SF Giants owner Greg Johnson’s ‘somewhat break even’ quote is enraging

Never in a million years would I have thought the first few weeks of the Giants’ offseason would have me pining for the halcyon days of Larry Baer’s “lightbulbs” comment. Yet here we are.

At the introductory press conference Wednesday for new manager Bob Melvin, Giants chairman Greg Johnson was asked by none other than the SFGATE sports editor whether fans should expect Major League Baseball’s competitive balance tax, which is a de facto salary cap, to limit what the team would be able to spend. His answer was … well, see and read it for yourself (emphasis mine): 

“I think it depends a lot on who we target. When you look at the luxury tax, one year you can go past that if you have to. I don’t think it’s something we want to do for a long period. I think if you look at the teams that have jumped up in free agency, they didn’t really have great years this year, with spending. So I’m not sure there’s a direct correlation there. But we plan on being active, and if we have to go through that, we will go through that. But we also represent a group that hopefully our goal is to somewhat break even, which is somewhat a challenge in this business. But everybody, I can tell you, from the ownership side: The goal is to win. And we’re doing everything we can.”

I couldn’t have come up with a worse, more tone-deaf answer if I’d tried. It was like the perfect amalgam of corporate speak and lip service, a word salad that should leave Giants fans enraged — or, if enraged is too strong, then definitely peeved.  

With a straight face, Johnson proclaimed that teams who went big in free agency didn’t have great years, apparently forgetting the Texas Rangers spent the equivalent of a small country’s GDP over the past two offseasons and are starting in the World Series this week. The Phillies, with the highest payroll in baseball, and the Astros (fifth-highest) both finished a game short of the World Series. The Dodgers and Braves were division winners. The Blue Jays made it to the Wild Card round. Every single one of those teams has spent over the past few offseasons.

Sure, teams that spend aren’t guaranteed success – the Mets are a prime example, as are the Padres, which is hilarious on a whole other level considering Johnson stared right at Melvin when he talked about high-spending teams underperforming. But to dismiss spending on free agency out of hand, when three of the sport’s final four teams all rank in the top eight of payroll, seems disingenuous at best and flat-out cheap at worst.

But the best-worst comment came right after that, when Johnson laid out the Giants’ goal for this season and beyond: to break even. To. Break. Even. Watching the press conference live, I had to stop and go back a few times to make sure I’d heard him correctly. And even then, I couldn’t believe that he’d actually said it.  

What fan wants to hear that the goal of their favorite team is to break even? Is that really the message you want to be sending at the press conference to introduce your new manager, one that you hired in part to try to win back a portion of your rapidly dwindling fan base? Do those fans care whether the Giants’ seemingly endless number of owners make their money back this year?

The answer is no. None of them care. All Johnson had to say was something along the lines of, “We’re committed to spending what it takes to put a winner on the field. We’re going to do everything we can to improve and add premier talent. We don’t expect to reach the luxury tax threshold, but if we do, so be it.” Of course he said something close to that last year, and we all know how that turned out, but it’s still what fans want to hear. It would have bred some goodwill, soothed some of the anger of the past few years, but no. He gave the most insipid, uninspired answer anyone could possibly think of. Your goal is to somewhat break even? Are you f—king kidding me?

If anything sums up the Giants over the past few years, it’s the phrase “break even.” They’ve broken even on the field, to the tune of .500 and close-to-.500 finishes. They’ve apparently broken even financially – or better, but we’ll never know until they open their books (ha ha ha). All of this breaking even has led to apathy and low attendance, sure, but apparently that’s an acceptable outcome, since breaking even is what they’re still setting out to do.

There’s always hope, I guess, and it’s early in the process. But after today, it’s impossible to feel good about the direction the Giants are headed. Farhan Zaidi and his newly minted contract extension really does seem like the perfect choice for what the Giants want to do financially.  

But no matter what happens, “somewhat break even” will be the millstone around Johnson’s neck for as long as he’s in charge. It was probably just a stream-of-consciousness, offhand comment that he didn’t really think about when he made it, but it was oh so telling. The mask slipped. When he listed the priorities of the Giants organization, “somewhat break even” was first. Winning was second. Unconscious admissions are usually the most damning, don’t you think?

“Somewhat break even.” Infuriating.