Tuesday Halolinks: Jered Weaver Doesn't Want Your Money, But MLB and StubHub Do

Do you have your Christmas tree up? Is there room for Halolinks under it?

• How much money did Jered Weaver lose by signing an extension with the Angels? - HardballTalk. "It seems hard to argue that Weaver isn’t as good as Greinke and there’s certainly an argument to be made that he’s better. And yet Greinke will be getting $147 million over the next six seasons while Weaver will be paid $70 million over the next four seasons. If healthy Weaver will close some of that gap with his next contract that covers Season 6 and Season 7, but it sure looks like he cost himself at least $40-$50 million by not testing free agency." I'm sure he thought that was a small price to pay to have the opportunity to be included in Halolinks on a semi-regular basis.
  
• I've whined about this before, and I'm positive I'll whine about it in the future, but I HATE the non-speak that most baseball front office people use. For one, say what you mean in words that mean something: Angels GM Jerry Dipoto confident pitching additions will lead to improvement - angels.com. "Sometimes," Dipoto said, "the smartest thing you can do is just make practical decisions." Hold on, are you saying that sometimes the smartest thing you can do is to make bad decisions? If that's the case, why is my life so screwed up? I'm great at making bad decisions, give me a job in baseball.
  
• The Angels, Cubs, and Yankees tell MLB to take their StubHub and shove it up their secondary market: Major League Baseball, StubHub renew secondary ticket market deal - ESPN. "The Yankees and Angels are working with Ticketmaster on a new arrangement, according to a person familiar with the situation, and will announce their plan in a few weeks. The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because no official announcement has been made. Fans will still be able to purchase tickets for the three missing teams on StubHub. The biggest difference involves the sellers, who will have to type in the ticket information and use a different way to get the ticket to the buyer for the home games of the Yankees, Cubs and Angels."
  
• Nightengale: Royals GM finds trade criticism 'insulting' - USA Today. ""To me, that's insulting,'' Moore tells USA TODAY Sports. "That's very insulting. Very, very insulting." Whew, for a minute there I thought he was going to go full indignant and find it very, very, VERY insulting.
  
• I heard they're adding solid gold bathroom fixtures to all of the public restrooms: Dodger Stadium renovation photos - True Blue LA. "The Dodgers are completely remodeling both clubhouses, among other things, and needed the seats out to dig and build underneath and behind. On the field level, all but eight sections of seats are out during the renovation"
• Wow, that was quick: Twitter / Dodgers: It's official! Zack Greinke ...
  
• I think the saber community, of which I feel I'm a part of, could improve how non-stats people perceive them by not being so condescending. Q & A with Tom Tango
  Q: How can the analytical community do a better job presenting their information?
  Tango: Seems to me they do a fantastic job. For those willing to go along for the ride, just sit back and enjoy it. For those who are disinterested, well, that’s not an audience for us to worry about. You have to be willing to be educated in order to receive an education. For those who are willing, but don’t "get it", then that’s the real challenge. I don’t know how to present it better than what we’re seeing and have seen, especially by the likes of Bill James who did a master job in presentation. But, for those who are willing and don’t get it, then keep telling us that you are a willing student, and we’ll figure it out together.
• I remember when Reggie was an Angel, but I remember him more for the stories of him trolling around Newport Beach in his Porsche: Was Charlie Lau right about Reggie? - Baseball Nation. "Jackson also talks about his decision to go into the Hall of Fame as a Yankee rather than an Oakland A; he did, after all, play quite a few more seasons with the A's. What I didn't realize until I looked him up: Reggie also played more games with the Angels than with the Yankees."
• But dammit, they're not making enough off of that secondary market!! MLB Revenues $7.5B for 2012, Could Approach $9B by 2014 - Biz of Baseball. "Major League Baseball will see revenues of $7.5 billion for 2012. To place this in perspective, when accounting for inflation, baseball’s revenues have increased 257 percent since 1995 when they were $1.4 billion." How will they afford to buy their kids Duplos?
  
• Some are pretty stupid, but most are at least somewhat entertaining...in a juvenile way (the best way?) baseball card vandals - "decent jokes on worthless cards, posted fresh daily".
  
• Don't you hate it when mommy and daddy fight? Young ready for fresh start with Philadelphia - Fox Sports. "As for his relationship with the front office? "There's no relationship there but that's fine with me," Young said."
• Rangers see dramatic identity shift - FOX Sports. "The Rangers likely will end up with one or the other (Josh Hamilton or Justin Upton). They could even end up with both, and still add a bullpen piece, a starting pitcher and maybe free-agent catcher A.J. Pierzynski." Oh God, wouldn't that be perfect. Douchetown will get a new king.
  
• No, Ranger 1000 degree daygame tickets aren't on the list: The Shitty Parent's Guide To Children's Christmas Presents. "There is no perfect gift that will ever satisfy both you and your child. There is only Video Games and Shit That Isn't Video Games. Every other gift is dogshit in comparison." But when a writer decribes Duplos as "legos for stupid kids", you just know there's some offensively funny stuff here.