Stanton a Ratbird?

[kaldaniels]

Perhaps at times through no fault of his own, the wrench that is thrown into this that Stanton isn’t a guy you can count on to stay healthy. That’s where I see the risk. What if 2 of the next 3 season’s are “partial” seasons again for him. What if the injuries add up. What if in 2020 he decides he’s not opting out?

I’m not firm on this so I understand both points of view.

But you are either getting 3 good-awesome years from him. Great!

Or things go downhill and you are stuck with a 200 M albatross of a contract.

If there was no opt out, I’d pay a kings ransom to get him for 3 yr 75 M (or whatever it is). But those last 8-9 years loom on the horizon...it’s one thing to pay Votto 200 M and have him produce. It’s another to pay a guy 200 M who’s only staying with you because he knows he isn’t worth it. I get it, it’s a worse case scenario but it’s there.

[M2]

That’s what I thought, but according to Gammons he has only explicitly said he wouldn’t accept a trade to a rebuilding franchise.

It appears that the rumors are substantial enough to suggest Stanton would accept a trade to StL.

The rumors seem to confirm Giancarlo's open to a trade.

[InsaneinthBrame]

You should probably try to switch teams, then. The Reds are never going to be players in the free agent market unless baseball changes the entire way teams make and share money.

lol The Reds can be players if they want they choose not to especially with changes in the last collective bargaining agreement

[WrongVerb]

Well, at least we have the chance that Stanton will be injured if he does get traded to the Cardinals.

[dougdirt]

lol The Reds can be players if they want they choose not to especially with changes in the last collective bargaining agreement

Sure. Every team COULD BE. But they aren't going to start taking losses in money. Just like everyone else. So, realistically, the Reds are NEVER going to be players in the free agent market. I'm sorry that I wasn't specific enough in my first post.

[Z-Fly]

I hope he goes to the cardinals. I think the contract ends up being an anchor. That guys rarely plays a full season. I can't imagine that getting any better. He'd be better off going to the AL.

[Falls City Beer]

I hope he goes to the cardinals. I think the contract ends up being an anchor. That guys rarely plays a full season. I can't imagine that getting any better. He'd be better off going to the AL.

I can't recall a time when they've been overly restrained by finances.

[dougdirt]

I can't recall a time when they've been overly restrained by finances.

That's because the two times they really tried to screw things up by offering huge deals to bad bets, both guys went elsewhere (Pujols and Heyward).

[Chip R]

Well, at least we have the chance that Stanton will be injured if he does get traded to the Cardinals.

He was healthy this year for a change wasn't he?

[WrongVerb]

He was healthy this year for a change wasn't he?

"for a change" indeed. The best predictor of injury is past injury. That he escaped this year could prove to be the anomaly, not the norm.

[nmculbreth]

"for a change" indeed. The best predictor of injury is past injury. That he escaped this year could prove to be the anomaly, not the norm.

Agreed. Perhaps I'm just a Reds fan scarred by the Ken Griffey Jr. experience but there is no way I'd want to be on the hook for $295mil for a guy with Stanton's injury history, unless of course I was operating with the kind of money the Dodgers have at their disposal.

[M2]

Giancarlo right now reminds me of Manny Ramirez after 2003 - massive contract, monster bat. The Red Sox put Manny on waivers in what may have been the worst idea of Theo Epstein's life. Fortunately for Boston, 29 other clubs proved to be even bigger fools. The Sox wound up with two WS titles thanks to that league-wide fit of madness.

Giancarlo ultimately might be available for not much more than the willingness to pay him. His AAV isn't really that high and he could 400+ HR over the next decade. Put him on a good team and you could find yourself basking in glory.

[InsaneinthBrame]

The Reds can spend a lot more than the fans realize. The Reds had a 105 Million payroll before the last national broadcast rights which created an additional 30 million per year per team.
Last year MLB sold 75% share in BamTech to Disney for 2.5 billion this is 80 million per team
Revenue Sharing (30% of all local revenue) for the Reds amount doubled this last year because the money is only going to 17 teams (17 smallest markets) the Top 13 Markets are no longer getting any of this money. In 2016 the A's received 35 million that means that the Reds at least got that much in 2016. With the change in the CBA it means that the Reds are getting at least 70 million in 2017 the smaller the market the bigger share they get in this new plan. This money has to be spent to improve team performance
The Reds attendance has shrunk so that revenue is down but they got new TV deal so I expect they balance each other out.
They are also getting Revenue from Baseball Advanced media (owned by all 30 mlb teams)
Mlb also has added more sponsorship money every year (this last year they added 600 million in new ad contracts)

So bottom line I see that the Reds have an added 65 or more million in yearly revenue from 2013 when they were spending 106 million so a 140-150 million payroll would not be unreasonable in my mind. Our payroll is projecting to 88 million at this point (68 for 5 players on contract, 11 for 5 in arbitration 9 for 15 players making minimum) so we could spend 50 million per year on FA. Edit some of the 65 million per year goes to analytics,draft, international sgnings and player development (20-30 million)

[Kinsm]

Castellini & the Williams brothers took out 100M$ in debt when they purchased the club, the Reds are paying that down now. It's not unlike the Marlins & Astros sales, the only difference is when they decided to pay it down - right away or wait.

Reds money from Bamtech was supposedly given to the minority shareholders as they'd never received a dividend from owning shares in the club.

Below is how the team's ownership is split.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This team's primary owner is Bob Castellini. Castellini has one of the smaller ownership positions among MLB teams’ primary owners though.

The shares Castellini and the Williams brothers initially purchased for 270 M$ (or roughly 70% of the franchise) came from Carl Lindner, Louise Nippert, William Reik, George Strike, Great American Insurance Company, and the Gannett Co - who combined owned nearly 100% of the club at that time. The Lindner family - 9%, the Nippert family - 6%, Reik - 6%, and Strike - 9% retained the other outstanding 30% of shares after Castellini's purchase (but the Nippert's eventually sold their share to Frank Cohen and Strike's shares were also sold upon his death).

Big Bob's group (he and the Williams brothers) then immediately turned around and sold a large chunk of their shares to 10 minority owner groups as non-voting shares. Each of them received approximately 3% of the club for a 6.5 M$ investment fee. Leaving Castellini and the Williams' controlling roughly 40% of the team. The sales were part of the original financing plan Castellini laid out to MLB in his bid for the club. It helped him reduce his debt load down to approximately 35 M$, which was initially 100 M$ of the 270 M$ purchase price.

In all there are 19 different shareholders with at least a 3% stake. Big Bob is the majority shareholder at 15% and he is also listed as the primary owner with MLB, the other 18 shareholders have a smaller stake.

Reds Ownership Shares as of 12/15/16:

Bob Castellini (15%), W. Joseph Williams (12%), Tom Williams (12%), Lindner Reds Baseball LLC (9%), Frank Cohen (6%), William Reik Jr. (6%), Buy Buy Baseball LLC (3%), EMK Investment Company LLC (3%), Larry Sheakley (3%), Jeff Wyler (3%), Harry Fath (3%), Jeff Gendell (3%), AACE LLC (3%), HKR Baseball LLC (3%), Ron Sargent (3%), John Wyant (3%), Queen City Diamond LLC (3%), Heading for Home LLC (3%), and Art Hauser (3%).

LLC's Above Broken Down -->
Lindner Reds Baseball LLC - Carl Lindner III and Craig Lindner.
Buy Buy Baseball LLC - Rick Steiner Trust, Jim Miller, Rocco Landesman, Gary Rabiner and Dale Rabiner.
EMK Investment Company LLC - Steve Cobb and others.
African American Capital Enterprises LLC - Edwin Riguad and others.
HKR Baseball LLC - Joseph Rouse and others.
Queen City Diamond LLC - George Vincent, Tom Neyer Jr., A.G. Lafley, Jim Johnson, Mike Ryan, Dinsmore & Shole, and Frank Woodside.
Heading for Home LLC - David Drees and Ralph Drees.

FYI: Since the initial purchase Castellini has reportedly expressed interest in buying ownership stakes if any investors decided to sell all or part of their interest in the team, but none of the owners of smaller stakes have seemed interested in doing so with the exception of the Nippert Trust in 2014.

[InsaneinthBrame]

The team is worth well over 900 million now according to Forbes

The money for BAMTECH to me shows that they rather make money than invest in the Team.

And none of that money is included in my payroll estimate. Baseball is flush with money.