Steve Phillips on Mets, Bernie Madoff Scandal -- MLB FanHouse

Steve Phillips talks about his years-long relationship with the Wilpons and opines about their involvement with Bernie Madoff.

Also, note the bookshelf behind Phillips in this video. Among other things, he has a copy of The New Bill James New Historical Baseball Abstract.

over 1 year ago Eric Simon 12 comments 0 recs |

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Steve Phillips

The man got one big time job in his life and goddamit he is going to milk that cow dry even if it takes 100 years to do so.

Seriously, Steve, go back to school. Learn a trade. Buy a store. Do something, just let it go man. For your sanity and ours, let it go.

"But also, there are lockers… and it’s a room… so, I call it a locker room."
-Matthew Cutandpasteone

by Dandy Salderson on Jan 29, 2011 11:26 PM EST via mobile reply actions

Coincidentally

I was just thumbing through my 1982 Bill James Baseball Abstract. My daughter had pulled it from the bookshelf, with seeming intent to tear out random pages.

Peter Bavasi had just quit the Jays GM job. He said the thrill was gone and it was time for new challenges. James suggested farm work, a filing station, or selling shoes. Although he understood that losing 100+ games might lose its thrill after 1-2 years, much less 5.

by wobatus on Jan 30, 2011 12:12 PM EST up reply actions

Sure Steve

a. The Mets were lucky (or smart) to ‘pull out’.
b. Those absurd returns that Madoff guaranteed and more times than not fulfilled didn’t bring pause to the Wilpon’s?
c. Care to disclose your investments?

Just wasted 5 minutes of my life listening to that blowhard.

"Give me liberty or give me Mets!"

by LOUtheMETandNATSfan on Jan 30, 2011 7:47 AM EST reply actions

Agreed

5 minutes wasted. He said absolutely nothing. Which, now that I think about it, was really one of his greatest skills ….

by brooklynlou on Jan 30, 2011 8:34 AM EST up reply actions

Hey Brooklyn

Here’s an idea: Why don’t we lobby for Citibank to buy the Mets?
1. We can outbid the Yanks for any player in MLB. (Luxury tax would be pittance w/all the money the bank has).
2. If the bank ever does run out of money (haha), it can get a loan from the U.S. government.
3. Most importantly, we’ll hire Steve Phillips to front this idea to Citibank. He’d be stupid enough to do it.

"Give me liberty or give me Mets!"

by LOUtheMETandNATSfan on Jan 30, 2011 6:30 PM EST up reply actions

One little problem

It would take 45 minutes to get through to 718-507-TIXX.

It's a triumph of number crunching over the human spirit...aaaaaand, it’s about time. -- Play-by-Play Announcer, The Simpsons.

by MookieTheCat on Jan 30, 2011 7:34 PM EST up reply actions

About b

The returns were not absurd. The consistency was. There are hedge funds that outperform what Madoff guaranteed, but they are volatile.

"The Mets are gonna be amazin'!" - Casey Stengel
"Bounding and astounding!" - Clyde Frazier

by Russ on Jan 31, 2011 9:21 AM EST up reply actions

Noted however, I assumed absurdity speaks to the consistency of the returns and/or the returns as they stand alone.

"Give me liberty or give me Mets!"

by LOUtheMETandNATSfan on Jan 31, 2011 5:30 PM EST up reply actions

Right

15% per year or more, year after year through repeated downturns of varying magnitude was the tip-off for those who noticed it. Hedge funds can semi-regularly return 30%+, but every hedge fund has a down period from time to time. When it should have been noticed is when the tech bubble collapsed around 2000. To be consistent through that should have been a huge red flag.

It's a triumph of number crunching over the human spirit...aaaaaand, it’s about time. -- Play-by-Play Announcer, The Simpsons.

by MookieTheCat on Jan 31, 2011 9:06 PM EST up reply actions

Hard to say

I would like to think I would have caught him, if I were asked to do a due diligence on Madoff before the Ollie hit the fan. I would like to think so, but I dont really know. I am an investment guy, and while I dont currently work in hedge funds, I have a chartered alternative investment (hedge fund) designation and I have done a ton of work in the past that I would like to think would have allowed me to figure it out. I dont want to turn this into quantitative avenue, but there are basic analytics you should perform before investing, such as cluster analysis, factor attribution, etc., that would have revealed – at minimum – that madoff was not running the strategy that he claimed. If you are interested in finance, check out the famous Markopolis letter:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/9189285/Markopolos-Madoff-Complaint

Not only did the guy nail it, but he identified the exact reasons and PROVED that madoff was a fraud. What is more amazing is that nobody noticed, and that is why I am not sure I would have caught it. Pre-2007, the investment world was a much more naive and trusting place.

Anyway, that was a long tangent to basically say that you might be able to blame investment professionals, such as the fund-of-funds that invested in him, but you cant blame the regular investors. They werent being greedy, they just thought they got access to a great and exclusive investment, who wouldnt be interested in that? And the Pons, specifically, are too stupid to understand basic baseball performance measurements (you see, you take the obp, and you take the slg, and you add them together!), thereis no way they could have known. And that is not even mentioning the fact that they were supposed friends of madoff and never would have thought to ask the basic questions.

"The team is not for sale, in whole or in part. There is no need to sell, there is no reason to sell. There will be no sale."
-Dave Howard

by Dandy Salderson on Jan 31, 2011 9:56 PM EST up reply actions