Count owners Drayton McLane (Astros), Mark Attanasio (Brewers) and Frank Coonelly (Pirates) in amongst those who want a salary cap in MLB.
There's a shocker. Really rich guys want to be "bailed out" because of their own ineptitude. Gee, where have I heard that before?
I'm sorry but this "baseball needs a salary cap" garbage just has to stop. Really. Like now.
Here are a couple of salary cap myths that I will proceed to smash into dust...
1. Salary caps make things more fair and creates a level playing field for all teams.
Salary caps do not make a sport more "fair," as is often alleged. They do not create parity and they certainly don't do anything to make the sport more "fan friendly."
Salary caps do one thing and one thing only: guarantee a larger profit for ownership.
That's it, nothing more.
That's not a terrible thing, by the way, it's just not how the whole thing is sold to sports fans. These bazillionaire owners know you'd tell them to stick it where the sun don't shine if they told you the truth about salary caps so they feed you a line of b.s. to get you to go along with the program.
Which sport has lowered ticket/concession prices for you after getting a salary cap? What have those leagues with caps done to make your life as a fan more enjoyable?
What caps usually mean is that teams have to let some of your favorite/most popular players leave via free agency because they're capped out and can't keep them.
Man, I love when that happens to my teams!
Caps also don't account for the amount of money teams have available to spend on bonuses, front office personnel, coaches and scouts. Even if it levels the playing field for player salaries - which it does not when you consider bonus money - it does nothing of the sort for any of the other important areas of the sport.
2. Salary caps create parity
That is the biggest, steamiest pile of dog poo ever foisted upon sports fans.
Look, there is parity in the NFL for one simple reason. THEY ONLY PLAY 16 GAMES!
It's the sample size, stupid.
Anything, and I mean ANYTHING, can happen during a 16-game season. Hell, even the Royals can go 11-5 during a 16-game stretch. The reason there is so much turnover in terms of playoff teams in the NFL is that they play a very short schedule.
It's pure statistics. If you do an exit poll during a presidential election you're not going to get an accurate result if you only poll 16 people. If you poll 1600 people you're starting to get to the point where you can actually learn something from your polling.
Baseball will NEVER have parity like the NFL has (nor will the NHL or NBA) because they play too many games. Over 162 games the cream will eventually rise to the top. A 4-game winning streak in the NFL is the statistical equivalent to a 40-game winning streak in baseball.
It's not the cap, it's the number of games that creates parity.
Here are a couple of other factors that should be considered if you want to advocate for a salary cap in baseball:
* With a "cap" comes a "floor." Do you really think teams like Florida, Tampa Bay, Oakland, Pittsburg and Minnesota want to add $15-20 million to their payrolls to reach a "floor" that will certainly be negotiated. Maybe, but only if...
* You add in TOTAL revenue sharing like they have in the NFL. Do you really think the owners of the Yankees, Mets, Red Sox, Angels and Dodgers want to give away a huge chunk of their own revenue to other teams? They already chip in to revenue sharing and the luxury tax, which goes to all those teams listed above anyway (which they seem to always pocket), so do you think they're going to be thrilled about the idea of giving away even more.
The MLBPA is not the only opponent a salary cap would face. I'd bet owners would be split 50-50 on this issue - at best.
* Isn't it funny that all these super-wealthy MLB owners love the capitalist system we have in the United States of America when it comes to their non-sport businesses but they're oh-too-happy to switch over to a socialist system when it comes to their sports team?
Can't have it both ways fellas. You either want to share-and-share-alike or you don't...
There is nothing wrong with the current baseball system. The Yankees can spend all they want and if they go too far, which they always do, then they've got to write a luxury tax check on top of what they spend.
Baseball's current system does a fine job of spreading the wealth, they just need to tweak the rules so those receiving checks have to SPEND THE MONEY on talent instead of just pocketing it.
Make no mistake about it, those low payroll teams make a profit every single year.
If they want to compete at a higher level maybe they need to cut back on profit a little for a couple of years and add some to the infrastructure of their franchise. Stop giving big contracts to mediocre players for the sole purpose of trying to convince your fans you're "doing something" and hire smart baseball men to make smart decisions.
In other words, your teams stink because of YOU and the people YOU hire, not because other teams have more cash on hand...
KW
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Salary Caps mean little without a Salary Floor. In baseball, I tend to believe that fact would be even more pronounced -- especially if teams are encouraged to keep their payrolls at or near the Floor.
ReplyDeleteBest bet for baseball: Soft cap, a luxury tax, a floor and a competitive-balance fund. What's a competitive-balance fund? Well that's where the money would go from the luxury taxes, and it would be spread out among the teams below the cap. There's a catch. That money must be used on player salary. Either that or return to it to the fund for someone else to use.
Yes, that means if Kansas City finds itself in default of the Competitive-Balance Fund, it must spend it's money on players -- even over-paying players -- or return to money. No more pocketing the money from other teams.
That would change the financial landscape of baseball -- for the better.