You don't see the difference between 25 year olds acting like 25 year olds and 65 year olds acting like 25 year olds?

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Does it affect his managing?

Who cares? I doubt Maddon cares that people think he's goofy. In fact he probably plans it that way.

The guy who posts as "America" is gay? Must have missed the thread where he came out of the closet.

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Go Cubs!!!!

I agree with your last sentence. I think he cares A LOT that people think he is goofy.

I don't care that he does the goofy stuff. The players are probably mildly amused so why not? I do, however, get a little irritated that the media will portray this as instrumental to the team's success.

It's the equivalent of jeans and Hawaiian shirt day at the office. It's enjoyable but has zero affect on production.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

If the Maddon act was as old as described above, I find it hard to beleive we'd be signing free agent. Much less consistently signing free agents for sub-optimal dollars.

So far Fowler, Zobrist, and Hayward all spurned higher dollar contracts to come here.

I'm 50-50 on the schtick. Doesn't bother me per se....but sometimes seems a little bit too contrived.

I did see the Cubs facebook posting of the van driving up & the clowns or whatever.....Then I read some of the comments & much of it was puke-worthy slurping of all things Maddon.

Just killing time until the regular season starts!

Go Cubs!

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Proud to be UNVERIFIED.

Do we really need to break down the truth behind this belief?

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I'm not actually gay Steve, but your interest sure seems piqued.

What do you want Steve? Don't tell me about what your "friends" in Elmhurst want you to be, tell me about your paradise. Surrounded by men? Young, talented men destined for greatness? Festooned in blue and white (emphasis WHITE)? Maybe a little grab ass in the locker room with one of the darker, Latin ones and one thing leads to another. It doesn't have to be a dream, Steve.

yea the media sucks. whatya gonna do?

Being relaxed helps players perform better. For generations it has been something players acknowledged as they will tell people how valuable a guy like Bob Uecker or Jay Johnstone was, because they kept guys loose and relaxed. That a Manager (who many times is the reason for increased tension) is the guy keeping guys loose, may be even more valuable. In any case, his record speaks for itself.

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Go Cubs!!!!

I think Fowler took less. Heyward was a push. Took less overall but more per year.

I don't think Fowler took less unless you mean less from the Cubs by failing to accept the QO. That opt-out that no one else was willing to give has a lot of value, especially with next season's weak group of outfield free agents. But we can go with the narrative that guys just want to put on Cubbie blue so much they don't care about getting paid.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Does it?

RPB, I agree that the media sucks, but their reporting leads to beliefs like the one above. Their belief in the antics is a self fulfilling prophecy. Meanwhile, they never acknowledge that players want to pound a guy like Swisher into the ground when he plays grab ass while they are not playing well.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

The Cubs wanted him for 1-2 more years while Almora and Martinez are being developed to take over the CF position. They not only got him back for that 1-2 year stretch, they got him for less than the qualifying offer. I don't care if it was because teams didn't want to part with a draft pick and give him an out clause. All I care about is it worked out perfectly.

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Go Cubs!!!!

If his intention was to take less to be a Cub, he would have accepted the QO from the start. Sure you can conjure up some number that he was offered $32 from the Orioles and $8 is less than $32 but that would display almost no sophistication with the subject matter.

Same with Heyward.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

It's not really $8 million anyway. It works out to $13 million and him being a free agent after the season. He would have been better off with the QO, but he only took a $3 million haircut.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

I think we all know that it is better for a business to pay less money than more money

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Maybe Swisher was more obnoxious than funny? Maybe Maddon has a better sense of timing and recognizes when it's an appropriate time for some hijinks and when it is not? I don't know. But the players seem to respond positively. Let the dance parties, clowns, jugglers and petting zoo's continue, if it keeps guys loose and relaxed and it results in better performance.

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Go Cubs!!!!

So he took less money but overall the same value. That's fine.

And lets get go nuts in the other direction. Players like to play for good teams and in big cities. That doesnt mean they will lose significant money over it but its not like the idea that a guy would want to play for the Cubs is crazy.

I believe it was a lot more per year in the first three years with an opt out likely to be invoked.

Heyward's Cubs contract is essentially a three year deal (with a very big insurance policy should disaster occur). His per year over those three years was significantly higher than that of the per year for other seven year contracts.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I think that they actually intend to pay him more. I think they believe Almora will be ready for 2017 and intend for Fowler to only be here for 2016, then pay him the 5 million to opt out of the remainder of the deal and allow Fowler to sign elsewhere without teams having to lose a draft pick to sign him. But they also have the insurance of knowing if Almora is not ready, they can keep Fowler another year.

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Go Cubs!!!!

The point remains, if he didn't want to be in that environment, he had viable alternatives in STL or Washington.

I thought Fowler's supposed deal with the Orioles was more.


I dont really care why guys play here. Just win, baby

It's very rare for a player to flat out take less to play anywhere. The union frowns on it. And no agent wants to allow it. It's considered a slap at the other players and it just really isn't done. When it is, there's always an angle. Like Fowler with the opt-out that probably is worth more than $10 million (at least in theory) or Heyward at a higher annual average plus opt-outs.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Nope. There is a handshake agreement not to QO him next year. That was the reason the return was attractive. In practice, the Cubs are paying him 13 million (as Joe pointed out) for one year with no QO.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

That is completely understandable.

I don't know why the myth is being perpetuated.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

So it took Castro until August to understand the humor (language barrier and all) but once he got it, he really thought it was hysterical. Same with Fowler.

On the other hand, Hammel found the jokes hilarious in April, May and June but he lost his sense of humor during the All Star break.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

That part is actually true. Hammel was having the time of his life in the 1st half and turned cunty in the 2nd

But your point is taken

Jon Heyman tweets that Fowler’s contract is worth $33MM over three years.

So let me explain the numbers to the "subbies"

$33 mil>$13 mil

and if gets hurt for the next 3 years

$33 mil > $0 + $13 mil

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and as to Heyward taking less

this from Fangraohs:

On Friday, the Cubs won the bidding for Jason Heyward, convincing the outfielder to come to Chicago despite offers for more guaranteed money from the Nationals, the Cardinals, and reportedly one other team, perhaps the Angels. While Chicago’s offer of $184 million over eight years is certainly a substantial amount, he apparently could have taken $200 million guaranteed by going with one of the other offers. Instead he chose the Cubs, and along with putting him on baseball’s best team in 2016, the fascinating structure of the contract Chicago gave him may end up making this deal a big win for both sides.

here ya go "subbies" $200 million guaranteed > $184 million

Never let the facts get in the way of your opinion

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