It's all about the money
It's all about the money.
My younger brother uses that line all the time when talking about ... well, pretty much anything ... but he's always believed it was particularly true when it came to pro sports.
Yeah, it's a business, and I get all that. But I always believed — naive as it might be — that pro athletes and owners had an insatiable desire to win.
I believe that no more.
Too many things are happening that prove otherwise.
The Pirates are not having a great season, obviously, but they were still in the hunt for the NL Central Division title at the trade deadline. The team had money to spend, since they didn't pay Starling Marte for half the season, didn't pay Jung Ho Kang at all and freed up payroll money with the Francisco Liriano dump ... er, trade ... to Toronto last year.
Jay Bruce, Curtis Granderson, Neil Walker, etc., all there to be had. So what do the Pirates do? They dump Tony Watson's salary and pick up 40-year-old reliever Joaquin Benoit.
Think Pirates owner Bob Nutting cares about winning? He added to the profit margin, not the win column.
A full report will appear in the Butler Eagle.
