This is a LOOONNNGG link but a good article.
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/sports/columnists.nsf/Bernie+Miklasz/483A81E1AD1B060C86256E26000D5818?OpenDocument&Headline=Pujols+is+following+the+example+set+by+his+employers
Original Post
Albert goes to arbitration in about a month. The Cards have offered 1 year at $7 mil, Albert wants $10.5. The club has also offered a 7 year deal at $100 million, the profit-mongering pig dogs.
Bernie has always been adamantly anti-owners and particularly anti-LaRussa, so his stance is as much a continuation of that attitude as 'support' of player's rights. (Veteran players giving hometown discounts because they've "already amassed a fortune"? There's probably at least a few of us here who would regard one year's paycheck of $7 million as "amassing a fortune".)
The fans in St. Louis (from the fan boards) were less concerned with Pujols' monetary demands --- he certainly didn't say "it's not about the money" --- than his statement: "It's not about me. It's about what God wants for me." Bringing the Diety into contract negotiations is not a popular stance in St. Louis. (Although you could look at it another way: It isn't greedy, as it allows for the possibility that God wants him to play for free. If so, then God will find a way to work that out in spite of the union. He's God, he can do things like that).
I'm a Cards fan. I want to keep Pujols. But not at the expense of an A-Rod contact, and that seems to be the way the man is leaning. Hence the reaction of the Cards fans....if that's what Albert needs(and, apparently the Lord....though I would suggest He's speaking through the mouth of the minister at the Kansas City Baptist Temple who's in line for 10%), the Yanks may be the only home for him.
---------------------------------
From 'Nice Guys Finish Last' by Leo Durocher:
Baseball lives at the center of a never-flagging whirl of irreconcilable opinions.
Bernie has always been adamantly anti-owners and particularly anti-LaRussa, so his stance is as much a continuation of that attitude as 'support' of player's rights. (Veteran players giving hometown discounts because they've "already amassed a fortune"? There's probably at least a few of us here who would regard one year's paycheck of $7 million as "amassing a fortune".)
The fans in St. Louis (from the fan boards) were less concerned with Pujols' monetary demands --- he certainly didn't say "it's not about the money" --- than his statement: "It's not about me. It's about what God wants for me." Bringing the Diety into contract negotiations is not a popular stance in St. Louis. (Although you could look at it another way: It isn't greedy, as it allows for the possibility that God wants him to play for free. If so, then God will find a way to work that out in spite of the union. He's God, he can do things like that).
I'm a Cards fan. I want to keep Pujols. But not at the expense of an A-Rod contact, and that seems to be the way the man is leaning. Hence the reaction of the Cards fans....if that's what Albert needs(and, apparently the Lord....though I would suggest He's speaking through the mouth of the minister at the Kansas City Baptist Temple who's in line for 10%), the Yanks may be the only home for him.
---------------------------------
From 'Nice Guys Finish Last' by Leo Durocher:
Baseball lives at the center of a never-flagging whirl of irreconcilable opinions.
