Mark Shapiro Quotations | Page 3

We've had a lot of conversations with a lot of people thus far. The key to this company is I think leveraging the media value of this company.

We've had serious discussions. We like the player and think he'd be a good complement to our club. It's not a done deal, but at this point we're optimistic.

Coco and Grady have similar skills, and we're extremely excited about Grady's future. Coco profiles best as a center fielder, which allowed us to be opportunistic and get a whole lot of value for him, which, in the end, was too much to turn down.

We're interested and we're waiting for a proposal from Major League Baseball. It's not going to generate the kind of excitement that World Cup soccer does, given the history and the equity just isn't there yet. But at least for this country, anything with the America's pastime and the American flag is sure to be a winning combination.

When you trade for a guy, you don't know his mental approach and the kind of teammate he is. That was probably the most encouraging thing, in addition to his physical tools. He fits in well with our team and our clubhouse.

Fred and the crew have set the Monday night standard. We want to build on it and at the end of the day have a grand celebration.

Franklin's had an unbelievable winter. He's cut down on his strikeouts. He's got to stay healthy and develop a two-strike approach. The guy's an exciting young player, but there's still some question as to what he'd be up here.

I think there's been a general skepticism in the game, a lot of people inside and outside of Cleveland waiting for us to collapse. It's been so hard for people to believe. But if we're still standing by the last weekend, either race, it doesn't matter.

It's less a comment on Alex Cora than it is a positive statement about those two.

I would have preferred to sign another impact bat to add to this team somewhere. Sometimes we're forced to be creative in the way we look at things.