Prince: "I'm not happy about (contract renewal)"

[aracko]

Where did signing "The Kid" Griffey Jr get the Reds? Sure it "put them on the map" and probably helped them sell jerseys and I believe even got them on the cover of a video game and I am sure a few magazines. It gave them big sportscenter time also.

 

But it did not help them win. Like it or not - and I dont like it at all - Prince will have to move on eventually. The Brewers can ask for the moon in prospects and likely get it back. One player can crush a franchise under their enormous shadow that the contract gives. Look at how negetive the AROD contract was for Texas.

[jazzytrav]

2. I think it would make perfect business sense for Mark A. to disclose the offer - either officially or have it "leaked" - so that Prince knows what the Brewers are indeed offering, especially if point #1 is true, which I strongly suspect is the case. It makes perfect business sense because it would show Prince that maybe his agent is not telling him the truth about what really is going on here.

 

I don't think it makes any business sense -- we have other young players that will look at that offer and think it's too high or too low and that will change their expectations.

There's one thing we're missing here, too. Not all Brewer fans know enough about the Brewers to know who Boras is and that he's Prince's agent. But if they read in the paper that "Prince" turned down a specific offer, it will make Prince look bad to those people. Most of us here know that Boras is a jerk, so we put a lot of the blame on him. The last thing we want to do is make all of those 16 year old girls that just became Brewer fans last year and might buy Prince's jersey think that Prince is the jerk.

[fondybrewfan]

I for one hope that Corey Hart and Ryan Braun will eventually wear off on Fielder. Both are going through a similar situation, they have both had success and both and stated publically that their contract situation doesn't bother them and they realize that is just the system and the Brewers arent screwing them over. I think eventually Prince will realize that he is the one the highest paid pre arby players out there and there is no use getting pissed off about $200K now when nest year he will be darn close to 8 figures. I really hope his contract situation isnt distracting him from play right now, because he hasn't swung the bat especially well so far this spring.

[GenoSeligPrieb]

"The odds strike me a very remote that the Brewers could make some very sizable offer long term offer that Boras first rejects without asking Prince, then on top of that Boras hides that offer completely and Prince manages for who know how long to never hear an offer even was made?"

 

Don't be so sure, Danzig. I look at the Kenny Rogers situation, and it makes it that much more plausible that Boras would hide a legit offer from one of his clients.

 

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3115010

 

This passage tells a lot:

 

"Detroit president and general manager Dave Dombrowski said last week that the team has expressed an interest in having Rogers return. But he said from the GM meetings in Florida last week that he was told that Rogers "and his agent want to explore other options."

 

...which was simply a lie. Rogers repeatedly expressed a desire to sign one final deal with Detroit, for 2008, which was where he said he wanted to end his career. But Boras put out this lie, even including the Texas Rangers as a team he was interested in.

 

Thing is, when Kenny was a Ranger, he had that run-in with that cameraman who shoved the camera in his face. When Rogers pushed the camera away, this phony, who was caught winking to a fellow media creature a few seconds after the shove, eventually appeared on ESPN in a neck collar, smelling money. Incredibly, Texas owner Tom Hicks stipulated that the only way he'd consider bringing back Kenny Rogers, was if the pitcher apologized to this clown!

 

Of course, Rogers hadn't listed the Rangers as a destination, but that didn't stopped Boras from declaring that Kenny would possibly be a Ranger or a Mariner (?) in 2008.

 

"It's different than what Kenny told us," Tigers president/general manager Dave Dombrowski told the Detroit Free Press, "but that's what Scott has expressed."

 

If Boras is willing to contrive unbelievable rumors about a 43-year-old pitcher, then what's to stop him from similar conniving, and hidden offers, when the time comes, for Prince Fielder?

[Invader3K]

Yep, he's pretty much scum. If you dig around, there's other stories similar to that involving Boras. The best thing Brewers fans can hope for is for Prince to have some sort of falling out with Boras, otherwise I doubt there's anyway Fielder is a Brewer long term.

[danzig6767]

If Boras is willing to contrive unbelievable rumors about a 43-year-old pitcher, then what's to stop him from similar conniving, and hidden offers, when the time comes, for Prince Fielder?

I'm sure clients of Boras heard about the rough offseason he had between Arod and Rogers. If he was my agent, i know that i'd let Boras know that he better not pull that kind of crap with me or he'd be losing another high profile client. Boras also had Sheffield ripping him in the press, that's three big time players in one offseason.

It would take some giant sized nads by Boras to to hide a large long term offer from the Brewers to Prince and risk losing yet another client, especially given how likely it would be that Fielder would at some point find out a long term offer was made and hidden from him. Prince is a guy set to start making huge huge cash and is very high profile. If Boras pulled crap with Prince and Fielder found out and then canned Boras, his already dented reputation among players would take another big hit.

Boras is a guy that has shown that he has no problem taking verbal shots from owners or media types over the years, hell, he seems to enjoy the back and forth. Angering clients though is bad for business, Boras has to be more careful after the Arod/Rogers debacles. I by no means would say it's impossible that Boras would hide a large offer from Prince, just that i find it pretty unlikely. All it would take is one media leak from the Brewers or Melvin/Attanasio bring up the offer to Prince and Boras has some questions to answer with his client.

 

[brewtank34]

I'm sure Prince was upset with not getting $900,000 this year, but I doubt that he was as upset as he made himself seem when quoted in the paper. My guess is that Boras told him to act all upset so that he has an argument in his favor for the abritration hearing next year. I'm going out on a limb and suggesting that Howard's agent told him to do the same thing two years ago when Howard came up crying about his renewal contract.

 

Fielder is just playing the game y'all....and we and the media have been suckered into it.

[mletto157]

Truffle Shuffle!

[trwi7]

There's a few "speak outs" in the Journal-Sentinel about this today.

 

 

 

Brewers' penny-pinching pains reader

 

Columnist Michael Hunt suggests that the Brewers were wise in not offering to lock up Prince Fielder with big money saying it's "easy to see why they adhered to the only system available to control a payroll before it becomes unmanageable in a smaller market."

 

Since 1992, the year we gave Paul Molitor away, the Brewers have not only stunk as a team but have also not featured one marquee player. The philosophy was to get what you can from a youngster before he prices himself out of Milwaukee. That didn't seem to work out so well.

 

I don't see why Fielder should be criticized for wanting to be locked up as a Brewer. I doubt he needs "new age" advice from a sports columnist covering a team that has failed to make the playoffs for a quarter-century.

 

Fielder is the positive, baseball-first leader we wanted Gary Sheffield to be.

 

-Tad Kriofske Mainella, Milwaukee

Brewers being paupers about Prince

 

Shame, shame, shame on the Brewers organization for their treatment of Prince Fielder. After what he did for the team last year, it is hard to believe that the Brewers would only give him a $200,000 raise.

 

Vern Velnicke, Franklin

Team hasn't exactly been dollar-wise

 

They pay bespectacled bum, Greg Gagne, $10 million. They pay past-his-prime, career .251 hitting, can't-even-play-in-April, Mike Cameron, $7 million. But they cheat the cornerstones of the future, Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun, by paying them less than what the general manager makes.

 

If you were these young talents, what would you do when you became an unrestricted free agent?

 

Kevin McGrath, Wauwatosa

No the Greg Gagne in the last one is not a typo, that is what he actually wrote. It's amazing how many people don't know the system. They're making it sound like the Brewers are the only team that does this which is simply ridiculous.