Jeter's First Steps With Marlins: A Cost-Cutting Coward With No Class

On September 22, the Miami Herald reported that Derek Jeter, who will (likely) be the part owner and incoming CEO of the Marlins, "plans to fire two special assistants who are in Baseball's Hall of Fame (Andre Dawson and Tony Perez), the manager who led them to the 2003 World Series championship (Jack McKeon) and the player known as Mr. Marlin (Jeff Conine)".

Well, that's technically true, but ...

What actually happened was: Jeter informed Marlins president David Samson that he would not be retained as team president. Then Jeter told Samson to do the dirty work of firing the four special assistants because Jeter "didn't want to do it".

"Process that for a second," writes SB Nation's Whitney McIntosh.

Derek Jeter, who seems like he can't wait to be the face of a major league team and is jumping the gun about management decisions, asked someone he had ALREADY FIRED to FIRE OTHER PEOPLE FOR HIM instead of doing it himself. The new owners haven't even fully moved in to the proverbial house yet before Jeter is asking the middleman real estate agent to fire the groundskeeper that has been taking care of the property for decades.

It'll be fine though, because it's not like owners have to make a lot of tough and tricky decisions throughout their time managing a team or anything. That never happens. It'll definitely be smooth sailing from here (/end sarcasm).

Craig Calcaterra, NBC Sports:

It seems that Samson did carry out the firings. Unless some handsome severance package was being held hostage over it, I'm not sure how Samson doesn't tell Jeter, "Hey Captain RE2PECT, know what? Up yours, you do it yourself." ...

[H]ow doesn't Jeter man-up and handle this himself? It's not because he's not yet officially the owner, because if he has the power to fire Samson, he has the power to fire Conine and his friends. ... [I]t comes off as cowardice on Jeter's part. ...

I'll be curious to see how this plays in the baseball establishment over the next couple of days. Everyone — particularly the press — loves Derek Jeter and credits him with a class, smoothness and media savvy matched by few others. This, though, was either (a) a failure of class and an act of disrespect to baseball luminaries; or (b) a complete bungling of public relations, serving to make what was, in reality, a reasonable move appear classless. ...

It'll be interesting to see if, for the first time in his professional life, the media gets its knives out for Derek Jeter ...

Jon Thayer, Sports Illustrated:

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss? That might be the case for Marlins fans, who will soon be free of Jeffrey Loria and his perpetual fire sales, but may find the team's new owner all too eager to continue that process. On Sunday, the Miami Herald's Barry Jackson reported that Derek Jeter, who agreed to purchase the team from Loria last month, wants to cut Miami's payroll drastically ... consigning the Marlins yet again to irrelevance just as they seemed to be climbing into a better place. ...

Miami is currently sitting at $115 million in salary commitments, but Jeter wants that number to drop to as low as $55 million in 2018 ...

MLB can't be happy with the idea that Jeter doesn't seem to have any desire to put money into the franchise. ... Even worse is that Jeter reportedly wants to pay himself $5 million a year to own the team so as to recoup the $25 million he put into the winning bid. MLB team owners are a rapacious group by and large, but the thought of new tenants dropping a billion dollars on a franchise and immediately shipping all the high-priced talent out of town while pocketing payroll for themselves may be too much even for them.

Barry Jackson, Miami Herald:

Jeter wants to run baseball operations and his lack of experience, and public comments in the past that he doesn't love watching baseball (according to the New York Post and several other outlets), are certainly pause for concern, despite his sterling reputation and exceptional playing career.

Jeter, October 2009:

[How many World Series games have you watched since the Yankees were in it in 2003?] Zero. ... I don't want to watch. ... I'd see highlights. I'd be lying to you if I said I wasn't aware of what was going on. But I can't sit and watch. ... Sometimes I'd check the score, but I want no part of sitting down watching.

Jeter, April 2015:

That was the question I got quite a bit in the offseason ... after I retired. The question I always got was, "Do you miss it?" ... But to be honest with you, I don't miss it at all. ... I'm sure [the AL East] will continue to be tough. But I have no clue. I really have not watched.

Joel Sherman, New York Post, April 29, 2017:

[H]ere is the oddity Jeter might have to work most to explain: He was a man who all but bragged that he never watched baseball, and now he wants to buy one of the 30 teams at a moment when Commissioner Rob Manfred is obsessed with getting people to watch the sport.

Jeter mentioned his distaste for watching baseball many times during his career. As an example, in his book "The Yankee Years," Tom Verducci relates that the baseball-infatuated A-Rod was at Jeter's apartment and was stunned Jeter did not have the MLB TV package. Mike Borzello, the Yankees' bullpen catcher at the time, witnessed the exchange. "It was just so funny because Derek will never watch a baseball game other than the one he's playing in."

Jeter, May 2017:

[Seth Meyers: "Do you still watch baseball?"] I do not. ... I'm starting to watch a little bit more because, ultimately, I have ownership aspirations.

According to ESPN: MLB is expected to hold a special meeting (via telephone conference call) in October to vote on approving the sale of the Marlins to the group led by Jeter and billionaire Bruce Sherman.

And: Jeter's apparent plan to get rid of the Red Grooms sculpture beyond the outfield fence has already struck out. Michael Spring, Miami-Dade County's cultural director, said the sculpture is a public piece of art owned by the county, commissioned and "designed specifically for this project and location". It is "permanently installed" and "not moveable".

Deadspin further explained that the sculpture "was required as part of the local Art in Public Places program, which mandates that county-constructed buildings include art. As former team owner Jeffrey Loria fleeced the city for hundreds of millions of public funding for the stadium, it is a county-constructed building which, therefore, needs some art."

Madoffs Mets, a commenter at Deadspin, wrote: "You'd think Jeter would be a little more understanding about keeping around a fan-favorite statue in the field."