Baseball Strike Survey
- Thread starter Sharon
- Start date
Here's the thumbnail, as I understand it:
There are some teams that are from higher-revenue areas (the Yankees, for example) and teams from lower revenue areas (the Royals, for example). The Yankees bring in a TON more revenue (from advertisers, seat sales, licensing, etc.) than the Royals do. Therefore, the Yankees can offer these enormous salaries to get the best talent. The Royals can't compete with this, obviously.
So they're talking about revenue-sharing, where high-revenue teams will kick money into the pot to help support the low-revenue teams and keep them afloat. Sort of baseball communism.
That's the gist of it. I'll come back later and we can explore because I can see both sides of the issue.
There are some teams that are from higher-revenue areas (the Yankees, for example) and teams from lower revenue areas (the Royals, for example). The Yankees bring in a TON more revenue (from advertisers, seat sales, licensing, etc.) than the Royals do. Therefore, the Yankees can offer these enormous salaries to get the best talent. The Royals can't compete with this, obviously.
So they're talking about revenue-sharing, where high-revenue teams will kick money into the pot to help support the low-revenue teams and keep them afloat. Sort of baseball communism.
That's the gist of it. I'll come back later and we can explore because I can see both sides of the issue.
The complaining is about big teams being able to buy players, keeping them big, and the little teams being stuck with the leftovers, keeping them little. It would make for a more interesting season if the talent was more evenly dispersed. But there's something about revenue-sharing that sends up a red flag with me - that whole Communistic approach.
I'm trying to learn more about how baseball does it's draft - seems to me that would be a better way to disperse the talent, but I don't know enough about it to talk intelligently.
As far as salaries go, it's like anything else - the consumer dictates what the players can command. If the fans went on strike you'd see advertisers pull out, seats standing empty and merchandise taking a dive. Then they'd HAVE to lower player salaries. Same with any other entertainer.
I'm trying to learn more about how baseball does it's draft - seems to me that would be a better way to disperse the talent, but I don't know enough about it to talk intelligently.
As far as salaries go, it's like anything else - the consumer dictates what the players can command. If the fans went on strike you'd see advertisers pull out, seats standing empty and merchandise taking a dive. Then they'd HAVE to lower player salaries. Same with any other entertainer.
Tonio
Asperger's Poster Child
I highly recommend Bob Costas' book Fair Ball. He has lots of great ideas for fixing baseball.
Costas' plan for revenue-sharing? For each game, the local TV revenue and ticket revenue would be split 50-50 between the home team and the visitor. The Yankees would still earn more than the Expos, of course, but the difference would be about $30 million per year rather than $60 million.
I much prefer this over the "luxury tax," which is only a Band-Aid approach. At the risk of sounding like David Stockman or George Will, the luxury tax is a disincentive for teams to boost their revenues. Percentage sharing keeps the incentives in place.
Even though most of baseball's TV revenue is local, there's no reason not to share this money among teams. The NFL has a 60/40 sharing of all TV revenue, which keeps all the teams financially solvent to a point.
vrai, of course revenue sharing sounds Communistic. That's because a sports league is not a collection of businesses struggling to drive one another out of business. A sports league is a (Oh my God, I'm being possessed by Karl Marx) collective. If the Yankees drive the money-losing teams out of business, where are the Boys in Blue going to find opponents? The Brass Rail? Sure, a sports league ought to be a meritocracy, but only as far as playing and managing ability are concerned.
Costas' plan for revenue-sharing? For each game, the local TV revenue and ticket revenue would be split 50-50 between the home team and the visitor. The Yankees would still earn more than the Expos, of course, but the difference would be about $30 million per year rather than $60 million.
I much prefer this over the "luxury tax," which is only a Band-Aid approach. At the risk of sounding like David Stockman or George Will, the luxury tax is a disincentive for teams to boost their revenues. Percentage sharing keeps the incentives in place.
Even though most of baseball's TV revenue is local, there's no reason not to share this money among teams. The NFL has a 60/40 sharing of all TV revenue, which keeps all the teams financially solvent to a point.
vrai, of course revenue sharing sounds Communistic. That's because a sports league is not a collection of businesses struggling to drive one another out of business. A sports league is a (Oh my God, I'm being possessed by Karl Marx) collective. If the Yankees drive the money-losing teams out of business, where are the Boys in Blue going to find opponents? The Brass Rail? Sure, a sports league ought to be a meritocracy, but only as far as playing and managing ability are concerned.
K
Kizzy
Guest
Wow this does shed a different light then the perception I had this morning about baseball. I, like most, thought that the ball players were just whinning for more money. I can clearly see the issue is much larger then that.
B
Bruzilla
Guest
It's not communism, it's just smart business. For national-level sports leagues to be successful they have to have representation across the country, not just in major markets. This means that no matter how good the teams are, teams in major markets are going to be able to generate more income than teams in smaller markets, but you still have to have a national presence. This means that you have to find a way to balance the revenues out for all teams. The NFL has been doing this for years and years. If it weren't for revenue sharing there wouldn't be a Green Bay Packers, or Cleveland Browns II, or Tampa Bay Bucs. There also probably wouldn't be an NFL because the league would have collapsed a long time ago in much the same manner as professional baseball is going down the tubes now. Can you imagine a large conglomerate like General Motors, RJR Nabisco, or Pepsico saying that they'll support some of their brandnames but others will just have to take their chances? Any CEO making a call like that would be fired in a second.
The viability and profitability of all professional sports is also based on competiveness. If teams can't compete, fans lose interest. If they win all the time fans lose interest. Even so called "America's Teams" lose their luster when they win time and time again. They get boring, especially when they're always playing against second-rate teams. It's like watching the Globetrotters and the Generals play... it's a joke. That's why the NFL very wisely began revenue sharing and salary caps to keep all teams in the race each year.
Revenue sharing ensures that teams from small cities like Green Bay can field a high-caliber team just as well as Dallas or New York can. And salary caps serve as a check and balance program for the teams. If you load up on star quarterbacks, you can't afford star wide recievers. Load up on star linebackers and you can't afford star running backs. This means teams have to make trade-offs and you can't just load up a team with superstars like baseball teams do... unless you try to cheat like Jerry Jones did with the Cowboys a few years back.
Revenue sharing and salary caps may impact the pocketbooks of some players, but the game should be more important than the players. If the fans don't come to the game, or even watch it on tv, even the best players are going to see their paychecks bouncing. Some guys may make out in the short run, but in the long run everyone loses.
The viability and profitability of all professional sports is also based on competiveness. If teams can't compete, fans lose interest. If they win all the time fans lose interest. Even so called "America's Teams" lose their luster when they win time and time again. They get boring, especially when they're always playing against second-rate teams. It's like watching the Globetrotters and the Generals play... it's a joke. That's why the NFL very wisely began revenue sharing and salary caps to keep all teams in the race each year.
Revenue sharing ensures that teams from small cities like Green Bay can field a high-caliber team just as well as Dallas or New York can. And salary caps serve as a check and balance program for the teams. If you load up on star quarterbacks, you can't afford star wide recievers. Load up on star linebackers and you can't afford star running backs. This means teams have to make trade-offs and you can't just load up a team with superstars like baseball teams do... unless you try to cheat like Jerry Jones did with the Cowboys a few years back.
Revenue sharing and salary caps may impact the pocketbooks of some players, but the game should be more important than the players. If the fans don't come to the game, or even watch it on tv, even the best players are going to see their paychecks bouncing. Some guys may make out in the short run, but in the long run everyone loses.