there that I doubt will be viewed favorably by most of the Sports Agent Blog’s readers.

America’s fascination with sports is severely sick and twisted.

Set fire to the stake, assemble the tar and feathers and send me straight to the guillotine, for I have finally said it!  America has a sick and demented obsession with their sports.

And believe me loyal readers, I say this with full admission of my own dependent addiction to the games and players that fill the void and act as an escape from the realities of my life.  I mean isn’t that what all drugs are meant to do?  Fill the emptiness of one’s life while simultaneously giving a glimpse of happiness and offering momentary escape through synthetic pleasure?

So if that is the case, then by the sports fans own admission, we are all metaphorical drug addicts.  Addicted to the perfect game, the next score, the championship, the players, the idea of next year and ultimately the feeling that even though we give our all to being a fan, the simple act of being a fan cannot control destiny.  Yes, America, as mentioned above, our obsession is a sick and twisted love affair, and we are all hopeless romantics.

With that being said, if sports are our drug, then Alex Rodriguez is most defiantly our heroin.

The most dangerous, addictive and mysterious drug there is, users have been known to go into shock and withdrawal when they do not have it until it finally gives them that feeling of bliss when it is once again reintroduced into their system.  If this horrid account of addiction doesn’t describe the juxtaposition of the public’s desire and the media’s coverage of the embattled Yankee third basemen, then nothing ever will.

For the record, my knowledge of this drug does not exceed multiple viewings of the films Trainspotting, Pulp Fiction, and Requiem for A Dream, all great films which show the perverse side of this terrible affliction.  But the correlation is all the same.  In the same way a junkie cooks up and prepares his next hit, the sports fan secretly wishes and waits for A-Rod to make his next slip up so they can call and cry into their favorite radio show, type a hateful comment on their fan message board or create that perfect blog entry.  You know the one.  It’s filled with just the right amount of statistics, sass and hate that will hopefully be that magical post that finally gets you discovered!

Am I defending A-Rod’s actions?  Absolutely not.  What he did was deplorable and an insult to the game of baseball.  I don’t care if this was the “culture of the time” in Major League Baseball,  Alex should have known that his raw talent and natural ability would be more than enough to break a plethora of records and walk right into the halls of Cooperstown.  If that wasn’t reason enough then he should have known that these drugs were illegal under federal mandates of the United States of America which Congress banned with the implementation of Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act in the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 1990.

Plain and simple, A-Rod was wrong.  He tarnished his legacy as well the purity and sanctity of the game of baseball.  Of all the steroid users, abusers and accusers, this admission in particular, is going to be the hardest to swallow as Alex Rodriguez represented the exception.  His superhuman statistics in conjunction with the pace that he has acquired them gave us hope that there was actually someone out there who could have achieved these things naturally and by the grace of G-d.

But this isn’t just one of your run-of-the-mill baseball players, this is the superstar of all superstars.  This man is so transcendent of the game of baseball that his divorce, celebrity dating habits and exploitations with muscular, Canadian strippers get front page coverage on several different days.  Predicted to not only surpass the home run record, but completely obliterate it, this is a man who can cause a 2 day discussion on the merits of saying “HA!” while rounding third base and draw merciless mockery after attempting to slap a ball out of a glove.  I MEAN, THIS IS A MAN who could quite possibly go down as the greatest right handed hitter in the history of baseball, but whose accomplishments, stellar play and unprecedented work ethic go overshadowed causing an entire stadium to boo because he decided to take his shirt off on a nice day while playing with his daughter in Central Park…

If a shirt can cause that much disdain and unwarranted discussion in the A-Rod crazed,  infatuated eyes of the public, he will never be able to publicly survive a steroid scandal.

And even though he has come clean and apologized, the fact that the American public has been nothing less then obsessed with this man since 2001, will only add to the scrutiny he will receive. From the talking heads on ESPN to the college kid blogging in his dorm and even to the housewife chatting it up with her girlfriends over a game of Mahjong, The Sports Nation will find their next fix in their addiction to A-Rod by knocking him off the proverbial pedestal.

This past Monday on his blog, Peter Abraham jokingly insinuated that Alex Rodriguez could single handily save the doomed newspaper industry.  He certainly has a point.  As long as A-Rod continues to live and breathe on Planet Earth, the masses are going to want to read articles on him using up too much oxygen.

It’s A-Rod’s world and we are all just addicted to it.  Am I a hypocrite for writing this and feeding into the very same issue I lampooned?  I sure am.

I can’t help it.  I’m addicted…

“There is a growing feeling within the industry that the nation’s economic struggles are going to have a major impact on the decisions of some teams. Some executives and agents believe a lot of teams might shy away from long-term obligations knowing that the disposable income of many of their fans might disappear —— and disposable income is what the baseball industry relies upon. More clubs may be apt to cut payroll or hold their budgets in place, rather than spend, because of the fiscal uncertainty. Some executives and agents talk about the upcoming off-season and increasingly sound as if they are coastal residents preparing to batten down for an economic hurricane.”

When all is said and done, the current economic climate and its effect on professional sports might be the biggest sports story of the year. While the current recession has not affected the New York Yankees who spent considerable money on free agents C.C. Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, and Mark Teixeira, it clearly has influenced the decision of other organizations to sign big name free agents. Take for example Bobby Abreu. Abreu was looking for a contract somewhere in the ballpark of three years at $15 to $16 million per year. Yet Abreu remains unsigned and it appears that he is looking at offers in the range of one to two years at $8 to $10 million per year. Several other big names such as Adam Dunn, Ben Sheets, Orlando Cabrera, Pedro Martinez, Manny Ramirez and Jim Edmonds remain unsigned. Teams are hesitant in the current economic climate to spend millions of dollars on players who are past their prime or injury prone. Even players like Andy Pettitte and Jason Varitek, who initially turned down offers from the Yankees and Red Sox to look for more money appear to have no other options out there. They will be forced to return to their former teams for a lower salary or to retire (Pettitte has already signed).

It will be interesting to see how this story plays out in 2009. A number of free agents may have to take significant pay cuts or sit out the upcoming season. It will also be interesting to see how the economic climate affects attendance figures. While the big market teams such as the Yankees, Red Sox and Dodgers should have no problem selling tickets, will fans in Pittsburgh or Kansas City want to spend their hard earned money to watch mediocre teams?

Andy Pettite

Jason Varitek was offered arbitration by the Red Sox, where Varitek would have received at least $10 million.  Scott Boras advised Varitek to reject the arbitration offer.  Since no other teams have bit the Varitek line, the Red Sox have all the leverage and are offering a Pettite-like $5 million guaranteed for one year of service plus a couple of options.

How long will Manny Ramirez play the waiting game?

Don’t be stupid, ya moron.  Strikingly obtuse, yet somewhat eloquent in it’s own  simplicity, the motto is actually a stroke of genius which should be etched along side E Plurbius Unum on the Great Seal of the United States.  In fact, it is somewhat ironic that the architects of the idea that a new nation would have soul autonomy to govern themselves by instilling power to the people was actually be created by morons.  And of course, they need a higher authority telling these morons “not to be stupid.”  Checks and balances at its most absolute, ladies and gentlemen.

Flash forward a couple centuries, add in some pin stripes, a fresh faced rookie from Kalamazoo, a Steinbrenner (or two or three) and billions of dollars.  Then sprinkle on some championships with a side of dynasty, not to mention the helpings of a powerful shortstop turned third baseman and the prodigal intern turned GM and you’ve got yourself the makings of a different kind of superpower.  An organization that annually spends more on their players then some nations actually earn through their GDP.  This is Yankee Nation.

But how could we possibly forget the architect himself, Mr. Joe Torre, the man who entering his second full season with the Dodgers has decided to air the dirty laundry of his time with the Yankees, specifically focusing on the A-Rod Era of 2004 to the Present.

As a die hard Yankee fan and someone who would pathetically lie down in front a bus for this team (okay maybe not a bus, but definitely one of those old school Fisher-Price Power Wheels), it pains me to say that if my old man ever met Joe Torre at this point and juncture, I would have him reiterate those immortal words that got me through some of the hardest times of my life: “Don’t be stupid, ya moron.”

It makes me want to scream: “Oh my dear Mr. Torre!  Wherefore art thou, Mr. Torre.  Eh Tu, Mr. Torre?  Where have you gone, Mr. Torre?” and many other literary cliches to add to my disappointment and betrayal.

The class and indispensable dignity in which Joe Torre veraciously carries himself has all but gone out the window with the tellings of this tell-all tall-tale.  The man who awoken a sleeping giant befuddled with 18 years of pennant-less baseball and turned himself into a demigod in New York has let Tom Verducci cheapen his accomplishments with the writing of The Yankee Years.  Recanting how teammates do not trust Alex Rodriguez and call him “A-Fraud”, painting A-Rod as a jealous younger sibling in his relationship with Derek Jeter and ultimately suggesting how Brian Cashman publicly aligned with Torre to stay on as manager and then secretly plotted against him in back room dealings to keep his own job safe are stories and accusations that should have been kept in the clubhouse of the Old Yankee Stadium.  At least for a while.

Where there’s money to be made, one should make it.  Especially in this economy, you cannot blame Joe Torre for putting out this book.  But for us here in New York, this is looked upon as the same treachery as Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.  And even though I am not calling for the electric chair, I believe it was irresponsible for him to print these stories while many of the main characters are still playing.  Let the memories of the dynasty fade away before the turmoil spills over.  It’s just too early.

So while Joe Torre soaks up the sun while riding around in his new convertible, which coincidentally is insured by State Farm, I would like to leave him with some other words of wisdom from my old man:

“Shut up and sit down!”

The Yanks initially made an offer to Teixeira a few weeks ago but then later withdrew it. This contract will pay Teixeira an average of $22.5 million per season.

The Yankees are definitely not shy about spending the loot. They have already committed $423.5 million in 1 month with contracts going to CC Sabathia, AJ Burnett, Teixeira and others.

When asked about the Yankees spending habit, Milwaukee Brewers owner Mark Attanasio said, “Frankly, the sport might need a salary cap.”

On top of all this, the Yankees were slapped with a $26.9 million luxury tax by Commissioner Bud Selig.

The Yankees, armed with a phenomenal pitching rotation, have spent $243.5 million on Sabathia and Burnett. Yankees GM Brian Cashman has reportedly made these deals after coming to the reality that the Yankees did not make the playoffs for the first time since ’93.

This past season with Toronto, Burnett went 18-10 with a 4.07 ERA.