Company that owns Jays wants to control costs

[J-Roc]

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slug=a ... &type=lgns

“We believe that the financial performance of the Blue Jays can improve,” said Tony Viner, president of Rogers Media, the corporate arm responsible for the team, stadium and broadcasting. “In fact, it’s the one division of the media company this year, year over year performance is better than it was. We think that we can bring costs reasonably under control and more in line with revenues.

Blue Jays general manager J.P. Ricciardi acknowledged earlier this month he was fielding trade offers for Halladay

When I read this article, the assertion seems to be that Rogers is more concerned with bringing costs in line, than winning...and that's even with the team doing well financially!!

[nowayjose]

Honestly..reading that garbage just made me throw up in my mouth a bit. even though i already knew this, i always had hope that the jays were willing to spend. the day ted rogers died is the saddest day in recent jays history!

[Hoopstarr]

This just confirms my suspicion about Rogers all along. They never were and never will be interested in a winning team. Their ownership of the Jays is 100% for use as an advertising vehicle and content provider for their other assets like FAN 590, Sportsnet, and the Skydome itself. They bought the Skydome for $25M (!) and squeeze every inch of advertising space out of it. It's like they have some complex algorithm that figures out the least amount they need to spend to get the most profit and they won't spend a dime more, not for Manny Ramirez, let alone Bobby Abreu. They just won't do it, not even with their ridiculous $1.3B in profits last year. Just imagine this team with Manny Ramirez, a guy who wanted to play here too, sigh...

This article gives me some hope: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/blogs/un ... le1233930/

[J-Roc]

This article gives me some hope: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/blogs/un ... le1233930/

Hmm, we all thought this when Uncle Ted passed, but I forgot about it till now. Makes sense. One thing about TO sports.....who is there to own these teams? Is the assumption MLSE might get involved? Would they bother since the Jays are hardly a money making machine? Apathy is growing for the Jays.

[Hoopstarr]

This article gives me some hope: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/blogs/un ... le1233930/

Hmm, we all thought this when Uncle Ted passed, but I forgot about it till now. Makes sense. One thing about TO sports.....who is there to own these teams? Is the assumption MLSE might get involved? Would they bother since the Jays are hardly a money making machine? Apathy is growing for the Jays.

Yea I'd assume its MLSE also. I've also heard Jim Balsillie's name but I don't think he's serious about it. He'd be perfect though since he's a billionaire. If he could get a hockey team up here, he might be interested in the Jays as well to take advantage of the cost savings of owning two teams under one operation.

[s_other]

With MLSE's recent approach of hiring a top GM in their respective sport and letting them run the franchise, I'm actually hoping they take over the Jays. The Jays already turn a pretty decent profit even without sniffing the playoffs and owning a modest payroll. I'm sure even an idiot like Richard Peddie can remember the 50,000+ crowds at the 'Dome in the early '90's and realize what a cash cow this team can be.

And maybe we'll also get the Skydome back.

[Geddy]

The problem with a team being owned by a non sports related company is that they only care about how their profit margin looks at the end of the day. I seriously hope Rogers sells the team somewhere down the road to some loon like baldsilly

[dirtybird]

They should have removed JP's checkbook a longtime ago.

[Michael Bradley]

According to USAToday....

2005 Payroll: $45,719,500 (looks a little too low)
2008 Payroll: $97,793,900

In a three year span, Rogers more than doubled the team payroll, so I find the criticism against ownership to be a little unfair. He spent money on this team as he promised. Unfortunately, he let the wrong guy spend it.

Ted's death coupled with Godfrey leaving has likely contributed to the "couldn't care less" attitude towards the Blue Jays that ownership now has. Whether you liked Ted/Godfrey or not, they seemed to care about the Jays. If Paul Beeston is powerless in all of this, then hope is starting to sink rapidly.

[Hoopstarr]

Committed ownerships don't say things like this..

"If we had the opportunity to improve the team, we would improve the team, especially if we felt it was going to drive our revenues"

That's the president of the Rogers division that owns the Jays. Unbelievable.

[J-Roc]

It seems Rogers was able to withstand a certain max payroll of $100M or whatever. The way JP has the team now, we'd have to go over $100M. Maybe $120M, just to re-sign Halladay and get another couple of pieces. Is that going to get us over the Yanks and Sox...and now Rays? Maybe not. So perhaps we need to drop back to $50M or less and restart.