Jan. 19 -- Varitek tears a page from the A-Rod book?
Hmmmm....Where have we heard this before?
A Scott Boras client, failing to find the open market as open as he'd hoped he would, goes back to the team for which he played last year on his own, without Boras, pledges his undying loyalty to the team and says he'd like to do a deal after all.
It worked like a charm for Alex Rodriguez last winter, and Jason Varitek hopes it works for him this year.
At the time that A-Rod pulled the trick on the Yankees, signing for a deal that was bigger and better than the one he supposedly offended them by opting out of, it smelled fishy. The whole idea of some kind of "split" between Boras and his best client was hard to swallow. I have always believed it was Boras' idea, and a great one. ("Alex, here's how we play it. Go back to them, tell them you want to cut me out and talk to them face to face. Let me be the bad guy. I can handle it. Been doing it my whole career, and it's worked out real nice.")
Last year, it worked so beautifully because both sides had reason to go along, publicly, with the ruse. Rodriguez got to look like the returning hero, ditching the big, bad agent for the sake of his love of the pinstripes. The Yankees got to look as if they'd pulled one over on the big, bad agent, and they got the player they wanted all along.
Like him or not, Boras isn't just good at his job. He's great at his job. Right now, it looks like he made a rare miscalculation when he advised Varitek not to accept arbitration. But if he can finagle a couple of extra million bucks out of John Henry by pulling the same trick he pulled with A-Rod on the Yankees a year ago, then good for him.
He'd just better be careful. This starts happening every winter, somebody's going to catch on...
A Scott Boras client, failing to find the open market as open as he'd hoped he would, goes back to the team for which he played last year on his own, without Boras, pledges his undying loyalty to the team and says he'd like to do a deal after all.
It worked like a charm for Alex Rodriguez last winter, and Jason Varitek hopes it works for him this year.
At the time that A-Rod pulled the trick on the Yankees, signing for a deal that was bigger and better than the one he supposedly offended them by opting out of, it smelled fishy. The whole idea of some kind of "split" between Boras and his best client was hard to swallow. I have always believed it was Boras' idea, and a great one. ("Alex, here's how we play it. Go back to them, tell them you want to cut me out and talk to them face to face. Let me be the bad guy. I can handle it. Been doing it my whole career, and it's worked out real nice.")
Last year, it worked so beautifully because both sides had reason to go along, publicly, with the ruse. Rodriguez got to look like the returning hero, ditching the big, bad agent for the sake of his love of the pinstripes. The Yankees got to look as if they'd pulled one over on the big, bad agent, and they got the player they wanted all along.
Like him or not, Boras isn't just good at his job. He's great at his job. Right now, it looks like he made a rare miscalculation when he advised Varitek not to accept arbitration. But if he can finagle a couple of extra million bucks out of John Henry by pulling the same trick he pulled with A-Rod on the Yankees a year ago, then good for him.
He'd just better be careful. This starts happening every winter, somebody's going to catch on...
0 Responses to "Jan. 19 -- Varitek tears a page from the A-Rod book?"
Post a Comment