On Wednesday afternoon, both Mookie Betts and David Price made their first appearances at Chavez Ravine as members of the Los Angeles Dodgers. Needless to say, high praise for each player from front-office boss Andrew Friedman and skipper Dave Roberts was not spared in the least.
Said Friedman of Betts, “he embodies everything we value in a position player.”
Indeed, there was no shortage of excitement from both the players and management alike.
One of the most interesting comments from Friedman, however, came on Monday when he was a guest on Sirius XM’s MLB Network Radio. Friedman explained that he started working Chaim Bloom on Betts’ availability even before Bloom was officially named the Boston general manager.
“It’s been a long road. Even when I was talking to Chaim when he was interviewing with the Red Sox, I was getting in my Mookie comments to him if he got the job,” Friedman said. “It took him a little while to get his arms wrapped around everything.”
Coincidentally, Bloom worked for Friedman during his days in Tampa.
What’s more, Friedman confessed that he spent a significant amount of time inquiring about Betts with Boston’s former president of baseball ops, Dave Dombrowski. When asked by Jorge Castillo of the Los Angeles Times if they made progress, Friedman said, “The Red Sox won a bunch of games in a row and they stopped the discussions.”
Betts last year slashed .295/.391/.524 with 29 home runs and 80 RBI for the Red Sox, primarily hitting in the leadoff position. His efforts tallied him a 6.6 fWAR, good enough for fifth-best in the American League.
Another topic of conversation was the matter of uniform numbers. As expected, Betts will wear his usual No. 50, while Price has selected No. 33. Price has donned three other numbers—10, 14 and 24—over the course of his 12-year, big league career. However, he indicated he selected No. 33 as a tribute to one of his Tampa mentors, “Big Game” James Shields.
“David was a huge part of the culture and the success we had at Tampa,” Friedman said of Price. “What he brings [to the L.A. clubhouse] goes well beyond what he does every fifth day on the mound.”
When asked to share a few words about his new outfield mate Cody Bellinger, Betts stated, “He won an MVP last year so he’s definitely going to put on a show. I’ll do my best to keep up with him.”
Surprisingly, there was a question thrown at Betts regarding a possible contract extension with the Dodgers, but the 27-year-old native of Nashville admitted it was entirely to early for him to digest such a concept.
“Right now, I just got here,” he said. “I’m not even thinking about that. I’m just focused on 2020 and going from there.”
A 3-1/2 minute portion of the press conference has been linked on the Dodgers’ team website.
Aside from the Betts/Price presser, there was a bit of other team news that took place on Wednesday, as righty reliever Pedro Baez won his arbitration case and was awarded a $4 million salary for the upcoming season.
According to Jesse Sanchez of MLB.com, Baez was represented by Kelvin Nova, Jeff Fannell and his associate Kap Misir.
Think Blue Planning Committee 
Price seems to have quite a nice personality and a good sense of humor, although there was that one incident in Boston a couple years ago when he got into it with Dennis Eckersley who made a comment he didn’t like during a broadcast. It wasn’t even about Price, it was about a poor rehab start that Rodriguez had. I guess that’s why Price is liked a lot by his teammates. He stands up for them. Remember after that spectacular performance by Eovaldi in the WS when Muncy finally tagged him for that 18th inning homer? Price was the first one out of the dugout and put his arm around Eovaldi to tell him what a great job he’d done.
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One thing I dislike about Nike now making the jerseys is the Nike swoosh that is over the right breast. Dodger uni’s probably one of the cleanest looks in the majors. I think the swoosh ruins that. I know all unis have it now, but they could have put it on the sleeve or something like that. That is what Majestic did, and New Era also.
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I’m very curious to see how they plan to get under the tax threshold. Right now we are about $10.8 million over the line. Trading Joc and Stripling would still leave us about $970K over the line with nowhere else to really cut salary by trading guys. The only way I can see is getting under the line is if either Joc, Stripling and Jimmy Nelson are all shipped out leaving you about $200K under the limit. The other option is trading Joc and either Alex Wood or Kike’ Hernandez which gives them about $1 million in breathing room. Tough choices coming soon.
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Both Kasten and AF have stated that they not only don’t have to stay under the tax threshold but don’t expect to. Not that they won’t make trades which might lower payroll, but they don’t consider it a necessity.
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I have stated repeatedly that I’m finally gonna earn my first million by June 1. 😁
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Tell Mr. Bloomberg you’ll run an ad for him here. I’m sure he’ll throw a mil at you.
If you wind up a dollar short on June 1 let me know and I’ll give you that last dollar.
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He’s been spending some ridiculous money, that’s for sure. I think he’s up to around $300 million spent on ads already. Insane, man.
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Spending 300 mil for him is like you or me buying something off the dollar menu at McDonald’s.
It’s something like 1/2 of 1 percent of his net worth.
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He’s basically throwing money away but he’s got it to spend. The Democratic Party is in such a laughable state that I don’t see anyone who will be able to beat Trump. They act like a bunch of pissed off teenage girls led by a senile old badger who I’m pretty sure has lost her damn mind. No continuity in that party whatsoever. The only thing they care about is complaining about Trump. If it doesn’t involve Trump, they don’t care. The State of the Union was priceless watching Pelosi make all her little puppets dance for her. Ripping that speech up on TV did more to get Trump re-elected than $100 million in advertising ever could. I need to send Nancy a thank you card.
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Say what you will, but Bloomberg’s second term was amazing.
Unparalleled IMHO
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Whatever anyone’s political leanings, a Bloomberg/Trump contest would be like the best heavyweight fight ever. And also the dirtiest. Lots of ear biting and below the belt punching.
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I think there’s a very reasonable chance we see that exact fight.
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We should know a lot more after Super Tuesday.
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It would be stopped by the judges in the first round
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Enough of the politics. It is time for baseball. There is enough of that crap on twitter, yahoo, facebook, google and regular TV news. Valera claimed by the Padres. That poor dude has made the rounds since he went to the Dodgers in the Machado deal.
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I think I have four or five Breyvic Valera rookie cards lying around somewhere. No clue how I acquired them, though.
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Hang on to them. They’ll be very valuable when he’s voted into the HOF.
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I don’t even know if he’ll make the Venezuelan Hall of Fame. 🙁
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I think he may be bumped off the list by Graterol.
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I don’t have any. Not sure I want one. LOL>..but I did get a Topps heritage Mookie card the other day. I love the heritage cards because they use the old designs, which I think are far superior to the same old same old they do now. 53, 54, 55, 57, 58 59, 60, those were some of my favorites. The Bowman’s were the player looked like he was in a TV screen. I even liked the TCMA cards because they were pretty much no frills cards. This year the Dodgers are finally giving away a Drysdale bobblehead that does not look like a cartoon character.
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I have a 2014 Betts 1st Paper card. Some folks are selling them for up to $10 apiece these days. The Betts rookies are actually selling better than the Bellingers.
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I remember getting my son getting an Eric Davis rookie card in a pack he paid about 2.50 for. The guy in the card shop we bought it at told him those were selling for 30 bucks. Same card today probably brings about 5. I probably had about 5 Rose rookie cards. They were the ones that had 4 players from the same team on them. Those things were going for over 500 dollars once. I have seen Belli cards for as much as 15 dollars, depending on which one it is.
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I have a bunch of Bellinger rookies. All the rookie cards from the late eighties and nineties deprecated like crazy. Many of the Piazza and Pedro Martinez rookies aren’t even worth $1.00 these days. Crazy.
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I agree with ya fozzybear, enuff of that shyte in hear.
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I just looked on ebay for the hell of it. There is a Bellinger card on there selling for 120,000.00$..wow. Made by Leaf. Also one going for 21,111.00$. Little too rich for my taste. There is a 1952 Mantle going for 225 thousand. There are 2 Betts cards over 15 thousand, nothing close to that Bellinger.
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I have a 1960 Topps Roger Maris. Probably worth more than any of the Koufax cards I have. It isn’t graded, but I would say it’s at least EX.
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I paid a little over 14 bucks for my 1959 Koufax. Close to that for my 59 Snider too. Hardest one to find was Gene Snyder and Art Fowler. High series, so they cost a little more than they should have. I bought a few Mantle 1960 reprints. I do have a 59 Maris that a friend gave me. In a A’s uni.
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Old friend Chase Utley with the ceremonial dropping of the puck at the Kings game tonight. Wearing his familiar # 26 on a Kings jersey.
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Kike, Muncy, Belli, JT, and CT3 all at camp already. Betts and Price on the way to camp in a private jet no less.
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Walker signed with the Mariners. Puig still out there too. Hmm……there were some rumblings that he would be open to signing in Japan. Not sure how his antics would play in that culture.
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If AF has been pursuing Mookie for this long, does that mean his off-season plans included both Mookie and Gerrit Cole??
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Maybe the plan was to sign one of either Cole, Strasburg or Rendon, then compliment that signing with a Betts trade. Hard to say. Makes you wonder why at least one reporter didn’t ask him…
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Reporting isn’t what it used to be, in all facets of the media
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In some ways it’s better. The problem as I see it is every idiot in the Twitterverse has a voice and most aren’t worth listening to. But I’ve found a lot of very smart, diligent writers out there willing to find and report the truth. We just need better fact from fiction skills and willingness to support those telling the truth.
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