Pod Insights Pablo Torre Finds Out The Room: Behind Closed Doors of the Messiest Ritual in Sports About this episode Luka Dončić is just the latest athlete to be deemed too expensive by their employer. But Major League Baseball has a special solution to this problem that is at once top-secret, excruciating and embarrassing. Because when a player and his team disagree on the new salary he deserves, baseball puts them before a tribunal of judges... and lets them argue over how much that player sucks... in front of that player. All-Star second baseman Dan Uggla and journeyman outfielder Cody Ross re-confront David Samson, the former Florida Marlins president who stood between them and their millions. And they have a lesson for every athlete who dares to enter The Room.
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2:58 Pablo Torre? I am Pablo Torre, and today, we're going to find out what this sound is.
3:03 Speaker 02 Listen, don't, don't threaten me with that.
3:06 Pablo Torre? Right after this ad.
3:09 Speaker 03 You're listening to Giraffe Kings Network.
3:25 Speaker 02 Look at his background. I like Cody's background better than Ugg's.
3:29 Speaker 04 You don't like the, you don't like the wood shades? You don't like the wood shades?
3:33 Speaker 02 That's the best you got? For $60 million, you got wood shades?
3:38 Speaker 04 Hey, we're budgeting over here. Budgeting, budgeting.
3:41 Speaker 05 Can you get, can you, can you get in front of your World Series jersey?
3:45 Speaker 04 That's right, dog. I got, that's in a safety deposit box. Safety deposit box.
3:51 Speaker 02 He went for the money, Cody. You went for love and fame and World Series and LCS MVPs. You're welcome, by the way.
4:00 Speaker 04 That's right. Thank you. Thank you.
4:02 Speaker 02 The nicest gift I ever gave you.
4:05 Speaker 04 That's the truth.
4:06 Speaker 02 Getting rid of your ass.
4:10 Speaker 06 You know, you really embody this team, what it's all about. I mean, Florida didn't want you. They put you on waivers. This team put a claim in on you, and here you are, the NLCS MVP.
4:20 Speaker 05 Yeah, I can't thank the Giants enough for giving me the opportunity to come over.
4:26 Pablo Torre? For $1?
4:27 Speaker 05 For a dollar?
4:28 Speaker 02 It was a dollar. It was a waiver claim and the Giants called us after they claimed him and said, "You're not gonna let him go to us, right?" We were just blocking him from going to any of our competitors. And we were like, "We're not paying Cody the rest of the year. We're letting him go." Larry Bear called the commissioner to try to interject because they didn't want to take on his money. And we were like, "Sorry, if you're gonna play the game of trying to block your competitors from getting a player, you have to risk taking the player." And we called Cody into the office and said, "Cody, love you, man, but you've been claimed by the Giants. Go speak to the traveling secretary because you're getting on a plane."
5:06 Speaker 05 And traps out.
5:09 Speaker 02 We had cleaned out his locker. We had done everything.
5:29 Pablo Torre? I want to explain one of the craziest rituals, processes in sports to people that have no idea what it is. And in the course of doing that, we will learn about your relationship. But I do want to just like establish some basics. So at the beginning here, because there are now three voices that are not mine on this episode. Could you say your name, when you played for the Marlins, and maybe an adjective that best describes your former boss, David Sampson?
5:57 Speaker 04 My name is Dan Uggla. I tell everybody that comes in here, this is the house that David and Jeffrey Loria built. They're like, "David who?" I was like, "David Samson." They're like, "Oh, I know who that is. Yeah." Outspoken is actually a very good adjective, but you know, for lack of a better vocabulary, that's kind of what I'm going with right now.
6:22 Speaker 05 Cody Ross played for the Marlins from 2006 to 2010. First of all, Dan, you're making me dizzy, bro. You're like moving around.
6:32 Speaker 04 I know.
6:33 Speaker 05 I mean, I'm like, I had too much wine last night, maybe. I don't know. But you're you gotta like stay still for a second. You're so fidgety.
6:42 Speaker 04 Let me get a, let me get a, I know. I was gonna say.
6:45 Speaker 05 I mean, do you have an office?
6:47 Speaker 04 I do have an office.
6:48 Speaker 05 Do you have an office in your 15,000 square foot house?
6:52 Speaker 04 Here we go. Let me get some. I need a place to put this thing.
6:57 Speaker 05 I mean, jeez Louise.
6:58 Speaker 04 Here we go. Here we go.
7:00 Speaker 05 I remember my first Zoom.
7:02 Speaker 04 Yeah, it's horrible. All right. It's so unprepared. Here we go. That's what Josh Johnson did. Hanley's homer and triple. Dad, uncle, did you?
7:13 Speaker 05 His name is Dad, uncle.
7:19 Speaker 05 There, there, there's the guy I drafted in fantasy baseball. There he is. Uh, anyways, back to me. Um, yeah, so 2006, 2010. Um,
7:32 Speaker 05 never really got an opportunity at the first few places that I was at. Um, and then got to the Marlins and had an incredible opportunity. I remember being with the Dodgers uh, in spring training in oh six and I was just praying. I'm like, please, like, let me go to the Marlins. I see what they're doing over there. They're like, they're, they're young and they're hat, they're enthusiastic. And, um, anyways, uh, yeah. So I guess the, I always say this to people about David. I say, he's the second best president I've ever had in my life.
8:05 Speaker 05 All right. This is where you ask the question.
8:09 Speaker 05 Everybody else is tied for first.
8:16 Speaker 02 I was, I always was honest with the players and I think that that's something that most front offices just aren't. And there, the tendency is to just treat players like chattel and to not involve them in anything and to be robotic and to not be human. And while people accuse me of that, I actually with these guys and with many other of our players, I just wanted you guys always to know where you stood and where we stood and that we always knew that there was business and then there was personal.
8:50 Pablo Torre? So this is where I need to mention that this is going to be an episode about the insanely personal business of Major League Baseball, as revealed through the arcane ritual of a thing known as salary arbitration, which is happening across the sport right now, even during Super Bowl week, as we speak. And if the term salary arbitration sounds boring to you, I get it. Because I used to think that way, too. But then I found out that the NFL and the NBA refuse to operate the way Major League Baseball does, and for good reason, it turns out. Because when a baseball team and an arbitration-eligible player disagree on what sort of a raise
9:34 Pablo Torre? that player deserves, the sport does something truly mind-blowing. They put that team and that player in the same room before a tribunal of judges, and they close the doors. At which point, everyone proceeds to argue before said judges about how much that player sucks. In front of that player. Now, everything that's said is kept off the record, obviously, completely secret. And, in fact, salary arbitration is so infamous for poisoning work relationships headed into spring training, that some franchises in baseball will simply pay a premium in order
10:16 Pablo Torre? to avoid ever having to go through this mess at all. Luckily, however, I found the one team president who apparently cannot wait to talk about that mess. And the same is true of his journeyman outfielder, Cody Ross, and his All-Star second baseman, Dan Uggla. What was at stake for you, Dan? Again, I know you as the guy on my fantasy baseball team, power hitter, guy hitting 30 home runs. And then in 2009, what's at stake for you ahead of arbitration, as you remember it?
10:50 Speaker 04 I was actually on the verge of possibly setting the record for the most money ever in arbitration received by, I don't know if it was like all players or just second baseman, I can't remember, but I know that that was like-
11:05 Pablo Torre? It was old white power hitters.
11:09 Pablo Torre? In the lead club.
11:10 Speaker 02 Very elite.
11:12 Speaker 04 Right? So I think, I think Dave, so I think that Mark was set at like 5.5 or somewhere right around there. And I think, David, I think, I believe you guys were around 4.2, 4.1. And so it was.
11:25 Pablo Torre? It was, hold on. It's funny. It's funny that you guys are so rich that I need to clarify the hundreds of thousands of difference here. 5.35 was what Dan wanted. 4.4 in millions we're talking about is what our friend David was willing to pay you.
11:42 Speaker 04 That's right. That's right. So that's a pretty big difference, right?
11:45 Speaker 02 So you're at 4.4 if you lose, just if you lose arbitration, the player gets what the team is offering, which would have been $4.4 million. And if you win, Dan would get 5.35. There's no middle. There's no splitting the baby. The arbitrators either choose to side with the player or the team.
12:03 Pablo Torre? Right. Right.
12:04 Speaker 04 And by getting to that point, you know, we obviously, there's a big gap between negotiations and that we couldn't come to. So, so that's how you end up in the room.
12:14 Pablo Torre? Right. But Cody, this is to say that this is a process that happens because of a fundamental disagreement about how good you are, how much you are actually worth.
12:24 Speaker 04 Right. It's a better way to put it. Yeah.
12:27 Speaker 05 That's, that's correct. Yes. And I'll remember mine very vividly, although I don't remember the actual numbers. You could probably tell me the numbers below.
12:36 Pablo Torre? It was, it was, it was a comically smaller difference than what Dan was dealing with. Dan, again, we're talking about a difference about a million dollars. In Cody's case, we're talking about you were asking for 4.45. David was offering 4.2.
12:53 Speaker 05 And so, and this is what happens is.
12:56 Pablo Torre? It's classic Samson.
12:59 Speaker 05 This is what happens with Marlins. I think we're the first team to start this file and trial deal. So if you filed a number, there was no negotiating between the time you filed and the time your arbitration hearing. So there was a deadline. I remember, I'll never forget, my agent was calling me to the, at the night, at the, you know, witching hour going. Like, hey, they're not budging. And I'm like, well, I'm not budging either. And so we'll just go to arbitration. And so hung up and sure enough, the, the, the time came and I'm like, let's see if they budge. You think David's budging? Hell, no. He ain't budging. And so, um, he texts me or called me the next day. He's like, you idiot. Now we gotta go to arbitration in Florida.
13:41 Speaker 05 Ah, gosh, this is gonna be painful. It's like, just wait and see how much we're gonna talk about you. You're going down. I'll never forget it. To, to finish my story, um, I'll never forget, I fly into Jupiter for spring training and our, our arbitration cases in Tampa. And David calls me and he's like, hey, he's like, hey, uh, I'm taking my family to Tampa. And do you want to jump on the jet with us to go to your arbitration case? So I'm like, yeah. And so my wife and I, my wife and I get on the private jet. But meanwhile, it's probably costs more to fly there than on a private jet than what I'm actually gonna either win or lose in arbitration.
14:26 Speaker 05 And so, so we get on the jet, we get there, we're, you know, cutting it up, having a good time. Going to the room and even though I put up a good year going into that year, like they bring out some of the craziest stats you've ever seen in your life of like what you, how bad you are. And compared to, you know, some guy from 1973, like what? How's how do I compare to that guy?
14:50 Pablo Torre? Typically, um, in the case of, for instance, the Giants, right? Uh, they had a policy that I was reading about and they were like undefeated in arbitrations for two decades, apparently. Uh, but the president of baseball ops for the Giants, uh, he did not want to be in the room for arbitrations because it was reported, it would help better preserve the clubhouse team spirit to not have the guy you'd have to see every day be the guy who was telling you, uh, by the way, uh, you're worse than you think you are. And so I just want to set the scene of like, David, it feels like a courtroom drama. And also maybe a reality show and also maybe a game show of some sort. Like, can you set the scene for what the [bleep] this is?
15:33 Speaker 02 So the scene is this, that when a player has between three and six years of service time, after six years, you're a free agent. For the first three years, the team has the unilateral right to decide the salary of the player as long as it's at the minimum or above. But in the middle three years, the player and the team have to agree. And if they can't agree on a number, they're not free agents. They can't go to another team. But you then go to three independent arbitrators who have to decide the salary. And what you do is you go into a room, a literal room with a rectangular table. And I couldn't disagree more with the Giants president of baseball ops. I think he's a wussy. You've got to be willing to go face your players and you've got to be honest.
16:16 Speaker 02 And so I didn't go to arbitration with just Dan and Cody. We went often with players, some of whom we never even met, until the arbitration room because we had just traded for them. Kevin Gregg, guys, I met in the arbitration room. Redmond, I met in the arbitration room.
16:32 Pablo Torre? Their first impression.
16:33 Speaker 02 Hey, good to meet you. You suck. That's literally how the relationship started. And our job is to explain to arbitrators why what the player wants is not reasonable. And you use what are called comps. You find players who have stats that are similar with numbers and salaries that are similar to what you want to pay. And the player gives different players and explains why they should be like those players. And the arbitrator decides.
16:58 Pablo Torre? So I want to ask Dan, your emotional state heading into this, your dress code heading into this. I don't know baseball players to be guys who love wearing suits as a comfort zone.
17:11 Speaker 04 I didn't sign for a lot of money. I signed for 40 grand out of college. And so the league minimum, once I got to the big leagues, was my first kind of like situation with decent money, right? So now I'm about to become a millionaire. It's either going to be 4.4, you said, or over 5 million. So I'm excited either way. Right? I'm excited the way you're wearing your best suit. You're like, you're prepared. You're like, uh, you know, I set some records going in. So I'm pretty cocky. I'm like, man, these like these got no chance, you know, gonna gonna embarrass them, right? You know, my agents are like pumping me up and then we go in and then they present their case and I'm like, oh,
17:55 Speaker 04 I'm not as good. I'm not, not as good as I thought I was.
17:58 Speaker 05 Like Dan, I mean, I'm coming from basically nothing and I'm, you know, I'm, we're talking about a few hundred thousand dollars. Yeah. So basically you're in a hotel conference room and it's like David said, a long rectangular table. On that side of the table is uh, your team that you're playing for. And the commissioner's office has a couple of attorneys and then over here is the arbiters. On my side, I have my agents, attorneys, uh, MLBPA attorneys.
18:39 Speaker 05 And then, so I'm sitting closest to the arbiters and I see David over there. I think it was Vine Fest or I can't remember.
18:46 Speaker 04 Yep.
18:47 Speaker 05 Was Vine Fest there? Yes. Yep. And I just was looking at them the whole time. David's got his little smile and he's like smirking at me and I'm like smirking at him. Meanwhile, my agents are like, hey, you can't like, when they're talking about you and you're, we're talking about you, you just like, you're literally like in a courtroom, but I just wanted to go in and hear what they had to say because I felt like even that was gonna make me better going into the following year.
19:12 Speaker 04 Wait, that, that, that seems so unrelatable to me.
19:16 Speaker 05 Yeah, I wanted it. I wanted the smoke. I, I heard all these horror stories about, um, you know, people going into arbitration and, you know, creating bad tension and bad blood, um, going into the season could have a, a bad taste in your mouth for the organization. But I really didn't, even though they hammered me, which was amazing. At the same time, I'm like, wow, where do they get this? This is incredible. Like they pull stuff out of their, literally out of their. It was a tough process to go through, but at the end of it, it was, I would do it over 100 times.
19:52 Speaker 02 Cody, let me remind you of a little nugget that you're forgetting, which is you negotiate with the player right up into the deadline. And you don't know what the player's gonna file at, and the player doesn't know what the team's gonna file at, because you exchange numbers right at a deadline. Do you know that Cody Ross filed at a number below his last offer to us? Cody, I don't know if you remember this, but this was the only time in my career, and it made me insane. Because not only did we go to the room over 250 grand, but when you filed at 445, you wouldn't go below 45 based on comps of ghosts. And we were like, if this guy files at that number, he loses.
20:34 Speaker 02 And then he goes in and files at a number he can win at. And when he filed at 445, I remember like it was yesterday. He filed smartly, knowing that we're a file-to-go team, so we're not gonna negotiate with him, and he has to file a number that he can actually support.
20:50 Pablo Torre? Which you didn't realize, that Cody Ross was just there for the experience. He just wanted to ride the ride.
20:54 Speaker 02 He told me that after, and I almost broke up with him. Because you said that to me, Cody, but I remember, he's the only player who ever said that to me.
21:01 Pablo Torre? Well, just to, again, state the obvious, maybe. It never is the case that the player is there to hear this, except for inside of this room. They never get the unvarnished thoughts. And I also want to just establish that when you walk into the room, there are these three arbitrators there, right? A panel that has been, I guess, decided by both the league and the union in concert. Cody, do you ever hear anything about your arbitrators?
21:24 Speaker 05 I do not, actually. I mean, I couldn't pick them out of a group of two, any three of them. I have no idea. I wasn't focused really on them.
21:33 Pablo Torre? You don't remember a gentleman named James Oldham from Georgetown Law, who was a researcher of English legal history in London in his spare time? He had written a book called "The Mansfield Manuscripts and the Growth of English Law in the 18th Century."
21:50 Speaker 05 It's even now a little shocking when people ask me how long I've been on the Georgetown Law Faculty and I answer, well, in truth, half a century.
22:02 Pablo Torre? That was one of the arbitrators.
22:04 Speaker 04 Yeah, I mean, I honestly came in knowing nothing. I don't think my agents knew anything about the arbitrators, other than that they're supposed to be neutral.
22:12 Speaker 02 The arbitrators don't talk during the arbitration. They don't ask questions.
22:15 Pablo Torre? Oh.
22:15 Speaker 02 They just sit there and listen and, and they don't give a written opinion at the end. All they do is rule in favor of the team or the player. You don't know why. You don't know what, whether it was a two to one or three to nothing vote. You only know the result. So there's zero accountability, which is why possession arrow is an important part of the arbitration system, where if the players have won eight in a row that particular year, the team is going to win the next one no matter what.
22:41 Pablo Torre? Wait, wait, just to clarify what that is. What you're saying is that there are decisions rendered that are not on the merits of this specific case.
22:48 Speaker 02 They won't admit it, but it's true. It's a hundred, guys, I don't know if your union told you that, but possession arrow in baseball arbitration is a real thing.
22:57 Speaker 04 Yeah, my agent told me that, actually.
22:59 Pablo Torre? So would just to, again, clarify that, it's the idea that these arbitrators are agreed upon by the union and the league. So to keep doing this job of arbitrating, they need to be satisfying both sides.
23:12 Speaker 02 That's exactly right. They will because at the end of every arbitration year, the players' union can point to a name and say, I don't want this person involved next year, and the league can't do anything about it. That person's removed. The league can do the same thing. In order to get appointed year after year, you have to have satisfied both sides, and to do that, you have to give wins to both sides.
23:33 Pablo Torre? And possession arrow is just a term of art. It's obviously a basketball term.
23:36 Speaker 02 It alternates. So you know that if it's been five league wins in a row, the player's going to get the next one.
23:41 Pablo Torre? Dan, just remind me, beforehand, what did you heard from other people? Like, what's the reputation of this whole process, this whole ritual, before you actually got to experience it?
23:51 Speaker 04 Well, you always hear kind of like, you can't.
23:56 Speaker 04 You can't like be friends with these people. They're gonna talk trash about you and they're gonna mean it and all this kind of stuff. So it's like, it wasn't the best, uh, sorry. Uh, it wasn't the best advice from, dude, I know, it's like, so stupid.
24:11 Speaker 05 He's like holding his iPhone.
24:13 Speaker 04 Why is my, why is my? Nah, I'm like, I'm holding wires out of the way. I'm in this horrible spot. The sun's coming in on me. My phone's dying. Can't find my AirPods, you know?
24:23 Speaker 02 This is Dan Ogla.
24:24 Speaker 05 This is, this is Dan.
24:27 Speaker 04 So after I get done here, y'all need to talk about five minutes while I charge it. Cause then I gotta unplug my [BLEEP]. So anyways. He's being serious. I'm dead serious.
24:37 Pablo Torre? I like that we're, I like that we're going on a tour of what appears to be the largest house in the world.
24:41 Speaker 04 Oh gosh.
24:42 Speaker 05 It is.
24:43 Speaker 04 I wish, I wish. Don't mind the two six right there.
24:47 Speaker 05 Dan's carrying his phone through his estate.
24:50 Speaker 02 He does have a beautiful house and a beautiful family.
24:53 Speaker 05 Where are you going, bro?
24:54 Speaker 04 I'm going down, going down to show him your jersey right there. Come on.
24:57 Speaker 05 Oh, there it is. Nice. Love it.
24:59 Speaker 04 So getting out of the sun.
25:00 Pablo Torre? Dan has settled his phone at yet another wing of the estate.
25:06 Speaker 04 So yeah.
25:06 Pablo Torre? Passed by the jerseys.
25:07 Speaker 04 Back to what I was saying.
25:09 Speaker 05 He just walked 15,000 square feet away to get to his basement. That basement's amazing. Y'all should go check it out sometime.
25:18 Speaker 04 It's a good one.
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28:59 Pablo Torre? When you enter the room, is there basically the clock already ticking? Because these are how many cases a day in some circumstances?
29:05 Speaker 02 You have morning cases, 9:00 AM cases, and 2:00 PM cases. And generally arbitrators will hear one or two cases or three during the course of a session in Tampa or in Arizona. It switches off. And it's just funny because in, I remember Dan's arbitration, we were arguing about a lot of money. And it was a tough one because Dan, you had great bulk. And I'm sure you-
29:28 Pablo Torre? What does that, what does that mean?
29:28 Speaker 02 Great bulk is when you go into arbitration, you've got a lot of stats. You have a lot of home runs, a lot of runs batted in. You've played a lot of games. So you are able to say that, look, I have performed. He was an All-Star. And I'm sure you remember this, Dan, but you were a pre-arbitration All-Star, which also counts for money.
29:46 Pablo Torre? Twice.
29:46 Speaker 02 Which is why we offered him what we thought was more than we needed to at 4-4. And he was able to call on players, you know, of the, you know, the Cabrera ilk practically because of what his numbers were. Pujols and all sorts of people who we said, you're not even close to. And we were wrong. Arbitration is a manifestation of the ultimate breaking down of an athlete trying to break his will, his confidence, by showing that he's something that he doesn't want to believe he is. There's a reason why the manager is not part of any arbitration hearings and the front office is. There's a reason why certain front office people don't want to be involved.
30:25 Pablo Torre? Right.
30:25 Speaker 02 Because they don't, they can't skate the other side.
30:28 Pablo Torre? Well, yeah, just how do you? I want to get in the mind of David Samson trying to throw haymakers to take down the incredible bulk.
30:37 Speaker 02 That's what you do. You try to excuse it. You, we talked about the fact, we would, do you remember, guys? That we would have to mention that the Marlins always were last in the league in attendance? And that we had no revenue-
30:48 Pablo Torre? You blamed them?
30:50 Speaker 02 That's what we would do. If you guys were better, we'd have more fans.
30:56 Pablo Torre? Amazing.
30:57 Speaker 05 I think that's where better. I told out all the stops.
31:00 Speaker 04 If you guys were better, we'd have more fans. I thought that was a good one.
31:04 Pablo Torre? It's the only moment in which David Samson regretted personally inflating and lying about attendance numbers.
31:10 Speaker 02 We would actually, in the arbitration, say that. We would say that, don't look at our attendance that's announced, and we would go through what our real attendance was. We would admit that in the arbitration because it's all confidential.
31:21 Pablo Torre? You said that they shouldn't trust those numbers because you are dishonest.
31:24 Speaker 02 Exactly.
31:26 Speaker 04 Exactly.
31:27 Pablo Torre? Tony, do you remember a moment when you were like, oh, that punch that David threw was a little bit harder than I was ready for?
31:35 Speaker 05 I just remember like certain stats that they threw out and I was like, oh, man, like that is below the belt. Like, I think they were trying to pin me on me not being a starter because I wasn't a starter when I got to the Marlins. I worked my way into being a starter. I was a platoon player. Somebody would get hurt. I would play like, you know, 30 games in a row and then the guy would come back and I would kind of platoon. And so going into arbitration, I'm three years in, I've only been a starter for a year and a half. So they were pounding the arbitration guys like, this guy's not a starter. He doesn't, you know, you can't look at him as a starter. Even though I came in on my platform year, having a really good year,
32:18 Speaker 05 they were just pounding like, he's not a starter. He's not a starter. And I'm like, okay, I get it. I'm not, I am a starter, but you're telling me I'm not. Now I don't think I am a starter.
32:28 Speaker 02 Well, our argument was that you can't compare him to starters because he was only a circumstance starter. And we didn't want the arbitrators to believe that we viewed him as anything other than a bench player who could be a good fill-in on a bad team.
32:45 Speaker 05 And, and also, and, and also.
32:49 Speaker 04 That's a good point.
32:51 Speaker 05 And also, I got thrown in, when I was really young, or not really young, but I came in as a center fielder in professional baseball. And so my agents were like, he's a center fielder. So they were comparing me to all the center fielders and David and them were like, he's not a center fielder. We only put him there because we had to put him there.
33:13 Pablo Torre? At this point, if I'm Cody Ross, I'm resolving to not be friends with David Samson anymore.
33:20 Speaker 02 No, I mean, I don't think, I don't think that that's true, Pablo. I think that I was communicative with the players who went to arbitration with, and we would explain the process. So when both sides view it that way, there's not animosity.
33:34 Speaker 04 Like you hear horror stories and you learn pretty quick that like, all right, am I gonna be tough? Is this gonna bother me? Uh, you realize it's part of the business. Your first instinct would be like, oh, man, F these guys. I can't believe they're not paying me. I deserve all this. All the port on, you know? And that just wasn't our relationship. Uh, I think that's, has a lot to do with, you know, David just, you know, being straight up with us. And I would tell all the players that are gonna go through it, uh, that haven't been through it is like, embrace it, you know? Enjoy as part of it. It means you're good that you're going through this.
34:08 Speaker 05 I would say like, when you asked me, like, why would, you know, would you wanna throw a punch at David? I would, I would say no, because a lot of what they said, like, like you can't deny some of the stuff that they said. So I'm like, even though that hurt, there's a lot of truth in that. Like, I can see where they would come and try to bring that case and, and, and try to make me look like a certain player.
34:30 Speaker 04 I was actually, yeah, I was actually pretty, uh, I was like, holy, they're gonna paramede it. This guy? Oh, man, that's cool. You know?
34:39 Speaker 04 And they're like, telling me that I've never gotten MVP vote and this guy has. I'm like, that means I might should've got an MVP vote, you know? I got screwed in that.
34:48 Pablo Torre? You were honored by not being Albert Pujols.
34:51 Speaker 04 Yeah, you know, it's like, I was never supposed to be there in the first place, you know? It's just so happens.
34:59 Speaker 05 You're Marcus Giles, bro.
35:00 Speaker 04 That's right. Yeah. 2.0. Marcus 2.0, baby.
35:07 Speaker 02 That is something. I think that it's also important to know that it's really hard to get to arbitration. The majority of baseball players, first of all, you never make it to the big leagues. And if you make it to the big leagues, the overwhelming majority don't get three years of service. They don't get an opportunity to get into this system. And I think Dan and Cody are two examples of players who understood that. And there's some players who just don't get that.
35:31 Pablo Torre? I want to know, David, we've, we've created a summit here of people who are shockingly reasonable about a very contentious courtroom drama. What's it like when it's not quite as simpatico?
35:46 Speaker 02 So I can only tell you in all the times I went to the room, I was able to, because of being honest, I was able to disarm the players. The difficult part is when you go with a player you don't know, and then you just have to build a relationship from a first and 20, from a negative spot. And that's, that was the case. Do you guys remember Kevin Gregg at all?
36:08 Speaker 05 Oh, yeah. I got a Kevin Gregg story. So when Kevin went from the Marlins to the Cubs, we played them in Florida. Dan hit a homerun off of him to tie the game in the ninth, and I came up right after and hit a homerun to win.
36:21 Speaker 04 Oh, yeah.
36:21 Speaker 05 Remember that?
36:22 Speaker 04 I didn't even see it because I was so high-fiving.
36:24 Speaker 05 Back to back. I was like, what? Back to back, Kevin Gregg. Two Gs.
36:30 Speaker 05 Cody Ross, left field. That looks deep. That looks over. Yeah!
36:37 Pablo Torre? Rock off, Cody Ross. Just like that. Back to back.
36:43 Speaker 05 Boom, boom, Kevin Gregg.
36:45 Pablo Torre? I just like that somewhere Kevin Gregg's like, what the [bleep], man? I'm just like at home, hanging out. Suddenly I'm dragged into this.
36:51 Speaker 02 Listen, he had a career, but when we acquired him, he would not settle, and he was a bastard, and his agents were about it. And we said, no problem. We'll go right to the room with you. Good to meet you. And he's a very tall, you know, Kevin Gregg, do you remember? Like, he's a big man.
37:05 Pablo Torre? Mom, 6'6".
37:06 Speaker 02 Yeah.
37:06 Pablo Torre? Six foot six, 245.
37:08 Speaker 02 And he's also, he has this menacing look. You know, Cody and Dan look jolly, and they are. Kevin Gregg is not what I would call a jolly guy.
37:15 Pablo Torre? He's a reliever, right? This whole job is to intimidate.
37:18 Speaker 02 He is intimidating. Remember he had those glasses like that he would wear? That you didn't never knew whether they were prescription? And he happens to be a great guy, but didn't know this at the time.
37:27 Pablo Torre? You called him a bastard like 30 seconds ago.
37:30 Speaker 02 Because I didn't know him. And he would not settle after the trade. And his agent said, "We will not budge." And we were like, "We're going to the room." And the agent said, "You're gonna acquire a player and then go right to the room without ever knowing him?"
37:46 Pablo Torre? The room.
37:46 Speaker 02 And that's what we call it, the room. And I said, "I'm not scared at all." And so Kevin comes in and...
37:52 Pablo Torre? He's like, "I was born in the room, raised by the room."
37:55 Speaker 02 Like, "Listen, don't threaten me with that." And so, but then after that, when I introduced myself to him outside of the room, when we went back to spring training, we built this relationship that was built on a mutual respect and honesty. And he was a very talented guy. But that was a tough, tough arbitration. Because we were explaining why we shouldn't have traded for a guy. We basically were saying, "I can't believe how dumb we were to acquire someone who's this bad." That we shouldn't be paying him any amount of money. And he didn't know me at all. And he was hearing us say this. It was a tough one.
38:33 Pablo Torre? So, the room that you're describing, you're talking about a player that you acquired where you're now saying, "Oh, this was a mistake." If you're trying to trade that guy to someone else, though, you're saying the opposite.
38:42 Speaker 02 You're saying how great he is. Yeah, the room, it's an interesting place. And I think Dan and Cody would agree. Where it's like Vegas. Where what happens in the room is supposed to stay in the room. And you're supposed to take it as its own entity. And some players are better at it than others. These two guys are amazing at it, but not all the players were. There's ego involved. We don't want to lose a case. We don't want the arbitrators to believe that players are worth more than we thought because we do it for a living.
39:11 Pablo Torre? How does this whole thing end? So are there closing arguments?
39:15 Speaker 02 Mm-hmm. Each side closes and they say to the arbitrator, the final word from each side is, "So, I hope that you will see from the evidence presented that Dan Uggla is worthy of 4.4 million and that you will rule in favor of the club." And the player ends with, "I hope that you will see from the evidence that Dan Uggla is worth 5.35 million and you will rule in favor of the player." There's a thank you, you shake hands, you leave, and then you go back, you literally go back to spring training immediately because there's workouts. Arbitration generally, many of the hearings happen during spring training and you have to get back for spring training.
39:55 Pablo Torre? And what's the, does the rest of the team like, "So, how'd it go?" Like, what's it like in the clubhouse?
40:04 Speaker 02 Well, you find out either that day or the next day, right? David, I remember it's really, really fast.
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43:42 Pablo Torre? All right, so it is decision time. You've kept you waiting outside this room for the verdict long enough, and I just need to point out here in total fairness before we proceed, that while a pitcher may not want to challenge Dan Uggla or Cody Ross, as Kevin Gregg discovered, arbitration is where you would not want to challenge David Samson, a financially savvy, detail-obsessed team president with a law degree who professionally haggles over contracts for a living. As he said earlier, "In the room, David Samson is wildly intimidating in his own right." Which is why it is especially hilarious to me
44:24 Pablo Torre? that David Samson's official record in the room against Cody Ross and Dan Uggla is 0 and 2. Do you remember the moment, the scene of how you found out that you won?
44:41 Speaker 04 It was early in the morning and we, uh... You know, I was up at 7:30 in the morning, couldn't sleep. And I think we got the phone call somewhere around like 8:30, 9 o'clock. It was quick, it was early, and they said, "We have ruled in your favor." And it was just like, you know, like an explosion. It was like jumped up, five-year-old kid and me, jumping on the bed, screaming and yelling. All my agents and everybody come running in. We had like eight people in the house. We're all like on the bed, jumping together, "Ah!" You know, popping champagne and I was like...
45:15 Pablo Torre? Oh, I'm disgusted.
45:16 Speaker 04 You know, it was like, it was, uh, it was party time, man. It was great.
45:21 Speaker 05 Mine was a little different. I remember I was obviously in Florida the next day and my agent called me before I actually went into spring training. And he was like, "Great news, we won, blah, blah, blah." And I'll never forget it because I remember thinking, "Now, wow, I'm a multimillionaire now. I just got four and a half million dollars. I can tell people I'm a multimillionaire." So that was kind of my thought process behind it.
45:47 Pablo Torre? And look, I can't tell you for certain that Cody and Dan would be quite so eager to relive all of this with me on camera 15 or so years later if in fact they had lost to their employer in the room. But what remains clear to me is that the guy who lost, David Samson,
46:06 Pablo Torre? absolutely is.
46:09 Speaker 05 So yeah, by the time you get back to spring training the next day, you already know that you won. And you know, when you win, it's nice because you can walk around the clubhouse and like, ah, just kicked their ass. Yeah, we won. We won. You know, so it's kind of a, it's okay. And then, you know, you see the front office in the clubhouse the next day and you walk by like, what's up, guys?
46:28 Speaker 02 I remember that clearly going into the clubhouse after a loss.
46:33 Pablo Torre? Yeah. What's it like for David Samson to walk around the clubhouse having lost in the world of one-on-one business?
46:39 Speaker 02 Yeah, you just feel as though that the other players are seen a weakness and that they're gonna use that when it's their turn for arbitration. And so I didn't want to lose any of the cases at all. But I do remember making it a point to be in the clubhouse the next day to make sure that all the players saw, including Dan and Cody, that win or lose, we're teammates and we are on the same side. And what arbitration does is it forces you to be enemies for that period of five hours. And if you do it with aplomb, you can get through it. And some players and some teams just can't get through it. Guys, there are teams that will not go to arbitration. And players know that. And you can take advantage of that.
47:20 Pablo Torre? To avoid all of the awkwardness, the tension in fighting.
47:23 Speaker 02 The Yankees are famous. They don't want to go to arbitration. They feel as though that that is beneath them to have to argue against a player. And it ends up hurting them because players take advantage of that fact and can get higher salaries.
47:38 Speaker 05 It hurts the Yankees, then it hurts the other teams too, because then the other teams have to negotiate on the behalf of the Yankees. And like, well, the Yankees are just handing money out, then, or for the teams like the Marlins, they're trying to save every penny they possibly can. So it creates this kind of distance between teams too.
48:00 Speaker 02 And we never wanted the union to be able to use a win like Dan Uggla's win cost the industry so much, much more so than than than your win Cody, just because of where Dan was in his career.
48:13 Pablo Torre? Because it moved the markets.
48:14 Speaker 02 A hundred percent because then everyone who wanted to compare themselves to Dan Uggla, they were comparing themselves to a 5.35 number instead of a 4.4 number. It's really actually a big deal and players should be thanking you Ugg's. I don't know if you get payments from them, but there are a bunch of players who came after you, who got paid a hell of a lot more than they would have had you lost that case.
48:35 Speaker 04 Right.
48:36 Speaker 02 Your pre-arbitration years were some of the best in the history of baseball.
48:41 Speaker 04 Oh my gosh, you guys are gonna make me blush over here, make me blush. I'm not, I'm not used to all the flowers. Thank you, thank you.
48:49 Pablo Torre? But the ultimate compliment is David Samson saying that true clutchness is when you're great before I gotta pay you more.
48:56 Speaker 02 Well, that's, we, these guys know my mantra, you have to have players outperform their contracts if you're gonna have a winning team. And that's the, that's true of the Yankees, the Giants, the Braves, or the Marlins. Every team needs that or you're not gonna win.
49:10 Pablo Torre? How much were you guys watching the faces of the arbitrators? Cause there's suspense in the room, you know, what's the tension like?
49:16 Speaker 02 The league and the union hate each other. So the representatives of the league and the representatives of the union, I don't know who you guys had, was it Michael Weiner? I don't know what year.
49:25 Speaker 04 Weiner.
49:26 Speaker 02 It could have been Weiner who was, rest in peace, he died young, but he, he was very difficult in the room. And it was him. He was, he's a great, great litigator.
49:37 Pablo Torre? Beloved by the players.
49:39 Speaker 02 Well, because what he did for those players, it's just incredible. He advocated in a way that, you know, would make Donald Fear blush. But what Weiner did in the room was try to get the arbitrators' attention by saying how greedy and how bad the teams are in the league, looking for arbitrators to give any sort of indication that they were listening or agreeing. My experience was I didn't really pay attention to the arbitrators because I knew they were gonna take the cases and after the oral arguments, they go into a room and just sort of decide and there was nothing I could read from it. I don't know if you guys found differently.
50:17 Speaker 05 Coached up on it by your agents to, you know, how to act, what to do, what not to do. You know, you're just super polite when you walk in the room. I don't remember if we shook hands before, we shook hands. I knew we shook hands after with the arbiters, but I remember just like, you know, trying to give them that like, you know, cute little smile that I have like, you know, when maybe a couple, when a couple.
50:39 Pablo Torre? Wait, winking and shooting finger guns?
50:41 Speaker 02 Seriously?
50:42 Pablo Torre? That's what you're doing?
50:43 Speaker 02 Like, that's gonna work? You were gonna charm them?
50:46 Speaker 05 It works, trust me.
50:47 Speaker 02 I can't even. Cody, you, you, I loathe you. I really do.
50:56 Speaker 02 Stands in front of the arbitrators trying to woo them with his million dollar smile? And he never wore a mouthguard?
51:04 Speaker 05 That's right.
51:18 Pablo Torre? So what did, what did going through this experience do for your guys' relationship?
51:24 Speaker 04 There was such a foundation of like friendship, business friendship, business relationship. You know, just knowing each other past baseball, knowing to those families and everything that, you know, we're having pizza in New York at, at four in the morning some nights. And there's no like, what are you doing? Or everybody's like trying to hide from the other. It's like, we're all in there being people together. And we had built that foundation, honestly. I mean, it didn't, I, I guess it could have made us a little stronger. We got through it because anytime you go through something like that and you're still friends or whatever, it makes you strong. But we were already so strong.
52:02 Speaker 05 I think for me,
52:05 Speaker 05 the reason why there was, there was no sort of animosity or hate or, I think obviously I have to give a ton of credit to David, even though I don't like to. I'm gonna give him a ton of credit. He was so good about coming back on the team plane, hanging out with us.
52:23 Speaker 05 Playing poker, having a couple of drinks with us on the back of the plane, talking [BLEEP] just, just so much fun just to be around. And then when it came time to do business, he was completely honest with us, whether we were good or bad. And that is exactly what you want as a player. You don't ever really get that. You don't get the personal usually, and you don't get the honesty, secondly. And that's what made him so, so amazing.
52:55 Pablo Torre? You know, as I'm, as I'm watching David genuinely be warmed by your warmth, by your friendship, I do want to point out the aftermath of this whole thing, which is that arbitration, of course, comes and goes. They both win. David Samson loses. But then, in the case of Dan Uggla, um, Dan, you're gone. You leave the Marlins by 2011. And Cody Ross, um, that, that next season, you're out of there.
53:26 Speaker 02 Got way too expensive.
53:39 Pablo Torre? This has been Pablo Torre Finds Out, a Meadowlark Media production.
53:45 Pablo Torre? And I'll talk to you next time.
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Previous Pizzagate: We Investigate the (Real) Government Plot to Stuff You with Cheese Next What NFL Owners Don't Want You to Know, with Don Van Natta Jr. Page updated November 4, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated