DM on 610 right now

Here’s how I might try to explain it to the Glass family if I were Dayton:

Look, David, can I call you David? Do you prefer Dave? OK. Listin, Mr. Glass, I know that you’re frustrated. I am, too. But remember, this "rebuilding toward winning and thus solidifying the fan base " thing is a long process. Sure, it doesn’t have the immediate rewards that blackmailing the texpayers into building a new public stadium, or, better, a heavily subsidized team-owned stadium does, especially when you think about how you can price the riff-raff out and make it safe for Business Class. No, we’re a few years from that Big Score.

How can I explain the reward of a long rebuilding process that will make sense to you? Hmmm, well, it’s a long shot. This might not be clear to you, but let me try.

Let’s say you’re a sucessful businessman moving into a new town to start a general store. There’s a long-term plan that you’ve used everywhere else. And it involves taking losses. When you first get there, people are suspicious. Especially since you purposely build your big store outside of town, so that people aren’t tempted to shop at other stores. The town council tried to stop you from coming in, at least until you greased their palms a bit. People in the town, who like to patronize the other, locally owned businesses, don’t want shop at your store. What can you do? Well, you just offer everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, at the lowest prices you possibly can. Heck, you take losses, for years and years, because you have deep pockets (this isn’t the first time you’ve pulled this off, after all). Sure, it will mean you lose money for a while. But you can wait. People start coming because, maybe, you’re the only store who has tube socks or something. They notice that there are other things they can buy there, and they aren’t close to any of the other stores, so they just to their other shopping there. And they notice that it’s cheaper than hitting the Mom and Pop Video and Foodtown, and they can do it all at once. Sure, you’re taking a loss. But those people keep coming back. And more and more people discover this. “Maybe this isn’t so bad. I’ll just do it once, I can quite any time.”

Meanwhile, the other local businesses can’t compete with your everyday low quality prices. They start to shut down. It isn’t noticable at first, since Mom and Pop Video had a pretty crappy selection and the carpet smelled funny, anyway. No one really went there. And Mom and Pop start working as greeters for you. See, you are family friendly! You take care of the old! They were about ready to retire and get their pension anyway. And maybe some other businesses start shutting down. You get the younger types you might have been around. Hey, some can make it into management. And those who don’t can always feel good that they aren’t working themselves to death with the hassle of a full-time job. Plenty of free time, without the bureaucratic snafus involved with “health plan cards” and “retirement plans.”

It takes a while, but eventually, you’re about the only game in town. You’ve been patient. And the money you’ve made from volume, and gradually raising the prices on products people find increasingly find hard to get elsewhere nearby. And cheap labor because there’s hardly anyplace else left to work. You DOMINATE the town.

Just like we will dominate the AL Central, if you are just patient and give it time.

Is that making sense? A bit? Good. Yeah, I’ll see you at Christian Family Night.