is today, and believe me, it is more frustrating to me than any hundred fans could feel. i still don't sleep after losses because it is just how i am. but every night, especially after the last month or so, i go home encouraged by another quality start or by stuff i see that is going to develop into being a big-time starter. we set out this off-season knowing that we had young starters coming. we set out this off-season to work on our offense. i think we did a good job of that. and i think our owners stepped up as they always said they would when the time was right. there were two left-handed bats that would fill the need in the middle of the order, .

whoever given us seven good innings. that is the thing we have to do either this season or in this next off-season. we have to get the best defense we can. back in '91, when we won the braves, they have their first jedi ship year, the only change that was -- the only change that was made was re-signed three

pieces, three free agents a piece, three defensive players. we signed 3 defensive players. all of a sudden, our pitching was a heck of a lot better. it is amazing how that works. we understand the connection. we are aware of that. we are on the lookout for those final people want to get the rotations put into place. it is happening. that is why i am as excited i am about the future and about how close we are. that is my observation. i'll tell you what encourages me more, our new coach. in oakland, he was once one of the great kids. now he is sitting in the dugout during one of our rain delays this year he says, this is very

exciting to watch. this is really happening. two days later, on the thumb with bobby cox, the holophane manager, he unsolicited, said the same thing. he knew all our other guys from personal experience. he called me to say that it is really happening. we have people like that to feel that way. the most recent guy who said that to me was just yesterday the starting tonight for the boston red sox. he went through this himself. he was one of those people himself and sees that we are so much closer than our standing today would suggest. that is what gives me even more encouragement. i feel pretty good about the way things are going myself. but to hear people and willie -- i really respect, makes me more encouraged.

that is where i think the team is going and how far we have progressed. let me talk about the -- this is something i'm very proud of. you remember three years ago we are playing at the rfk -- many of you loved it for your own emotional ties. it clearly was not what autumn -- what modern-day customers want or expect. the process was in place to design and build the stadium. as i travel around the country to all the new stadiums, our stadium is as fine a stadium as there is anywhere in baseball. it is more beautiful than virtually any city might can think of. it has the ease of access. the sidelines are spectacular. more and more people recognize that. you are going to have a good

time when you come to a ballgame at the nationals park. for about a third of our games so far, it has been raining. i understand that will put a damper, pun intended, and our night, but there is no finer way to spend an evening and at the ballpark. that is especially so i nationals park. i understand that when i saw people a ticket is not just the money that i am asking for. it is the 4 q hours of their time. we have to be prepared. we need to make sure that all of the time is easy and convenient and safe and clean and entertaining. most important of all those things is affordable. baseball has always been and remains the most affordable of all entertainment alternatives. we are very proud to have $5 a ticket for every game all year, including tonight. we are very proud that we have

thousands of $10 tickets. we want to remain accessible to the wide spectrum of our fans. the stadium was glorious last year. we have continued to work on the game presentation. the thing to see on the board in the music he may not love all of it, but we work very hard on this. we have staffs of people who spend all their time trying to work on what goes up on that board and in what sequence. as i travel around the country and look at other games, our game presentation is up there with any. our magnificent screen and other led boards matches in the stadiums. the way we do things is as good as we can get in terms of game presentation. we have this silly raise that to know about, -- race that you know about, i cannot explain

exactly why. it is still the single most popular thing we do. people are starting to know are formula. they know what we do in the middle of the fourth inning they know every night in the middle of the third evening we will salute our returning officers and soldiers coming back from various spots. they know in the seventh inning will have a "god bless america" and other songs they can get up and dance to. we have a program that makes you have a great time no matter what the score is. we also spent an inordinate amount of time on the friendliness program. i can tell you the thing to get the u.s. complaints about is our ushers. i would say 99% of our usher's -- compliments we get are that the of the friendly as ushers anyone has ever seen. that is something we work hard. it is not an accident.

we work hard at training them once we do hire them. i'm very proud of the measures we have. food -- last year, we opened a ballpark with a lot more in terms of alternatives, a lot more variety, much better quality than we are able to provide previously. it still was not good enough for us. it was not enough for me. we needed to do better. this year be replaced our company with the levy company who is renowned for doing good things. we have expanded its and improved our food offerings in the quality and in a variety we have as many different cool things. we of budget items. we have health items. we have it all. one thing that continues to disappoint me, we are still not fast enough or good enough in

our transactions. we are good. we have gotten better since last year. we have many excellent employees. too many of them are not yet excellent. that is what we are working on. we are searching for the exact right crowd. we work very hard when we hire. it is a tricky process. we have replaced a lot of them last year. all our people are excellent. we are not there yet. that is our goal. we are working on it. that is a little bit about the game experience and the customers. i hope you are all having a good time any night your coming to the ballpark. i thought by now it will be better in terms of our neighborhoods and the economy, which has all of us hit, the development we all thought we would see by now has not

happened yet. we all know it is going to. it has been delayed for a few years. it will make the evening experience of coming to the ball game even better than it is now. the last thing i want to talk about is the most important in many ways. it is the thing which is least talk about. i want to spend some time on this. i even brought some paper. i never read i did not know what i would talk about. i like to talk. i wanted to bring some materials to talk about, because it did not leave anything out. this is our relationship effort. these of the things we do in our city for our neighbors for the citizens, not just for the city, but for maryland and virginia, all our fans and people that come. the nationals do it a superb job of reaching out across the many ways the camp. we do literally hundreds of

programs over the course of a year to reach out, mostly to d.c., but also in maryland and virginia. in so many ways, and most of you never read about it, because there is not a lot of media interest in these things, but they are touching the lives of children, fans throughout our area. let me talk about the business. we have about 1000 people a night working this. 2/3rds of our people are d.c. resident. we are very proud of that. we have held a number of jobs typically within six months of the ballpark. we are trying as hard as we can to hire from our neighbors. that is a real important thing to us. we have succeeded at that. we need to continue to refine our mix of employees, but we work very hard and bringing in people who are citizens of the

district. we think that is a very good thing. in terms of economics, it has worked out great. the bonds are being paid off with the revenues agreeinthat ag brought in. things of a moving along just great. we are very proud. on the charitable side, i want to talk about that. let's stop with the dream foundation. if it does so much good work. most of you do not know about this. i want to read a few of the things we do. the start of the three big goals and programs. first, is the urban academy. it has been slow because we've not been able to secure the land that we have identified, because it is currently owned by a park service. the plans are in place. we have identified more funding to make it happen.

we have been working to make it happen. it is going to happen. we will be very proud to have a third bourbon baseball academy. we need it in all cities across america. the second is the juvenile diabetes program we are building. this is something terribly important to us. it is one of the centerpieces of all the foundations. the third big thing is our relationship with the boys and girls club of greater washington, specifically we work with the chapter closes to the ballpark, but we reached out to all of them. we are proud to do all this work. the three anchor programs are all four children or for d.c.. d.c. children. that is what we are spending our time and effort to achieve to benefit.

they also do some little things. let me give you a list. arlington little league, centro neosho, center city schools, children's cancer foundation, d.c. rbi, the everybody wins program, hispanic scholarship funds, living classrooms foundation, the diabetes center, rebuilding together programs, and the tyler elementary school partnership fund. that is just a partial list of the grants that are foundation had given out in the last year or two. in addition, the steps we do with our players and with their coaches and managers in the neighborhood is extremely important. this year alone we will give out between 50,060 thousand tickets

to d.c. kids. we will hold six free clinics, baseball and softball at our ballparks. we had six different drives for different things. every month we choose another cause to get behind. this is jim. we are working with the american cancer society. i can go on and on. we originally went through hundreds of programs. my favorite is a new one. we tried to kick it off on a small base. we've been able to grant it up. this is the d.c. high school initiative. it is one of the few things have been able to get the mayor and council president to agree on. we all of the d.c. high school initiative. every d.c. public high school, their baseball team is having a full baseball team practice at our expense at nationals park.

it is a great thrill for the kids. it is a great motivator for the kids. each high-school, for every child in that school, every child will get a ticket to a game at that has lost game at the ballpark. thousands of tickets, thousands of kids coming to the nationals park. we are doing it at our expense. we are happy to do it. i hope it is increasing morale. i hope it is helping. we are trying to help kids and working on health initiatives. we found ways to combine all of these things. this is going to be a lot more exciting and newsworthy when the record of the team gets better. i understand how that works. everything feels better when the team on the field gets better. until then, we are not going to

stop. we will continue doing our work in the neighborhood and with our community, keeping our customers happy, having the best experience they can, so that when this team -- which is not very far from being competitive -- once they are here, everything will be in place. i am looking forward to that day. i learned something in atlanta that i have used here. while i was in my village idiot phase, the one thing i learned carrying forward here is that -- i have been called everything before. and being called that again. two people on the front office, to our owners, tour staff members, interesting thing to remember from 2004 -- two -- espn did a review of all

franchises, about 121. they had many categories of rankings. one category was owners. how bitter the owners? the number three owner that year of the one the 21 franchises was the owner of the detroit red wings. that is pretty good. number one 15 out of 121 -- one under 15 was the owner of the detroit tigers. -- 115 of the detroit tigers. he owned both teams. it is a lesson that i assure you i kept in mind. it does say all of the job we are in. of an alternate over to people the want to ask questions.

i wanted to win over to questions. >> what are the magic ingredient used by the boston red sox and yankees that put them at the top every year? is money one of the elements? >> i can talk about this for hours. let me some of this. i have until 2:00? i will tell you from doing this for a long time in many sports, i have a very strong belief that smart always beat rich. if you are smart. there are many examples of this. when you are smart and rich, that is up. both franchises are smart and extremely rich. they are able to parlay that into continuous success. the yankees had a good streak going last year. it was a good streak.

it was a good streak. i give them a lot of credit. >> if my recollection is correct, [unintelligible] --where the nationals on that time line? >> i wish i could give you a year. everything is so dependent on the development of players and injuries and your competitors injuries. as it did during my remarks, i believe that once we get consistent and mature rotation of pictures anything is possible immediately. when he get that, you did not have to wait 2 or 5 years. i assure you, both i and my owners are ready to throw in any pieces we need as we established this. >> why your president of the and atlanta braves, you put together

when the greatest pitching staffs in history. you have often stated that putting together a strong starting rotation is the key to the long-term success of the ballclub. under current roster, the seven highest-paid players are not pitching. you gave $20 million contract to an outfielder. he has led the league in strikeouts three times and is putting it nicely a defensive liability. are you going against the blueprints that made them the team of the '90s? >> no, i am following exactly that blueprint. we are not the only team that is a pending our hopes on the backs of a young pitcher. the oakland team is doing a great job of that.

releasing, you are going to see baltimore doing a good job of that. in baseball, you are younger players do not make much money. but they are not eligible until their fourth year in the majors. if you are building three young pitchers, you may have your very best players as your most affordable. i think we are exactly on track. >> as president of the washington nationals, how much blame the shoulder for the poor performance of the team? but i shoulder all of it. i will take that responsibility. until we get it right, it is not right. i have to keep working. right now i am the village idiot. i except that. i wear it proudly. we are in the phase. there are no shortcuts with

pitchers. have to develop a rotation. we have done an excellent job so far. they are making the impact of the major leagues. another year or two and i think they will stop calling me that name. >> the owners of the nationals are very happy to make money with a mediocre product and will not spend money needing to build a winner. what is your response? >> that is unfair. that is a common theme for people who do not look behind the real events. that is a little editorial. i think the truth is that the lie was put to that this past season. we identified the need a could be satisfied by a free agent acquisition. we worked very hard at trying to do that. we have a free agent in the spring.

the most important thing to remember is young pitchers grow and grow and grow and become more expensive. in atlanta, we started off with a very low payroll because we have young kids. they all grew up together. the all became expensive together. we kept them together. that is what will happen here. >> who will succeed manny and whne? en? >> obviously, that has come up here. media reports to make you not. i have been asked about his status every day since the first week of the season. i never comments on the status of some one. i support everyone we have every day. i always will. i happen to be a big fan of his. i think is the demeanor to be a

long-term solution. i had this great talk around the batting cage last night with the young genius manager of the boston red sox. i said, i remember when you were done with the manager of the phillies. he said, i promise you, i am still laying dunce, i just have better players. it is so true. [laughter] i've always been in support of manny. i cannot predict whether it will work. i'd think it will. he certainly has the potential to be a long-term manager here. that is my hope. >> your first round pick in the draft was steven and has been and"th -- being called upon with the savior of the nationals --

his agent is well aware of this. the largest contract ever given to an amateur player is some $0.5 million. that was in 2001. now people are throwing around numbers like $50 million for this man. how are negotiations going and is there a limit to how much you can invest in one player for someone was never played a professional game? >> i never negotiate. i will talk about steven, though. when the cool things -- one of the cool things about the rotation that we are putting together, four rookies, and 124- year old, is that we are developing the same kind of atmosphere we had in atlanta. great closeness, a great

friendship, and also greater competitiveness. they want to outdo the other. they also want to pick the other one up. that collegian bodes well for the future. that is what we have. -- that a legiocohesion bode wer the future. this is what we have. he cannot have a better place in which to grow and contribute. he will be a very good addition to this crop that we have here. it'll be a great environment for him to grow. >> according to the column in this morning's "washington post " there is no incentive to raise payroll. how much equity do you and they have. will the payroll be increased and by how much? >> i forgot to bring mine w-2

with me. [laughter] ownership is tricky. sports reporters have a tough time on business. that is on going to say. it is more complicated than sticking to a sports store. i do not want to go into that too much. there is no one more competitive than the lerner family. we are trying to build long-term projects. we are close. no one was to win more. i assure you that we'd make a lot more money. trust me on that. the matter how you want to run the money is, we are going to make a lot more money if we win. we are trying to do that as fast as we can. >> compare the braves in the

late '80s to be nationals now. >> it is a fair comparison. the circumstances were different. the braves were a mature organization. here in washington, it was kind of a new thing that has to be started. the teams are the same. they are working on a player development and scouting and being aggressive in signing talent and waiting until the moment was right to strike a free agent. we made an effort in 1990 to sign a free agent that did not work out well because of an injury. we did not sign our first real free agent until 1993 when we had already been to two world series. we are on course here. we hope to achieve the same success. >> can you give us some advice on what can be done to