David Samson is a whiny bitch. That's how I see it.
Look, I don't want to make this a Marlins thing, but let's face the facts. When Derek Jeter got the Miami Marlins reigns, even I was critical of him and the decisions he was making. He was removing some of the stables of the ballpark, getting rid of the "DJ" vibe that was there.
Getting rid of that horrendous piece of artwork out in center field, and when a Marlin hit a homer, the marlin would move around that piece of art, and everyone would be excited.
He even showed Jeff Conine, Mr. Marlin the door. Jeter was making changes for that team to bring a more corporate feel to it. He wanted people to take the Marlins seriously. He was trying to erase the joke of the Marlins that was the Loria / Samson era. He wanted to prove to everyone that he was a serious owner. And there's one more thing he did... he started to bring in young talent, talent that few heard of, but the idea was the build a solid pitching staff... and a young, energic and talented roster that could one day make a run.
In February 2022, he left the organization, and we all started to see a Derek Jeter that was the Yankees Derek Jeter again. But this time he was more open... he was friendly, smiling, joking and showing off his beautiful family. Derek Jeter looked like he was finally at peace with his decision to leave the Marlins and embrace the Yankee fans that loved him forever.
I was one of the harshest critics of Derek Jeter with the Marlins, until I saw his documentary and actually started to understand what made this man operate. How his mind worked. How he wouldn't let people in because he was a private person. I finally understood it, and I embraced it too. I got it.
If you don't know who David Samson is, all you need to know is the Marlins were never good when Samson and Jeffrey Loria were running the team. For Samson and Loria, the team was a money grab. They were terrible owners, always had been. It was right around 2013 when I started hammering these guys about not being serious owners. Read LITTLE WOMEN for more.
These days David Samson is a broken-down podcaster. He was fired from the Marlins when Jeter moved in. He's jealous of Jeter, he clearly doesn't understand business. He clearly didn't understand what Jeter's plan was to turn the team around. He didn't get any of it. And so because of that, he hammered Jeter in a podcast and was NEVER CHALLENGED about it.
The New York Post writes:
"...he was very critical of Jeter’s tenure as minority owner and CEO of the Marlins.
“[Jeter] was able to bring in all his own people and he thought that everything that I did was bad,” Samson said. “So he erased anything I had done. And figured he could do [George] Costanza, which is opposite day. Anything I did, he did the opposite and assumed it would work.
“He assumed that he could get a bigger TV deal. He assumed he could get a big naming rights deal, that he’d get tons of season-ticket holders, that he would make the team a winning team. And after four years, I think he realized that being a shortstop and being an executive are two totally different things. … And I think he realized quickly that being a pitchman for Subway was probably going to be more up his alley than running the team every day and being accountable for that.”
So let's break it down. Samson didn't know what he was doing as one of the guys running the Marlins before Jeter, and so it makes sense that Jeter would want to change things.
I guess Samson is butt hurt by that, but the reality is the Loria/Samson era never worked for that team. Jeter made strict changes and being opposite of Samson would make perfect sense to me to be honest. In other words, it didn't work their way, how about do it another way.
Samson goes on: “After the team was sold to Derek Jeter, I would have stayed on, I had a contract to stay on,” Samson said. “I got a text alert from ESPN.com that I’d been fired. I called Derek and said, ‘Hey, I just got an alert. Am I actually fired?’ He said, ‘Oh yeah, I didn’t get to you. I’m sorry.’”
Now let's unpack this...
Samson was annoyed and hurt he didn't get fired with a face to face with Derek Jeter. Samson is a millionaire, hardly in a situation where he needs any one-on-one time. If Samson didn't see the writing on the wall the day Jeter took over, he's delusional. What respect does Samson need for a face to face. Does he realize that in big business, when you are a top dog and get fired, it's usually an attorney that calls you? You don't get a face to face. What world does Samson live in?
Samson's a big boy... that move by Jeter and the new Marlins staff was strategic... that's business, deal with it.
But wait, Samson cries more:
"Derek Jeter was the perfect person to buy a team because he didn’t use his money,” Samson said. “And he had someone in the name of Bruce Sherman who let him do anything he wanted with absolutely no accountability. And if you can get that kind of job, you might as well go get it.”
The most idiotic quote of the interview. Jeter's a genius. If you can get major investors to buy a team and allow you to control the team, YOU JUMP ON IT. It might be the 1st part of Jeter's genius when it came to taking over as CEO of the Marlins.
What Samson, or Dan Le Batard and John Skipper (where he was interviewed) failed to point out is that the Marlins, thanks to Derek Jeter's leadership in Miami has changed the game. I mean, have you seen the Marlins lately?
The Marlins are in second place in their division, just 7 games out behind the Braves.
Luis Arraez is hovering around .400.
Jorge Soler already has 22 homers. Their pitching staff is young and solid, led by
Sandy Alcantara. They have better player, but they have better YOUNG players. My point is the moves Jeter made that Samson never understood are paying back for the Marlins team right now.
The Marlins are not bad, or worse because of Derek Jeter. They are actually better since Jeter made the changes and MUCH better than when Samson ever ran the team.
The fact that Le Batard and Skipper never bothered to challenge Samson may be the worst part of this whole thing. Samson was allowed to rant and not be checked. Pathetic.
Look, as Yankee fans, we were disappointed when Jeter wanted to be an owner for the Marlins. But looking back, he knew exactly what he was doing, he was building the Marlins Future, something tool Samson never did. For Samson, for Loria, the Marlins was their piggy bank. He wasn't hoping for a championship, he was hoping no one would notice he was literally lining his pockets with a mediocre team.
But you can't say that about Jeter. In fact, for me, I would suggest that Jeter did more for the Marlins from 2017- 2022 than Samson EVER did. And that's the bottom line.
Sour grapes, Samson? Yup. I think so.
