I Think Rob Manfred Saved The Winter Meetings
The MLB Winter Meetings are kinda fuckin bullshit. A lot like road tripping with your friends to Milwaukee Summerfest in the late 2000's. Some years it was awesome, and some years it was just Milwaukee. Some years you get drugged and robbed at a riverfront strip club. Other years you'd chase some strange older pussy up to a Lake Pewaukee guest bed for an overly-odoriferous night of sex.
The good was great. The bad, equally traumatizing. And most (if not all), completely outside your control.
That's MLB's winter meetings to me and this year is no different.
Of course I want Shohei Ohtani and Admiral Yamamoto signing with the Cubs. No shit. One of the few joys left in this sick cruel life is good clean baseball. You're on fuckin pluto if you think otherwise.
Here's my problem
The whole thing is a clusterfuck. We got zig zag reporting. Rumors. Anonymous front office sources. Scumbag agents and scumbag owners manipulating a desperately employed populace. Even more tortured fans, hoping waiting watching judging
Look at the baby. Look at the baby.
Season ended a month ago. They gave out awards for 2 weeks, paused for Thanksgiving, took a dump and went to Nashville. Call me crazy but the turn around time here's a little tight. Little firm.
Some ideas (and again we're just spitballing here folks)… what do we think about moving the winter meetings up and the free agency window back? Or maybe going full live auction with one of those professional GOINGOINGOINGOING-DO-I-HAVE-$535 MILLION guys. Make the boys get the checkbooks out on a Saturday night? Who says no to that?
It's obvious we can do this better and I want to applaud Rob Manfred for recognizing that ahead of time. Rob Manfred's going to fix this and that's because Rob Manfred is a good commissioner.
Earlier this week it was obvious Shohei was hijacking the meetings. There was minimal activity. No trades. A splash of Erick Fedde rumors from Korea. Sloppy reporting from Bob Nightengale and some weird Dodger conflict. Otherwise, all quiet and extremely awkward with everyone confused about appropriate Shohei coverage. Reporters genuinely conflicted about how to handle what appeared to be a bizarrely delicate situation.
Insert Rob Manfred. (This is my working theory.)
I think people were legitimately terrified that the week would come and go without major activity given Shohei's attention. So Rob (again, working theory) gets Shohei to agree to commit to signing before the weekend. Master negotiator. Rob then gets that information public through his own channel: MLB Network. They break that news yesterday and a bunch of shit flows downhill. It's as simple as having a firm date for the number 1 guy to let the other chips fall. That's what Rob did yesterday. He got Shohei to give a date and those chips fell. Hard.
Again. And again. Just a working theory. But my sense tells me Rob intervened in some capacity on behalf of the greater good of baseball. That's the guy Rob is and the kinda shit he does, all behind the scenes without a fraction of the credit.
Meanwhile Adam Silver's making geo-political moves and preparing to lead the first installment of a surveillance-heavy global government. But Rob Manfred's a bad guy?
myfuckinass
We're really off the rails here. No politics. My point is that the Winter Meetings are hard/impossible to control. This week was off to a shitty start. Rob Manfred stepped up and I think by the time you can criticize this blog, Shohei's already whittled it down to his final 2 destinations.
And scout's honor, I think the Cubs end up #1.
I really do.
I think this Saturday afternoon during Army-Navy, I'm gonna get a notification.
BREAKING: The Chicago Cubs and Shoheyman Ohtani have agreed on a 10 year contract worth $535M.
It's gonna be fuckin awesome.
And for that, I thank Rob Manfred first and foremost.