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Speaker 1: Welcome to this excision of fan territory. There is only

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Speaker 1: one thing to talk about, the thing we've been talking

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Speaker 1: about for I don't know years now, And of course

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Speaker 1: on Saturday it all came to fruition the show, hey

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Speaker 1: Otani contract, the terms, the team, the whole shebang. The

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Speaker 1: team wasn't really that surprising, although after Friday Shenanigans it

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Speaker 1: might have been a little surprising. That was the Dodgers.

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Speaker 1: The terms, though, oh they were surprising. Ten years, seven

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Speaker 1: hundred million at seventy million per season if you're keeping score.

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Speaker 1: And the reason the term was surprising is because we

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Speaker 1: had all thought when he underwent that second elbow surgery

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Speaker 1: in five years that it would diminish his value somewhat. Now,

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Speaker 1: I wrote at the time, He's still going to get

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Speaker 1: five hundred million. A bunch of readers told me I

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Speaker 1: was full of it. They were right. I missed by

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Speaker 1: two hundred million. But in reality, this deal is not

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Speaker 1: seven hundred million, least in present day value, and at

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Speaker 1: least more importantly, when it comes to luxury tax calculations,

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Speaker 1: the deal includes deferrals, massive deferrals. I want to show

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Speaker 1: you what I tweeted on Saturday, and a number of

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Speaker 1: others picked up on as well. We were told this

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Speaker 1: by a source. Otani's deal with the Dodgers includes unprecedented

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Speaker 1: deferrals the majority of his salary. The deferrals were Otani's

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Speaker 1: idea to ease the Dodgers luxury tax and cash flow

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Speaker 1: of burdens, to give the team flexibility to be as

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Speaker 1: competitive as possible. According to the source, Now, maybe the

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Speaker 1: deferrals were Otani's idea, but let me tell you something.

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Speaker 1: Andrew Friedman, president of baseball operations for the Los Angeles Dodgers,

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Speaker 1: loves nothing better than deferrals. Go look at the Monkey

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Speaker 1: Bets contract to see what I'm talking about. So present

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Speaker 1: day value, we're expecting that the deal will be between

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Speaker 1: forty and fifty million dollars a year, again in present

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Speaker 1: day numbers, and that's the number that you will see

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Speaker 1: for the luxury tax calculation as well. Of course, it's

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Speaker 1: a big number. And I expect his salaries over the

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Speaker 1: initial years of the deal to be rather low, and

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Speaker 1: I expect a massive signing bonus and then of course

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Speaker 1: a ton of money coming to him later. That is

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Speaker 1: what he is talking about. There are the sources talking

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Speaker 1: about in terms of the cash flow, it will give

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Speaker 1: the Dodgers the ability to do more things than they

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Speaker 1: would have if they were simply paying Otani seventy million

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Speaker 1: dollars a year. So for the Dodgers, obviously this is

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Speaker 1: a huge move. For twenty twenty four, well, it is

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Speaker 1: an offensive move, a move to help their run production,

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Speaker 1: which didn't really need more help, considering that last year

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Speaker 1: the Dodgers scored nine hundred and six runs, the most

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Speaker 1: by any team in Los Angeles Dodgers history. Brooklyn Dodgers

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Speaker 1: had a few years in which they scored more, but

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Speaker 1: for the Los Angeles Dodgers this was the record, and

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Speaker 1: now they get even better. Otani replaces JD. Martinez, and

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Speaker 1: obviously Otani is one of the top offensive players in

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Speaker 1: the game. From a pitching standpoint, well, the Dodgers are

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Speaker 1: going to have to wait. Otani will not be ready

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Speaker 1: to pitch again until twenty twenty five, coming off that

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Speaker 1: surgery that cannot be named, and even then we don't

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Speaker 1: know how many innings he'll be able to provide, and

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Speaker 1: from that perspective and that point on, how long he'll

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Speaker 1: be able to pitch and pitch effectively. So the Dodgers

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Speaker 1: now are in quite an interesting position. Let's take a

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Speaker 1: look at their rotation, the state of their rotation as

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Speaker 1: we sit here on Sunday night, with the Otani deal

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Speaker 1: still not official, but we're sitting here looking at this

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Speaker 1: group Walker Buhler, Body Miller, Ryan Peppio, Ryan Yarborough, and

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Speaker 1: some combination of Emma Sen and Gavin Stone. Of course,

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Speaker 1: that's subject to change based on spring training, performance, health,

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Speaker 1: and most importantly, who the Dodgers get next. They've been

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Speaker 1: in talks for Tyler Glass. Now I can see them

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Speaker 1: pivoting to perhaps Dylan Cease if that comes available to them.

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Speaker 1: Corbin Burns might also be availed, but Gosst now seems

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Speaker 1: to be the one that they've been focused on of late.

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Speaker 1: Trade talks are fluid, they can shift at any point,

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Speaker 1: but I would expect that they're going to make a

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Speaker 1: trade for one and then at least go to get

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Speaker 1: some free agent. Now you've heard them linked to Yamamoto

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Speaker 1: even after the Otani news was announced. I can see that.

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Speaker 1: But man, the Dodgers don't often play at the top

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Speaker 1: of the market, and this time they're doing it once

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Speaker 1: at least with Otani. Are they going to do it

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Speaker 1: twice with Yamamoto. When you've got the Mets, the Yankees,

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Speaker 1: the Giants and all these other teams involved, I'd be surprised.

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Speaker 1: But you still have Blake Snell out there, you still

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Speaker 1: have Jordan Montgomery out there, Lucas Giolito, any number of others.

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Speaker 1: They're gonna figure it out. They're gonna be fine. Now,

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Speaker 1: to close out this segment, I want to talk about

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Speaker 1: what I wrote after the terms were announced, after the

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Speaker 1: choice of team was announced as well, and essentially I

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Speaker 1: wrote a column saying that this was good for the game,

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Speaker 1: that baseball will benefit from this, that overall, this is

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Speaker 1: a positive. Fans did not react well to that, or

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Speaker 1: at least the ones who responded in the reader comments.

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Speaker 1: I'm accustomed to that. That's fine, everyone is entitled to

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Speaker 1: their opinion. But I want to take you through exactly

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Speaker 1: what I was thinking. And I wrote that colm knowing

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Speaker 1: that fans of certain teams, small market teams in particular,

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Speaker 1: would hate what I was saying. Payroll disparity in this

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Speaker 1: sport is a historic problem. It has not ever been

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Speaker 1: solved and probably never will be solved. It wouldn't even

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Speaker 1: be solved necessarily by a salary cap, and we'll go

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Speaker 1: into that in a second. The game's economics are based

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Speaker 1: on locally generated revenue, not national television revenue like the NFL.

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Speaker 1: It's a different kind of animal. And for the better

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Speaker 1: part of a half century now, since the creation of

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Speaker 1: free agency, fans have screamed for a salary cap. Now

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Speaker 1: it's not going to happen. The Baseball Union has held

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Speaker 1: strong in this. They are never going to allow it.

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Speaker 1: For them, it is the absolute line that cannot be crossed.

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Speaker 1: But for all the complaints about the disparity in payrolls,

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Speaker 1: we don't necessarily see disparity in competition the way some

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Speaker 1: fans might think. Now, if you're sitting there in Pittsburgh

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Speaker 1: or some other cities, Oakland would be obviously one. Now

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Speaker 1: you're saying to be whoa what are you talking about?

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Speaker 1: But let me show you something right here. Let's go

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Speaker 1: to what we've seen in Major League Baseball since the

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Speaker 1: year two thousand nog repeat champions. Only the Red Sox,

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Speaker 1: Giants and Cardinals have won multiple titles, and we've seen

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Speaker 1: sixteen different World Series champions sixteen. Now, let's look at

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Speaker 1: the other sports the salary cap. Sports that fans seem

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Speaker 1: to long for in this sport, franchises with titles since

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Speaker 1: two thousand Major League Baseball sixteen, the NFL thirteen, the

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Speaker 1: NHL thirteen, the NBA eleven. So if you're telling me

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Speaker 1: that there's great competitive balance in these leagues, no, it's

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Speaker 1: simply not happening. And frankly, in our sport. In baseball,

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Speaker 1: we have seen low revenue teams succeed and succeed over

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Speaker 1: multiple years. Now it's difficult to sustain, there's no question

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Speaker 1: about it. And that's really where you see the difference.

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Speaker 1: The Dodgers can sustain it to some extent. Other teams

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Speaker 1: can sustain it too, But Oakland and Tampa Bay and Milwaukee,

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Speaker 1: the teams that were successful for a period of time,

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Speaker 1: Tampa Bay and Milwaukee still fit in this category. It's

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Speaker 1: harder for them. Kansas City was successful for a time

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Speaker 1: in Cleveland, and now Baltimore was coming on as well

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Speaker 1: as Arizona. The Orioles last year won the Al East

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Speaker 1: with the second lowest payroll in the major leagues. The Diamondbacks,

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Speaker 1: with the tenth lowest payroll, made it to the World Series. Meanwhile,

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Speaker 1: the Mets, Yankees, and Padres all underachieved and underachieved dramatically.

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Speaker 1: So obviously, yes, there are differences in the way teams

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Speaker 1: go about it because of the money that they generate

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Speaker 1: because of their locally based revenue. But the sport, the

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Speaker 1: attendance last year, for all the people who tell tell

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Speaker 1: me the sport is broken, was up. The new rules

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Speaker 1: were having a positive effect. People are enjoying the game again.

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Speaker 1: And the expanded playoffs that I'm not necessarily in love with,

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Speaker 1: but the expanded playoffs have actually worked to enhance competitive

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Speaker 1: balance to a degree. Not necessarily, of course, in the

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Speaker 1: teams that get in, but once the teams get in,

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Speaker 1: it's more random, and we saw that last year. The

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Speaker 1: Diamondbacks knocked off the Phillies, they knocked off the Dodgers,

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Speaker 1: And for that reason, those teams that get in, the

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Speaker 1: low revenue teams that can figure it out, they've got

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Speaker 1: maybe a better chance than they did under the old system.

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Speaker 1: Is this perfect, It's not even close to perfect. I'm

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Speaker 1: not going to pretend it's perfect. It would be foolish

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Speaker 1: to say anything like that. But don't tell me the

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Speaker 1: sport is broken. I can see why in certain cities

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Speaker 1: people feel that way, but overall, from the global perspective

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Speaker 1: of this, the game is in a good place, and

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Speaker 1: the game is in a good place, which showhit Otani

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Speaker 1: in Los Angeles for the reasons I wrote time now

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Speaker 1: for the Inside Dish. This is the segment in which

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Speaker 1: I go maybe inside a story I've written inside a

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Speaker 1: trend in the game, and this week it would seem

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Speaker 1: to me that there is no way to get around

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Speaker 1: talking about what happened on Friday with regard to the

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Speaker 1: reporting about Shoe Otani's whereabouts and what he was doing.

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Speaker 1: With regard to his choice of team, there was a

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Speaker 1: report by Jp Hornstra on Dodger's Nation saying that Otani

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Speaker 1: had chosen his team and that it was the Blue Jays.

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Speaker 1: And there was a report by John Morosi saying that

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Speaker 1: Otani was on a flight from Orange County to Toronto,

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Speaker 1: presumably to either close the deal or I don't know

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Speaker 1: whatever it might have been, but it should have been

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Speaker 1: a good sign if he was indeed on that flight

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Speaker 1: for the Blue Jays. Obviously, both reports were proven to

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Speaker 1: be inaccurate, and what happened was embarrassing. It was a

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Speaker 1: poor reflection on our industry. It was whatever you want

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Speaker 1: to call it. You would be justified in being upset

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Speaker 1: as a fan. I want to preface what I'm about

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Speaker 1: to say with a few things. One, I'm friends with

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Speaker 1: John Morosi. I worked with him at Fox. He is

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Speaker 1: a great guy and he is someone that has really

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Speaker 1: come a long way in the business. We were at

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Speaker 1: Fox sports dot Com together for a number of years.

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Speaker 1: I don't know Jp Hornstraw as well. I know him,

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Speaker 1: but not as well. And the other thing I want

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Speaker 1: to say before I get into this, we all make

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Speaker 1: mistakes in our jobs. You make them, I make them.

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Speaker 1: No one is perfect. Now I'm not saying that to

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Speaker 1: excuse what happened. There's no excuse for what happened. There's

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Speaker 1: no question about that. It should never happen. But this

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Speaker 1: is the kind of thing that occasionally happens in the

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Speaker 1: Twitter era. Fans want information in real time. Reporters are

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Speaker 1: trying to give them information in real time. Everything gets

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Speaker 1: sped up and it leads, frankly, to more sloppiness than

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Speaker 1: existed in the days before the Internet, when we were

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Speaker 1: well most of us were just writing for newspapers that

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Speaker 1: came out the next day. Now I've talked about my

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Speaker 1: worst mistake, reporting that the Padres were close to getting

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Speaker 1: Max Scherzer at the twenty twenty one deadline. I have

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Speaker 1: since learned that I got played by one source and

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Speaker 1: that I placed too much value in the words of another.

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Speaker 1: It was not excusable. I have to own it. I

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Speaker 1: have to live with it, and to this day it

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Speaker 1: haunts me and it will always haunt me. I am

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Speaker 1: not happy about what happened. Shouldn't happened. There was bad

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Speaker 1: judgment on my part, but in this day and age,

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Speaker 1: there are very few of us who haven't been caught

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Speaker 1: in the same situation. And yes, the bigger the stakes,

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Speaker 1: the more careful you should be. Anything you want to

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Speaker 1: say along those lines, I'm good with. You're right. The

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Speaker 1: question people have often is what is the value in

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Speaker 1: being first on Twitter? And honestly, I'm not so sure anymore.

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Speaker 1: I don't know that I was for show. Sure, most

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Speaker 1: transactions can be confirmed in a matter of minutes. I

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Speaker 1: don't know anyone who remembers who breaks what, who's keeping

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Speaker 1: score out there? And I've said on various platforms. Now

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Speaker 1: I've said it on this show and other places as well.

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Speaker 1: My goal, at least in the last couple of years,

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Speaker 1: is not so much to break stories on Twitter. It's

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Speaker 1: to write stories that cannot be confirmed in a matter

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Speaker 1: of minutes, stories that really people can't touch. Obviously, the

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Speaker 1: most outstanding example of this in my career was the

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Speaker 1: story I wrote with evand Relic about the Astros science dealing.

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Speaker 1: Scan couldn't make a phone call and say, hey, can

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Speaker 1: you confirm this? No, there was too much to it.

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Speaker 1: And even the story I wrote last week, the one

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Speaker 1: about Otani being in Dunedin, Florida, at the Blue Jays

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Speaker 1: spring training complex, writing that he was believed to be there,

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Speaker 1: that qualified as well that could not be confirmed so easily.

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Speaker 1: In fact, I don't know that it's been confirmed yet,

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Speaker 1: so when you look at the whole picture here, in

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Speaker 1: some ways, I should be the last person to complain

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Speaker 1: about Twitter. In many ways, Twitter raised my profile to

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Speaker 1: a place where it hadn't been previously, even though I

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Speaker 1: was at Fox on television. But in recent years, the

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Speaker 1: len that baseball writers will go to to get scoops

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Speaker 1: has changed. Reporting is built on relationships, but the question

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Speaker 1: now often becomes how far are you willing to go

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Speaker 1: to maintain access to get information? Now? I get amused

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Speaker 1: when I see people commenting on my stories by columns,

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Speaker 1: as they did after the Ottani column, after he signed

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Speaker 1: saying Ken, you're a shill, you're a boot liquor, You're this,

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Speaker 1: you're that, the other thing. Guys. MLB Network declined to

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Speaker 1: bring me back in twenty twenty two because I was

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Speaker 1: none of those things. There are two prominent agents right

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Speaker 1: now who won't talk to me because I am none

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Speaker 1: of those things. And there are two other and an

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Speaker 1: agent's who went I don't know about a year, maybe

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Speaker 1: a year and a half without talking to me because

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Speaker 1: I am none of those things. It's just the way

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Speaker 1: it is. If you're going to report, you're going to

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Speaker 1: upset people, You're going to upset fans. From time to time,

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Speaker 1: things happen. That's the nature of journalism, the nature of journalism.

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Speaker 1: The intent is not simply to be nice to people

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Speaker 1: so they will give you information, and that to me

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Speaker 1: has been something that has been going on for a

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Speaker 1: while now. Now, the choices I've made, they've hurt me

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Speaker 1: in some ways, there's no question about it. And I've

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Speaker 1: had to live with that. And I'm not going to

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Speaker 1: sit here on my high horse and tell you I'm

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Speaker 1: the greatest, Like I said, earlier. I am not perfect.

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Speaker 1: It's a hard game, man. It's a hard game to

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Speaker 1: be right all the time. It's a hard game simply

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Speaker 1: to just go day by day and grind it out.

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Speaker 1: But I've concluded over the years that journalism has to

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Speaker 1: come f first. That's what we're here to do. And

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Speaker 1: the speed is important, the quickness of reporting something no

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Speaker 1: one can deny it. People want that, and you guys

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Speaker 1: out there telling me we don't care. No, you care,

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Speaker 1: that's why you're on Twitter in the first place. But

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Speaker 1: as much as speed might be important, accuracy and honesty

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Speaker 1: are more important than they always will be. Time now

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Speaker 1: for dude and dork of the week. Now, the dude

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Speaker 1: of the week, quite obviously for many people is going

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Speaker 1: to be Sho Heo Tani. How could it not be

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Speaker 1: seven hundred million dollars for a guy that has just

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Speaker 1: transcended our sport. But I'm gonna name due to the week.

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Speaker 1: A guy who spoke his mind last week had the

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Speaker 1: audacity to say that shoe Hao Tani was the Dodgers'

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Speaker 1: top priority, had the gunshan to say the Dodgers had

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Speaker 1: met with Sho Hao Tani and for several hours I'm talking,

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Speaker 1: of course, about Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, who broke what

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Speaker 1: was this supposedly unwritten rule about talking in any sense

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Speaker 1: about the show Hey Otani negotiations, and you saw the Dodgers'

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Speaker 1: brass react kind of negatively to this, or at least

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Speaker 1: say we did in author Rogix Dow's comments or something

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Speaker 1: along those lines. I don't even remember. It was ridiculous.

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Speaker 1: Number one on the ridiculous scale was that teams were

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Speaker 1: so afraid to talk when the reality was Shoe Otani

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Speaker 1: was not going to refuse to sign a contract because

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Speaker 1: you had mentioned his name show Hey. He who must

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Speaker 1: not be named, Dave Roberts said very normal things. Everyone

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Speaker 1: in the world knew that they had to have a

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Speaker 1: meeting with Otani. Everyone knew he was the Dodgers' top priority.

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Speaker 1: So what Dave Roberts did was not wrong. He was

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Speaker 1: actually the one guy in this process who spoke his mind,

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Speaker 1: who told the truth. Dave Roberts, due to the Week

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Speaker 1: Dork of the Week, the deal was not even official.

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Speaker 1: The deal had not even been announced when the Angels

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Speaker 1: started tearing down sho Haotani's mural at Angel Stadium. Who

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Speaker 1: knows he might flunk the physical. Maybe he'll be back

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Speaker 1: in play for the Angels, all right. Not likely. But

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Speaker 1: Sam Blum from The Athletic did one of the more

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Speaker 1: enterprising things in recent memory for me. Clever goes out

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Speaker 1: to the Angel Stadium just to take a look around.

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Speaker 1: What's going on here? And boom, this is Saturday afternoon,

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Speaker 1: shortly after the signing is announced. The mural is coming down.

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Speaker 1: Sam took a couple of photos. He's a photographer as

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Speaker 1: well as an excellent writer. And the Angels, my goodness,

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Speaker 1: show here, Tony gave you a lot. Now, I know

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Speaker 1: the mural has to come down, of course, I don't

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Speaker 1: know that it needed to come down with him. I

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Speaker 1: don't know a couple of hours of the announcement. The

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Speaker 1: Angels from the beginning, they handled Otani well. In many

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Speaker 1: ways they enabled him to become the player he is

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Speaker 1: and the seven hundred million dollar man. But my goodness,

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Speaker 1: they could have waited until the dark of the night

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Speaker 1: to paint that mural. They could have waited, I don't know,

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Speaker 1: a day or two until the announcement, the official announcement.

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Speaker 2: But no, the Angels had to wipe him away from history. Well,

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Speaker 2: not exactly, but they had to wipe him off their walls. Angels,

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Speaker 2: Dorks of the Week. Time Now for Grill and Ken,

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Speaker 2: Let's get to your questions. Are the Giants really serious

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Speaker 2: about getting Yamamoto after not being a finalist for Otani?

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Speaker 1: Yes, I would expect the Giants are really serious, Gustavo

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Speaker 1: who asked the question. And what's interesting now is to

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Speaker 1: see how many teams will be on tilt as the

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Speaker 1: off season progresses, and what I mean by that is

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Speaker 1: how many teams will become increasingly desperate or increasingly urgent

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Speaker 1: in the way they attack this. The Giants, in not

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Speaker 1: getting Otani struck out on yet another superstar wasn't necessarily

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Speaker 1: a surprise, but that is the reality. They want somebody

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Speaker 1: to be their franchise guy. Ideally it would have been Otani.

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Speaker 1: The history would have been kind of cool. Willie Mays,

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Speaker 1: the Barry Bonds to Buster posey to Otani didn't happen.

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Speaker 1: I don't know that Yamamoto is the same kind of

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Speaker 1: force for them, twenty five year old great pitcher. I

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Speaker 1: get it, But who else is out there? Cody Bellinger

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Speaker 1: is not going to do it in that sense. He's

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Speaker 1: a good player Matt Chapman, same thing. So the Giants

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Speaker 1: are going to need to do some things to improve

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Speaker 1: their team and to get that face of the franchise

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Speaker 1: that they've been trying to get for so many years now.

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Speaker 1: And I don't know how exactly it's going to go down.

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Speaker 1: And I'll tell you another team that's going to be

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Speaker 1: on tilt as well. If you remember a few days

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Speaker 1: before the Otani signing, while we were at the Winter meetings,

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Speaker 1: I wrote a story with Kitlin McGrath about the Blue

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Speaker 1: Jays and why suddenly they were in in on Moon

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Speaker 1: Soto hasn't really been their style. Well, the Jays have

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Speaker 1: three hundred million dollars in Bullpark renovations to justify premium

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Speaker 1: seating to sell. They too need a big time off season,

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Speaker 1: and the two biggest names are gone. So as this

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Speaker 1: thing evolves and the dynamics change, it's going to be

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Speaker 1: really interesting to see the Giants and to see the

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Speaker 1: Jays and how they react. For the Giants and Yamamoto,

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Speaker 1: it's going to be difficult for them. The Mets are in,

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Speaker 1: the Yankees are in, the Dodgers supposedly are in. The

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Speaker 1: Red Sox might be in. Every big spender you can

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Speaker 1: think of, wants a shot at this guy. It makes

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Speaker 1: it all the more challenging for San Francisco. All right,

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Speaker 1: on to the next question. Let's see what we got.

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Speaker 1: This one comes from Devin Nolan who asked, Hey, Ken,

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Speaker 1: how do you personally feel this deal with Otani is

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Speaker 1: going to affect the market for Juan Soto? Considering he

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Speaker 1: is five years younger, his agent is Scott Boris, do

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Speaker 1: you believe this means his floor is somewhere in the

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Speaker 1: six hundred million dollar range. Devin, great question. And if

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Speaker 1: you recall Juan Soto rejected four hundred and forty million

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Speaker 1: over fifteen years from the Nationals, and at the time

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Speaker 1: a lot of people thought he's not getting that in

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Speaker 1: the open market. Nope, he's getting that. He is getting

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Speaker 1: almost certainly at least five hundred and I don't know

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Speaker 1: that six hundred is out of the question. Now, again,

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Speaker 1: these things are valued differently. The Otani deal, the number

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Speaker 1: the shiny object is seven hundred million, but the reality

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Speaker 1: of it is in present day value, maybe it's five

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Speaker 1: hundred million or five fifty. Well, we don't know yet.

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Speaker 1: We have not heard the official terms. If Soto gets

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Speaker 1: a five hundred and fifty million dollar deal with no deferrals.

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Speaker 1: It might actually be worth more in present day value

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Speaker 1: than Otani's deal. But yes, I expect him to do well. Now,

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Speaker 1: one caveat with Soto, he has declined in his base

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Speaker 1: running and defense. Now we know he is an historic

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Speaker 1: offensive player, one of the great offensive players of this generation.

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Speaker 1: He's on a Hall of Fame track. All that is true.

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Speaker 1: But if he can get into better shape or at

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Speaker 1: least improve his performance defensively and with base running, in

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Speaker 1: my opinion, he'll be that much more valuable. And I

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Speaker 1: expect that with the Yankees, he's going to be extremely

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Speaker 1: motivated and is going to want to kind of re

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Speaker 1: establish himself in the other parts of the game. In

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Speaker 1: the batter's box, there is really no one like him.

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Speaker 1: We'll see how it goes for one, but I expect

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Speaker 1: it's going to go pretty well. All right, final question

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Speaker 1: here we go. This one comes from Robert. When was

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Speaker 1: the last time you paid to get into a ballgame? Now, Robert,

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Speaker 1: I know exactly where you're going with this. The fact

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Speaker 1: of the matter is that most of the games I

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Speaker 1: attend I am working at. But there are times that

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Speaker 1: I will go as a fan. Now, last year I

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Speaker 1: did not, but in twenty twenty two I did. Let's

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Speaker 1: get the picture up from photographic proof evidence. That's me,

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Speaker 1: that's my sister, that's my nephew. Oh and by the way,

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Speaker 1: we're in the upper deck at Yankee Stadium. Yeah, mister

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Speaker 1: media elite in the upper deck. Got my tickets on

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Speaker 1: stub Hub. I don't even remember what they cost. But yes,

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Speaker 1: I will go to a game on occasion with family

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Speaker 1: members just to sit in the stands. So what you're

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Speaker 1: getting at, Robert, is that I can't understand perhaps the

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Speaker 1: plight of the true fan. You're not saying that, I'm

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Speaker 1: kind of surmising it. I get it, And yes, of

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Speaker 1: course I get that it's difficult to for a Major

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Speaker 1: League ballgame for a family of four. We all know that.

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Speaker 1: But guess what on another level here, ticket prices are

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Speaker 1: not contingent on salaries. Ticket prices are based on supply

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Speaker 1: and demand. It is that way, it has always been

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Speaker 1: that way, and it always will be that way. But

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Speaker 1: to answer your question, yes, I go to games as

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Speaker 1: a fan on a rail off night. Yes I will

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Speaker 1: pay for tickets. Yes I am out there in the crowd.

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Speaker 1: In fact, that night people were asking me a Yankee stadium,

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Speaker 1: the heck do you do it up here with us? Actually?

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Speaker 1: I like it up there, all right, that's the answer.

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Speaker 1: Thanks to everyone for listening, for watching it, of course

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Speaker 1: for your questions as well. You know where to find

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