Palm Beach County has approved $108MM in public funding for a $135MM spring training complex to be shared by the Nationals and Astros, writes James Wagner of The Washington Post. The clubs must still agree to a site for their new spring home. The move to Florida’s east coast also has implications for the Cardinals and Marlins. They are now more likely to remain in their shared complex, which included an opt out based on number of teams in the area.
- Phil Plantier has been relieved of his duties as hitting coach for the Padres, writes Corey Brock of MLB.com. The Padres featured the worst offense by many measures in 2014, although much of that can be pinned on sub-par personnel. Assistant hitting coach Alonzo Powell is expected to remain with the club.
- Jose Bautista spoke about Melky Cabrera’s upcoming free agency on Sportsnet 590 the FAN and handicapped a return at about 50-50, reports Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet.ca. According to Bautista, Cabrera will see what’s out there, but he’s “had a good experience in Toronto.” With Colby Rasmus expected to leave via free agency, the Blue Jays outfield could be in a state of flux is Cabrera also departs.
- Newly hired Astros bench coach Trey Hillman has worn a lot of different hats in his career. Evan Drellich of the Houston Chronicle profiles Hillman in his latest piece. He was let go from on-field positions with the Royals (manager) and Dodgers (bench coach) before latching on with the Yankees as a special assistant. Per Anthony McCarron of the New York Daily News, Yankees GM Brian Cashman approached Hillman about the opening left by former head of minor league operations Mark Newman. Hillman reportedly declined the position because he preferred an on-field role.
You could have put Hillman in as 3B coach Cashman!!
I can understand that places such as Florida gain revenues from having spring training, but it always amazes me that a multi-billion dollar industry and billionaire owners so often are able to redirect money that could have gone to basic services for ordinary citizens.
Large corporations..the Marts of the world do this all the time.
More public money given out for no reason. As if the TIF money for STL didn’t show what a mess that is. Ballpark village turned from supposedly being restaurants/offices/etc into a giant bar owned by the Cardinals. So now it makes the Cardinals a lot of money, meanwhile the local independent bars nearby now suffer.
There should be requirements that at least 50% of the money is private money or something like that.
The fact is that a lot of cities in Arizona and Florida are clamoring for a spring training site to come to them. They compete to lure the club there.
Ultimately, the bidding gets so competitive that some city agrees to pay a ton of money to help get the thing built.
The reason the cities want the site is that it then generates way more money to help improve the city (and the services in it) than the city ever spent luring the club there.
So stop yelling about tax dollars spent and think of them as tax dollars invested in generating more tax dollars.
Seems like all the teams will move to Arizona if they are smart, less travel time to games.
The problem is that it turns out to be a good investment for a select few and a mistake for the majority of tax payers. That’s a fact. Let multi million dollar businesses build their own stadiums and facilities.
Is there any evidence that they are major revenue producers? $108 million is a hefty sum for a county to fork over especially for a little more than a month of exhibition baseball. It would seem that if they are such huge money producers teams wouldn’t be inclined to share their facilities.
It is unfortunate that Plantier was let go as he seems as though he is a pretty good guy. He sure wasn’t given much to work with, but he got absolutely nothing out of any of the Padres hitters and did deserve his dismissal. Not quite sure how Powell didn’t end up with the same fate.
Palm Beach County has approved $108MM in public funding for a $135MM spring training
If that is the case, then if Palm Beach is making the Taxpayer pay for this, then tickets should be 5 bucks and parking should be five bucks like it is out in Arizona!
Or actually, we got away with not paying for parking a couple of times!
It is so much cheaper to go to a game in Arizona!
I am not surprised that Plantier was fired. Was always curious as to how a guy that was as bad of a hitter as Plantier got a job as a hitting coach. Bad average, no plate discipline and probably the worst batting stance ever. What was Byrnes thinking?
While you don’t have to be a good player to be a great hitting coach (former-Yankees, now-Mets hitting coach Kevin Long is one of the best in the biz and he never cracked the majors), it is really odd they picked someone with such a bad approach.
And it’s clear from watching the Padres day in and day out as I do, that there is nobody doing an adequate job of helping them figure out what’s wrong with their collective and individual approach.
When you watch a guy like Jedd Gyorko stand a mile from the plate and waste half his at bats topping outer half breakers, you start to wonder why nothing ever changes.
So……. Hillman is good enough to be in charge of the Yankees entire minor league system, but ISN’T good enough to be their bench coach?