Mets Still Broke

[Guest Swan Swan H]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: What college paper was that originally published in I wonder

[Edgy MD]

I dunno. Right from the top I learned something. Dinosaurs were mostly carnivores or herbivores. Huh.

[ashie62]

What is Medgal's fucking problem..He really really needs a job...

[Zvon]

COMMENTARY "Fans want to see a winning team," said die-hard Mets fan Matt Kaufman. "Or at least a team they think can win."

I'd settle for a team that I think can win.

[Ceetar]

I'll settle fora team that simply wins, as I suspect most Mets fans aren't going to believe it until well after they see it.

[Edgy MD]

Yeah, but the article and the comment by "die hard Mets fan Matt Kaufman" offers less insight than a cab driver. Yes, fans prefer good teams. Yes, good teams draw more. No, the economy isn't primarily what's keeping people away from Citi Field.

Hey Mets, be better.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Mets' ballpark revenue from Citi Field dips for 3rd straight year
Originally published: July 13, 2013 7:09 PM
Updated: July 15, 2013 4:26 PM
By JIM BAUMBACH AND RANDI MARSHALL jim.baumbach@newsday.com, randi.marshall@newsday.com


People walk outside of Citi Field during Gatorade All-Star Workout Day in Queens. (July 15, 2013 )

The Mets' ballpark-related revenue dropped last season for the third straight year, to $121.5 million, slightly more than half the $234.3 million the team had expected. Analysts expect that figure to decline even more because 2013 ticket sales are 10,000 fewer per game than the team projected. A portion of the team's ballpark-related finances are far from what the Mets anticipated before opening Citi Field in 2009, when they told prospective bondholders they expected to sell the majority of their game tickets for five years. Had that come true, the Mets projected that annual revenue from a part of their ballpark revenue for such items as premium seat tickets, suites, concessions and parking would eclipse $200 million each year and reach more than $240 million this year. A Mets spokesman declined to comment, saying the team does not talk publicly about its finances. Earlier this month, the team announced the hiring of Pittsburgh Pirates chief marketing officer and executive vice president Lou DePaoli as its new chief revenue officer. Despite the Mets' inability to meet projections -- and the downward trend of their finances -- the team's bonds are still attractive to investors. Thomas Metzold, the co-director of municipal investments at Eaton Vance Investment Managers, said the Mets' bonds are regarded by investors as "money good" -- meaning they still expect the team to continue to make bond payments. The Mets' inability to meet projections has the potential to financially impact New York City, which was hoping for an economic boost from the new stadium, experts said. "If attendance is dropping and activity within the stadium is dropping, then you're going to have less economic activity [in the city] and less tax revenues coming from it," said the city's Independent Budget Office spokesman Doug Turetsky. Getting the numbers The five-year projection figures for Citi Field revenue come from a bond prospectus published by the New York City Industrial Development Agency in January 2009, as the Mets received an additional $82.28 million in tax-exempt bonds to complete the construction of Citi Field. Newsday obtained that document, along with quarterly financial statements, through Freedom of Information Law requests with the NYCIDA, which issued the bonds. The financial statements are filed with the city by Queens Ballpark Company LLC, the Mets' subsidiary that leases the stadium from New York City. The statements present a partial window into the cash flow of the franchise and are designed to show only that the Mets can repay its annual bond payments of about $43 million. Not included is the revenue from the Mets' television contract with SportsNet New York, minor league operations expenses, revenue from 30,000 non-premium seats at Citi Field and the player payroll, which this year is $90.9 million. The Mets' revenue projections in the 2009 bond prospectus show how optimistic the team's management was that Citi Field would provide revenue far greater than Shea Stadium, which opened in 1964 and had grown antiquated by modern ballpark standards. Low sales on premium seats From 2009, the team's actual ballpark revenue has fallen well below its projections. That year, the team projected $224 million and received $180 million. The following year, it projected $226 million and received $144 million. The most significant financial difference between the Mets' forecast and actual revenue took place within Citi Field's most expensive seats. Revenue from these 15,000 seats is included in the team's revenue stream to pay back its bonds. The Mets expected $123.5 million in 2009 from "retained seats revenue," which represents 10,635 premium seats, about a quarter of the stadium's capacity. The Mets expected to build off that an annual average increase of about 3 percent for five years, through this season. But the "retained seats revenue" never met 2009 projections and continues to drop. The Mets reported $99.3 million in ticket revenue in 2009; last year it received only $43.9 million, 67 percent shy of their 2012 projection. Sports business experts said the Mets' projections were consistent for teams opening new stadiums before the economic downturn that began toward the end of 2008, but two ratings agencies that study the bonds -- Standard & Poor's and Moody's Investors Service -- described the Mets' forecasts at the time as "aggressive." Jodi Hecht, a Standard & Poor's analyst who has issued annual reports on the Mets' bonds since they were first sold in 2006, said the team's projections were overly optimistic because game attendance is largely related to the team's performance. The Mets have not had a winning season since 2008. The Mets' estimates assumed paid attendance would decrease slightly in five years, dropping from an anticipated 39,981 tickets sold per game in 2009 to 37,983 this season. In reality, the Mets averaged 38,942 in 2009 and have averaged 26,655 through 44 home games this year. Smaller crowds than Shea The Mets' attendance of 2.2 million last season was lower than its 2.4 million average during the team's last 20 years at Shea Stadium, one reason Hecht said S&P's slightly lowered its rating on the Citi Field bonds last December. "It was surprising to me personally that they had fallen last year below what their 20-year historic figure was at a less modern arena," Hecht said. With smaller crowds than projected lately, companies have been less willing to advertise at Citi Field. Records show revenue from stadium advertising and signage has averaged $46 million per year since 2009, about 25 percent short of the team's annual average projection of $62 million. Concessions' revenue has also dropped each year, from $15.2 million in 2009 to $11.4 million last year, well short of the Mets' annual projection of about $21 million. Citi Field hosts Major League Baseball's All-Star Game Tuesday. The Mets have said most of the revenue generated that day goes to the league, not the team. Robert Boland, academic chair of New York University's Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism and Sports Management, said the Mets did not enjoy "the honeymoon period that was once typical for a new stadium" because fans quickly discovered they were paying to watch a team that was not as good as previous seasons. The Mets opened Citi Field after four consecutive winning seasons, including a 2006 postseason appearance. The franchise sold more than 4 million tickets during its last season at Shea Stadium in 2008, leading the Mets to believe there would be a carry-over into Citi Field, Boland said. "Those predictions, they're rosy, but they were rosy within the range of what the Mets had been doing in the latter half of 2000s at Shea Stadium," Boland said. "They thought they could replicate that in their new stadium and add to that, which was logical."

http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/mets/mets-ballpark-revenue-from-citi-field-dips-for-3rd-straight-year-1.5682633

[batmagadanleadoff]

Jeff Wilpon: Mets will have higher payroll for 2014 season after big contracts come off books

Mets COO Jeff Wilpon told WFAN radio on Monday that the team is prepared to invest aggressively in the club's payroll for 2014, helped by improved flexibility because big contracts such as those of Johan Santana and Jason Bay are set to expire. "We haven't set a payroll for next year, but I can tell you we're ready to invest with those big contracts coming off the books," Wilpon said. "We have the money to invest. We're going to invest it prudently. Sandy [Alderson, the general manager] is going to set a path. "There's no predetermined, set way we're going to spend the money, but we do have the money to spend, and depending how it all falls out . . . what trades can be made or can't be made, and where Sandy thinks the best use of those funds are." Wilpon expressed optimism that fans will turn out to support an improved, exciting young team. "It has some effect on how many people come out and support us," Wilpon said. "But we think the product we're going to be putting on the field, [the fans] are going to come out and support it because they're going to be excited about it, with the young kids as well." Wilpon was asked what the biggest misconception is about the organization and said "I think that ownership and the organization doesn't care about the fans. We care about the fans. We want to put a good product out there. "We live and die with the team, and we wouldn't own it if we didn't want to live and die with the team. This is our life, this is our business and we'd like to do a better job at it. And we need to do a better job, and we will . . . We're going to do what we need to do to win."

http://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/mets/jeff-wilpon-mets-will-have-higher-payroll-for-2014-season-after-big-contracts-come-off-books-1.5698883

[Vic Sage]

blah blah blah buy tickets blah blah blah

[soupcan]

That's all well and good but who exactly are they going to spend money on?

They aiming to overspend for Ellsbury? Okay I guess, but what else is going to be out there that they can simply buy?

On another note, Bobby Bonilla should be in charge of the Mets finances. The guy is a super genius. He turned $5.9 million into $42 million! He could even teach Hilary Clinton a thing or two about how to make your money grow.

[Ceetar]

you know what's never asked when people repost these Bonilla stories year after year?

If the Wilpons do file for bankruptcy (or the Mets do) do they still owe him?

[metirish]

No wonder his daughter goes to the Sorbonne.

[metirish]

Ceetar wrote: you know what's never asked when people repost these Bonilla stories year after year? If the Wilpons do file for bankruptcy (or the Mets do) do they still owe him?

I remember reading an article from before where BB was very worried that with the Madoff thing would the Mets be able to pay him, his money person assured him that yes he wold get his money.....but to the bankruptcy, that's an interesting question, sure he worries about that too......Sterling is doing great so he's safe I guess.

[G-Fafif]

Fred extols in the Times.

Wilpon Extols Mets� Finances and Future By RICHARD SANDOMIR Fred Wilpon stood on a stage not far from Citi Field on Monday. It was the day before the All-Star Game, which the Mets are hosting for the first time in 49 years, but his audience, made up of military veterans, some of them in wheelchairs, was not there to talk about baseball, or when Wilpon�s team might actually become a contender again. Instead, they listened appreciatively at St. Albans Community Living Center, a sprawling veterans facility, as Wilpon helped to unveil improvements to a recreation area and green space that the Mets helped to finance with Major League Baseball. �We are very proud today to be with many veterans who served our nation and who sacrificed,� said Wilpon, who shared the stage with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and baseball�s commissioner, Bud Selig. It ws only outside, after the ceremony, that the 76-year-old Wilpon did something he infrequently does these days, which is to talk about his team, which has not had a winning record since Citi Field opened in 2009. In the last few seasons, Wilpon has held spring training news conferences in Port St. Lucie, Fla., in which he has consistently, and sometimes pugnaciously, maintained that he was not selling the team despite the financial stress caused by his connection to the fraud perpetrated by Bernard L. Madoff. And that�s been pretty much it, except for a 2011 interview with The New Yorker in which he made some ill-advised, unflattering remarks about several of his top players. On Monday, standing under a tree in the sweltering 90-degree weather, he did not offer up a lot of details about the Mets, but, not surprisingly, what he did say was positive. �I think Sterling�s position is excellent,� Wilpon said in reference to his family-run company Sterling Equities. �The Mets� business is excellent.� Of Manager Terry Collins, who has had the Mets playing winning baseball of late despite a work-in-progress roster, Wilpon said, �We all love Terry, who has done a very good job with what we have.� Of General Manager Sandy Alderson, who is now in his third season of rebuilding, Wilpon said, �We haven�t turned him down on anything.� Then again, since Alderson took over, the Mets have been cutting payroll, as the franchise wrestles with its financial obligations and seeks to get out from under some onerous player contracts. Asked if the team payroll, which is now about $90 million, will soon enough return to the $140 million level it stood at several years ago, Wilpon said: �I asked Sandy about that. He said he couldn�t invest that much money.� Wilpon did say that Sterling�s real estate operation, the core of his business empire, was going well. He said it had sold only a few of its properties, even though the team, in the aftermath of the Madoff fraud, needed infusions of money from new, limited partners as well as short-term loans from Major League Baseball and Bank of America. �We don�t need to sell,� Wilpon said, adding that the Mets had not refinanced their bank debt of $300 million to $400 million, due next year.

[Edgy MD]

soupcan wrote: That's all well and good but who exactly are they going to spend money on? They aiming to overspend for Ellsbury? Okay I guess, but what else is going to be out there that they can simply buy?

Well, it's both foolish and against the rules to announce their targets before they are available. Besides, spending can mean spending in the free-agent market, but it can also mean trading for good players that already have large contracts, or trading and signing. It can also mean being more aggressive with the next Cuban defector or Japanese gyroman.

People who will be available include I dunno, Robinson Cano, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, A.J. Pierzynski, Carlos Voltran, Shin-Soo Choo, Nate McLouth, Luke Scott, probably what's left of Roy Halladay, Josh Johnson, I dunno.

I hear that Lincecum guy is good. We can even get Olvier Perez back.

And there's the always-desirable Delmon Young.

[Frayed Knot]

Well, it's both foolish and against the rules to announce their targets before they are available.

But how else are they going to SHOW US THE PLAN!!!!?


I used to get a kick out of the discussions on the old MoFo that would break out following each GM appearance on WFAN, inevitably starting with the complaint that, "he didn't tell us anything!", as if they expected him to make a public pre-announcement along the lines of: 'yeah, after we release everyone on the squad who's not paying well right now we'll be dealing Smith & Jones to the _______ next week for X. Y, & Z, all of which will set us up to sign Johnson & Perez in this winter's FA market'.

[soupcan]

I wasn't really asking specifically. I just wasn't that aware of who was going to be available via FA this off-season.

I'm thinking that they are talking about plugging holes more effectively with more established players.

[batmagadanleadoff]

[youtube:1mcymwfl]XmLPCtwFU64[/youtube:1mcymwfl]

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

I didn't know bml had animation skills.

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

I didn't know bml had animation skills.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Fred extols in the Times. Wilpon Extols Mets� Finances and Future By RICHARD SANDOMIR Fred Wilpon ... Of General Manager Sandy Alderson, who is now in his third season of rebuilding, Wilpon said, �We haven�t turned him down on anything.�

I caught this quote when I first read the NYT piece on eff Wilpon's latest State of the Mets Finances MetSpeak and thought to myself, that it reads as if eff is laying all of the responsibility for the team's drastically lowered payroll on Sandy the Slave GM.

Not surprisingly, H, Megdal is the only writer who picks up on that quote, and spins it into an entire piece:

Mets owners blame their stinginess, bafflingly, on the general manager



By Howard Megdal
11:19 am Jul. 18, 2013

While Mets fans were enjoying Matt Harvey, David Wright and the Major League Baseball All-Star Game at Citi Field, Fred and Jeff Wilpon were busy assuring the public, as they've done periodically since they fell hopelessly into debt, that some spending from ownership was just around the corner. This time, what they said effectively pitted them against their own baseball operations department, and against general manager Sandy Alderson's declaration of principles last month. Within the owners' generically positive comments were some clear indicators that these promises to spend aren't any different than those that came last year, or the year before, or the year before that. �I think Sterling�s position is excellent,� Fred Wilpon said in reference to the Mets' parent company, Sterling Equities. �The Mets� business is excellent.� Of course, Newsday had published an article that very day pointing out that the Mets' business is not, in fact, excellent. Revenues are half of what was projected back in 2009. Attendance is well below what even Standard and Poor's had projected when they lowered their bond rating on the team's stadium debt last December. The Mets' business has pretty much been the opposite of excellent ever since Bernie Madoff wrecked the Wilpons' finances. But that article only put some specific numbers to what we already knew. The team lost $23 million last season. And despite offering access to the All-Star Game as an incentive for season-ticket holders, overall attendance in 2013 is down nearly eight percent over last season at this time. The drop is likely to get steeper without the All-Star Game carrot. But while this doesn't help on issues like revenue to increase payroll next season, it is a separate question from the larger picture of Sterling as a whole, which looks much worse. As Wilpon told Richard Sandomir in the Times on Monday, the Mets have not re-financed the $320 million debt, taken against their ownership stake in the team, which is due in June 2014. The problem, beyond an inability to pay it back, is that JPMorgan Chase has a clear incentive not to push back the timeline of the loan, which could put them in line behind the more than $600 million debt Wilpon and his partners now owe against their ownership stake in S.N.Y., and which is due in 2015. Previously, JPMorgan Chase pushed back against allowing David Einhorn's proposed deal to put Einhorn ahead of them in line among the Sterling debt collectors. A similar objection led to the Mets structuring David Wright's contract extension last winter so that the invaluable third baseman's compensation actually went down between the date signed and the June 2014 due date. So yes, significant money is coming off the payroll this winter, just as more than $50 million did following the 2011 season. But ownership's position makes payroll money-in/money-out a largely irrelevant question. Instead, with that principal coming due, any spending needs to happen in conjunction with, or following, JPMorgan Chase allowing it to happen. The true hurdle for ownership: saying to their creditor, We can't pay you $320 million next June. But in the meantime, we'd like to pay Shin-Soo Choo $80 million. In the meantime, Wilpon and son seem to be laying the groundwork for blaming Alderson, rather than their precarious finances, for the coming winter. They are apparently sticking with the cover story that unlike every general manager in baseball history, Sandy Alderson prefers not to have a larger budget to improve his team. �We haven�t turned him down on anything," Fred Wilpon said of Alderson, who last August described a need for "an infusion of players, productive players" and then repeatedly joked about his outfield before adding a total of two free agents on major league contracts totaling $5 million, both pitchers, both no longer on the active roster. In a recent background conversation about the owner's comments, a source close to Alderson told me they were "ridiculous," and expressed bafflement that Wilpon had appeared to lay blame for the Mets' lack of spending on the general manager. "I think we all know he�s turned down more than one move," the source said. "Not even sure what he means." Wilpon, for the record, didn't just say that Alderson had chosen not to spend more money. When asked whether he would return the payroll, currently at approximately $90 million (by counting deferred money to Wright and Jason Bay as a 2013 expense) to the $140 million mark of a few seasons ago, Wilpon said this: "I asked Sandy about that. He said he couldn�t invest that much money.� Jeff Wilpon, the chief operating officer of the New York Mets and son of Fred, piled on in an appearance on Mike Francesa's show, where he said that the Mets, under Alderson, are "a little behind where I thought we'd be." This, despite the fact that overall payroll size hasn't just limited Alderson's options, but has shifted so frequently that Alderson's department can't plan for the medium-term, instead forced to make each move in a vacuum. "We haven't set a payroll for next year," Wilpon told Francesa, pushing back against Alderson's $90-100 million figure from last month. "But I can tell you, we're ready to invest. With those big contracts coming off the books, we have the money to invest." That was precisely the argument the younger Wilpon made a few months into Alderson's tenure, back in January 2011. It was never about team payroll, and that hasn't changed. As team ownership heads into a winter when it needs to account not just for service on its mountain of debts, but the coming due date for a debt itself, what happens next won't be determined by baseball operations, which still hasn't gotten the particulars for winter budgeting more than a month into the six-month timespan Alderson described last month as critical. As another member of the Mets' hierarchy put it to me when I suggested I'd like to write more happy stories about the team, like the kind Matt Harvey has provided every fifth day, he held up his hands and said, "One day at a time."

http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/sports/2013/07/8532016/mets-owners-blame-their-stinginess-bafflingly-general-manager

[batmagadanleadoff]

Doesn't anybody read this guy anymore? He's claiming access to an inside Mets source and wishes he could write happier Mets stories.

[dgwphotography]

Sorry, but I'm of the belief that you can tell that a Wilpon is lying because his mouth is moving.

[MFS62]

I would love to see a press conference next year, held by a power-hitting free agent outfielder, during which he says, "Sandy offered me a great contract. I was ready to sign with the Mets, but he called back a few minutes later and told me ownership nixed it".
Megdal would be positively orgasmic.

Later

[Edgy MD]

Put me down as not wanting to see that.

(The press conference or the orgasm.)

[Ceetar]

It's felt pretty likely to me that the Wilpons are not adding their own money to the team, but everything within the actual budget of the Mets is Sandy's call. If he can make something work within the revenue stream the Mets generate, then fine. If not, he knows better than to ask Fred and Jeff for an outlay of cash at this point above and beyond what the Mets can cover themselves.

The question, to me, is where exactly does licensing money (which is freaking substantial) SNY, naming rights, etc all go to? Are those revenue streams available to Sandy if he was going to raise payroll by 20 million or so? Is it factored in now? Supposedly SNY is making money, what's licensing up to, 50? 60? naming rights are 20..that's practically payroll at this point before a fan walks through the door.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Ceetar wrote: everything within the actual budget of the Mets is Sandy's call.

But was that the point? eff n Jeff can't lay it on Sandy for not spending in excess of a budget that they, eff and Jeff, set.

[dgwphotography]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: Ceetar wrote: everything within the actual budget of the Mets is Sandy's call. But was that the point? eff n Jeff can't lay it on Sandy for not spending in excess of a budget that they, eff and Jeff, set.

Remember Sandy's changing budget from a few years ago, and then surprised that the bloggers kept track?