It’s Bobby Bonilla Day
Eat your heart out Charlie Weis (please don’t literally attempt to eat your own heart though)
If it's edible Charlie has tried it.
With some fava beans and a nice chianti?
Idk. Weis strikes me as more of a “throw it in the microwave and nuke it” kinda guy
That made me lol, +1 to you sir.
LOL!!! Good management there...
Yes. Reminds me of this:
https://huddleup.substack.com/p/the-greatest-business-deal-in-sports
Thanks for posting and linking the Spirits of St. Louis deal. While Bonilla may be the modern day example of sweet or bad deals (depending on perspective) Ozzie and Daniel Silna are the godfathers of them!
It’s good management in the sense that this was all deferred, and with time value of money it benefited the Mets by doing it. I’m sure there’s an interest clause but it’s probably low.
The agreed upon discount rate was supposedly 8%. Not unfair in either direction if you assume the money was invested.
The Wilpon's invested it into Madoff's ponzi scheme....so not a solid move on their part.
They're paying him like quadruple his original contract. That's like saying it's better to stretch your mortgage over 40 years instead of 10.
That's due to compound interest. From a recent planet money:
"MALONE: And what our Mets-loving economist Jose's spreadsheet shows us is that $6 million with 8% annual compound interest, it grows into exactly the amount of money the Mets are paying Bobby Bonilla. In other words, $6 million in the year 2000 is worth the exact same as the roughly $30 million they are paying him in the future.
FERNANDEZ: So for the Mets, it's kind of like a wash whether I pay that money now or later. Even though it does sound nominally as a lot more money on paper in the year 2000, it was a good deal for the Mets."
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1010404697
Bobby Bonilla wanted a guaranteed income stream into the future to hedge against losing all his money, and the Mets wanted to use his $6 million salary on other players in a potential world series window. It was a good deal for everyone involved.
Isn't Billy Sims still cashing checks from the lions?
i jest
He deserves it!
I believe you're thinking of Barry Sanders..... HE deserves it. Billy was on the DL with turf toe for 1/2 of his contract.
I watched the Lions in the early 80's aggressively, and this is definitely not the case. Up until his horrible knee injury, he played in 60 of 65 games. And that was awfully impressive for the load he carried combined with his running style. He was an absolute stud.
Sims would have been one of the greats had he stayed healthy. Loved watching him play when I was a kid. I had a t-shirt that said "Motor City Roars, when Billy Sims Scores!" Every time we got a "free dress" day at St. Monica's I wore it.
One of my first sports heroes as a kid.
nobody who saw billy sims play should ever suggest he wasn't worth every single penny.
adrian peterson v1.0
Please let me in on the joke
Last night, when I got ready to go to sleep, I said a small little prayer to Saint Bobby Bonilla, the patron saint of signing a contract that the other side can't pay up in the initial term so they give you 5x the amount they owe to defer payments over 25 years.
There should be a cryptocurrency named after Bonilla.
Bobo coin ?
I'll have what his agent's having.
All hail compounding interest. And Bernie Madoff.
Here's a great article on the history of Bobby Bonilla day:
https://thefederalist.com/2021/07/01/bobby-bonilla-day-shows-new-york-mets-history-of-futility/
An excerpt from the article:
Following the 1991 season, Bonilla became a free agent and left for the Mets. He spent four years with the team, followed by stints with the Baltimore Orioles, Florida Marlins (where he won a World Series in 1997), and Los Angeles Dodgers, until he returned to the Mets in 1999.
By this time, Bonilla had turned 36, and age plus persistent questions about his attitude and temperament had taken their toll. During the 1999 season, heplayed in 60 games, and obtained only 19 hits the entire year, batting an anemic .160. To top it off, during the 1999 National League Championship Series, Bonilla and a teammate reportedly played cards in the team’s clubhouse while the rest of the Mets were on the field fighting for their playoff lives, as part of “a show of defiance against manager Bobby Valentine.”
The Mets wanted to get rid of their aging, insolent player, so released Bonilla prior to the 2000 season. But they still owed him the $5.9 million left on his contract.
Aaand there's the Michigan connection with alumnus Fred Wilpon investing all their money with Madoff that resulted in this deal.
The Michigan difference!
Ohh, wait...
The Mets GM for part of the Bonilla Era was Steve Phillips, who is also Michigan alum.
When you're Bobby Bonilla, every day is Bobby Bonilla Day.
That dude is a legend and so is whoever negotiated that deal for him.
<laughs in Bruce Sutter>
https://fansided.com/2020/07/01/atlanta-braves-bobby-bonilla-contract-bruce-sutter/
Don't forget another Mets special: Bret Saberhagen gets $250k every year as part of a 25-year deferred contract that runs through 2028. He hasn't pitched in 20 years.
Bobby Bo Day also coincides with the first day of the fiscal year at my job. After 2 years of negotiations, we finally ratified our contract that goes into effect today. AFSCME Local 3308
Two years of negotiations?! Better have backdated that shit!
Public Act 54 in Michigan, passed in 2011, doesn’t allow us to get retro….which sucks.
P.S. It was a perfect storm that stalled negotiations. After our election toward the end of 2019 we had a change in leadership. Our new President had a new negotiation team. The Chief Judge and Court Administrator were removed, so administrations negotiation team changed…then Covid hit
As a Yankee fan, I approve this post.
Bobby Bonilla day, where everyone on the internet tells on themselves that they don't understand time value of money.
https://www.npr.org/2021/06/25/1010404697/bobby-bonilla-day
There's some explanation in this podcast about how the time value of money means this deal is not bad.
That said, it is still a fun story.
I don't really understand it either, but I always figured it would be better to claim my lottery winnings as an annuity, so at least I won't risk blowing it all right away.
This so much. It was by no means a bad deal for the Mets. And on top of things, they saved enough immediate money back then to allow them to trade for Mike Hampton. When Hampton signed elsewhere after that season, the Mets got a compensation pick that they used to pick David Wright.
If the Mets had a crystal ball back then and could choose whether or not to make this deal, no doubt they jump at the chance.
Yes, but the Mets actually have new ownership--a hedge-funder. So the new ownership is still paying off a contract for a dude who hasn't played in 20 years and was only a truly great player with the Pirates at the beginning of his career. The new ownership will continue to pay that contract off for another 15 years. If I'm the new owner, it looks pretty shitty to me. Also--and this is additionally the value of having robust social security over a 401K--an investment return higher than the rate of inflation over time is not a given. You can easily fuck up, or have a money manager who fucks up, or you invest in a Madoff-type con that promised high returns but is really a Ponzi scheme, and lose it all. Never turn your nose up at a safe steady return.
Thank you! A lot of people site the time value of money like it's a given that Bonilla would have invested this and earned exactly what the market did in those years. Or that he should have felt more comfortable investing the 5.9 million and having to manage it along with the risks for the next 25 years. Investing is such a personalized thing and the guy had plenty in career earnings, so maybe he thought an annuity for 25 years sounded better and safer than the chunk of money upfront. Maybe it was better for the Wilpon's but I don't hear Bonilla complaining about it at all. Both sides can win in a deal. Though the Wilpon's getting hosed by Madoff makes me think Bonilla came out better on this deal.
It was a fair / good deal for Bonilla for sure. My issue is with people saying it was a horrible deal for the Mets.
Steven Cohen doesn’t give a shit about this. Not just because he has billions but was a known liability and priced into the valuation the same as any other debt obligations
Good point Steven Cohen was happy to blow 8 million on a shark suspended in a tank of formaldehyde, so I can see your point.
Yeah, because no one, especially professional athletes, have ever made bad investments and lost their money. Some people would rather take the annuity for 25 years and not have to worry about the risks of managing money. It's not really "telling on yourself" about not understanding, just about your risk tolerance.
It’s telling on yourself when people say it was a bad deal for the Mets. It can be a good for Bonilla and for the Mets.
Well, considering how much the Wilpon's lost in the Madoff scandal and the fact that they put the Bonilla money into the Madoff fund, I wouldn't say they came out on the better end of things. Yes, in theory it would have been a good deal for the Mets, but in reality they invested it into a ponzi scheme and lost all of that money. So it was a bad deal for them.
LET'S GO METS!! F...A...N!!! Bah-dah-dah!!!