http://www.murraychass.com Thu, 09 Feb 2012 11:49:19 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.5 en hourly 1 MurrayChasshttp://feedburner.google.comSubscribe with My Yahoo!Subscribe with NewsGatorSubscribe with My AOLSubscribe with BloglinesSubscribe with NetvibesSubscribe with GoogleSubscribe with Pageflakes http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/kjFowe4IzOo/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4305#comments Thu, 09 Feb 2012 11:47:56 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4305 The Boston Red Sox endured a miserable season last year, but this is a new year and the e-mail suggested that they might be ready to take flight. “Media alert,” the news release said three times. “JetBlue Airways to reveal new element in Red Sox partnership.” This new element was to be revealed at what would not be a routine news conference. The news release said it was scheduled for Friday at 7:45 a.m. – yes, that’s 15 minutes before 8 o’clock in the morning; if reporters are up at that hour, they probably have yet to go to sleep. The site of the news conference was just as unusual – the north gate at Boston’s Logan International Airport. “A government-issued photo ID is required for normal security screening,” the release said. “Allow adequate time to pass through TSA screening. Please call Phil Orlandella, Massport, for detailed instructions if needed at 617-XXX-3100. Bus to event area will leave at 8:30 a.m. sharp.” What could this possibly be about? JetBlue already had a working relationship with the Red Sox as the team’s “official airline” and the corporation whose name is on the team’s new $75 million spring training facility in Fort Myers, Fla.: JetBlue Park at Fenway South. The new spring park, which is ready for use this month, is modeled after Boston’s Fenway Park, complete with the Green Monster, the left field wall with seats on top. The Red Sox begin spring training with a new development, though it has nothing to do with the addition of a pitcher or a hitter. Various news media reported last week that The New York Times Company had sold 100 shares of its remaining ownership in the Red Sox.]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4305 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4305 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/ubpX5OlwUwA/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4284#comments Sun, 05 Feb 2012 12:45:46 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4284 Ken Williams would have preferred being in Indianapolis this weekend, but he lost his reason for being there. “Unfortunately I’m not there,” Williams said Friday. “I would like to have been, but I’m in Greenwich, Conn., with my girlfriend.” Williams, general manager of the Chicago White Sox, wanted to be in Indianapolis Sunday watching his son Kyle play in the Super Bowl for the San Francisco 49ers against the New England Patriots. But Kyle spoiled those plans, committing a fumble that led to a field goal in overtime that gave the New York Giants a 20-17 victory in the National Conference championship game two weeks ago. “It gives you aches and pains to see your children go through that,” Williams said in a telephone conversation Friday. “But as a father I couldn’t be more proud than to see how he handled it. I would expect nothing else from the Williams boys.”]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4284 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4284 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/iOUiIxHRDEk/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4275#comments Thu, 02 Feb 2012 12:56:31 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4275 Watching the National Football League playoffs, I wondered what Major League Baseball could do to come up with gimmicks for extra innings that would be as inane as the N.F.L.’s new overtime format. In my ignorance, I was not familiar with the new rules, and I wasn’t listening closely enough when the television announcers and the referee in the Pittsburgh-Denver game explained them before those teams began overtime recently. As a result, I went into overtime thinking each team would get a chance on offense before the game could end. So when the Broncos, after taking the kickoff, scored a touchdown on an 80-yard pass play, I expected that now the Steelers would have their chance to match the Broncos’ touchdown.]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4275 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4275 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/xqF3X5TRoeE/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4259#comments Sun, 29 Jan 2012 12:13:50 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4259 As unlikely as it seems, the Super Bowl comes to Indianapolis next Sunday. As unlikely, too, as it may seem, there is a baseball connection to that development. Twenty years ago, Jeff Smulyan was the principal owner of the Seattle Mariners. One of his major partners was Michael Browning. Smulyan and Browning were Indianapolis residents and businessmen then and still are now. By now, their baseball endeavor is ancient history, maybe best left there. But Smulyan and Browning are enjoying the fruits of their Super Bowl efforts this week, Browning as chairman of the game’s host committee, Smulyan as one of the committee’s co-chairmen.]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4259 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4259 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/WFWmpKM2jqQ/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4249#comments Thu, 26 Jan 2012 11:47:57 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4249 A believer in giving credit where and when credit is due, I have to defend an agent I’ve never been particularly fond of. And, to be candid, Scott Boras has never been fond of me. When word emerged Tuesday that a Boras client, Prince Fielder, had agreed to a 9-year, $214 million contract with the Detroit Tigers, the development came as a surprise because the Tigers had not previously been mentioned as one of the teams interested in Fielder. Reports of the signing immediately branded the Tigers a mystery team, as in this CBSSports.com report:]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4249 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4249 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/LQoSiQzmfJs/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4234#comments Sun, 22 Jan 2012 12:33:34 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4234 How did Commissioner Bud Selig allow the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs to create the baseball farce of the year, and the year hadn’t even started? Let me count the ways. * The commissioner allowed the Cubs’ pursuit of Theo Epstein, the Red Sox general manager, to overshadow Major League Baseball’s showcase event, a.k.a. the World Series. * Selig allowed Epstein to abandon his unexpired contract and take the Cubs’ No. 1 baseball job with no agreement between the clubs on compensation for the Red Sox. * He allowed the clubs to extend the deadline for completing an agreement on compensation for Epstein, then abandoned the deadline altogether. * By telling reporters he expected to wind up with the compensation dispute on his desk, he virtually invited the teams not to reach agreement and leave the matter for him to decide. * By allowing Epstein to go to the Cubs with the compensation issue unsettled, he put Epstein in position to negotiate his own compensation, a bizarre circumstance tantamount to having a player to be named later in a trade becoming the player who was traded for a player to be named. (It really happened once – Harry Chiti 1962.) ]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4234 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4234 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/axBpDSWvha4/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4228#comments Thu, 19 Jan 2012 11:15:22 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4228 When Octavio Dotel throws his first pitch of the 2012 season, he will establish a major league record. It won’t matter what the pitch is, whether it’s a ball or a strike or if it’s hit into the stands fair or foul. Dotel, however, may want to get the ball back and put it in his pocket as a keepsake. That is, if the Hall of Fame doesn’t claim it first for display in Cooperstown. Dotel may go for that idea because how else will he be in the Hall of Fame? When Dotel throws his first pitch, he will have officially played for the Detroit Tigers, and they will be the 13th major league team in his career. Until that pitch, the 38-year-old relief pitcher remains tied with Matt Stairs, Ron Villone and Deacon McGuire, Elias Sports Bureau says, for having played for the most teams in a major league career.]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4228 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4228 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/v3YyLZKUMXc/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4218#comments Sun, 15 Jan 2012 12:33:17 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4218 Many years ago an 8-year-old girl wrote a letter to the New York Sun, a newspaper popular at the time but that subsequently died along with many other New York newspapers. She asked the editor of the Sun if Santa Claus really existed, explaining that she was writing because her father told her if you read something in the Sun you can believe it. Yes, Virginia, the Sun responded in an editorial, there is a Santa Claus. Once upon a time, if you read something in The New York Times, you could believe it, too. Sadly, no longer. Based on my recent experience with the Times and its version of historical accuracy, I could not be surprised if the Times told its readers that the South won the Civil War and the Holocaust never happened.]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4218 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4218 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/VGfNgSVlyi0/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4206#comments Thu, 12 Jan 2012 11:59:27 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4206 In recent weeks several people have asked me if I thought Bud Selig would really retire when his term as commissioner expires after the 2012 season. Always feeling certain that he would not retire, I replied that by the start of spring training Major League Baseball would announce a contract extension for Selig. This qualifies as coming before spring training so the owners, meeting my expected timetable as they held their quarterly meetings in Arizona this week, asked Selig to stay on as commissioner for two more years through the 2014 season. With a salary of at least $22 million a year and use of a private jet, how could he say no? He’d rather write a book and teach history at the University of Wisconsin at Madison? Not in this lifetime. This column wasn’t going to be about Bud Selig so that’s all I will say about him. ]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4206 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4206 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MurrayChass/~3/IrV6HM0kAkw/ http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4195#comments Sun, 08 Jan 2012 06:27:44 +0000 Murray Chass http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4195 When I left The New York Times in 2008 after having written for the newspaper for 39 years, the first offer I received to continue writing came from a high-ranking Major League Baseball official who was in position to offer me a job as a columnist with MLB.com. My initial reaction was to say no, but some people urged me to reconsider and at least talk about and consider that possibility. Accepting that offer would have turned out to be more economically lucrative than what I have done with this Web site the past three and a half years. But money isn’t everything. Writing for MLB.com just didn’t seem like the right thing to do.]]> http://www.murraychass.com/?feed=rss2&p=4195 0 http://www.murraychass.com/?p=4195