For those not familiar with the Wire, "Proposition" Joe was a rival kingpin drug dealer of the shows main antagonist drug dealing clan. So know as Prop Joe due to his always having a deal for you if your interested. My favorite quote of his "dealing drugs is easy buy for a dollar sell for 2..."

That quote applies to the business of baseball and sports in general, just look at the NBA and NFL labor negotiations. Most base ball teams like to keep payroll at or about 40% to 50% of revenues.

What doe this have to do with this post?

Simple I am sick and tired of hearing how we can't afford this and can't afford that. What we can't afford is losing. Losing is expensive just ask Tom Hicks and Ross Perot Jr.

In 2009 the Rangers had attendance of 2.15 Million on 78 games. This year they have 1.42 on 38 games. They are on track to have attendance of around 3,019,842. Or about a 50% increase in attendance from in two years. WOW. It might be one of the highest increases in attendance over a similar period. Last year they were at 2.5 million.

Now here is the deal in 2009 TV and Radio revenues were 65 million. Surely those have gone up. Ticket revenues excluding suit sales was 46 million, this year it will be north 90 million. That increase puts total revenues around 220 million. Merchandise sales are up over 50% as well and may very well be higher. That's my best guess for total revenue.

This puts us in a place to afford a payroll of 100 to 110 million. But if attendance drops next year due to lack luster post season performance or not making it to the post season. Well then your back to the 164 million revenue days of Tom Hicks.

These numbers are the basis of my claims about signing Lee and front loading, signing K-Rod and eating a large amount of his contract and other short term uses of windfall revenues. The Rangers have a chance to be the big market team the are the small market team the have acted like in the past. One thing is for sure they must keep winning to buy some blue sky from the average to casual fan, if they want to succeed and be an elite team.

One last thing I like spending this early cash better than giving up prospects.

Sitations for research quoted:
http://rangersblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2010/08/report-rangers-financial-state.html
http://oakridge-econ5.blogspot.com/2011/04/texas-rangers.html

Sorry for typo's and grammar mistakes I might have had a beer or 2

dude i agree with you 100% and i've attempted to make that very argument myself. nobody wants to listen to it, or you and I are obviously missing something else. However i do disagree about Krod (i'm just not a fan, and I think the money could be used elsewhere) I too and tired of hearing everyone say that we cannot afford to trade for so and so because of their contract. Granted i'm not giving license to go trade for carl crawford or crap like that. but if we can improve this team by taking someone with a contract situation similar to even MYs. this team can afford it. Some ppl really need to quit living in the hicks era and realize that we're in the Nolan era. Now that being said, Nolan is also not one to spend money foolishly... so I honestly do not see him making any significant moves this year. Just be prepared for a possible minor move or two for BP help, and for us to take this team as-is to the playoffs. Your overall argument though, yes. We have the money, we have lots of money. Ryan has said so himself when we came up as one of the teams in debt. He said that it was an error in the method that MLB prefers their accounting reports are done and that the team is extremely well off. not to mention the added revenue to the Ryan Express that was added when he made Round Rock(the most profitable AAA organization in baseball) the Rangers AAA affiliate. Granted i dunno if you can use money from that, i just figured it all goes under the overhead of Ryan Express...

Anyways i support your call out on the rangers financial situation, the constant bitching of we cant afford that, and the beer or 2. Have a few more cuz this team right now gives you a license and me a GD headache. lol

its like that line from varisty blues where the coach calls him the "smartest dumb kid" he's ever known. I'm on that level w the rangers right now. Theyre absolutely the worst best team ive ever seen. and its beyond irritating. It almost makes me wish last year never happened so my expectations for the success of this team this year have not been met, and thus are a perpetual let down. oh well.... still alot of season left. and alot of beer....

They don't need to be foolish with money. My one and only attraction to K-Rod is my belief we won't have to give up much in the way of prospects. Now if the Giants want to do a deal for Yorbit, I am OK with that too. But giving up pitching prospects for a rent a player like I believe Bell would be I am not OK with. While money is easily replaced if we keep winning, prospects are not. By the way I am taking my numbers straight from the Rangers MLB financial statement, you can download it at the DMN link above. I didn't even look at the Balance Sheet or the Cash Flow statement because those are immaterial to the point. Just the looked at the Income Statement. As far as some of MLB's treatments of accrued liabilities and expenditures and depreciation of player assets for purposes of franchise valuation those are all accounting tricks governed under FASB's that a CPA can explain but I believe it is to help with either capital gains tax or other tax issues.

I agree with most of what you both are on about. I do believe this FO is more willing to spend than the Hicks group was and I think they understand that in order to make money you have to be willing to spend some money along the way.

Where I disagree is with the idea that the Rangers are a large market club. As markets go yes DFW is one of the five or ten largests. However, from year to year the Rangers are closer to the middle of the road when it comes revenue and are currntly sitting at 12th. Unfortunately the Rangers suffer from a horrible fan base. Yes I said horrible. Lets face the reality. This is and has always been a football town. The Cowboys were here first and so that's were the primary loyalty of most fans lye. The other part is that most fans in the area are fair weather fans. I personally can't stand it when I hear a "fan" tell me they aren't going to watch or go to games until their team starts winning and I hear it all the time. To me there is no such thing as bad baseball. Baseball can be played poorly but that doesn't make it any less watchable for me.

In reality the Rangers are a mid-market team because a majority of the market they're in doesn't care about baseball or the local team unless it's a winner. It's really quite sad because when it's full there are few places I would rather watch a game than RBiA but that doesn't happen very often unless Yankee or Red Sox fans fill it for us. It's why I always find myself yelling at the radio when some sports buffoon sits there and pontificates about how it's not the fans its the FO and if the FO would spend more money to put a winning product on the field it would put butts in the seat. If a fan is waiting for the FO to put more money down before attending or watching a game then they aren't a fan. They are simply individuals looking for good entertainment value which is all fine and good but lets not confuse them with real fans of the game or team of which they're really aren't that many.

I do think it's getting better with regards to actual fans but we still have a long way to go to match the true large market clubs.

Do you honestly think that Nolan and Co. are going to be stingy with the cash? Nothing they've done points to that. They went out and spent a bunch of prospects on a handful of deals last summer to improve the team. Some of those deals didn't work out (Cantu, Guzman), but you can't say Nolan didn't try. They offered a hell of a lot of $ - too much $ - to Lee, and when they didn't get Lee they arguably overpaid to get Beltre.

Of course, it's easy now to look at the bullpen in tatters and say "why didn't they buy a guy for the 8th inning"? But there's another way of looking at that. If you sign a back-end starter or a late inning setup guy, you have yet another year where you are not giving precious experience to the young kids. At some point, you have to let them play over the long run to see what they can do. Last season the bullpen looked really sketchy on paper, but they pitched far better than expected. This season, on paper they looked even better than last year, but we see they've been crappy - that's how baseball go.

Finally, if you think JD is just going to sit back and do nothing, you obviously don't know JD. But because the talent level on the team is already so high, you can't add mediocre guys and make the team better. And if there aren't top-shelf pitchers sitting there waiting for JD to grab them, you can't make them appear by bitching about it. If a guy is old or has a ridiculous contract, then you can use cash to get him. If a guy is young and has long-term value, he's going to cost prospects. That is also how baseball go. So it isn't just a matter of whether or not you spend $$$, but how you spend it, and what you can get for your $$$. Look at the Mets - they spend lots of $$$, but would you like to be where they are now? I doubt it - I imagine most Texas fans would rather be where Texas is. That comes from playing the WHOLE game smart, including the $$$ part.

WWJD,

I for one do believe that Nolan, JD and the rest of the FO will do whatever they can to help this team win now and in the future. JD is one of the best GM's in the business in my opinion and there's to much money already invested for the team to not spend like other large market teams do. I think we are all saying we are tired of hearing other people not involved in the organization say the Rangers won't do this or that because it costs to much. Those are the individuals who are living in the past.

My argument is that I can understand why past owners have been reluctant to invest because the market for baseball in DFW is not resiliant. People don't keep going to games, buying merchandise or watching games on TV when the Rangers aren't playing well. Every team gets support when they are winning. What seperates the Rangers from teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, Cubs and Phillies is that when the Rangers don't play well their fans disappear. True large market teams have a much larger "die hard" fan base than the Rangers do and until the "die hard" fan base approaches the size of the market leaders "die hard" fan base the Rangers will remain a mid market team in a large market area. Lot's of potential but undersupported by the local market.

I know it was said earlier that we are a medium market team. And that has been true. I don't think that is Nolan's goal, nor the "true owners", i.e. Bob Simpson, etc. We are a major market team. A change in culture has been badly needed. I accused JD of not being capable of being the bat boy after some of his early moves. He has since proven himself. He is not one of the best... he is the best. Any man that learns from his mistakes is a good man in my book. During a Mavs play-off game on a Tuesday, there were 30K plus in the seats. This is my team. Always has been, always will be.

arp - man I couldn't agree more. DFW is not a baseball city (Well, there are about 5 cities there, but you know what I mean). They have always loved their Cowboys first and foremost, and the Rangers are somewhere between a diversion and an afterthought. Sure, people pay attention when they are winning, just like it happens in every city. But DFW is not a baseball city. Growing up in New Jersey, the NY metropolitan area is most definitely a baseball city. Everyone likes either the Mets or the Yanks, and they are loyal for life. It doesn't matter what the team is doing, people go to games and follow the team.

This might be a little off-topic, but what I see when I go to sporting events in Texas is a lot of posers who spend most of the game going to concessions, hanging out, or texting on their cell phones. It's somehow fashionable for young women to spend the entire game getting up from their seats & walking around in their short shorts so everyone can get a good look at that a$$, over and over and over every inning. Self-promotion. What I'm saying is it often seems like people aren't watching the game, and they don't seem to be at the event for the sake of the actual event. I never saw that as a kid going to Mets and Yankees games. Part of that has to be the difference between that area and this area, and part of it I imagine is just a sign of the times. With respect to both, it sucks, and honestly, in almost 99% of cases I would rather just watch the game on my sofa than go there and be a part of that nonsense.

WWJDD, your last paragraph explains how I feel about going to a game. Most of the women and the younger girls don't even want to be at the game. They are either there with their family or friends and don't really care about baseball. I can't stand when people are constantly getting up from their seats and going to concessions or bathroom each half inning. It's so damn frustrating to go anymore. And 1 thing... Don't sit in the upper deck or you will really kill youself.

Arp you are exactly the fan I am talking about with my post. This extremely snobby attitude that is the casual fans responsibility to show up and spend money on a piss poor product that Hicks and his supporters have had in the last decade to turn off many true dedicated fans from this franchise.
The size of the market is one of the top 5 in country. This isn't Indianapolis. This is DFW. They build a team that wins now and long term, stop playing Day Games after the end of May. The fans will eventually sell out the RBIA every game just like the Cowboys and the Mavericks.
The Rangers are not you college or high school, they don't deserve fan loyalty just because. They have to earn it over time.
Here is the great thing, they are on the right track. JD and Nolan et al have a golden opportunity I just don't want to see them waste it.
As I am typing this on the Radio they are asking questions about the Rangers FO. comparing it to the Mavs, Cowboys... the Stars not even in the convo...what does that say about loosing and winning. The Cowboys are part of the convo because they have a history of winning and 5 super bowls. If the Rangers run off 3 or 4 good seasons with getting to the ALCS 1 or 2 more times and maybe a WS win they will be the large Market Team they are.
Again my post is more "don't spend prospects to get anyone, use cash unless it is long term."

Yes the DFW area is notorious for turning its sporting events into social hour. however its pretty much like that area. the one thing yall arent accounting for is Winning. Since the rangers went from perrenial losers to making the WS attentdance merchandising, seasont ticket sales, etc, have all gone up. Same thing will happen with the Mavs. This may be a football town, but if the rangers keep winning what says it cant be both? What are you gonna call Philly right now? you'd mainly say football town. however the penguins and phillies have won more championships recently than the eagles. Theres room for more than one sport in everytown and for the most part its schedueld that way. I for one refuse to give up and say that the rangers cant be a top market team just because of the dallas cowboys. Dont get me wrong i'm a HUGE cowboys fan. and yes, on the few occasions that the rangers are playing the same time as teh boys, i'm gonna watch the boys. however i'll have the rangers up on gamecase every minute of the game. I implore you to look at the ratings during the cowboys games last year while the rangers were playing. ratings for the cowboys overall were down, because the rangers were in the middle of a division race, and then the playoffs hit. I believe i read somehwere last year there was a record influx of ppl watching the cowboys, them beginning to lose, and these same people turning to the rangers and finishing out a rangers game for relief. Yall are all majorly discounting what winning can do, which is why the rangers must spend the money or atleast attempt to spend the money for any and all needs to improve this club. That includes bringing in a TORP if needed. IF this team makes a run and even just makes the ALCS again, that will only further increase its fanbase and bump them up a notch on the totem pole. Again, i'll repeat i'm a cowboys fan first, but until they start playing like winners, rangers come first in my book. but i'm not the rest of the metroplex... but more and more ARE starting to follow. I guarantee you if Jerry Jones was interviewed today he would tell you that he's concerned of the rangers continual success effecting his revenue. Granted not by much... but in this economy, you feel the pinch of every penny

You can't compare Rangers fans with Philly fans - no way. Philly fans might be a-holes, but they love their team, always have, always will - they are "die-hard" fans. Rangers fans? Please.

On the whole fan/market issue:

I would add that the Rangers suffer a bit from the "everything is bigger in Texas" cliché. By that I mean that unlike New England, New York, LA, etc. - the fan base of "true fans" for the Rangers spans an extremely large geographic area.

For instance, I live in the Panhandle of Texas, roughly (or rather exactly) 5 hours and 45 minutes from RBiA. We (wife, kid and me) attend roughly 2-3 Rangers games a year, mostly due to the fact that we have to treat it like a small vacation with a vacation day at work, the drive, hotels, etc. We have pretty good income and would easily attend a dozen games a year at RBiA, and could potentially be talked into season tickets (if we lived closer).

I am unequivocally a "true fan", as I have followed this team since 1995, when I was 11 years old, and there are several more just like me in my area, and I imagine all over the state.

The point is, in a more compressed state (which would be practically any other state in the U.S.), it is very likely easier for the fans of a given team to commute to their team's ballpark, even if they live outside of Chicago, or what have you.

It is the fan's responsibility to show up! Supporting a baseball team isn't like going to a movie or eating out. If being the kind of fan who believes we absolutely should tow some of the line regardless of winning pct makes me snobby then so be it.

Going to a baseball game is a communal experience and from that standpoint the wagon is large enough for everyone so jump on. Just don't expect those of us who watch/go to games and buy/wear the team colors regardless of record or history to consider people who constantly jump on and off the band wagon "fans". There are lots of t-shirt fans around and teams need them to but there is a difference between a t-shirt fan and a die hard.

And I'm certainly not saying that anyone on this site is a t-shirt fan because if you spend any time at all on a site like this you obviously care more than most. But like I said earlier until we have the number of "die hards" of other large market clubs we will be destined to be a mid market team. Winning certainly helps and I certainly won't deny that. But teams like Boston, Philly, the Cubs and Yanks have significantly larger number of "die hards" than we do. It's an important distinction because if you keep trying to claim we are a large market club then our expectations are set to high and dissapiontment soon sets in and fans stop going to games which decreases revenue and eventually the team decends into the money pit that was the early 2000's.

WWJDD,

i couldnt disagree with you more. There are more die-hard rangers fans that you could imagine. Caleb nailed it on the head. from the panhandle to el paso, to austin, san Antonio and beyond. youre forgetting that baseball is and always will be america's pastime. and there is a special bond btw the game and its fans.

i am actually shocked at the audacity you have to even implore that there are no die hard rangers fans. What's the last game you've been to? sure theres the DBs and the slutty girls just trying to nab their future husband. but even at the shittiest games possible the 3rd deck is atleast halfway full with families going for love of the game. lower to middle class families spending that little bit of extra cash just to watch a game at the stadium for once as opposed to on tv every damn time. every section has fans cheering their asses off for this team.

i'm sorry man. i'm pretty passionate about this. We may not be the yankees who have the absolute fakest fans on earth, or the red sox or whatever team you might say has better fans. But the rangers have many die hard fans that would bleed for this team. That shed tears when Arod's knees buckled and Nefti announced to the baseball Gods "We are Here".

how dare you question the Rangers, and their fans. I hold alot of respect for you and your opinion for the majority, but dude you couldnt be more wrong and i gotta say you crossed a huge line

Regardless of my thoughts on his posts? WWJDD? is a genius moniker.

WWJDD

sorry to go off on you like that. i've a minute to calm down. look. i get what youre saying. from a purist sense you only want to see "real" fans at the games. and to you, the rangers dont have enough at the games as you see it. Thats understandable. Look its even worse at Mavs games. the entire lower bowl is ppl just trying to show off money. I think one thing thats forgotten (and i have to tell myself this everytime i end having to go out to parts of plano, and highland park, southlake, coppel, Keller, Mansfield) The DFW combined is an extremely prosporous metroplex; also thrown smack dab in the middle of an area also surrounded by poverty. The majority of your real fans cant afford tix, and in this economy its more of a luxury of those with expendable income to go to a game. But trust me there are true die hard fans at the games. even if it doesnt seem that way. But the majority of the fans in tx either cant afford to go to a game, live too far, or wont go cuz its "too hot" <-- which i say is inexcusable imo.... if youre gonna pay 30 a month to go tan in a bed 4 hours outside to get your bronze on isnt gonna hurt.

But secondly, if there werent any die hard rangers fans... why is it that during every broadcast you see multiple rangers fans at opposing games. Are we to assume theyre just travelling to all the stadums? no. theyre just as die hard, and theyre just as happy to get to see thier team make a trip to their hometown stadium so they can watch them in real life as opposed to tv.

We'll never be the cowboys. Football rules all around here. But Texas is big enough for the Rangers too.

DCAg - I think you missed my point. I am not saying that there aren't true Rangers fans, and many of them. Of course there are. My argument is that this is not a baseball town, and that Texas Rangers are known to be plagued with the fair-weather fan problem. Every team is to an extent, but it's pronounced here. What evidence do I base this outrageous claim on? Simply having grown up in a real baseball city, and then having lived here for over 20 years. Part of the problem might be due to them being so bad for so long, yes. But I think it's bigger than that. I think the city as a whole is a football city. Football is the culture - baseball is considered boring and slow, and a waste of time. That seems to be obvious to me.

You can call Yankee fans a lot of things. Many of them are not nice people, especially when you talk about their team. And they certainly love to gloat when they win. I'm not a Yankees fan. But I completely disagree with this idea that they are "fake." That's wrong - I can attest to that from personal experience having grown up there and attended countless games.

Cell phones and the desire for personal celebrity are part of the "sign of the times," as i said before, and I expect all baseball teams deal with some aspect of that problem. But I fail to see how you can't notice the vast difference in what goes on at BPiA on any given night as opposed to other places, especially the teams on the East coast like Philly, NYY, Boston, etc.

I'll put it this way. I'm a real baseball fan. I don't even watch pro basketball or pro football any more. But I still love baseball, and will always till the day I die follow MLB every single day of the season. Because I've lived in TX for around 25 years now, I am a Rangers fan. When I was in grad. school, I worked at the new BPiA selling tix on the phone, just so I could go down & watch the last few innings for 50-70 games of the season. That was back in the 90's when Oates & Melvin were running the ship, and they were going to the playoffs for the first time. I have a pin that I got from the very first ASG held in the stadium, among other souvenirs. So I bleed Texas blue, and I love them even if they are the worst team in the majors. Hell, I loved them back when they had Inky and WERE the worst team in the majors!

But I can put all that aside and admit, sadly, that the metroplex generally speaking is not a baseball town, and probably never will be. All you have to do to find that out is see what becomes the focus of everything come August - Cowboys football. Texas Rangers will immediately take a back seat.

I dunno man. probably cuz its all i know. by fake fans, i meant that there are too many front runner yankee fans. same thing with boston when they started winning. samething with all the spurs fans in dallas. same thing with the lakers. everybody wants to just claim a piece of the pie from the winning team. I'm sorry.... call me insane, but its just my personal beliefe that if youre not from NY, you dont have family from NY, and you dont have any affiliation to NY. and youre a yankee fan.... youre just a DB. and that goes accross the board. i'm not one sided. If youre from NY. and have zero affiliation to Texas and youre a ranger fan just to hate on the yanks. i like youre style... but youre a DB. i'm sorry i'm not just this free spirit fair spreading love and joyous baseball dust to the fans of all.

Sports in general all date back to the greek days, the olympics, gladiators etc. maybe i'm that twisted in the head that i actually still belive that sports is a battle. There should be factions, but instead of bloodshed the ultimate thing on the line is the pride of an entire city, state, etc.... i'm just wired that way. i have know excuses. and i'll live in my fantasy world. anyone can join, i could use the company lol.

Regardless, i still refuse to back down and say that this cannot be a baseball town. Things change. And no offense, cuz i've had to have this argument with several different posters, and i know youre older. You have to realize that things can change. My point of bringing up the phillies (while poorly written) was that while philadelphia is typically determined a FB town, its slowly shifting into a baseball town. more people get excited for the phillys season to start than the eagles. Now you can chalk that up to fair weather fans accross the board, and as soon as the eagle get good again, which they did last year... alll your philly die hards.... are gonna fade away. My point again comes down to winning. While the Cowboys are still number one right now... they havent won, but one playoff game in 14 going on 15 years. in that time we've had the stars win a Stanley Cup, the Rangers go the the WS, and now the Mavs have won the NBA Championship. eventually ppl are going to start paying attention to the other sports, and many already have. theres no denying it, look at the increase in ratings and attendance.

I guarantee you two things if the rangers keep winning, make and ALCS this year, and continue winning... and the cowboys begin continue their woes.... you'll see how big a baseball town this can become. 2. the yankees are getting older and more tied up in money. Watch how true your yankees fans are after they dont make the playoffs even just 2 years in a row.

There are very few cities that you cant say that about though. again, you act like the phillies are die hards, the Eagles take precedence when they are winning. Besides the LA teams (cuz there is no football) the yankees, and maybe the RedSox, St. Louis, and maybe a few others, FB takes precedence. its not just here. Basically any town with a FB team, FB takes precedence over baseball. besides NY. NY will always be baseball. But thats a combination of winning tradition and they technically dont have a team cuz they play in NJ. (thats just my personal shot at NY). Regardless, baseball is america's past time. it always will be. unfortunatley the keyword is PAST. Today is a FB world, and until something drastic changes (maybe the strike?) going forward it always will be.

LOL I like your style too, DCAg. When I'm talking about Yankee fans, I'm talking about the people who live in the NY area and follow the team - the ones who get on the subway and go to the stadium, and who bleed Yankee blue. I'm not talking about punk kids in Plano who buy lime green Yankee hats and wear 'em around sideways. I agree with you there - those are not real fans.

I hope you're right and that DFW can become a baseball town. I'm not really convinced, though. The only hope for that, to me, is the growing population of latino kids. I'm not trying to be a racist or an essentialist (stereotyping) - just noting from my experience that baseball seems to be bigger with the latino folks than it does with African Americans or Caucasions, generally speaking of course. Talking overall trends.

But baseball itself is a hard sell to the young generation - way too long, slow and boring. No juicing = not as many homers. Kids today don't want to see a 2-1 game. I think that's one reason that when you go to the park you see so many kids spending pretty much all 3 hours of the game on their cell phones. But I'll shut up - I've probably talked enough today for the entire month of July. :)

First off arp, WWJD, DCAggie, and Caleb and all the others on this post that are invested in this team, I love these threads and enjoy exchanging HSO's with everyone here.
Arp think about it you make my point in that there won't be die hard fans until the casual fans stay invested long enough. Casual fans won't stay invested if the team stinks it up. All of the examples you listed have a history of winning (by the way go look at Phillies attendance when the team sucked not so good) and/or downtown ball parks. The cubs the only team that hasn't been a winner has a gimmick of day games at home and one of the first national cable outlets in WGN. When I was 13 they were the only team to watch during the day when I came in from playing outside. So if we build a culture of winning, bandwagon fans will turn into die hard fans and the egg becomes the chicken.

Speaking as a guy who has watched games from the dug-out, as well as the stands? Never belittle a man for watching a game on his dime. Even if it is upper deck. I sit in a suite with free booze and food. I hate that the real fans sit up top. Never belittle the real fans. I'll give back when I can. But do not be a popous a-hole.