Kendrick Lampoons Homeless

In an apparent effort to drum up lagging ASG enthusiasm, tone deaf Dbacks owner Earl "Ken" Kendrick managed to mock homeless people instead:

This still is captured from his club's latest 'lipdub' extravaganza, showing the wealthy magnate wielding a cardboard "Will Work For...." placard. The self made Kendrick is such a sharp card that, even in this highly choreographed advertisement, he forgot to hold his amusing sign high enough for grounded earthlings to actually read and potentially be offended.

If you look through the roll bars like an obsessed doofus, however, you may be able to make out the words "All Star", which suggests the intended message was:

Will Work 4 All Star Tix

One can't assume for a moment Kendrick was intending to ridicule homeless people. I imagine this was an awkward attempt at self-deprecation, and a rather ponderous stab at feigning solidarity with the middle class. To assure MLB's poorest market, struggling through a regional depression, that he feels our pain. That he understands these ASG strips, which have yet to sell out in almost two months online, are expensive.

Despite those reasonable business, and perhaps even personal, intentions, and the fact Kendrick is a charitable giver and grew up in West Virginia and all of that, this remains an inordinately wealthy businessman, who blew more than a million dollars on a baseball card, holding up a different kind of cardboard.

These creased, makeshift signs of desperation are all over Phoenix. Some are scammers and some are destitute people suffering serious ailments. Some of them routinely die outdoors during baseball season, within walking distance of where this allegedly amusing video was shot.
 
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hat tip AZ Snakepit

More Whispers From Kendrick

Of all the famous gaffes and baffling missteps perpetrated by Managing Partner Earl "Ken" Kendrick, perhaps none backfired like the time he curiously volunteered to The Arizona Republic that previously unimplicated Gonzo was the subject of vague and unspecified steroid "whispers". 

Four years later, Kendrick appears to have this 'whispers' strategy down pat.

thrilling climax and denouement >>>

Name That Franchise

Arizona Diamondbacks. What does that even mean anymore?

The organization's original, inclusive vision extended the triple AAA club, as well as spring ball, to Tucson, our state's second largest metro. Jerry Colangelo, who still resides off Thomas Road in central Phoenix, wanted to exploit the southern market and brand the club across the state. 

But after the franchise father was disowned, his successors severed the last limb of this statewide vision. The independent minor league squad recently relocated to Reno. Then, Paradise Valley residents, Ken Kendrick and Derrick Hall, abandoned Tucson entirely for greener casino pasture, just west of their private mcmansions. The audacity with which Arizona's indigenous team circled its wagons in Scottsdale, before the adolescent TEP was even paid off, begs the question whether the broad 'Arizona' appelation applies anymore.

thrilling climax and denouement >>>

Puppet Show

It's pretty evident Gonzo benefited from PEDS. No clean player in history enjoyed such a late career power transformation. I dont think that makes him a pariah, necessarily, or all that unusual among contemporaries - nor does it negate earlier franchise glory, within such a broadly corrupted sport.

But if I was Kendrick, blustering about the game's old fashioned virtues whenever it suits me, I might think twice before eagerly tatooing '20' on the stadium next to Jackie Robinson. The same owner who planted "whispers" about Gonzo before contract negotiations, today cant fill seats with his own whisper of a team. So a compromised Kendrick finally adopts the popular WS hero to nudge ahead of the Nats and Reds in attendance - subordinating pious PED 'principle' to profit.















By all accounts, it was a welcome event for a near sellout throng, who paid premium rates to send off Gonzalez for the twenty ninth or thirtieth time. Ah, the joys of club sponsored, canned "tributes". Some say it signals a change of policy, or even of heart. Diamondhacks isnt so sure. We bristled when these stewards actively erased our heritage, and yes, we're complaining now when they embrace it. Because timing and track record are everything.

Gonzo's well attended and, let's face it, long underdue, honor is the latest in a string of puppet shows manipulated by Kendrick and Derrick Hall. It's what you dish out when you cant deliver the real thing. Dolls, puppets, cheap mass produced reproductions. Wide screen reruns of a distant World Series, co-opted by Kendrick after years of sneering at everything associated with it.




It's early August and we're already waist deep in increasingly dubious bobbleheads, which are plastic (formerly ceramic) puppets. Daron Sutton's oleaginous bidding and spasmodic theatrics evoke puppetry of a different kind. AJ Hinch was a figurative puppet. Ungainly characters in the ill conceived "Legends Race" are, literally, puppets. This entire organizational cast is inflated and painted for the show, yet relatively hollow inside.

Ironically, Luis Gonzalez seems to be the most human character among them. Fifty thousand came out to say so. To affirm that even with his wooden cliches and the spectre of steroids dancing overhead, something about Gonzalez is still more real and worthwhile than anything the current organization has to offer.

Room For Two

After navigating the toughest month of opponents in franchise history, skipper AJ Hinch has predictably been dismissed. Less predictably, he took the General Manager with him. Like Bob Melvin's ouster a year prior, the timing of the firings, relative to the seasonal schedule, leave little doubt as to the short term impetus or curious integrity of the changes.

If you recall, Melvin was axed immediately after surviving a 29 game stretch against almost exclusively .500 or better teams, ushering in Hinch to face the then hapless Nats and Reds at home - and one of the easiest extended stretches in recent memory. Today, Hinch endured a brutal interleague schedule to make way for Kirk Gibson, who will be greeted by 17 of 20 at home against lesser foes. After that, the schedule trends even easier, if that's possible. Sound familiar?

The other parallel involves tangential effects. Melvin's dismissal didnt stir much outrage, at least outside the clubhouse, but did lead directly to the departure of Bryan Price. Today, most everyone is relieved to see Hinch exit, but the absence of Josh Byrnes may prove more strategically problematic.

Byrnes, it is rumored, is the early odds on hero in all this, standing by his man, a la Tammy Wynette. Just kidding. I think it's actually damn dignified and a pretty rare thing to do. To punt a high profile baseball job, because you really believe in someone you think is getting a raw deal.

Just ask Bryan Price.

Longer term, jettisoning AJ Hinch is a good thing, although not as good as never inserting him in the dugout in the first place. The clubhouse vibe, which he was hired to improve, never did, and in fact badly deteriorated. Reportedly, the relationship between Byrnes and Hall had also grown strained. That's what happens when you put a marketing careerist ostensibly in charge of a substantive baseball mind competing under tight fiscal pressures.

The marketing careerist won and I'm not sure that's a good thing for the franchise.

What easily gets lost in all this shifting, is that Melvin and Hinch both had their clubs objectively playing better just before they were dropped. That doesnt mean AJ should've ever been hired, or that Melvin was a great manager. But both teams had settled down, with clearer skies ahead. That contextual performance tends to fall by the wayside, however, when what matters most to the leaders of an organization is manipulating fans and perception. When what's more important than fielding a good team is telling you how good it is. When what trumps winning is manipulating personnel so you can take credit for anticipated bumps a softer schedule affords.

I fear that's what this organization has largely become. It's defining character seems to be perception, rather than substance, driven. Hinch and Byrnes were party to that, at times, and received criticism here. So, I harbor mixed feelings about both of them. But in the end, seeing how their respective if not always respectable tenures played out to the bitter end, it's hard to escape my impression that each young man, in his own way, was probably a little too good for the room.

Fans Speak: Hall's Off The Field Superlatives Fall Broadly Short

While its methodology has been skewered more often than pineapple and shrimp, ESPN's latest franchise rankings still furnish valuable data about the Dbacks, if you poke for it. Their eighth annual survey ranks franchises in the four big sports, based on national fan input on half a dozen "satisfiers" - and a couple other tabulations.

On the face of it, the Dbacks come across quite well, ranked #26 out of 122 North American franchises. Expect the likes of Derrick Hall and Jim McLennan to trumpet this finding as evidence of organizational substance and vision. But looking closer, and I hope more meaningfully, one finds pretty much the opposite.

Meaningfully? Well, what's the value of comparing baseball teams to the Buffalo Sabres or Cleveland Browns? When baseball enjoys inherent affordability advantages and each sport cultivates its own brand of customer. In addition, ranking franchises across markets and sports (ie product) simultaneously creates excessive statistical noise. In order to more accurately evaluate the Dbacks, we need to filter out the other three sports.

Just baseball teams. The Dbacks still look pretty good. Eighth out of thirty teams. But is this proof they're doing a marvelous job? Or is there something else we can control for? There is! We can control for market, by eliminating the other 29, and comparing recent poll results with earlier in-market numbers. Apples to apples, or about as close as we can get - Phoenix to Phoenix. No skewing "noise" from entrenched bicoastal negativity; the Dodgers and Red Sox for example, and both pairs of teams from New York, all finished in the lower half of these rankings. Yes, the World Champion Yankees ranked 16th! Phoenicians are generally much easier to please. So let's control for that, mindful that each year's rank really reflects previous year's performance (ie the 2010 survey was conducted prior to the 2010 season, and reflects previous attitudes.)

ESPN first polled fans early in 2003. How did we do?

In terms of overall satisfaction, the Dbacks ranked first in baseball. The next year they ranked second. Even in the 2005 survey, reflecting a hostile ownership takeover and 111 loss season, the Dbacks (run by Colangelo through July and Kendrick the rest of the year) polled ninth. Five years later, Hall's rank of 8th doesnt sound quite so impressive, does it?

Let's look at polling components. My favorite is "affordability". Again, Arizona currently ranks eighth, which is about where I think they objectively belong (in MLB's lowest per capita income market) - but still a fair distance from Hall's largely unchallenged "lowest prices in baseball" ideology.

Wait, it gets better. Colangelo raised prices every single year. Wouldnt 2002-03, right after the World Series and a 98 win season, be the perfect opportunity for him to really gouge the base? In 2003, they ranked fatcat Jerry seventh in affordability - better than the talkative Hall's best mark! You have to laugh. For years, Hall has harangued locals about his superlative values in a half empty ballpark. Colangelo never claimed he had baseball's lowest prices. Saying so, over and over, would've been beneath him. He provided utility instead.

Additionally, year-to-year affordability numbers paint an instructive picture of when local fan utility actually fell of the cliff.

2003 - 7th Colangelo
2004 - 10th Colangelo
2005 - 12th Colangelo/Kendrick
2006 -19th Kendrick
2007 -18th Kendrick
2008 - 8th Kendrick
2009 - 9th Kendrick
2010 - 8th Kendrick

As mentioned, Jerry incremented prices every year, and fan utility was slipping, so that by the time Kendrick took over they had dropped to about twelfth. But look at 2006, which represents Kendrick's first full year at the helm. It was then - and not before then - that affordability took its sharpest plunge in franchise history. 2005-06 is when Kendrick and Moorad jacked individual game prices by 30-150% while fielding losing teams, and it's from THAT policy that Kendrick and Hall have been trying to win back fans. Not some corporate fantasy about Colangelo previously fracturing or alienating the fan base. He played a part, but a relatively small part in that transitional fracture.

Here's year to year "Ownership" data:

2003 - 2nd
2004 - 3rd
2005 - 13th Jerry? Ken? some shared dissatisfaction likely
2006 - 14th
2007 - 18th
2008 - 7th
2009 - 21st
2010 - 14th

Pretty similar. The big drop here was captured early in 2005, after the ownership transition, the Backman fiasco,etc. I'm probably being kind to Kendrick, attributing the town's negative feelings to "shared" dissatisfaction, but hey, that's the sort of guy I am.

Let's close out with a couple nuggets. Starting this year, ESPN expanded the ownership category into subclasses and ranked them as well. One subclass is ownership "honesty". I was interested in what fans felt about this, since we enjoy the most objectively "accessible" team executive in baseball, Mr Derrick Hall. Derrick is justly famous for chatting with fans, disgruntled or otherwise, and the Diamondbacks promote the image that they are the most responsive, communicative, "fan friendly" franchise in sports.

Despite, or maybe because of those efforts, they scored below league average in honesty. And this was before this summer's debacle, when Derrick defined and defended his "championship-style" team. Ouch. Maybe if he just let fans judge his product and pricing on its own terms, like they did under Colangelo and did in these surveys, he might've scored higher. Instead of, you know, trying to fool everyone and make them feel stupid for not fully appreciating his oversold and disappointing product. It's a cautionary lesson, I think, about the difference between quantity and quality of business communication.

Lastly, there's an ownership sub-category on Community Involvement. The Dbacks do better here, scoring 12th. Nothing wrong with that, except for Hall's lofty suggestions they're the most charitable and involved in baseball. Memo to Hall: the people you're reaching out to, those benefitting from your vision, think you're closer to middle third. Dont take my word for it. They're just sayin'.

Willis, Stottlemyre To Swap Roles

Struggling starter Dontrelle Willis will switch roles and responsibilities with embattled pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre Jr, the Diamondbacks announced Tuesday.

According to GM Josh Byrnes, the reassignments aim to optimize organizational resources in a challenged market, and are effective the moment the 46 year old Stottlemyre finds a glove to his liking.

We tried to get Dontrelle to aim the ball between on-deck circles, with mixed results. Mel doesnt throw very hard at his age, or quite as hard as his dad in Missouri, but I think our remaining fans will be pleasantly surprised with his command.

Willis, who has no formal coaching experience, enthusiastically supports the initiative and aims to succeed in his unfamiliar post.

"The ball just wouldnt stay down for me, but I'm down with this. Whatever. Anything that helps the club, you know? That's what I'm about."

Byrnes further defended what, flat on its face, appears to be an unorthodox move:

People may question, "Arent you changing the nature of the job a little bit?" Yeah, we'll do that.

Just because Dontrelle cant throw a strike, doesnt mean he cant inspire others to do so. We noticed how vocal he was with Edwin during the no hitter, and thought it was strange Edwin had never pitched anywhere near that well for Stott.

So, we wanted to capitalize on Dontrelle's unique mentoring skills. We feel we've done that.

General Partner Ken Kendrick chastised skeptical media members:

Some "experts" liken this to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, but we think that's irresponsible. Firstly, the Titanic was an ungainly - and quite ostentatious - vessel, with lots of lifeboats, so it's hardly analogous to our efforts here.

I didnt get into this business to fail, or sink as it were. It's been five years now, and I dont honestly recall why I got involved exactly, but sinking twelve thousand feet straight to the bottom of the ocean wasnt in my wildest dreams.

At heart, I'm a modest man, operating a modest business, realizing modest returns, but despite what others may think, I do have wild dreams from time to time, when I feel it's appropriate. That's the key. I carefully assess whether or not it's appropriate, under the particular circumstances.

The Times, They Are A Fakin'

Josh Byrnes, last week in The NY Times:

In a market like ours, we have to be disciplined with managing our payroll...

Market not only implies disadvantage, but an external, static handicap beyond franchise control. To be fair, he's talking to a New York reporter, covering the biggest, most lucrative market in the sport, but for an articulate spokesman like Byrnes, there probably are more accurate nouns than "market" at his disposal.

ESPN.com's Rob Neyer picked up on this. Here's his response to that portion of the Byrnes interview:

I'm not exactly sure what Byrnes means when he references "a market like ours" as if that were a bad thing. Last year the Phoenix metropolitan area was the 12th most populous in the United States, and growing incredibly quickly (sure it's a desert, but land is cheap and people are incredibly short-sighted); within a year or two, the region will break into the top 10.

Maybe the corporate support isn't there and maybe retirees won't pay top dollar for tickets and the people are definitely not concentrated within 20 minutes of the ballpark. But the Diamondbacks do not have a population problem.

Neyer's not exactly right either. There's conflicting evidence as to whether Phoenix is growing at all right now. It's certainly not growing incredibly quickly, like it has for a long time. But it's a substantial, spread out metro. The spread out challenge has been mitigated by improved freeways and signature light rail.

Corporate support has dwindled due to the economy and waning baseball utility. The Diamondbacks predictably responded by going where the money is, much like bank robber Willie Sutton, and heavily tied their enterprise to casino interests. As far as paying "top dollar" for tickets, the expensive box seats at Chase Field dont drive the vacancy issue. It's the mid to low range seats that Phoenicians feel are too high.

So, if selling your most expensive seats arent a real problem, and eager casinos are bankrolling your new stadium and half of what's in the old one, is it really "the market" disciplining your payroll? Relative to New York? Yes. Relative to most other MLB cities? Probably not. If fans arent buying enough tickets, can it really be tied to "market" if Colangelo sold substantially more tickets - to a younger, smaller metropolis with inferior public transport?

What's disciplining payroll isnt "market" nearly so much as "budget", which implies similar disadvantage, but not nearly the same determinism. A budget is a dynamic function of external and internal considerations. Ownership discretion and input are clearly implied, as are financial pressures stemming from a variety of internal actions, like bad contracts and fielding barely competitive teams.



The thrust of organizational advocacy is to make your boss look good. If you cant make him look good, like on the field, then you at least try to make him sound good in the papers. That's what this is about. Subtlely deflecting responsibility from Josh's bosses, and frankly, from himself.

As Neyer indicated, the Diamondbacks dont suffer from particularly unusual external challenges. It's an internal credibility issue that plagues them, that by dancing around with The New York Times, is becoming more "external" every day.

Corridors of Change

Some years ago, the Yankees visited town for a set. An average of 48,200 inhabited BOB's rafters. It wasnt the World Series. It was 2004, amid a most trying season when they dropped 111 games.

Fast forward six years, to a metro Phoenix at least ten percent larger, serviced by a popular light rail system that whooshes by the stadium entrance every seven minutes or so. Colangelo's inheritors have, for years, insisted they proffer the lowest prices in baseball. And into this accessible bargain basement march the defending world champs, baseball's rock star roadies.

We only average 46 and change, on the rising tide of these Gotham gushers. Energetic crowds, who enjoyed an entertaining, closely contested series. But never has the ballpark on Jefferson been so overrun by alien foes of humanity (excluding in-game host "Mike" and one Trace Adkins concert).

At least we didnt hear claims of a sellout, as we so often do from Derrick Hall, when thousands of his most loyal, valued chameleons instinctively dress as dark green, hard molded plastic seats. Did he simply forget to bend the truth this time? More likely, he's too busy orchestrating a far bigger sellout, as his Dream Team feverishly co-opts a history they strategically discounted for half a decade.

They methodically demonized the father of that history, in the papers and on TV, even after they fired him. They blasted his business acumen and ethics. They snickered at his out of date, paternalistic culture. They denigrated the stadium only he was able to realize and from which they now hold court. They obliterated any vestige of brand continuity and the uniforms of a World Series champion. They not so casually denigrated fans' two irreplaceable heroes, Luis Gonzalez and Randy Johnson. And they denigrated fans themselves, chastising Phoenix for not supporting second and third rate teams and for not understanding the game or the daunting onus of keeping a franchise afloat in what they've disingenuously painted as an unusually challenged market.

Under the stands, there's a corridor, between the dugout and the clubhouse, through which all Diamondbacks pass. After practices, losses, wins. Even championships. One of the walls was purple and players wrote stuff on it. Left their personal marks for posterity, year after year. It was the players' wall and became a sentimental connection for some, between each other and between their ephemeral athletic selves and the concrete permanance of a stadium and a franchise.

Yes, the usurpers painted it over. Sedona Red. It sounds like a small thing, a petty thing to do or even to get upset about. Nonetheless, a startlingly tone deaf and unnecessary directive, with significant repurcussions. More important than the act itself was the indelible knowledge that a new leadership team would even want to do something like that.

It's not the only reason players here have been looking over their shoulders, and looking out for themselves, ever since. But it's one of many slights, triggering a toxic and ongoing disconnect between Kendrick/Moorad era management and players. When management casually disregards players feelings and paints over their little piece of immortality, players tend to perform with all the heart of a contractor or temporary worker.

A more recent, tone deaf directive was the shockingly insular hire of AJ Hinch. Same ivory tower disregard for player input or feelings. Same resulting morale issues. Same "inexplicably" discouraging results.

I guess the easy metaphor is about walls, of which there are now so many, stifling this organization. But the resonant metaphor, especially now, is really about painting things over. Kendrick, Moorad and MLB didnt just oust Colangelo to realize a better rate of return. Kendrick, in particular, was so angry at Jerry's spending that he felt compelled to paint over - literally and figuratively - the very creation and accomplishment that the spending brought.

Unfortunately for him, the creation he systematically obscured, to get back at Jerry, was the creation this city identified with, more than anything he's managed to create on his own terms, since. It must be an extraordinarily bitter pill for Kendrick, not just because he strutted around for years about how he was going to outperform Colangelo on the field, but moreso because Kendrick himself quietly funded a good chunk of the inaugural success.

After failing to field more than one team that outscored it's competition (barely), in six tries, the artist formerly known as Pious Earl has his paint brush out again. With another season and the fanbase escaping him daily, Kendrick has instructed his minions to suddenly embrace the purple past, with a frenzied lack of subtlety for which they are justly famous. Perhaps we'll explore the gaudy limits of this strategic deflection at a later date, after we've caught our breath and stopped holding our sides from laughter.

What's important to note for now, is that even the transparent dolts at azcentral.com see right through this similarly transparent charade. You cant obscure and obliterate the past at every turn for half a decade, then use that same past to suddenly obscure your unpalatable present. Well, I suppose you can try. These are, after all, people with a comically low opinion of their customers. They can continue to brush all they want, but that underlying contempt for fans hasnt changed, and will require more than another coat of paint.

Creator of .370 Club Making Improvements, "Getting More Involved"

Since the Earl of Penury has hinted at transformative changes, bigger than Saul Rivera apparently, I guess I should chime in. After all, people used to flock to Diamondhacks from miles around, to get up to speed on all the latest vitriol and schadenfreude directed at our self styled Dream Team. So, if just one person still stumbles in here, by God, I will deliver vitriol and schadenfreude!

After ten straight losses, 31 innings without a run and half a decade without much of a clue, criticizing the Diamondbacks is like shooting large, slow fish in a...well in a desert, frankly. The hoi polloi have coalesced around the intuitive initiative that some combination of Hinch and/or JByrnes needs to go. Having studied Kendrick's tactics for years, however, and listening to his recent comments, I question whether either insider will exit straight away. Ken's odd and obstinate, but he must realize AJ's a bust. How could one not? I imagine he's showing support for Hinch now because he doesnt want to introduce a new manager against June's brutal interleague schedule - an awkward time to be fostering even the illusion of competitive progress.

Besides, Kendrick is almost assuredly more eager to cut costs and float hazy perceptions of long term progress, than invest in easily measured (and judged) short term moves in a 'lost' season. It sounds as if AJ's gonna stick around, at least through the most difficult stretch of games, much like Melvin before him.

And if AJ's safe it's hard to conceptualize Josh Byrnes getting the immediate boot either, despite Nick Piecoro's emphasis on JB's tenuous future. Perhaps an internal promotion, like Woodfork, is possible. It just seems exceedingly awkward for AJ to be thrust upon any GM coming from outside the organization.

Instead, I anticipate player moves to dump salary and prepare for next year and beyond. I also think Mel Stottlemyre Jr will be dismissed. This FO has a long history of blaming low level managers for encompassing, organizational shortcomings, and Stott's dismissal can easily be justified by Arizona's atmospheric ERA. It also serves to at least partially appease a hostile fan base lusting for management blood.

Who will this club's geniuses dump or trade this go round? Here's their priciest long term obligations, in millions: '

Justin Upton $50
Dan Haren $34
CY $24
Reynolds $14
Ed Jackson $12
Snyder $11
Drew *** (arbitration in 2011-2012)


Developing...

Double Edged 'Advocacy'

Just as placarded protests at Diamondback games seem to be dying down, a related story questioning the integrity of club ownership is just building steam.

Ken Kendrick is reportedly "hosting" a partisan fundraiser at Chase Field on May 20th, during a game. This is important because it comes on the heels of Derrick Hall's SB1070 related denials that the "organization" takes political stands.

I really wouldnt have an issue, if one of the "quieter" partners (ie Royer, Chipman) held a fundraiser, and comparable suite leases were available to different political persuasions (which, I assume, they are).

But Kendrick is the face of the franchise, along with Hall. So for him to lend his name to this event (quite apart from any money), in our publicly financed stadium, seems incongruous with the club's stated position. It contradicts the tone of the earlier statements, that's for sure.

For a blustery figure with an almost casual penchant for sullying the integrity of others (Colangelo, Luis Gonzalez, Wally Backman, WVU athletic dept), Mr Kendrick appears to be saying one thing and doing another, parsing his own actions and words with the sharpest of double edged blades.

Hinch Ditched For Wagner Card

The holy grail of baseball cards, a Honus Wagner T206 owned by Ken Kendrick, will immediately supplant AJ Hinch as skipper, the Diamondbacks announced today. Hinch has been reassigned.

"We knew when we hired AJ that we were pretty out of the box. Believe me, we knew" Kendrick said. "It didnt work out, so this time I decided to keep our search within the box. Specifically, PSA's lucite casing, which protects my extraordinary Wagner card.

I want two things from a manager. First, dont ask questions when I give a directive. And two, be clean cut. I was pleased with AJ's appearance, the lack of facial hair, but one doesnt need a magnifying glass to see the Flying Dutchman is expertly trimmed as well. "

Team President Derrick Hall also issued a statement:

This latest move is exciting for the franchise and the Diamondbacks' nation of highly valued fans. Our most recent year of gross underperformance was a perception issue among our wonderful fans who are still learning the game, and doesnt reflect negatively on AJ or the outstanding leaders who hired him. AJ is a true difference maker, who developed and managed our fabulous core, without a hint of facial hair.

Kendrick added: AJ was a very clear thinker, but nothing matches the clarity and gloss of my Wagner card. It's a PSA 8 for God's sake, and just jumps off the paper. Take a look! It's hypnotic!

The principal owner was asked if a player card managing a major league team might present problems.

"No. Honus commands respect wherever he goes. We'll display him on the manager's stool, in the dugout, where everybody can see him. I'm confident we'll be fine."

The High Price of Deception

While fans of normal major league clubs anticipate Cactus & Grapefruit League action, word weary followers of the Diamondbacks brace for this spring's iteration of Baseball's Most Byzantine Memo, courtesy of President Derrick Hall. The headline, if history holds, should look something like:

DBACKS REDUCE OR HOLD TICKET PRICES on 84% OF SEATS FOR FOURTH YEAR IN A ROW

The percentage deviates from year to year, but the underlying con job is the same. What the above construction has basically meant, in English, is they raised prices on the 16% of seats sat in by season ticket holders, and raised individual game prices on half a million, unaccounted for, single game buyers. Yeah, I know, that sounds incompatible with the headline, but in spirit, that's what they've done since 2005. Regularly raising prices where fans are most likely to sit - then leveling, and more recently reducing, rates in weak selling sections.

On a fundamental and important level, neoclassical supply and demand, there's absolutely nothing wrong with the last part. It makes perfect sense, actually. What's wrong, and exasperating, is the lengths Dback deciders go to dress up this for profit strategy in a righteous, almost altruistic cloak. One reason, perhaps, is that it uncomfortably contradicts Mr Hall's airy service mantra of "rewarding his most dedicated fans". By reducing prices in only low demand areas, it's generally not diehard package accounts who benefit, but discerning holdouts who may be enticed by select reductions in less than stellar seats.

The larger contradiction is simply the hikes themselves. When you rely on tenuous and misleading "evidence" to brazenly prop your franchise up as "the most affordable in baseball", raising rates every year creates dissonance in your base that must be smothered, spun or simply smiled away.

Single tickets go on sale a week from tomorrow, yet remarkably, not a hint of individual game rates appear anywhere on dbacks.com. Despite grotesquely comic divorces that have compromised Dodger and Padre focus, both found time between sniping and court filings to prominently display prices - and the relatively amicable Rockies and Giants have been hawking regular season tix online for some time.

So why are the Diamondbacks "priceless" and arguably, clueless here? Could they be less customer focused than the Moores and McCourts? Does Mr Hall need extra time to craft this year's intricate crannies within The Memo? Is he the lone priest entrusted to upload this normally rudimentary information to the great unwashed? Is he running behind, or has he temporarily misplaced his remarkable gift of distortion? Hall might be otherwise engaged, managing fallout over the sour choice to abandon Tucson for Casino Park, and his awkward injection into Mesa's proposal to build the Cubs a new spring complex - a performance for which he was roundly pummeled by fans, media and state legislators. Whatever the "priceless" reason, it seems like a curious way to sell tickets.

Which brings us to something else Mr Hall said this week. According to beat writer Nick Piecoro, the CEO relayed that the club's 2010 attendance goal- provided that they win - is 2 million fans. I'm aware the economy is struggling, but this minimum target of theirs is lower than any annual gate realized in Diamondbacks history. Lower than 2005, when certain geniuses decided to increase prices after losing 111 games the year before. A half million lower than 2004 itself. And lower than last season, when the economy, poor play and ongoing value erosion conspired to drop attendance more than 4000 per night. Their goal is to be lower than that? Seriously?

With a team virtually guaranteed to perform better, probably much better, than last year? With the Dodgers and Giants poised for potentially significant regressions? With the Yankees on tap? With [snicker] the lowest prices in baseball? With the golden carrot of the 2011 All Star Game driving package sales? With enormously popular lightrail gliding to and from Chase Field's doorstep - from Mesa, Tempe and points north and west? With a Metro population twice as large as during the Diamondbacks' inaugural 1998 season? I'll say it again, because I know it's important - the economy is very weak. Fair enough.

But a goal of two million, in this town, is still a joke. It's an indictment. Not of fans, who averaged 3 million under Colangelo, whether he won or lost a hundred, without Mr Hall's fireworks, concerts or the city's light rail. In a Valley 20-50% smaller, with prices far cheaper than Moorad and Kendrick's - even after adjusting for the Dept of Labor's and Mr Hall's respective inflations.

In the same chat, Hall unintentionally revealed more on the subject, in that sideways manner of his:

Fans need to have confidence in the talent on the field.

That's true, certainly, and I'd go farther and predict locals will be pleasantly surprised by this year's hardball model. But Hall's tautology distracts from a more troubling, overarching ennui inspired by his "team". Phoenicians lack confidence in this ownership group, whether it be an ability or willingness to fashion a competitive product at market driven prices. In addition, baseball loving Phoenicians dont particularly like this ownership group either, which Diamondhacks has tirelessly (and tiredly!) documented since the rift went public, in 2004.

There's no denying Derrick Hall has ingratiated a personal fan club - encouraged by leadership to distract from unpopular principals, principles and not ready for prime time teams. He works hard at it and his cheerful energy can be infectious in small doses. Look no further than the insular circle of ostensible adults gushing how great it is to have "access" to a club president, who deftly schmoozes them for maximum PR exposure, while Barnuming our much larger, potential market into submission.

The profit from this targeted salesmanship is the adoration of a few hundred fanboys, and maybe a few thousand others, who think Derrick Hall's uncommon enthusiasm and people skills merit allegiance to - or very light treading upon - unpopular policies and methodically dishonest salesmanship.

The price? How much has relentless obfuscation from Hall and phony "entertainment" from talented underlings like Daron Sutton cost this franchise? It's not all their fault certainly, but two million is a nice round number. Where there used to be three.

At the end of this year, Ken Kendrick will have essentially run this franchise for as many seasons as Jerry Colangelo before him. Six years and change. Colangelo created the enterprise from essentially nothing, shepherded it to its greatest competitive heights, and bequeathed a lucrative farm system for his usurpers to exploit and mismanage. Mr Kendrick's legacy? He's managed to stabilize his rate of return by fielding a second division product in an historically weak National League. Yet even today, misguided fanboys parrot boilerplate it was Colangelo who ran "the operation" aground.

It is, at heart, a self interested, corporate deception. Fans in the nation's fifth largest city are on to it, and exacting its price on the appropriate parties.

Out of Town Scoreboards

This time of year, normal Phoenicians have long since tired of what the usual opinionistas profess did in our local nine. Derrick Hall looks to injury and happenstance, Levski targets the EB contract, and my dear friend Jim McLennan blames Colangelo, stupid fans or anyone other than Jim's put upon franchise princelings. This blog, Diamondhacks, ID's pretenders undermining not just our NL West chances, but Western civilization itself.

So there you have it. We know where everyone stands. Or bends. Let's fill our lungs, instead, with some fresh air from beyond our well dug trenches. From Andrew Baggerly, for example, an SF Giants beat writer. Keep in mind, "beats" normally come down more critically on the orgs they cover every single day. Three days v. the Dbacks apparently made quite an impression.

Baggerly:

The Arizona Diamondbacks are a hot mess. I used the word “dysfunctional” in my game story, but only because I write for a family newspaper.

The players don’t appear to hustle or care, they make embarrassing fundamental errors and almost every inning, you get the sense they’ve never scouted their opponent or pay any attention to detail. I suppose that’s what happens when you replace your manager with your farm director in the name of “organizational advocacy.” (And while I don’t know much about A.J. Hinch, it’s pretty clear a Stanford degree only gets you so far.)

Let’s put it this way. If a runner is standing at third base with less than two outs, the game situation often compels you to play the infield in, right?

When that runner is Bengie Molina, uhhhh… not such a smart move.

The most embarrassing part was when pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre Jr. went out to talk to Dan Haren, got snippy when plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt tried to move things along, and ended up getting tossed. Then Hinch got tossed, too.

All the while, Haren was standing on the mound, getting cold. Brilliant stuff, boys.


Another out of towner, Spink Award winner Tracy Ringolsby, rumors the reeling Dbacks are for sale. One can certainly pray. His unsourced tidbit drew a blustery denial from Earl "Ken" Kendrick, the moralist legally squabbling over Jeff Moorad's outgoing share, while preaching he's not in baseball for the money.

Kendrick:

"It's a complete and total fabrication of the highest order. That's [selling the Dbacks] the last thing on my mind."

Well, hardly the last thing, given recent sale of another major league franchise all but confirmed "the last thing" on Kendrick's mind was his most embedded partner's vigorous interest in the San Diego Padres.


Ringolsby points out "there is no indication that there have been any serious talks with a prospective buyer...", so he's not floating a baseless rumor that a sale is imminent. He's implying a credible, unnamed source has hinted to him that the Dbacks are "available", open to discussion, etc. Kendrick calls that a complete and total fabrication? It's not much of a story, is it? The idea Kendrick would sit down with a hypothetical buyer? Why would Ringolsby completely fabricate something so mundane out of thin air?

It's true he shares my general disdain for Dbacks brass, and more specificially their hollow cult of organizational aggrandizement, but as a columnist, he's entitled that. The issue isnt who likes who - it's whether there's anything to the sale rumor and who's telling the truth.

We dont know the answer, but I would ask two questions pursuant to it.

1. Who sounds more credible, less bombastic here? A high ranking journalist who claims the Dbacks are "available" but there's no evidence of any serious sit downs, or an owner who dismisses such tame talk as "a complete and total fabrication." How could Kendrick possibly know what others have confided in Ringolsby to make such a sweeping indictment?

2. Who's got the larger potential conflict of interest? A very well-connected journalist relaying an unsourced aside, or the owner of an unstable $400M concern, worried about his position amid rumor he wants out? Who has more to gain by hiding the truth for their own profit?

Perhaps Jeff Moorad could shed some light on the subject.

Executive Weak

Disenchanted Diamondback fans (are there any other kind?) may look forward to a pair of hot, airy events this weekend. The hapless, cost-shedding Pirates are flying into sizzling Sky Harbor. And the hapless, fan-shedding Dbacks are launching "Executive Week" on FSN.

No, seriously. You cant make this stuff up. Under the guise of being responsive, even useful, to fans, Derrick Hall and selected spokesmen will commandeer literally hours of postgame air time to sell a disbelieving public on just how marvelous the organization is, from top to bottom. Wait, how silly of me. There is no bottom! It's one great big, continuous Circle of Success. I almost spoke out of turn.

It's hard to tell which is the more inexorable force. The Pirates shedding payroll every summer, or the Dbacks' shedding of fans with an increasingly tone deaf penchant for self-promotion. At least FAA regulations preclude the Bucs from jettisoning pricy veterans while their plane is in transit. The FCC provides no such temporary relief to Arizona fans, yearning for something approaching a normal baseball telecast - or a straightforward front office.

Here's what Hall will probably broadcast (and parenthetically, what he will not):

We've had some injuries (front office decisions arent to blame for the poor record)

We've lost some close games (and we've won close games. The overall record speaks for itself)

We're playing better than before ( a Little League team could play better than we were before)

Dan Haren can win the Cy Young (unlikely, but I'll wake you up every fifth day, just in case)

Mark Reynolds and Justin Upton have emerged (and we still stink)

We have the lowest prices in baseball (except for the Pirates and some other teams)

Fireworks every Friday night ( if it's not the least bit windy, which hardly ever happens on July evenings in Phoenix)

The All Star game is coming ( eventually, along with heat-related medical emergencies)

We're building the best spring training park ever (down the street from our benefactor's 240,000 sq ft casino).

We're doing it for the best fans in baseball ( the ones I recently criticized for disloyalty and not understanding the game).

Another self serving public relations blitz to distract from the unprofessional mess that is this season. Another crafted condescension by entrenched execs to massage their own unsatisfactory performance. Another day in Paradise Valley, Sedona Red style.

Man On The Boon

As front office credibility dwindles, leave it to MLB stooges to spin damage control fluff about the Diamondbacks' core of the future and to prop up Ken Kendrick as some financially responsible franchise savior.

This "financially responsible" Dream Team has been mostly responsible for refinancing (and to be fair, salvaging) their personal investments and for disenchanting the fastest growing major city in North America. Doesnt make them bad people - but it doesnt make them civic minded altruists or praiseworthy franchise stewards either.


Mr Kendrick asserted ownership control and has continued to increase his share at every opportunity, because team value is generally increasing and whether he reports it or not, he's realizing a return - even when (and some might argue, because) the team loses on the field. Colangelo's teams won, but franchise value was relatively flat because of the debt. Different priorities, different dreams, different results.

Ken Kendrick:

"If somebody had told me before the season we'd have lost Webb and Jackson, I'd have told them we'd be lucky to finish .500"

Diamondhacks:

If someone had told me Dan Haren would hurl like Zeus, Justin Upton and Mark Reynolds would morph into All Stars, Doug Davis and Max Scherzer would sport ERA's in the threes and Jon Garland's park adjusted ERA would hover near league average, I'd have told them no injuries could possibly explain being fourteen games under .5oo.

The fact is, a bunch of good, unexpected things have happened - rendering the front office meme that this year's model is "snakebit" as lame excuse-ism. Worse, it reveals an entrenched reluctance to accept responsibility for their own selfish priorities. Their own small dreams. Their own mediocre results.

In related news, we landed on the moon forty years ago. Or not. You decide.

Phoenix had its own Man on the Moon a decade or so ago.

The Philosophy of Organizational Aggrandizement

Before AJ Hinch ever coached a game, Diamondhacks distilled what his auspicious arrival primarily portended. Quite apart from driving tangible improvement, his head scratching hire was wordsmithed and painstakingly timed, to position and ultimately seize organizational credit for generally expected short term performance regressions, following an injury plagued and uniformly disappointing April.




Not a month into Hinch's 12-14 reign (versus weaker foes than Melvin faced), the front office Dream Team unveiled Phase II of its campaign to assume and assign credit for their hand picked Success Agent. Amidst an 8-0 rout of the hapless Padres (projected by many to lose 100 games), play-by-play toadie Daron Sutton dutifuly chimed in that the club is hitting "almost a hundred points higher" with runners in scoring position (RISP) than they did "in their first twenty nine games". This is true (well, seventy-six points [.262 v .186] when he said it, so true "enough"), but this was no impromptu trivia, blurted in the booth to kill time in a laugher.

The less than cryptic "twenty nine games" is a measure of Bob Melvin (12-17), the 2007 NL Manager of the Year-turned-scapegoat, who predated Josh Byrnes and CEO Derrick Hall, and who was Ken Kendrick's reluctant second choice following the West Virginian's self-inflicted Wally Backman debacle. These high class movers and fakers are too classy, it appears, for mouthpiece Daron to actually name the skipper they aimed to implicitly malign last night.

Sutton couldnt simply observe, for example, the team's hitting better "in May than in April", which reflects an even clearer statistical distinction for the public. No, the ponderous '29 games' spiel is their rather purposeful cue that Melvin couldnt manage an offense (and Hinch can) - although it bears mentioning (because Sutton assuredly didnt) that Rick Schu (another Josh Byrnes hire) was hitting coach during this entire inoffensive stretch. Schu, we recall with limited amusement, was this GM's 'answer' to replace Kevin Seitzer, Byrnes' earlier, outside the box, personnel "failure".



If that's all Sutton said, it wouldnt be a big deal, of course. Announcers say stuff like that all the time. In SedonaRedland, however, Daron's riff set up a pre-edited video segment with Jack Howell, this month's hitting guru. Howell emphasized working on batters' weaknesses and, unlike Seitzer, didnt say anything too aggrandizing. That came after, when Sutton proclaimed causality between recent BA/RISP gains and the efforts of Howell and Hinch.

It's not just happening, folks. It's the direct result of a philosophy.

There are substantive and political problems with this tone of declaration. Substantively, the samples are too small to draw that conclusion. The player samples (and circumstances) are also inconsistent. Is Schu culpable for trotting out his most consistent hitter (from 2008) with an undiagnosed case of valley fever? Or savaged for playing Augie and Josh Wilson, when Drew went on the DL? When it suited his agenda, Derrick Hall chirped about how TEP puts the whole team at an April disadvantage - now, the poor April hitting is on Melvin and Schu? How much credit does Howell deserve for a AA callup (Parra) hitting .667 (12/18) with RISP? I dont really know, but the point is, neither does Daron Sutton or anybody else.

The team is undoubtedly hitting better since Melvin left, but it's also a fact the three guys who hit for him (Upton, Lopez and Reynolds) have continued to hit under Hinch, and with the exception of a surging Snyder and reserve Ryan Roberts, the culprits who didnt hit for Bob in April (CY, Byrnes, Whitesell, Montero, even Drew for pity's sake), havent hit much since either. The biggest boost, so far and by far, has been Parra, who never played for Melvin, and Roberts, a 28 year old with a career .074 BA, who's been ethereally raking .400 for Howell. A month of this is being touted as a triumph of coaching philosophy? Seriously?

The more galling component of this quick and very dirty presumption is that Melvin and Schu are somehow responsible for the .186 BA in any meaningful sense; the idea that this young, ascendant offense might somehow be resigned to hit .186 w RiSP under Melvin going forward. Last night, Sutton praised Howell and Hinch for briefly overseeing a .262 RISP at Melvin's expense, despite the fact Melvin's 2008 squad, the one tirelessly lampooned for a lack of clutchness, hit .257 w RISP over an entire season. Talk about a disingenous, statistically insignificant comparison.

Is Daron unaware of such context? A big innocent earnestly trying to educate us, even if he doesnt "get" all the statistical implications?

Hardly.



Sutton himself is intensively 'coached', tutored, by statistical wonks - wizards if you must. Wizards well aware of data's limitations - and no doubt hip to Daron's contrived declaration and the disinformation campaign to come. That's the self-serving political aspect that's to be expected from a Dream Team with a long history of glossing over, and indeed blaming others for, their strategic and tactical missteps. The next time we're subjected to this sort of organizational blather, and I promise it wont be long, understand these sorts of things dont just just happen, folks - it's the direct result of a philosophy.

Aces and Owners of Diamonds

As Phoenician's football blood pressure spurts into Cardiac arrest, it turns out the Dbacks may boast the biggest "card-iac" around. General partner Earl "Ken" Kendrick.

Back in 2007, in a transaction that somehow eluded Diamondhacks' phalanx of electron microphones and numerous large antennae, our own Earl of Penury surreptitiously purchased the most expensive baseball card in the world! That's right, for basically the same blow ($2.8M) he played chicken with hometown flesh and blood icon, Randy Johnson, Ken-du snagged the actual player of his dreams - a 1909 T206 Honus Wagner cardboard cutout.

Who can blame him, really? The legendary Wagner boasts superior range to any Dback infielder, a front office sore point given The Flying Dutchman's been encased in PSA plastic for much of the century. In addition, club brass has hinted at building a baseball museum for a couple years now, inside The Lovely Morgan, beyond her hazel green batter's eye. This Wagner T206, baseball's most valued shard of memorablia, celebrating its centennial no less, would instantly be the museum's centerpiece. Even I'd like to stand in the same room and gawk at the hobby's allegedly clear cut Mona Lisa.

On the other hand, such cardboard ostentation might not "play well" - much like the remnants of Kendrick's second division roster. A fabulously wealthy owner, perceived (rightly or wrongly) as a personnel penny pincher, flaunting his $2.8M baseball card before MLB's lowest income fan base, in the midst of what is looking more and more like a bona fide depression.