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Yankees win their 27th World Series: Should MLB consider salary cap? (part 2)
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Oakland A's GM Billy Beane (left) revolutionized the way small-market teams compete. (Jeff Chiu/AP)
This article is part two in the series. To read part one, click here.
So should Major League Baseball institute a salary cap similar to the NFL and the NBA?
Proponents of the current system will argue that teams with smaller payrolls like the Tampa Rays and Colorado Rockies have reached the World Series recently. The little guy can reach the World Series, there’s no denying that. But these teams will never be able to maintain what they’ve built. They’ve been forced into the “Moneyball” strategy instituted by Oakland A’s GM Billy Beane. This approach calls for teams operating under a smaller payroll to:
- Consistently make intelligent draft selections and develop young players.
- Trade star players for prospects before they leave via free-agency.
- Go bargain hunting for overlooked players deemed not worthy of a spot on the Yankee or Dodger roster.
The strategy worked well for the A’s earlier this decade; they reached the playoffs five times. But eventually the house always wins. Two players developed by the A’s started in the outfield for the Yankees during the World Series: Johnny Damon and Nick Swisher. Jason Giambi was also lured away from the A’s to the Yankees. Oakland has finished the last three seasons under .500 while the free-spending Angles have dominated the AL West.
Proponents will also argue that any multi-millionaire owner is free to spend as much as he wants on his baseball team. There’s no denying this either. But only in New York can an owner charge $2500 for a ticket behind home plate and actually find people willing to spend that much. And vendors were charging $10 for a hot chocolate during the playoffs! Those prices just don’t fly in Cleveland or Oakland.
While MLB’s revenue sharing policy helps to even this out to some degree, it does nothing to even a team’s earnings on local TV contracts from regional sports networks. The YES Network in New York is hugely profitable for the Yankees. It reaches almost 8 million households in the NYC area alone. No other city can generate advertising profits comparable to the New York City market. So through revenue sharing, which rewards bad teams with free money from good teams, MLB can claim they are trying to fix the problem. Meanwhile the Yankees are making money hand over fist from YES and using that revenue to lure a team’s best players.
Sure the Yankees are a good team and you could argue they’ve always been a good team. Nobody was worried about the state of Major League Baseball in the 1950’s when the Yankees were racking up World Series wins. Back then, baseball didn’t have much to fear from competing leagues. The NBA and NFL were in their infancy. Hockey? That was just a sport for crazy Canadians. These days, the other leagues are well established. NBA and NHL playoffs stretch into June and the NFL preseason starts in August. Soccer is finally more than a blip on the American sports radar. Golf is widely popular during the summer. A sports fan in Washington, Pittsburgh, Cleveland and Kansas City can skip baseball season altogether.
Sports fans have more alternatives than ever for their entertainment dollars. If fans find their baseball team in a constant state of dysfunction, the money goes elsewhere. So while a salary cap looks like an evil socialist plot from a team-by-team basis, for the state of MLB it’s a way to stay competitive against the NFL and NBA. Why would any Clevelander even bother with an Indians game while the Cavs are still playing?
Until Major League Baseball gets serious about leveling the playing field, Commissioner Bud Selig is going to find more sports dollars going to the NFL, NBA, and NHL every year. It’s time for baseball to open its eyes and realize that it can’t thrive in the long-term without a salary cap.
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