Yankees President Randy Levine Tells Brewers Owner Mark Attanasio to Quit Whining

by

Apr 6, 2010

Yankees President Randy Levine Tells Brewers Owner Mark Attanasio to Quit Whining Yankees president Randy Levine fired back at Brewers owner Mark Attanasio a day after Attanasio commented on how New York's infield makes more money than Milwaukee's entire team.

Levine told ESPN.com on Tuesday that he was "sorry that my friend Mark continues to whine about his running the Brewers."

Attanasio made the remarks for a USA Today story about the recession hitting major league teams — except, it would appear, for the Yankees, whose $85.2 million-a-year infield is higher than the payroll of 16 teams.

"We're struggling to sign [Prince Fielder] and the Yankees infield is making
more than our team," Attanasio said.

New York's payroll for 2010 is $206 million, according
to USA Today
. Third baseman Alex Rodriguez is slated to make
$33 million all by himself, just under the Pirates' total payroll of
$34.9 million. Two of his infield counterparts in Derek Jeter and
Mark Teixeira will pull in salaries north of $20 million while
second baseman Robinson Cano scrapes by with a $9 million annual salary.

"We play by all the rules," Levine said of the Yankees' approach. "There doesn't seem to be any complaints when teams such as the Brewers receive hundreds of millions of dollars that they get from us in revenue sharing the last few years."

The Brewers will pay out just over $81 million to players in 2010. The Yankees paid out $76 million in revenue-sharing penalties alone in 2005, the last year in which data is available, according to BizofBaseball.com.

The Yankees are responsible for the vast majority of revenue-sharing dollars paid out to clubs under the 7-year-old luxury tax requirement. If teams exceed a certain threshold, they are taxed with the funds then being distributed to teams in need of additional finances.

Fielder is the Brewers first baseman and is expected to hit free agency
after 2011. With a 50-home run season under his belt already and Scott Boras advising him, the
26-year-old figures to haul down a hefty contract.

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