Jon Lester is back in the Cardinals off-season mix?
On ESPN.com right now there’s this story.
The identity of the fourth team isn’t known to the other clubs involved. But there is speculation among rival teams that the St. Louis Cardinals remain interested in the free-agent left-hander.
Did you read the whole story? Ok, now let’s break this down in 3 parts.
PART 1
You know what I have an interest in? Dating a Victoria’s Secret model. And winning the Mega Millions. And about 600 other things that aren’t happening. It’s cool, though. I’ll make it.
Are the Cardinals “interested” in Jon Lester? Yes. I feel confident they are. But there’s a big difference between being “interested” and actively negotiating a contract.
Lester isn’t dropping his price. Meaning the Cardinals remain “interested” but not an active suitor. Sometimes how you parse the words makes all the difference. ESPN (and other media) employ people to look at how words are used in their stories very carefully. There is nothing in this particular piece that the Cardinals could deny.
Doesn’t mean, though, that anything has changed from last week or the week before. Any good player in baseball the Cardinals will have some level of “interest” in. Would be pretty piss poor if they didn’t, right?
PART 2
Jon Lester is looking for his big payday.
A classic negotiation tactic is FOMO. It’s the fear of missing out. And it’s been pretty popular the past couple of years in marketing. But by creating FOMO with the Red Sox, Cubs and whomever else is interested in signing Lester, the free-agent’s camp is driving up the price they can ask for.
“Oh, you don’t want me to sign with the Sox, Mr. Hoyer? Another 10M and I’ll be in Chicago tomorrow!”
PART 3
The Cardinals are a really good organization. And that starts with GM John Mozeliak. He doesn’t comment on personnel matters very often. From the ESPN article:
And Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak has never publicly commented about Lester specifically.
Mozeliak did tell the St. Louis Post-Dispatch last week that his team was “always open for business” and still exploring the free-agent pitching market in an “opportunistic” manner.
This tight-lipped approach serves him well. Other teams trust him. His teams respect him. And if the mention of the Cardinals leads to other teams spending more money to get a player because he no comments rumors? Well, that’s just gravy.
In short – the Cardinals aren’t signing Jon Lester. So we can put this to bed. Again. Hopefully.
Photo: Boston Herald
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