ESFL Schedules: New York Sharks

Week Date Opponent

1 Thurs. 08/18, 815pm New York Seacooks

2 Sat. 08/27, 1pm @Ithaca Champions

3 Sat. 09/03, 4pm Chicago Madmen

4 Sat. 09/10, 1pm @Long Island Amazin'

5 Fri. 09/16, 745pm Buffalo Bulls

6 Sat. 09/24, 1pm @Boston Conquistadors

7 Sat. 10/01, 1pm New York Seacooks

8 Sat. 10/08, 4pm Florida Panthers

9 Fri. 10/14, 745pm @North Bay Polar Bears

10 Sat. 10/22, 1pm Boston Conquistadors

11 Mon. 10/31, 745pm @Long Island Amazin'

12 Sat. 11/05, 4pm @Independence Walkers

13 Sat. 11/12, 4pm @New York Seacooks

14 Sat. 11/19, 1pm @Boston Conquistadors

15 Thurs. 11/24, 315pm Long Island Amazin'

16 Sat. 12/03, 4pm @Detroit Gamblers

17 Sat. 12/10, 4pm Boston Conquistadors

18 Fri. 12/16, 745pm Philadelphia Geysers

19 Sun. 12/25, 1030am Long Island Amazin'

20 Sat. 12/31, 745pm @New York Seacooks

Dutrochet deal: Reaction/Interpretation

Matt Ruffalo is at it again. Since purchasing the Seacooks in 2004 he has handed out threer $100-million plus guaranteed contracts: over $150 million to linebacker Rylan Abece, $105 million to quarterback Elijah Banker, and $130 million to third baseman Marco Dile. He also inherited most of a $130 million obligation to quarterback Rick Ryzer, of which he maintained liability for about $70 million. This on top of a new stadium estimated to cost $600 million, paid for entirely with debt, and rent obligations at the Flat Grounds and Sprint PCS Field estimated at around $100-$140 million a season.

So what does he want to do? Throw perhaps another $100 million at a starting pitcher, to prop up a historically uninteresting baseball operation that prior to this year played its home games in front of nearly vacant caverns in Smithtown and Huntington Station.

It’s impossible to say what effect today’s action by the USSL to in effect toss out all antitrust charges against Michael Barnett had to do with the pulling of the trigger on a Dutrochet deal that has been rumored for weeks. Barnett, of course, is heavily suspected of personally financing the new Seacook stadium and doctoring the Flat Grounds lease agreement. Otherwise, Ruffalo would probably be at least $1 billion in debt against an asset as of yet without more than a couple hundred million in value. But the ruling seriously decreases the chances of a meaningful USSL public audit of Seacook finances and Seacook-Shark business dealings, allowing the money (and strategy) to be traded in the shadows.

Ruffalo’s business model is at this point clear: continue to load up on debt, presumably provided interest-free (or significantly cheaper) by Barnett, in an attempt to build a sporting juggernaut. It’s already worked in football, with four consecutive playoff appearances, two regular-season titles and an ESFL title since 2007. Now the strategy has spilled over to baseball. The Seacooks quadrupled their investment in player development in 2005, and since have churned out one of the most impressive collections of young talent in the USBL. Smelling their chance, they’re shifting gears, first by nabbing the game’s defining superstar in Dile and now targeting Dutrochet, the sport’s most consistent pitcher.

Both players of course played in New York before. When the Bluebirds snap-moved for the 2004 season, Dile was just bursting onto the scene and won Rookie of the Year honors. Dutrochet came to the majors the next year and flattered crowds with a devastating strikeout pace, French-Canadian good looks and a dominating 2006, in which he posted 21 wins in 33 starts, a 1.64 ERA and over 11 strikeouts per nine innings, en route to his first of three Pitcher of the Year honors.

But by 2007, it was time for the Hanover regime to push its way back in once enough of the bad debt from the early decade was deferred into a Players’ Association pension fund and pushed onto the sovereign state and other team owners. Just as the area began to develop a love affair with the two stars, off they went to Boston, now cast as arch-rivals.

The potential for putting both back in front of Long Island crowds could be a coup for the Seacooks. First of all, they’re obscenely talented, and transform the surprising Seacooks into title favorites. But also they get the baseball revenue ball moving. Although interest is down from its 1999-2001 heyday, when the Sharks averaged over 90,000 a game, the NYS-LIA axis still has the ability to make baseball lucrative if the conditions are right. The Seacooks, without a natural home or baseball fanbase, have languished since moving back in 1998, leading some to argue for baseball operation termination or relocation. An impressive weekend at the Flat Grounds earlier this month raised eyebrows: a total of over 90,000 fans attended a three-game series against a little-known Puerto Rico team, including a record* 32,355 on Sunday afternoon.

DUTROCHET TRADED TO NY SEACOOKS FOR 3 PROSPECTS

Deal contingent on contract extension; parties granted 72-hour window

BOSTON, MA Jun 22 2011

The New York Seacooks and Boston Bluebirds agreed in principle on a four-player trade that would send three-time USBL pitcher of the year Henry Dutrochet to Long Island, if the free-agent-to-be and the Seacooks can agree on a contract extension by a 9am Saturday deadline.

Dutrochet, 29, was the first overall pick in the 2003 USBL Amateur Draft. He reached the USBL after one season with the Bluebirds A-League affiliate in Bethesda. He was a key component of the Bluebirds’ championship runs in 2006, 2008, and 2010, and won the USBL Pitcher of the Year award in 2006, 2008, and 2009. He also leads all active starting pitchers with a career mark of 9.87 strikeouts per nine innings. This season, he has started 16 games for the disappointing Bluebirds, posting a 6-6 record and 3.04 ERA in 107.2 innings, striking out 113 batters and walking 45.

Dutrochet, who is earning $7 million this season as per a contract he signed with the team in December 2007, is set to be a free agent this offseason. Likely to be heavily coveted, he is reportedly seeking upwards of $100 million guaranteed. He would be the first pitcher to USBL history to cross the nine digit mark. The current record belongs to Doug Licoe, who signed a $88 million extension in 2000 with the New York Sharks, but the deal was never paid out in full as the Sharks folded baseball operations after the 2003 season.

The Seacooks have 72 hours to ink the pitcher to an extension. Reports say the sides remain apart, with the Seacooks offering about $75 guaranteed million over five seasons with a vesting option for a sixth based on innings pitched. Even that offer would shatter the Seacook franchise record for a pitcher, currently belonging to Emil Cook, who signed a $36 million, six-year contract extension with the team after the 2009 season.

With a 51-40 record, the Seacooks sit atop the USBL Northeastern Division, up 1.5 games on the Sharks and 4 on the Long Island Amazin’. The Bluebirds are in fourth place, at 43-49, 8.5 games behind and on pace for their worst season since 1997, when they played in Washington, DC. A major reason for the shift was the free agent defection of third baseman Marco Dile to the Seacooks this past offseason. Dile signed a 9-year, $130 million contract with the Seacooks which includes a 1.5% ownership stake in the Seacook USSL operation. Dile, 28, is on pace to break the USBL records for batting average and on-base percentage, as he is currently batting .419/.588/.847, smacking 25 homers in 97 games played.

The move is not without cost. The three prospects headed back to Boston would be catcher/first baseman Jerry Urban, infielder Kerry Magellan, and pitcher Juan Moses. All three were rated in SKSL’s Top 50 prospects manual heading into the season.

The key piece is Moses a 21 year old flamethrower. He has continued to improve his stock, first with eight dominating starts in the A-Leagues and since with 14 strikeouts in 11.2 innings pitched in relief since being recalled on June 4^th. He is regarded as the top right-handed pitching prospect in the game, with scouts raving about his high-90s fastball and devastating split-finger. Some scouts have concern about his ability to command a true off-speed pitch, with both his changeup and curveball lagging behind the other two offerings.

Magellan, a 25 year old 2008 supplemental draft pick out of Idaho, draws rave reviews from scouts for plate discipline and superb defense at both shortstop and third base. Ranked the 48^th best prospect in the league coming into 2011, he has posted a .402 OBP in the A-Leagues but struggled in 14 games with the big club in April, recording just 4 hits and 3 walks in 42 plate appearances before being returned to A-North Carolina as shortstop Benny Dicci returned to heath.

Urban is known for his bat, but concern over whether he can remain at catcher as a professional leads to questions about his value. If relegated to first base his value drops precipitously.

The Lawsuit

So...

What is The Lawsuit?

Why is it so important? and,

Why is it something owners, and possibly the Players' Association, can bargain over?

It threatens to shake the core of how the ESFL, and, even further, USSL-USA is run. Which makes it important... but how so?

With the aid of what can be best imagined as legal aid, non-profit, activist watchdog societies - or, more accurately, at their begging and eventual persuasion, James Rasbey, Jr., best known as the owner/operator of the Independence Walkers ESFL operation, filed an "antitrust" claim against the New York Sharks ESFL operation - and, by association, its 100% owner, Michael Barnett.

Antitrust suits - and this is the first, ever, since the rule-set was passed by ESFL owners in 1994 and approved by the USSL (for ESFL jurisdiction only) the same year, follow a procedural pattern, as follows:

1. Submission of Grievances

2. Solidification of Claims

3. Culling and prima facie evaluation of claims

4. Debate on the merits of Claims +verdict

5. Ramification Stage (if necessary): Remedial and Pecuniary debate + verdict

We're currently between stages two and three.

Rasbey signed his name to a sprawling, 325-page document presumably written by young, American ESFL/USSL activists. "Activist" can effectively be read as "anti-Barnett" in this climate. The document details a series of deals and transactions since the passage of antitrust regulations in 1994, involving the late Sharks owner/operator David Hanover and, of course, Barnett. Notable components include:

1. The circumstances surrounding the Sharks and Seacooks move back to Long Island in 1998. The affidavit claims Hanover illegal conspired with then-Long Island Amazin' owner-operator Michael Harrington, Sr., in order to get the Seacooks to release from their San Diego stadium lease. Hanover then moved to purchase the Cincinnati Sharks and relocate them to the Flat Grounds. The Seacooks were left homeless by the caving of the Hanover-Flat Grounds deal and thus were forced to sign an above-"market" lease deal with Harrington, in order to use Sprint PCS Field in Smithown, NY.

--> Perhaps the most curious aspect of the whole affidavit for those keenly interested in the circumstances that led to the Shark-Seacook relocations in 1998. To begin with, it has been generally accepted that after their less-than-amicable split was finalized in 1989, Harrington, Sr. and Hanover did not speak directly until their public meetings as aged men in 2002. To review, Hall of Fame player Hanover and real estate magnate Harrington teamed up in 1955 to purchase the Long Island Amazin', and co-owned and operated the franchise and related exploits until 1988, when disagreements over the team's future led to a settlement: Hanover refused to help finance the construction of Sprint PCS Field, and relinquished ownership rights to the team effective January 1, 1989, but he also retained exclusive property rights to the monstrous Flat Grounds.

--> For ten years speculation was constant about Hanover leveraging to purchase a team and bring them to the Flat Grounds: Long Island had had just one football team since the Sharks moved to Cincinnati in 1949. Sharks USBL operations, however, had relocated to New York in 1977, long fueling speculation that the football team would follow... but it seemingly never did.

--> Thus the Sharks were identified as Hanover's most logical target. Hanover wooed Mark Bangston in February 1998 into interest in a complicated leasing compact that would relocate the Seacooks to New York, give Hanover a minority ownership stake in the team and revenue flow, and control over football operations. Of course the deal fell through just three days after Bangston let his lease with the City of San Diego lapse, and Hanover moved quickly to purchase the Cincinnati/New York Sharks for a total of $57 million to call them all his own. Bengston was forced into an expensive leasing deal with Harrington that is cited by Seacook apologists as the reason for the organization's failures in their first decade back on the Island.

--> The affidavit filed, and Claim #13 of the sixty-seven that currently exist, claim these happenings were part of a conspiratorial effort by Hanover and Harrington to drive down the ultimate price of the Sharks and decrease Bengston's leverage in the Seacook relocation. By "playing" Bengston, Hanover was able to draw him into a situation where he was forced to let the San Diego lease lapse, providing him no leverage in negotiation with Harrington. And by making Cincinnati ownership, which was desperate to sell, believe that they were competing against Bengston for Hanover's dollars, Hanover saved some cash in the ordeal.

--> Claim #13 goes on to state that evidence will be presented that Hanover was negotiating simultaneously with both Bengston and the Cincinnati group, and that negotiations with the Cincinnati group were ongoing when the failed leasing deal with Bengston was in the drafting stage with counsel for both sides.

--> Related Claim #14 states that evidence will be provided to the effect that Hanover threatened to lock the USBL-operation NY Sharks out of the Flat Grounds for the 37 home games they were scheduled to play there in 1998 if his asking price was not met.

Bengston sold the team in 2004. Neither he nor the Cincinnati ownership group from the 1990s ever alleged anything of the sort in the press either at the time or in the time since.