Help me understand the #'s

[ram]

I'm a longtime Reds fan but have become increasingly frustrated with the apparent inability or decision not to pay the $ necessary to do better than simply "compete". I loved the G Steinbrenner approach...he was not interested in competing and willingly spent the $ he believed necessary to give his team a shot at going deep in the play-offs.

Help me understand the #'s that supposedly require the reds to have such a low payroll. Don't we sell 2+ million tickets? Don't we get tv revenue? What is the issue? Does ownership require a bigger return on investment than other organizations? What's the problem? It's getting to the point that I find myself thinking that if they are not going to strive to do more than just compete, why even have a team?

ram

[RedlegJake]

The Reds aren't even close to being bottom of barrel in payroll since Bob C. took over but there are limits. Ticket revenue alone barely covers the 25 man roster. Teams also pay their entire minor league player payrolls and some equipment costs for all of their minor league teams, plus all expenses for developmental teams. Plus all coaches, instructors, scouts, managers, administration, rents and leases, grounds crew, travel for minors and majors, signing bonuses, expense allotments, maintenance, food, marketing, utilities, and the sundry things every business has to pay for. With one of the lowest paying media contracts in the sport. If you love the Steinbrenner approach then, and I mean this respectfully, you really need to find a bigger market team to cheer for. That's just the reality. I'm not bothered so much by the amount of payroll, which I think is very good for the market, but I think there have been some mistakes made in allocation of those dollars. Well meaning mistakes (like Votto and BP's contracts) but as it is turning out, mistakes, nonetheless.

[dougdirt]

The Reds have some of the cheapest tickets in baseball, they are middle of the pack in terms of tickets sold, make middle of the road at best TV money.... They simply don't have as much money to spend as a lot of other teams. Fair or unfair, that's how it is. The Reds are never going to be able to take "The George Steinbrenner" approach. The average Yankees ticket price is more than twice what it is in Cincinnati. Their TV deal is even larger of a gap.

[dMaus14]

I think where our payroll is right now is what is needed to compete. You could do it for more and do it for less but where it is right now is what I believe is needed to keep some of our homegrown talent as well as be able to go out and get some FA. My problems with the way our FO has handled the payroll is:

1) Spending big money on the bullpen (we spent $25M last year and will spend $20M+ this year -- unless trades are made)
2) We should have been happy with what we got out of Ludwick in 2012 and then moved on to someone else (that is not hindsight either)
3) The one thing I have noticed over the years about the trade deadline is even those who win the division by a large margin still make trades because you build a roster to win the division during the winter; make upgrades to win the WS at the deadline

We need to get back to what type of organization we should be. They messed up by signing Votto, Bailey and Phillips to those big contracts but the future is not bleak. We still have high talent, price suitable assets to get us on the right track. We just have to be able and admit when we are wrong and move on.

[DanielPlainview]

I'm not bothered so much by the amount of payroll, which I think is very good for the market, but I think there have been some mistakes made in allocation of those dollars. Well meaning mistakes (like Votto and BP's contracts) but as it is turning out, mistakes, nonetheless.

This. 100 x this.

If the topic is specifically money, I certainly can't agree that Mr. Castellini isn't spending it. And if it's more than money I'd still take Bob over George any day of the week. I hate the TMZ aspect to sports and George, to me, was about as TMZ as it gets.

[marcshoe]

What does any of this have to do with hashtags? :p

[villain612]

It's pretty tough to criticize Castellini on his spending habits for this team. Cincinnati is about the 25th largest market in baseball but the Reds payroll was 12th highest last year. If anything, Bob should be lauded for spending the dough.

[VPI97]

It's pretty tough to criticize Castellini on his spending habits for this team. Cincinnati is about the 25th largest market in baseball but the Reds payroll was 12th highest last year. If anything, Bob should be lauded for spending the dough.
Agreed. As far back as I can remember, we've always been in the lower half of the league in payroll, but Castellini has opened up the pocketbook ever since he's been here. When I moved to Atlanta in the 90's, I found Braves fans increasingly annoying because they never knew how good they had it with a $100 mil+ payroll. Meanwhile I had to watch the Reds from afar try to compete with about $45 mil in salary. It's been great the past few years knowing we have opportunities to keep our top talent.