Greedy Red Sox Firstbaseman

[Seinatra]

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slu...v=ap&type=lgns

BOSTON (AP) -- Red Sox fans have seen the video over and over again. A ground ball to pitcher Keith Foulke. He tosses it underhand to backup first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz, who raises it high as Boston celebrates its first World Series championship in 86 years.

Mientkiewicz still hasn't let go of the ball. But now the Red Sox want it back.

Calling the ball, ``my retirement fund,'' Mientkiewicz stored it in a safe deposit box. Red Sox CEO Larry Lucchino said Thursday he's going to ask Mientkiewicz to return it to the team.

``We want it to be part of Red Sox archives or museums so it can be shared with the fans,'' Lucchino told The Boston Globe. ``We would hope he would understand the historical nature of it.''

Mientkiewicz seems to understand it very well, which is exactly why he held on to it.

Historic baseballs have recently fetched impressive sums. The baseball Red Sox catcher Carlton Fisk banged off the foul pole in the 1975 World Series sold for $113,373. The ball Barry Bonds hit for his 73rd home run went for $450,000. The most expensive baseball of all time is Mark McGwire's 70th homer, which went for $3 million.

Mientkiewicz said he thinks the Boston World Series ball has more value than a home run ball.

``Those are important and all, don't get me wrong, but there are always going to be more home runs,'' he said. ``This is something that took 86 years, and 86 years is a long time. Personally, I went through hell and back this year. But winning the World Series is something I'm going to remember for a long time.''

Mientkiewicz came to Boston from Minnesota in the three-team midseason deal that sent Boston shortstop Nomar Garciaparra to the Chicago Cubs.

Mientkiewicz, who batted .215 for Boston, was used primarily as a late innings defensive replacement, and the former Gold Glove first baseman has indicated his unhappiness with the role.

Boston broke its championship drought by beating the New York Yankees in seven games in the American League Championship Series, then sweeping the St. Louis Cardinals in four games in the World Series.

After the game, Mientkiewicz said he put the ball in his locker, then gave it to his wife, Jodi, who put it in her purse. The next day, the ball was authenticated by Major League Baseball.

Carmine Tiso, spokesman for MLB, told the Globe that Mientkiewicz owns the baseball, though Joe Januszewski, Red Sox director of corporate partnerships, said he thinks the team owns it.

Mientkiewicz couldn't be reached for comment Thursday by the Globe after Lucchino said the club wanted the ball back. But on Wednesday, he left no doubt that he believes the ball belongs to him.

``I know this ball has a lot of sentimental value,'' Mientkiewicz said. ``I hope I don't have to use it for the money. It would be cool if we have kids someday to have it stay in our family for a long time. But I can be bought. I'm thinking, there's four years at Florida State for one of my kids. At least.''


Red Sox fans - Is he signed through next year?

[Janice]

Doug Mientkiewicz isn't a sport's superstar. There's talk of trading him, so why should he feel any loyalty to the Sox. He was new to the team. He owns the ball. If MLB wants to change the rules about who gets to keep balls, they should do so.

If the Sox want the ball so bad, they can buy it from him.

[Brian]

Originally Posted by Janice

If the Sox want the ball so bad, they can buy it from him.

Anything (well, almost, anything) is negotiable. That's more fair than forcing him to give it up.

[Hollow]

*sings the theme song to diff'rent strokes*

[Kay Scarpetta]

So it's legit that he does own it, and not the team?

But wasn't it the Sox who purchased the balls?

[Janice]

This story is not unique. Other players keep balls. Here's a story from the NY Times. I've bolded parts that I think are relevant.

People have to ask themselves: Would they hand over something that is worth possibly a million dollars?
___________________________________

Title Is Theirs, and Red Sox Want Ball That Goes With It

New York Times

It is the ninth inning, it is late October, and your team is one out from winning the World Series. You are one of nine fielders on the winning team, and the baseball that clinches the championship lands in your glove. What do you do with it?

It happened last fall to the Boston Red Sox' first baseman, Doug Mientkiewicz, a defensive replacement with three months of service with the team. He secured the ball that ended 86 years of torture for New England fans. He still has it, and according to an article yesterday in The Boston Globe, the Red Sox want it back.


"What do I do in his case?" Kent Hrbek, a member of the Minnesota Twins' 1987 title team, said yesterday. "I'd run and hide. That's a pretty significant baseball."

Hrbek was laughing over the phone as he said it. He and Mientkiewicz are former Twins first basemen, and each has caught the last out of a World Series. When Hrbek did it, to wrap up the Twins' first championship, he gave the ball to his manager, Tom Kelly, during the postgame party in the clubhouse.

If Mientkiewicz asked him what to do, Hrbek said, he would tell him to give the ball back.

"If it was a tennis match and you won the last point with that ball, sure, you can keep it," Hrbek said. "But I think it's the team's baseball. It's a team sport, and I think the team should get to have it. I think he'll think about it, and he'll probably give it up. He's smart enough to realize it's the team's baseball."

The Red Sox believe it is, or at least they believe it should be. Their president, Larry Lucchino, told The Globe that the team would ask Mientkiewicz to return the ball so it could be part of the team's collection and shared with fans.

"We aren't going to have any other comment until we have a chance to talk to Doug directly about this matter," Lucchino said in an e-mail message yesterday. "We certainly owe him that courtesy."

On Oct. 27 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis, with two outs in the ninth inning of Game 4, Keith Foulke, the Red Sox' closer, fielded a grounder from the Cardinals' Edgar Renteria. Foulke carefully fielded it and made an underhand toss to Mientkiewicz, who caught the ball for the final out and rushed to leap on Foulke.

Mientkiewicz, who is 30, told The Globe that he had given the ball to his wife, Jodi, who had it authenticated by Major League Baseball the next day. He said that the ball was with his 2000 Olympic gold medal in a safe deposit box in Miami.

"That's my retirement fund," he said, later adding: "I can be bought. I'm thinking, there's four years at Florida State for one of my kids."

The topic raged on Boston call-in shows yesterday, and Mientkiewicz went on WEEI radio and clarified his comments. He did not rule out ever selling the ball but said he was joking when he said he could be bought.

"The last thing I am is money crazy," said Mientkiewicz, who made $2.8 million last season. "But I'm also not going to give the thing away, either."

Mientkiewicz said he would be happy to lend the ball to the Red Sox, and he spoke yesterday with the principal owner, John Henry.

"We didn't discuss solutions," Henry said in an e-mail message, adding that Lucchino had already stated the team's position. "I just wanted to listen to what his feelings were with regard to all of this. I have a great deal of respect for Doug."

Paul Weiler, a professor of law at Harvard, sided with the Red Sox.

"Certainly, if it had gone into the hands of a fan in the stands, like the one who caught McGwire's 70th home run, it belongs to the person who paid to be there catching the ball," Weiler said in an e-mail message. "On the other hand, Mientkiewicz is being paid by the Red Sox. To be out on the field catching that ball, and as an employee, even a unionized one, his rights likely are different."

The ball that Mark McGwire hit for his 70th home run in 1998, then the record for a season, sold for $3 million, including commission, the most paid to date for a baseball. Arlan Ettinger, president of Guernsey's auction house, which auctioned that ball in early 1999, said he doubted that the Red Sox ball would go for the same amount. "If I had to throw a number out, I'd probably say a million dollars," he said.

Mientkiewicz could follow the example of Cal Ripken Jr., who caught a liner to end the 1983 World Series for the Baltimore Orioles. Ripken owns the ball, but he has lent it to the Babe Ruth Museum near Camden Yards.

Jeff Idelson, a vice president at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., said the Hall of Fame had the ball from the final out of only two championships, 1889 and 1903.

Idelson said the fate of the 2004 ball was an issue between the Red Sox and Mientkiewicz; the Hall of Fame did not ask for it after Game 4.

"There were so many compelling stories that the ball from the final out wasn't one we pursued," he said.

In his 10 years with the Hall of Fame, Idelson said, he has asked for the last out of a World Series only once: in 1998, when Yankees first baseman Tino Martinez caught the throw from third baseman Scott Brosius to finish a four-game sweep.

But by the time Idelson asked him, Martinez had given the ball to Andy Pettitte, whose father, Tom, was ailing. Idelson did not ask Pettitte for it.

The whereabouts of other final World Series balls are less certain.

Larry Shenk, a longtime Phillies vice president, said he did not know what became of the ball from the final out of the Phillies' only title, in 1980. Catcher Bob Boone got it after a strikeout, but Boone's son Aaron, the former Yankees playoff hero, does not know where it is.

"No clue," he said yesterday.

The Royals won their only title in 1985, but the team said it did not have the ball from the final out. The Mets, who won the next year, do not have that ball, either.

The ball from the Los Angeles Dodgers' last championship, in 1988, belongs to Fred Claire, who was their general manager. Rick Dempsey had promised Claire that if he signed him as a backup catcher, he would catch the final out of the World Series and give Claire the ball. That is exactly what happened.

Dempsey said he hoped Mientkiewicz would not sell the ball. "It may be a priceless item, but who cares about the money?" Dempsey said yesterday. "It's a memory that will go to your deathbed with you."

Todd Benzinger, a first baseman for the 1990 Cincinnati Reds, said he still had the final ball from that year's World Series in an old equipment bag. Benzinger, who also played for Boston, said the Red Sox should buy the ball from Mientkiewicz. "If the Red Sox really want it that bad, then pay for it," he said. "It's just a ball."

Mientkiewicz's plight amused Darin Erstad, who caught the last out of the 2002 World Series for the Anaheim Angels. That ball secured the only title in Angels history, but as soon as he reached the mound from center field, Erstad tried to unload it.

He offered it to closer Troy Percival, following his routine after games Percival saved. Percival told Erstad to keep it. Erstad did not know what to do with it and does not display it.

"It's in a box," Erstad said yesterday, and he did not mean a safe deposit box. "If the Angels asked for it, I'd give it to them in a heartbeat."

Alas, after 86 years, it might not be so easy for the Red Sox.

[Brian Damage]

I don't blame the guy either. He's not a superstar that makes millions upon millions. Even if he did, that is his ball, he can do with it as he pleases.

[TJL]

The Red Sox should slip the guy a check under the table, and then he can graciously "donate" the ball to the team.

[Seinatra]

The idea of him keeping the ball is not particularly bothersome, but it was the comments he made in the first story that really made him sound like he valued money above anything to do with his team or the accomplishment. Sounds like he took some of that back in the article Janice posted.

Brian he only makes 1.8 million upon million.

I think TJL probably got it right, maybe they will set up a college fund for him.

[TJL]

Originally Posted by Seinatra

The idea of him keeping the ball is not particularly bothersome, but it was the comments he made in the first story that really made him sound like he valued money above anything to do with his team or the accomplishment.

Ask Pedro. He knows all about that.