The One Hitter – Honest Lies

This is the One-Hitter, don’t forget to exhale.  The last several days have been a lot of fun in White Sox twitter, with reporters hurling barbs at each other from their respective sources all in the name of providing us with the latest and greatest on Manny Machado’s free agency.  EVERYONE has an opinion on who is right and who is wrong and it often depends on your personal narrative of who you believe.  The 108ers don’t tend to worry about these mudslingings unless there is an opportunity for some comedy…..OR if there is a lesson to be learned from the ordeal.  Yea, a lesson.  What if everything everyone is saying is true, or at least shades of truth or better yet, as true as their perspective source is telling them.  Maybe each group of “journalists” (if we can call them that) are getting information that is factual enough to be believed, but isn’t quite telling the entire story.  No I do not have any light to shed on Manny Machado, but another narrative that I have heard 57,000 times this off-season did finally peak my interest enough to look into it.

“The Cleveland Indians are looking to cut payroll, they  had their largest payroll ever in 2018, while winning the AL Central for the 3rd straight time and what did the Indians fans do, they came to the ballpark less in 2018, than they did in 2017.“

I’ve heard that bandied about the aforementioned 57,000 times this off-season and it finally got me to investigate.  Everything in that headline is factually accurate, but the conclusion is less so.  The implication is that the gate receipts at the ballpark decreased so Indians management has no fucking choice but to reduce payroll by trying to trade one of their more salaried players.  Hang on, peep this little article about average ticket prices

2018 Cleveland Indians average ticket price

See the table below sketching out what revenues might look like…..sure attendance is down overall (which sounds like a reason to cut payroll), but revenue appears to be up (this is an estimate).  So while all the FACTS are correct in the italicized conglomeration of the headlines folks are trotting out about the Indians, I am not sure the conclusion ties in.

The Indians want to cut payroll, well, because they want to cut payroll.  I guess saying it like that won’t get the whole twitterverse a buzz.