I was driving around today listening to XM’s “MLB Home Plate” talk shows, and heard something that seems like epic level news. A caller called in and mentioned that Tom Hicks & the Texas Rangers failed to make payroll yesterday. They said that MLB had to step in and give the team $15 million to make payroll. Whether that was office payroll or player payroll, they weren’t clear.
But Kevin Kennedy who was the host said he had several personal ties in the orginazation, going back to his days here (so he said). He claimed he knew something about the situation, and was quite sure that the team “would be in different hands this coming offseason”.
Now we knew Hicks was trying to sell controlling interest (PLEASE PLEASE – Mr Ryan..), but this was the first I heard of real money problems like not being able to make player payroll. Kennedy said this wouldn’t affect day to day operations, because MLB has a fund set up for things like this, but he did say it probably would affect who could be brought in at the trading deadline, that we couldn’t take on much (if any) salary.
This is the first I’ve heard of it. Either I missed something bigtime in local reporting, or nobody’s talking about it. Surely I’m not the first person in DFW to mention this?
Maury Brown says
Updates from MLB and Kevin Kennedy (see link).
MLB does not comment on club finances, and Kennedy denies any knowledge of loan from MLB.
Joe Siegler says
Looks like I started something. Apparently I was the first person to post about it.
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/Did-Rangers-have-to-borrow-money-from-MLB-to-mak?urn=mlb,174379
Joe Siegler says
ESPN, too? Wow.
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=4303809