The Dodgers introduced their latest big-ticket free agent signee on Thursday. Team president Stan Kasten was among those in attendance at the press conference to celebrate Tanner Scott joining the club on a four-year free agent deal.
Asked about the Dodgers’ second consecutive monster offseason, Kasten defended the organization’s spending. “This is really good for baseball. I have no question about it,” he told reporters (link via Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic). Kasten pointed out that MLB’s playoff volatility reduces the chance for any individual team to post a dynastic run of World Series titles. He argued that the Dodgers’ roster-building approach should energize both their own fanbase and those of other clubs who want to see them fail.
“On the entertainment side, which is what we are, it’s really good when there’s one beloved team by their fans who come out in record numbers, leading all of baseball in attendance, while that same team can be hated and lead baseball in road attendance. That’s a win-win for baseball,” Kasten said.
Needless to say, not everyone outside Los Angeles shares that opinion. ESPN’s Jeff Passan published a lengthy column looking at both the Dodgers’ successful Roki Sasaki pursuit and their overall success in both free agency and internal player development. Unsurprisingly, the Dodgers have gotten backlash not only from opposing fans but from rival front offices. That’s in response to both L.A.’s overall willingness to spend and the level of deferrals they’ve included in most of those contracts. Readers are encouraged to check out Passan’s piece in full.
Cot’s Baseball Contracts projects the Dodgers for a luxury tax payroll around $375MM. The Phillies have the second-highest layout at roughly $308MM. The Yankees are the only other team above $300MM by that estimate. The gap between the Dodgers and the 30th-ranked Marlins is almost $300MM.
Passan writes that the payroll disparity (plus the $765MM guarantee which Juan Soto secured from the Mets) has led to a “rekindling” of talks amongst owners who hope for the implementation of a salary cap. New Orioles owner David Rubenstein, who purchased the franchise from the Angelos family last spring, is among those in support.
“I wish it would be the case that we would have a salary cap in baseball the way other sports do, and maybe eventually we will, but we don’t have that now,” Rubenstein told Yahoo Finance at this week’s World Economic Forum in Davos. “I suspect we’ll probably have something closer to (the salary caps and floors) the NFL and the NBA have, but there’s no guarantee of that.”
A cap, of course, would need to be collectively bargained. Major League Baseball’s owners have attempted to implement a cap in many previous CBA negotiations. The MLB Players Association has refused to budge on that issue, as it remains strongly opposed to putting fixed limits on players’ earning power. The luxury tax is designed to curtail spending at the top of the market. It has indeed served as a deterrent for some big-market franchises but obviously is a barrier which teams are free to cross if ownership is willing.
“I think the big city teams have some advantages. Now, in Los Angeles, they have another advantage,” Rubenstein added. “They have Japanese players, [a] number of them that they got like Shohei, and people in Japan really love watching the Dodgers, and they sell a lot of merchandise in Japan for Dodgers players.”
A salary cap would not have directly influenced the Sasaki signing. His earning power was hard-capped by MLB’s international signing limit for amateurs. Sasaki qualified because he hasn’t turned 25. He signed for a $6.5MM bonus that is hundreds of millions of dollars below what he would’ve commanded had he been a true free agent. The Dodgers’ spending may have indirectly influenced his decision — he’s joining the defending champions on a roster that already had a pair of Japanese superstars in Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto — but the geographic and endorsement reasons for his signing are outside the purview of a cap.
Nevertheless, it’s clear that many fans are frustrated by how this offseason has transpired. More than two-thirds of respondents to a recent MLBTR poll indicated they hoped for a salary cap to be implemented during the next round of collective bargaining, which will take place after the 2026 season. Roughly half of respondents said they’d be willing to sacrifice the entire ’27 season to a work stoppage if it meant the league could successfully leverage the players union into agreeing to a cap. MLBTR’s Darragh McDonald and Tim Dierkes discussed the situation in greater detail on this week’s edition of our podcast.
Deferrals are another source of agitation for many fans, particularly after Ohtani’s deal that deferred $680MM of his $700MM guarantee. The Dodgers are neither the first team nor the only current club to defer significant money. The Nationals had deferrals on a few deals (e.g. Max Scherzer, Patrick Corbin) that were crucial to their 2019 World Series win. The Blue Jays deferred around two-thirds of the salary on Anthony Santander’s contract just this week. Still, the Dodgers have deferred a much greater amount of money than anyone else within the past year-plus. Ohtani, Will Smith, Blake Snell, Teoscar Hernández, Tommy Edman and Tanner Scott have all deferred payments on recent contracts.
As MLBTR’s Tim Dierkes covered shortly after the Ohtani signing, the deferrals are not really a workaround the luxury tax. In many cases, those contracts’ net present value — which adjusts the deferrals for inflation — ended up around expectations. As Passan notes, the CBA requires teams to set aside money for the future salaries within two years of signing a contract that includes deferrals. Passan points out that the deferrals and significant signing bonuses, which many of those deals included, are advantageous for the players to minimize taxes under California law though.
None of this will change in this offseason or next. We’re less than two years away from the expiration of the CBA and what seems likely to be another offseason lockout. These conversations will take on greater urgency as that draws nearer.
Isn’t merchandise split evenly among all teams? So, selling all that Dodgers gear in Japan also goes to Rubenstein and Co….. Can’t be a good feeling when a new billionaire group takes over a team and is already talking about spending too much.
And the advantage he’s talking about are that LAD signed players, which his group could have and should have done. Can’t have your cake and eat it too.
Problem is these guys expect a cash cow while also scaling back spending. It’s like trying to buy smaller properties in less desirable areas and wondering why you’re not making better money on resale.
This is all about limiting salaries and gaining profit from teams that are not your own.
Haters gonna hate, hate, hate…
Fakers gonna fake, fake, fake…
Dodgers gonna rake, rake, rake.
Actually, the usually-bastardized saying is “You can’t eat your cake and have it too,” which makes a lot more sense when you think about it.
Why can’t major league baseball just take away a larger percentage of LA’s RSN money ??? There is no reason that money should just belong to LA since all of baseball contributes to the televised product. Then MLB can take that revenue and redistribute it to teams in smaller media markets who are still trying to compete.
The tv contract is bigger partly because they spent money to have a more entertaining product.
It is also bigger partly because they are a larger city.
The large city franchises are worth more than the small city franchises and you are seeking to make them all worth the same. The large city owners paid more for their clubs. This formula has gone on for decades. The truth is fans are worried just because the Dodgers have combined really smart FO decisions with higher spending.
No one is complaining about the Mets because they lost. The Angels and Rockies, please. The Rangers spent more to win on 2023. I am not claiming that everything is equal. But the Dodgers were not the top spender last year, people are worried just because they are really good.
Another ignorant take by compkk ll winning mariners fans. Why does your team deserve money that dodger fans spend on their team? You think that’s fair? That’s not fair or competition. LA puts more fans in the seats than Seattle, they have more TV sets tuned in. You don’t deserve to steal from them so your team doesn’t have to build a winner like most winners have.
That’s a contract the Dodgers signed, not MLB. That’s the Dodgers’ money. This isn’t communism nor socialism. You cannot take from others and spread it out.
I should clarify a couple points. The redistributed income should come with a mandatory spending floor. Nobody can just pocket the extra money. I’m not asking for handouts for my cheapskate Mariners. But I believe the TV Media RSN money and the proceeds from Jersey sales, etc (from all 30 teams) should all be thrown into the same pot and then give equal shares to all the teams (predicated on a spending floor & penalties for misuse.)
The teams contribute 48 percent of their net local revenue to the MLB revenue sharing pool, including media revenue. This pool is divided equally between the teams. So apparently MLB owners are already a bunch of dirty rotten commies. The CBT redistributes even more revenue from the have to the have not teams. Who knew these billionaires were such good socialists?
Except they are blatantly not trying to compete. That’s the problem
They aren’t being rewarded for competing. They are being rewarded for reducing expenses.
@sob – MLB’s system is already evening it out some. Every team puts 48% of local revenue into revenue sharing, which is equally distributed (so high-revenue teams are net payers, small-revenue teams are net recipients).
The question is if the system will get closer to the NFL model, where all TV revenue is shared equally (because the money is in national deals).
There’d definitely have to be more additional revenue sharing in MLB to come up with any meaningful salary cap/floor system.
But they will have to start competing in order for it to work. Or at least they have to throw more money into player salaries, however that looks. I suppose the funds could be used in other areas like player development but regardless there has to be a floor.
This article is the best I’ve read describing what is wrong with baseball’s revenue sharing system and how to fix it. The article was written before the most recent CBA, but I don’t believe any of the basic facts have changed.
blessyouboys.com/2021/12/16/22831008/mlbs-revenue-…
@Ignorant – even after revenue sharing, outside revenue estimates (at Forbes) are that the Dodgers and Yankees have on the order of $200 to $300 million more annual revenue than a team like the Cardinals or Nationals. Teams such as the Brewers, Guardians, or Royals are about $50 million farther behind than that ($250 to $350).
And that revenue difference is going to mostly show up in MLB payroll , because other costs of running an MLB team (draft bonuses, IFA bonuses, running a minor league system, front office, etc.) just don’t vary that much between team.
@Blue Skies – good link, thanks for sharing.
There have been a couple relevant changes in the latest CBA.
(1) 50% of luxury tax money goes into a fund that’s distributed to revenue sharing payee teams (i.e., small market teams getting shared revenue) who have grown their non-media local revenue over several years. It’s a discretionary fund run by the commissioner, who has to consult with MLBPA about it. The fund has the same goal as the article’s idea about gate receipt sharing: a financial incentive for small-market teams to grow attendance.
(2) There’s a grievance process involving the MLBPA, outside arbitrators, and the Commissioner that can result in a revenue sharing payee having to alter its plans to try to be more competitive (or lose part of its revenue sharing). If a club isn’t spending at least 150% of its revenue sharing net receipts on payroll, the burden of proof shifts to the team having to convince the arbitrators in a grievance hearing that it’s using revenue sharing money for competitive purposes.
The grievance process has been there in prior CBA’s. I think the 150% of revenue sharing receipts threshold is new with the latest CBA. The process is involved enough that it’s not a true salary floor. But MLBTR has mentioned reporting by the Athletic that the 150% threshold is a factor in the A’s spending more money this offseason.
Things continue to change and not for the good. My cable company dropped MSG and Comcast I believe moved NESN off of the tier it was on and those who want it will have to shell out $20 a month. Congress should but won’t get involved. Netflix adds sports and raises rates immediately. The fan is the one who suffers and I’m just tired of it. I really haven’t missed the Rangers, Kicks, Islanders and Devils this month and I suppose if I have to I’ll adapt to baseball on the radio like when I grew up.
@mlb top 100 –
No, the Dodgers’ TV contract isn’t bigger because the team spent money to have a more entertaining product. At least not any recent spending. It’s a 25-year deal that was signed in 2013.
It’s almost entirely due to the market size and audience size.
The other sports do.
While I agree with you b Murray, one thing that the errors benefit from that other teams can’t control is geography. The whole Japanese thing started because yes, they were willing to spend. But mainly it’s due to the fact that they’re on the left coast. Now, other teams b are too. But for teams elsewhere they can’t compete for the best Japanese players because they’re naturally going to want to be closer to home.
They have been good since then. Spent money then too.
Gee, maybe they have more fans in the seats because they have more people in the city. Maybe they have more viewers because of the larger population. Could MLB have cut up the markets to make them equal size, and put multiple teams in the larger markets, not limiting them to two? But they didnt. Now LA and NY being 19x the population of KC is something the large market owners will never rectify. Its to their advantage not to. They make the playoffs every year while KC may every 10 years. Amazingly, when you take away that advantage, with caps and floors, like the NBA and NFL, NY and LA are not the dominant franchises. Teams absolutely have to have better front offices to remain dominant, and can’t just outspend. The Lions becoming dominant was thru front office change and improved team building. It allows fans more hope for success.
Actually, the anti trust exemption acknowledges the league is one enterprise, hence communistic. Deal with it.
Stymee.. So you want to watch sports for the front office competitions? I just don’t get that. But it’s irrelevant. Teams like KC, NE, etc just run the table for years. It’s the appearance of competition, but is anyone surprised KC and BUFFALO are playing again for a championship berth, while the Eagles are too?
At best it’s no different, at worst teams truly have no shot and their fans are given a carrot and stick because .500 teams get a playoff shot in those other leagues.
“This isn’t socialism or communism.” Apples and oranges. Baseball cannot operate under a capitalistic system. Unlike business, teams require other teams in order to sell their product.
I said this a couple of weeks ago. Spot on! It’s a league of teams, not a bunch of separate businesses attempting to put others out of business to eliminate competition!
This isn’t Walmart where you want to put other companies out of business to reduce competition. In any sport league you need other teams to compete against. It’s amazing how many people don’t get this.
Down load the dofu app
@realist101. FWIW, the grievance system is standard as it applies to the many provisions of the CBA, so probably this one works the same way as appeals of suspensions and the like. I know they tinkered with the revenue sharing system some in the latest CBA, and this coupled with the somewhat randomized draft lottery was supposed to improve competitiveness. I think it’s fair to say that it hasn’t worked.
This is where I believe the writer of this article gets it right: MLB does not incentivize winning. It essentially preserves the profitability of the smaller-market teams but then requires little of them other than keeping 26 men on the field and the lights on. Even the “improved” draft does little to penalize failure. Effectively, stinking is still rewarded with higher draft positions.
Start penalizing the perennial non-competitors with the loss of draft picks, and reward them more for making the postseason, then maybe we’d start seeing these teams spend more of their revenue sharing on fielding teams that don’t suck. Spending floors are really just papering over the basic problem, which is that fielding no-hope teams is guaranteed to be profitable. If you want to change this, incentivize the outcomes you want to see. MLB just isn’t doing that now.
Right, dm867; but, the cap does not increase competition as those other leagues reflect. A cap may limit spending, but increase competition it does not.
I’m all for increased competition, but the fallacy that a cap increases competition because small markets can have dynastic runs in the NFL is a straw man. It’s longer, less competitive dynastic runs, it’s just by “smaller markets.”
If the argument is truly about competition (it’s not), then people would look to the NFL and NBA as examples of what *not* to follow.
This argument is about saying that it’s okay to have even less competition (or the same) so long as the dominating teams are decade-long “small” market teams, like KC.
The entire “cap for more competition” argument has no basis in evidence. It’s simply shifting dominance to a different market.
The fact that spending money is the focal point of the argument is exactly how owners want fan bases divided because it’s a win for all owners.
Stymee – which teams have a better FO than the Dodgers? Take your time. I will wait.
@realist101. True, up to a point. Less of the Dodgers’ media contract is contributed to the revenue sharing pool than other teams due to the terms of the McCourt bankruptcy. This was a pretty big factor in valuing the team at the time it was sold out of bankruptcy, which was underreported at the time, and is pretty much completely forgotten now.
When one brings up the ism’s, it becomes dangerous when the basic assumptions are wrong (and they almost are).
MLB has an anti-trust exemption, which is anti-competitive by its very nature. As a fan, I understand it and want the game to thrive. But owners and their markets are incredibly protected and have benefited to an incredible degree over the years due to the fact that they are actually a “socialized” economic market.
But when fans become too over the top in their free market thinking on the other side, it is simply under-educated and simplistic by nature. Every aspect of the baseball economy is regulated in some way – market protection; ownership protections; player protections and so on. Working to manage the inequities between teams and markets is very fair, given that it is an artificially protected set of marketplaces from the outset.
@CarverAndrews. The impact of baseball’s antitrust law exemptions are often overstated. They really only apply to the number and location of franchises. All pro league sports control this aspect of their industry without the need for any legal exemptions. MLB is one business with 30 owners. They can and do decide among themselves how to divvy up the revenue pie. This would be the case with our without the antitrust exemption.
True. But the other American sports leagues DO operate this way.
Congress should never get involved. Owners should be smarter and better. But of course, good luck with that.
BlueSkies_LA
this coupled with the somewhat randomized draft lottery was supposed to improve competitiveness.
===========================
There was never a chance that a randomized draft was going to improve competitiveness. The WS were the worst team in history and only got the #5. The Guardians finished 1st AND got the overall #1/1?
And somehow the league and the players thought that would make the WS more competitive with the Guardians?
Insane.
@JoeBrady. I don’t know why you think citing one team proves anything, but the general idea is randomizing the draft somewhat would discourage tanking and thus improve competitiveness. Within the limitations of what ownership will allow, it was at least a reasonable theory.
But I have to eat cake!
Preferably coffee cake.
Blue Baron, you sound like the Unabomber
deepseamonster32: Thank you. Maybe I am, bwahahahaha!
So it should be a 10 team league the rich market .
or a 6 team league of small markets. I know which league I’m watching.
Let’s relegate teams, the few worst. You’ll see how fast they can spend.
Yeah something tells me that Mr rubenstein is just like the other 80% of owners in baseball
People were treating him like a savior but then he didn’t spend a ton and now he’s blaming the dodgers
You might want to review the Orioles spending over the past 6 seasons and you will realize that Rubenstein actually HAS spent “a ton” on the major league product compared with recent seasons past. He has clearly shown willingness to spend in his extremely short ownership so far, but the club is not in a position to grow payroll arbitrarily. They must be smart with acquisitions and the money will be spent if it makes sense from a current AND future standpoint. Personally, the only gripe I have as a fan is that the team seemingly didn’t make a big push for Sasaki. Yes, it was extremely likely he was going to LA but they could have made a serious push. If Toronto was a finalist, no reason Baltimore couldn’t have been – the roster, system and future outlook is all better than Toronto.
The Orioles are currently 15th in the league at 146M, I believe. Yes, higher than the embarrassing pittance payrolls of the past couple of years but I don’t think they’ve yet surpassed mid 2010s’ peak or (adjusting for inflation) the mid 90s.
But they are 4th lowest with 26M committed for 2026. They have ZERO committed for 2028, one of 3 teams tied. Slow start, fire sale, they’re at 60M at the ASB.
The spending was to run in place offensively and drop in pitching (replacing an ace with a bunch of 4/5 guys which is only incremental improvement of the 4/5 guys of last year).
Otherwise it was the same old “interested in” and “In on” BS that we’ve seen every winter for years.
I give them a D this winter. Last winter (Burnes) was better.
@sad Based on his comments, I’m almost sure he’s waiting until the next CBA meetings and will be spearheading a salary cap push among owners. He’s been buddies with the former presidents Bushes forever with his company Carlyle Group. MLB is just another old boys club he paid to join.
or it’s called a fair playing field, which we obviously don’t have.
Life isn’t fair and neither is business.
But how can we say a fair playing field doesn’t exist when at least 1/3 aren’t even trying? That’s a self-fulfilling prophecy…. We won’t compete and spend because we won’t compete…it’s circular logic.
Clip – The revenue sharing without a hard payroll floor requirement is THE biggest problem. Big market teams are generating profits for the Pirates and others, and the Pirates and others are pocketing the profits. There’s no incentive for the Pirates to try and win.
It’s like during Covid when millions of people WANTED to lose their job because the handouts they received were MORE than what they were earning by working.
Like the old saying, instead of giving a man fish all the time … teach them how to fish, and force them to do so if they want to eat.
@Fever –
Disagree that’s the biggest problem.
Pirates could probably push up spending, but what would be sustainable MLB payroll spending for then? Maybe same range as the Guardians or Brewers, which implies somewhere between $20 to $50 million in additional payroll for the Pirates.
It could help, but it pales in comparison to the differences between the really big market teams and small market teams from revenue disparities.
Team. Revenue. Payroll. Ratio
Nationals $323M $134M 41%
Brewers $317M $158M 50%
Orioles $310M $131M 42%
Twins $309M $161M 52%
White Sox $308M $125M 41%
Rockies $305M $167M 55%
Reds $303M $119M 39%
Guardians $295M $140M 48%
Tigers $294M $106M 36%
Pirates $287M $118M 41%
Rays $280M $89M 32%
Royals $276M $162M 59%
Marlins $274M $117M 43%
Athletics $241M $81M 34%
Why?
Thank you for the information. Where did you find this information? Just one of the reasons, I am not excited about the A’s coming to Vegas.
There are a few payroll websites. I happened to choose Roster Resource this time. Here is the Yankees 2025 payroll:
fangraphs.com/roster-resource/payroll/yankees
You can switch teams and years at the top of the page.
Can you post these same numbers for the rest of the teams?
Yanks – Forbes publishes that information every year, you can find it with a quick search.
And the A’s are a unique situation. When they get settled in Vegas their revenue will increase quite a bit, and then so should their spending.
Same situation with the Rays, why should they spend now with their revenue potential so limited because they are playing in a ST stadium.
Why cherry pick your teams? Lets do the major markets:
Yankees 679/303/44.6
LAD 249/549/45.4
CHI 213/506/42.1
NYM 306/393/77.8
PHI 243/458 53.0
Outside of the Mets, all the major market teams spend on par with the small market teams. You are intentionally gaslighting to prove your point.
Thank you.
dm – I’m guessing he picked just the revenue sharing recipients.
Either way, you are way wrong on all teams spending the same percentage of payroll to revenue.
Why don’t y’all provide sources like I do????
BTW – Red Sox are statistically the 5th-cheapest team in MLB.
thescore.com/news/3107553
Yankees $720M $376M 52%
Dodgers $637M $428M 67%
Red Sox $557M $224M 40%
Astros $544M $265M 49%
Cubs $541M $235M 43%
Braves $521M $294M 56%
Phillies $486M $272M 56%
Rangers $473M $255M 54%
Giants $465M $251M 54%
Mets $441M $450M 102%
Padres $427M $229M 54%
Cardinals $422M $216M 51%
Angels $407M $189M 46%
Blue Jays $383M $235M 61%
Mariners $374M $163M 44%
All these revenue numbers are just speculation. No one has seen any team’s books except for the Braves which are publicly owned.
Suit: I also believe that is one of the major obstacles in the proposition of a cap. Many, if not most, of the MLB organizations don’t want those outside their small circle truly knowing how much revenue and profit they’re making. I don’t believe it’s going to be too far off from much of the speculation, honestly, but there’s a reason they’re so secretive.
I say that, but add, I don’t think they should show their books if they choose not to; but, they have to accept the current capless system (or one close to it) then.
Yeah, I think there will not be a cap anytime soon.
Clip – Exactly! Forbes uses sources that include sports bankers, team and league executives, public documents, and media rights experts. If anything their revenue figures are UNDERstated, not overstated.
Certain people here associated with the Red Sox front office will always attack the credibility of Forbes because their numbers confirm the Red Sox are very cheap.
All these revenue numbers are just speculation.
========================
It’s solid speculation. Investors do this type of analysis all the time. You know the TV contract. You know the number of tickets sold, and the average price. You can extrapolate in-stadium consumption by ticket sales and the price of refreshments.
They won’t miss by a material amount.
Statista estimates the Dodgers brought in $549m vs the O’s $328m in 2023. Merch can be split, but it’s obvious there’s a wide gap in resources
Sure, but it’s also part of generating a better product. For example, when teams acquire better players and perform better, their stadiums are full and more people watch. Pittsburg and the other such teams aren’t spending free money as it is; they’re certainly not going to suddenly spend if they get even more unearned profit. It’s the fallacy of the cap and I just don’t buy it.
@Yankee – better product moves the needle a bit, but market size is a huge part of it.
For example, the regional TV revenue has next to nothing to do with current quality. It’s tied mainly to market size, with some tie to popularity that’s been built up over many decades (hence, Yankees > Mets, Dodgers > Angels).
There’s not any viable path for the Orioles or Pirates to generate revenue in the same neighborhood as the Yankees and Dodgers.
This is correct.
People on here that are saying spend on the team and you can get a better tv deal.
Perfect example is the padres. They have spent, they have great attendance. Matter of fact their attendance would likely be even closer to the dodgers of their stadium was the same size. Plenty of reasons to believe the padres attendance which sold out some 51 games would have sold even more tickets to at least a number of those games if they had more seats.
Yet because the tv market size in San Diego is so small that don’t even have a tv deal. They got roughly 4m from padres.tv last year. The dodgers are getting like 340m this year. Yes the dodgers share 48% of that but that still a massive gap.
The padres also have gone from a constant revenue sharing receiver to a payer. Why because they are creating much more revenue now then they were. Manly do the attendance they are getting now. Yet the lack of even a decent tv deal keeps the revenue gap between them and the dodgers massive.
Now there is plenty of room to complain on the other side about cheap owners who just pocket money. I get that but saying if a team spends they can generate anywhere near the revenue the dodgers do is a ridiculous statement for all but a few big market teams.
Now they may be able to create a system that doesn’t need a cap. Though there does need to be greater revenue sharing and a floor to stop the cheap owners from pocketing more money. I’d even be fine with letting teams keep all their attendance money but share their tv money equally. Every team should be able to compete attendance wise. If they can’t like say the marlins then relocate them. Just allow teams a fighting chance to compete revenue wise.
SIMM, you’re correct but only proving the point that the massive gap doesn’t matter, as SD eliminated the Dodgers, and then nearly did it again, while AZ made the WS.
I don’t see how a hard cap will fix this. I believe it’s a purported fallacy to keep salaries lower overall.
That’s the randomness of playoff baseball. Which will exist no matter what.
The padres in 2022 got spanked by the dodgers all year long. In short series anything can happen.
The big issues is over a 162 game season. Which is where you see the a major gap. Which means the dodgers get chance after chance after chance to win it all. Sooner or later like last year luck will be on their side. I say luck because you need a little luck in a short series. Aka judge dropping a ball he catches 99.999% of the time.
Small market teams have small windows where they can compete. Some really good orgs can extend that window. The issue is because the revenue difference, they have to be more perfect than the dodgers. People are already talking about the padres window closing because they can’t sustain the payroll they had. Which is unfortunate because the org has a great fan base. They just don’t have the tv money and never will have anything close to the dodgers.
Right on Simm!!! I am with you on everything you say here. I think you succinctly summed it up and articulated about 90% of the problem quite well. Let’s throw all the TV revenue together and devide by 30. Institute a hard floor and keep the luxury tax system pretty much as is, no need for a salary cap. (Roughly roughly speaking.)
Simm-bingo, wanted to acknowledge this reply. I said something nearly identical on another reply. Couldn’t see yours until now because it was hidden behind a “see all replies” thing.
Clip – Well said!
This is a non-issue until the Dodgers win more than one legit WS since 1988. Nobody would be as concerned if they hadn’t won last year.
Luckily they are in the NL where at least 4 other teams have a decent chance of beating them.
Ha, fever. Now, the Dodgers have to win another WS to be legitimate? Two in five years (one which you discount may be the hardest ever for a variety of reasons, all of which you know).
Dave – No, you missed my point. People are complaining because they think the Dodgers have bought a bunch of championships. They haven’t. Their payroll doesn’t guarantee championships, that’s my point. Only if they have a dynasty like the 1996-2000 Yankees can people complain about the Dodgers buying championships.
As for 2020, look at their schedule that year. It was a joke season, MLB intentionally dragged their feet to play the minimum number of regular season games only because postseason is where the money is.
Agreed YC.
Instead of a hard cap, let’s first introduce a corresponding soft floor with escalating penalties but no redistribution of revenue sharing. Force the teams at the bottom to spend and increase their own in-market revenue. Right now we have teams operating without any concern about selling tickets, concessions, merchandise. The A’s moved to a smaller media market simply to increase their portion of revenue sharing. These type of owners would be frightened if they had to depend more on their own skills to increase revenue and would thus sell. A win-win for fans.
Davos govern me harder please! I am always amazed when people are fooled by someone telling them that capping earnings is a good thing for anyone but the super rich.
“On the entertainment side, which is what we are…..”
It’s our National Pastime, a hole.
Respectfully, sir, the “hole” is in your logic.
Dodgers were not the top spending team last year.
The problem is with owners who pocket all of the appreciation in ownership capital rather than reinvesting capital and profits into their franchises. There are more billionaires who want to join the oligarch fraternity that spots available. If the owners want to open their books, we can further engage the conversation. Otherwise, the only cap will be on the players’ heads.
AAV they were
@MLB – there are enough reasonable revenue estimates out there (such as Forbes), and enough publicly disclosed data points on RSN contracts, to have a reasonable sense of the massive revenue disparity between large-market teams and some smaller market teams.
The Braves have publicly disclosed financials because they’re publicly-traded, which provides additional insight.
You’re bearing your head in the sand if you think most teams have the revenue to spend anything in the neighborhood of the Dodgers.
*burying your head in the sand
Thus a Cap AND a Floor. At the current rate of things the two sides are going to kill the sport.
They spent a billion on two Japanese stars. Even if it’s deffered,no other team did that
BUT THEY COULD HAVE, redsfan.
Everyone could have afforded one or the other, but likely not both. And if a team pays Ohtani $42M, they have to take that $42M away from other expenditures. It’s a zero-sum game.
No, it’s an industry, no different than the movie industry, other than not having scripts.
sufferforsnakes: Actually he’s right. Professional sports are entertainment much like pop music, the film industry, and Broadway theater.
Fans pay to watch the players perform just like they pay to hear Taylor Swift or Billy Joel, watch Tom Hanks or Leonardo DiCaprio, or see The Book of Mormon at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre.
I think baseball is entertainment, but it is different from other types of entertainment in that there is winning and losing involved. So, people want an even playing field, whatever that means to them.
@all – I think a big sense of “even” is fans feeling like sustained success is heavily tied to how well the team is run for drafting, trades, development. And that the league’s economic system allows teams in smaller markets to have the revenue to keep their stars.
So situations like the current Chiefs, or the Peyton Manning-era Colts, or the Spurs (when they had Duncan, Parker Ginobli, etc.) are possible in smaller markets.
@Baron
I disagree. Baseball isn’t performance like pop music. It’s athletic competition that requires a high level of strength, conditioning, stamina and IQ. It’s also a very long and often grinding season that also calls for a major commitment.
WWE is performance.
Baseball is what you say it is, but also performance in the sense of a show people pay to watch. That’s why players refer to it as “The Show.”
And watch a film or Broadway musical/play with singing and dancing and tell me those don’t involve a high level of strength, conditioning, stamina, and IQ.
Dbacks were in the series last year and no one even watched it. It’s your own fanbases fault that your team doesn’t get more views/$.
If you don’t think market size matters then you are wrong.
All you have to do is look at the padres. They have spent, they have great attendance and yet almost zero tv money. Why because they are near the bottom in tv market size.
There is almost nothing more than can do to increase revenue besides raise ticket prices, which they have done for like 3-4 straight years.
If the dodgers make more money in attendance..fine. Let them keep that money for building a product fans want to see. As the padres have shown a small tv market club can at least compete in attendance if the ownership has a team people wan to see. It’s the tv money that is the issue that is the problem with having a somewhat level playing field revenue wise. Otherwise small tv market teams have to count on small windows or the random playoff luck.
As the padres have shown a small tv market club can at least compete in attendance if the ownership has a team people wan to see.
============================
Which is true, but according to Forbes, SD lost $116M. Much like us commoners, poverty-stricken billionaires cannot afford to lose 10% of their 401k each year.
Lock them out for as long as it takes. I won’t watch any game involving the Dodgers. Sort of the anti-Kasten approach. I’m boycotting even prior to the lockout.
Miss you already.
I think a salary cap is absolutely necessary. Something like increasing the tax penalties for going over the luxury tax levels may create a temporary solution, but would ultimately still lead to bigger markets and owners being willing to tank the penalties. A salary cap would significantly level the playing field between small and big markets. Even if small markets still spend less money, the playing field will be a lot more competitive. And I disagree with people that say that other teams could have offered the money that the Dodgers offered to these players. Teams have and have still been passed up for the Dodgers. Money for individual contracts is not the issue, it’s the vast amount of contracts that the Dodgers are able to take on which the majority of other teams cannot
This is sort of the issue imo. It’s not the individual contracts that are the problem, but the sum total.
For how many MLB teams does a $15m middle reliever make sense? Or a $10m 4th OFer? Probably only the ones at the top.
And for the record, it’s also a known secret that many small-market teams exist purely for the sake of business rather than competition. Two things can be happening at the same time here.
One could also argue that you are a team at the bottom precisely because you don’t make those deals. The Dodgers paid market value for most of the players they have signed. Its not any one team that will compete with the dodgers (though the Yankees, Mets and Phillies can and probably will), If most teams that claim they want a competitive league would simply sign players in position of needs for them, then they would certainly slow down the Dodgers from acquiring all the talent. Instead it appears that most teams are colluding to keep prices down.
YES EXACTLY!
Sure. You can argue that the reason the marlins are terrible is because they didn’t re-sign Tanner Scott.
Do it. Argue that. I want to read it.
If a hard cap levels the playing field, why have more franchises (16) won a title in MLB the past 25 years than in the NFL (13), NBA (11) and NHL(15)?
A cap does not stop stars from getting together to start a super-team. If you want equality, you do it roto re-draft style. You can keep ten players from year to year and the rest are re-drafted. But then there is no incentive to develop players if you can’t keep them. No incentive to protect players from long-term injury. Players would have no say in what city they play and live. Etc. I think the system is pretty good the way it is. If your local team is not spending enough to compete, start an online petition asking your local owner to sell their team.
The existence of the Minor Leagues, much larger rosters and drafts, and the general inconsistency of careers year-by-year
The NFL has the Cap system but the funny thing is how the major market teams, especially in NY and Chicago, have been clown car rodeos for years now…NY Giants, NY Jets, Bears are laughing stocks. (The two LA teams Rams & Chargers are okay but they have such short histories in LA…they have nothing like the Dodgers behemoth in LA for the NFL.) And which teams have been thriving???? Those from the tiniest media markets: Kansas City, Buffalo, Baltimore, Detroit….LOL.
Ignorant: Not true of the Rams. They moved to LA in 1946 and played there through 1994, then they returned from St Louis in 2016, so they’ve played in LA for 58 years, just 9 fewer than the Dodgers 67.
so you don’t really care about competition, you just want the tiny market teams to win.
@BlueBaron. THANK you sir! My bad. I am a newbie NFL follower. I was not aware of that…I assumed the LA Raiders were the team back in the day. Wow. I need to go read about the Rams!
No, not at all. Just more of an equal playing field in one area of revenue. But teams would need to spend to a floor, not pocket it.
Number of champions in MLB primarily reflects the nature of the sport. Specifically, the inherent variance of short series playoff baseball.
PsychologyVan: A salary cap would only shift the responsibility for large market and smaller market franchises working out their differences onto the players and penalize them by creating a fixed pie of competition wherein one player making more necessitates another making less.
Minimum salaries, especially for Minor Leaguers, should absolutely be increased as well but a salary cap would just reshape the range of values offered. The owners are the worse of the bunch because they take the profit without doing any of the playing but I don’t think that players should complain that they have to make $15 mil instead of $20mil in the grand scheme of the sport
it’s also about the bad contracts that rich teams can eat when they make a bad deal….can you imagine if that soto deal went to a mid market team (since fools out here say that they can afford it) and he was bad? they would be screwed for 10 years….the angels are living proof that bad deals destroy world series hopes….
well they would deserve to be screwed if they were to hang so much dependence on one player. Good luck ever getting players union to accept a cap. You really think the players give a damn about “a fair playing field’ or would they rather be able to make sky’s the limit money?
If your team can’t afford to build a roster, blame your stingy owner and stop supporting them until they feel it in their pocketbooks. (hey it worked to get rid of The McCourts.)
So if all teams can offer the same max offer, you think they will suddenly choose the reds or the rockies, over the Phillies/Yankees/Red Sox/Dodgers? If anything it would make it way worse
Exactly… it would be Roki Sasaki all over again and the crying would continue. They demand a FA draft.
Yeah the Blue Jays would be screwed if they couldn’t overpay.
I don’t think ppl understand the flex the Guggenheim Baseball Management pose. Steve Cohen, owner of the Mets, is worth about $23 billion, and a large portion of his wealth comes from his financial management company, which controls about $35 billion in assets. In comparison, Mark Walters, Co- owner and chairman of the Dodgers, is also the CEO and co- founder of Guggenheim Partners as well as Guggenheim Baseball Management. His personal worth is “only 6 billion,” but GP manages about $325 billion in assets. The GBM company is owned by a who’s who list of billionaires including Magic Johnson ($1.2 bil estimated networth), Stan Kasten (not publicly known but estimated to be a multi billionaire), Todd Boehly ($8.5 bil estimated networth), Peter Gruber ($800 mil estimated networth), Alan Smolinisky ($1 bil estimated networth), and others. To put that in perspective, the personal individual networth of Walters, likely Kasten, and Boehly INDIVIDUALLY are higher than Hal Steinbrener and about 20-22 other team owners. Add to the fact that many of the owners are also members of the Guggenheim PE that manages over $250 bil in investments. The possibilities are staggering.
And irrelevant. Teams spend out of TEAM revenue, not their owners’ pockets. You or I could own the Dodgers and their profit and loss statement would be identical.
In 2023, Steve Cohen remarked, “I don’t think it’s sustainable for the long term to be losing the type of money I’m losing,” he said. “It’s a lot to ask. And frankly, we’ll figure that out as we go. I certainly have the wherewithal to do it. It’s just a question of how long.”
By I, do you think he meant ‘the Mets’ team revenue?’
Cohen is the exception that proves the rule.
There have been a few teams that have spent to the point of teams running sizable losses, subsidized by an owner: the Cohen Mets, Mike Ilitch Tigers in his later years, probably the Peter Seidler Padres.
It also only moves the needle on distribution of talent if one (or a small handful) of owners do it at any one time.
If every owner (or most) spend to the point of losing money, the biggest payroll budgets would still be the highest revenue (i.e., large market) teams. That’s just basic arithmetic,
How many exceptions does it take to admit the rule isn’t really a rule and more just a common miserly practice?
No owner loses money. There are a line of billionaires drooling every time one of the current owners wants to sell. If they lost money, they’d never find owners. Rich people are rich because they don’t lose money.
They may jiggle the accounting to show a loss on paper but its only a loss on paper.
This is why you don’t see their books.
raisinss –
Do you understand the concept of denominators?
We can find *3* examples of this, over the past 20 years, in a 30 team league.
One of the examples is ongoing.
Each of the other ones lasted maybe 5 years?
And the Padres are in a financial mess because the big spending didn’t result in the total revenue that they expected, because their TV deal fell apart.
Additionally: Mets owner Steve Cohen’s 2024 payroll bill is $9.2 million *greater* than the team’s most recent full-year revenues. The Mets are willing to spend at a deficit like no other club. Cohen is the anti-Scrooge.
thescore.com/mlb/news/3107553
raisinsss,
I wonder how Sportico got their numbers. I’m guessing they’re fairly accurate, but there’s no way to confirm how close they are to reality.
Not true. Several instances where team owners spend out of their own pockets. By all accounts Cohen is spending out of his own pockets for Mets payrolls. Mike Ilitch when he was alive most certainly spent money out of his own pockets, one year to the tune of $40M.
So the wealth of a set of team owners is relevant. Such wealthy individuals not only get a kick out of trying to buy a WS title, but they are also fine with some losses to balance their gains in other areas.
It’s a fundamental misunderstanding of what investment firm “assets under management” means to think that has any bearing on what’s available to Walters personally (or the Dodgers).
Those hundreds of billions dollar numbers being quoted are other people’s money. It’s analogous to money in a Vanguard mutual fund: Vanguard absolutely *cannot* spend the $9.3 *trillion* it has under management.
@realist
I didn’t say they could spend it. I said they have the expertise to invest it, and the teams can absolutely use the deferred money held in escrow to invest and profit from.
Absolutely true that the investment firm cannot spend the billions/trillions of others assets that they manage. But they certainly can spend the profits in commissions and fees that they earn by managing those portfolios.
Player salary cap not going to happen. You will have a work stoppage before a salary cap.
The MLBPA will never agree to that. What’s needed more than anything is a salary floor adjusted for market to motivate these teams who are luxury tax recipients use most of that money on salaries. In my opinion they should have to spend 100% of that layout just on salaries.
Missing a year of baseball would suck (but worth it imo) yet it would be funny to see replacement players again
Every time there’s replacements whether it’s the 1994 lockout or the 2012 nfl referee stoppage the game turns into a circus
sad tormented: The NLRB ruled in 1995 that replacement players is an unfair and illegal labor practice, so it won’t happen.
Blue Baron
I agree with you on the issue, but you must be aware that the new (largely anti-labor) administration will have an appointment to the NLRB thus possibly reversing many well deserved labor gains from recent and distant past.
Cap with a 90 % floor . Fix the media to sell to big money tv. Like Amazon/ apple/ Netflix . Ticket sales 40 % split . NFL revenue sharing was 400 million for each team .
Solaris-I think they pay 150% of revenue sharing dollars now. Hence the A’s being forced to spend this year.
Oh yes. And there will be.
Problem is union and owners they don’t care about the fans who support a avg team . The tv media is broken , union is killin fans like me because large markets LA/NY /PHI /can buy free agents. The revenue disparity 400 million dollar vs 200 million payrolls how is that fair league .
good, that’s what needs to happen.
What they have effectively done is combined the BASEBALL TEAM + AN IN- HOUSE PRIVATE INVESTMENT FIRM!!! That is freaking awesome. They have convinced their players to defer their future earnings, which allows them to stack their team in talent and avoid going over the harshest levels of the lux tax. Here’s the kicker to all those who say “well they still have to spend the money and fund the escrow account now.” Well they have enough asset collateral to borrow against and fund the deferred money in escrow that it wouldn’t even be noticed AND the money doesn’t have to just sit their collecting interest, it can be used as capital investments which can be flipped over a 10 year period as deferred money can be paid out over a MINIMUM of 10 years. This is due to a federal tax code provision that prevents states from taxing deferred income on out-of-state residents if the payments are made in equal amounts over a minimum of 10 years. For the Dodgers and their players owed over $1 bil, who better to govern and grow their money than the Guggenheim Partners??? And..I bet you there’s some agreement to split the capital gains between the two parties. I’m no financial expert but let’s say they take that $1 bil and in 10 years, assuming a conservative 5% annual return, a $1 billion investment would grow to approximately $1.629 billion in 10 years. They can have an agreement with the player to do a more favorable commission split of that additional $629 million capital gains that’s better than the standard 2-8% standard in the private equity forum. They can literally profit themselves off of their employees’ deferred money. The player can benefit because their deferred money can’t be paid out until at least 10 years after their initial contract. By that time they’ll likely be retired and if they move outside of a high income tax state like California to someplace with lower taxes then they can save hundreds of thousands if not millions, especially if they residual some place like Texas or Florida. And because the invested money is likely to outpace the rate of inflation, they are not really losing the cash value of their deferment. In other words, Ohtani depreciated money will be offset by the capital gains. If his estimated $480 mil grows to $600 mil, then it would basically be a wash, but if he moves out of California by the time it’s paid off, then he wins.
I was wondering if teams are allowed to make a profit on deferred $ put into escrow.
Looking at the definition of escrow, I don’t think a team could make a profit on $ put in escrow because a third party controls it.
shhhhh don’t tell him.
the yelling into the clouds is soothing
@raisins
Yes, MLB teams can invest deferred player salaries in certain securities and other investments. The money is set aside in escrow accounts and can be reinvested while it’s waiting to be paid out to the player.
How it works
Set aside money: Teams must set aside the present value of the deferred salary.
Invest the remainder: Teams can invest the remaining money in securities or other investments.
Profit from investments: Teams can keep the returns from their investments.
Certify quarterly: Teams must certify to the commissioner’s office that they’ve funded their deferred compensation obligations.
In fact, Ohtani can and probably will move out of country. It’s a colossal tax dodge for him.
more money for him to gamble with!
Knicks
Some nice thoughts, but may I suggest paragraph indents?
If CA wasn’t such a terrible tax hell the Dodgers probably wouldn’t even be offering deferred salaries. It really benefits the player.
Knicks,
I’ll second Top 100’s comment: good stuff, and several paragraphs would have made it easier to read.
However, “I bet you there’s some agreement” is pure speculation that runs counter to the hard data you provided.
Ah yes, instead of improving my crappy coffee shop I can just complain that Starbucks needs to spend less.
I’m far from an expert in this field, but maybe mlb year can have someone more informed about the benefits Guggenheim can manifest if they, in essence, invest the deferred money on behalf of their players?
People are upset that the Dodgers caught up with the spending by the Mets, Yankees and Phillies. The Dodgers have a great farm system and have done great international scouting. Yes the large city teams have an advantage, but there are a lot of owners and front offices who are pocketing the profits because there is no salary floor and the accounting ledgers hide in the shadows of darkness.
The Dodgers and Yankees owners both make WAY more profits, even with their payrolls, than the small market teams. The problem is a revenue imbalance not a profit imbalance.
The Dodgers have blown by the spending of the Mets, Yankees and Phillies in 2025:
LAD $366.6M actual, $369.9M CBT
PHI $288.5M actual, $307.5M CBT
NYY $283.7M actual, $303.3M CBT
NYM $297.3M actual, $294.0M CBT
per Roster Resource
All in the suit
You can’t assess the numbers until the end of a season, even more so when it is still the off-season and signings are ongoing. The Mets could sign Bregman and Alonso tomorrow. The Marlins will not. The fact that we both know the Marlins will not but we are unsure about the Mets tells me that the Marlins and not the Mets are the bigger problem.
You assessed the numbers saying “the Dodgers caught up with the spending by the Mets, Yankees and Phillies”. The actual current numbers do not reflect that.
Let’s not forget the era of Frank McDebt held LA hostage in the not too distant past.
That operation versus what runs the LAD today, is literally a tale of two cities in itself.
People mostly forget the small market years before the forced sale rescued a franchise.
The cap idea is DOA unless we want to go a couple years without MLB. I have zero interest in that – the NHL did that 20 years ago and I haven’t followed it closely ever since.
A stronger luxury tax I see coming – I’d love a reverse one too to create a kinda-sorta cap/floor situation. Adding another tier where the tax is 200% and you lose your top draft pick and have your IFA cash reduced by 50% might make it tougher on the Dodgers/Mets/Yankees. Reverse one would be if you spend under $100 mil you pay a tax for half of the difference and/or lose access to the small market cash that is handed out to them. Add in the ability for teams to trade draft picks and you might see more creative trades and the like – a team that is sucking could trade with a team that has a dead contract, get up to the minimum and gain more draft picks for a quicker rebuild.
To sell it have a big portion of any luxury tax money go to the players (equal based on days in the majors that year).
no it won’t because big markets teams will trade their bad deala for prospects and continue spending with no regard for ‘picks’.
Big- market teams would have to trade prospects with their bad deals. Small-market teams would have the option of overpaying players like Luis Severino to meet a salary floor instead of trading prospects for big-market teams’ bad contracts.
I’m getting extremely tired of hearing about the Dodgers. Leave them alone! They’ll get eliminated in the playoffs at some point in the next few years. lol
Studies show dodger articles get the most views and engagement. Why would they stop going for high ratings? Dbacks and rangers was the least watched world series of all time
Go DNacks ot was great to see an underdog team knock the dodgers out . It’s a sport , it’s a league so you like having a payroll twice the size of opponents that way you win .
Tim needs to get over his hatred for the Dodgers.
A lot of you fail to realize one of the beauties of baseball. When the Yankees were the “evil empire”, there was just as much backlash. However, they did not win every single year. There were times when small market teams would come up out of nowhere and shock the baseball world. As a fan base, sure it’s nice to “buy” top players. However, it does not guarantee a championship.
95 wins for 5-6 years in a row. it’s buying wins.
Notable Trends Over the Past Decade
Luxury Tax Threshold:
Teams’ decisions about spending are influenced by the MLB luxury tax threshold. Some high-payroll teams strategically avoid surpassing the tax limit, which can impact roster construction.
Rise of Analytics:
The increasing emphasis on data-driven decision-making has allowed lower-payroll teams to compete with big spenders. Effective player development and undervalued asset identification have reduced the reliance on payroll for success.
Parity and Competitive Balance:
MLB has seen greater parity in recent years, with more teams having realistic postseason aspirations. The expanded postseason format (wild card games and additional playoff slots) has also reduced the correlation between payroll and postseason success.
Correlations
Regular Season: Moderate positive correlation between payroll and wins, with notable exceptions from efficient, low-payroll teams.
Postseason: Weak correlation, as smaller sample sizes, variability, and strategic factors become more significant.
Conclusion: While higher payrolls provide a clear advantage in acquiring talent, they are neither a guarantee of regular-season dominance nor postseason success. Smart management, analytics, and player development are increasingly vital for success regardless of payroll size.
Best comment so far Raisins. Facts and logic tend to be the best argument against “Waaaa Waaaa waaa….reeeeeedeee!”
Low payroll teams (a.k.a. cheap teams) cannot CONSISTENTLY compete. By definition, salaries rise over time. All of the Orioles young core getting paid beans now will graduate to big boy contracts and play elsewhere. The cheap teams then reload with “pre-peak” or second rate players. High spending teams reload with high paid high performers.
It still takes a little thought because the Mets demonstrate it can be F-ed up, but the Yankees have not had a losing season since 1992. The Dodgers have not had a losing season since 2010, 12 straight playoff appearances.
Some low payroll teams just pocket profits and revenue share.
Hard cap, hard floor at 80% of cap, no loopholes. If it costs the 2027 season so be it. Fix the game before it dies.
Express what you mean by “consistently compete” using anything measurable. I.e 1 playoff period per three years.
raisiniss – Yankees and Dodgers are almost an annual sure bet – that’s consistent. A down year for the Yankees is 82-80, they bounce right back.
The cheap teams will build up for a hopeful 3-5 year window where they have a chance, then return to the void from which they came once they sell it off and have no hope for a number of years.
I would define “consistent” as:
1. Longer term period of time – like 10-20 years.
2. No more than 1 losing season in a row in the period/no more than 2 or 3 years out of 10.. A bad year for a consistently competitive team is 76-86, not 47-115.
3. Make playoffs at least a third of the seasons and be competing for a spot until the last 10% of the season at least say 60% of the time.
No, but it certainly does improve the odds. And that is part of the problem. Year in and year out the richer teams by and large do better than the poorer teams. Even IF the poorer teams took all their profits and put it into payroll they still would not come close to what the top payroll teams do. The revenue disparity in baseball is massive compared to other sports. It leads to a competitive imbalance that isn’t good for baseball.
Then why does baseball have more competitive balance than any other sport?
If you’re talking about WS winners, it’s mainly just the nature of the sport. Lots of variance to short series baseball: the better true talent teams lose a lot.
If nothing changes, the game will die outside of about eight sites. It’s as simple as that.
Baseball died in Cincinnati long before the Dodgers started spending. Blame your fan base and owner
Baseball has never died in Cincinnati, it goes dormant around the ASB every year though.
Ha!
I disagree with both of you.
Fans still enjoy the Rockies and the Angels. They are horribly run teams. But the fans still find games entertaining. Many fans go to games where they root for the road team. More tickets sell for Marlins games against the Dodgers and Yankees than against say the Pirates and A’s. So the lower spending owners benefit from the big city higher spending owners. There is inequality but it is not leading to the game doing worse, but rather increases the game’s profitability and sustainability. The one wrench this past year was some of the television contracts collapsing. There is no reason to change the longterm framework of the game to navigate the issues caused by the television contract issue.
An ownership tbat is awesome to their fans and wants to win at any cost is great for the game. Honestly, MLB just needs to start relegating teams like the Pirates and A’s
Why? No matter how many teams that you contract, half of the remaining teams will be below the median. There likely will always be cities and fans seeking to acquire a lesser-performing team.
The only reason to contract teams is if there isn’t enough talent to fill all the teams rosters.
All owners are billionaires. Most don’t care if they win. Dodgers are doing everything they can to win. If your team isn’t – then they are the problem…
The most recent data I could find shows that 5 of 28 (Braves and Jays excluded) owners are NOT billionaires.
Jays are owned by Rogers Communications – they are super-rich, far beyond the standard billionaire. They own the biggest cable company in Canada, one of the biggest internet providers, one of the 2 biggest cell phone networks, plus TONS more including the sports channel that televises the Jays. Basically if they want to have a billion dollar payroll they could without shareholders even noticing it on the books.
This constant argument about how many different teams win the World Series isn’t a good argument. MLB isn’t apples to apples with the NFL or NBA. It’s more of a tram sport. The NFL is heavily based on a good QB, while you can get by with 1-2 superstars to win it all. If that were the case in MLB, then the Angels would have won several World Series with Trout/Ohtani. Money adds to the floor of your team’s success. Tampa Bay (who have never won) are an outlier.
@Cincyfan – Angels never had good pitching. All the offense in the world is almost always defeated by good defense beginning with good pitching. Tampa Bay refuses to supplement a good team with FA acquisitons when needed. They simply refuse to spend beyond their minimum requirements. I am sure they make a profit every year without winning, sad.
I agree, and the variance of short series playoff baseball is also a big factor.
The “better true talent” baseball team still has a pretty meaningful chance of losing a 5-game or 7-game series.
If you can’t compare baseball to other sports what can you compare them to? Your argument is that your opinion is correct because comparing the subject of your opinion to anything else isn’t fair.
There is a mathematical argument to it as well.
In baseball, its 162 games. Regression to the mean will put most teams between 91 and 71 wins. A top tier team wins 100, a terrible team loses 100. Thats WP of .617 and .383 respectively. Apply those WP to the NFL and you get a range of 10.5 to 6.5 wins.
With the long MLB season, that 62 win team is out of it by June even with expanded playoffs (worse before that). They are having a fire sale, and fans suffer through July, August, and September. In the NFL season, a team can be 6-6 at Thanksgiving and start to lose out but still cling to hope into December. A 5-7 team goes on a run and makes the playoffs at 10-7.
2 NFL teams have gone winless and 1 without a defeat in a season just since 2000. No MLB team has won or lost less than 40 in even the strike years (not counting 2020).
The NHL and NBA with 82 games fall into the middle.
Regression to mean with more games in a season does not mean the sport has greater parity.
I love enjoy Reds and Mariner fans crying how they want LA to give their teams more money. These angry comments posted here only drive more engagement and make me giggle like a school girl. Fans called the dodgers garbage when we had McCourt. The Yankees spent more compared to the league in the early 2000’s. Mets, Phillies, Padres, Yankees have all had years where they went and got the top free agents. Friedman has let Trea, Seager, Scherzer, Yu, Manny Machado and others walk, but LA wins another chip and now those trash talkers are literally crying over sports. I love it
Exactly, This doesn’t get as much notice. But the Dodgers also pass on a ton of big Ticket FAs the ones you mentioned, They usually bide their time to get the guy they want.
League is broken broken large markets ruin it for even the avg teams . It’s not a fair game period . Dodgers is not good for the league / Yankees are not good for the league / Mets not good for the league because it’s not fair to the 10- 30 teams that don’t have the revenue to compete evenly . Your advantages are 4-1 greater .
It’s not fair to take money dodger fans spend and line the A’s owner pockets with it. It’s crazy how many sports fans will justify welfare for billionaires
Outside of the COVID year, the Dodgers hadn’t won a title since 1988. The Yankees haven’t won one since 2009. The Mets haven’t won a title since 1986. More individual franchises have won a title in MLB in the past 25 years than in any other sports league.
The Mets F things up.
No losing seasons for Yankees since 1992.
No losing seasons for Dodgers since 2010.
How many ways are there to build a roster? Free agency is merely one way. All teams should be utilizing their resources to find a way to win, whether it’s from increased spending, better scouting and drafting, better developing, or better trading.
If your team is performing at every single one of the other methods and can’t seem to be competitive because free agency dollars overwhelm them then there can be a discussion about a cap and parity. Not before.
@Dropped – a lot of teams try to do that, some better than others.
But even the ones who are often good at it – such as the Brewers, Guardians, and Rays – end up on a treadmill of trading most of their good players right before they hit FA, to get something back and keep refilling the minor league prospect pipeline.
It’s working on a limited margin of error.
And, except for a few players who sign early career extensions, every star ends up being shipped out of town.
To clarify, I’m talking above about small market teams who do a good job at drafting and development.
Corporate billionaires spewing bs as always
“Asked about the Dodgers’ second consecutive monster offseason, Kasten defended the organization’s spending. ‘This is really good for baseball. I have no question about it’…”
Good for baseball, eh?
Well. I guess let’s see where the attendance and viewing numbers go, first of all. The demographics of the fans, too. Not gonna look it up, but the last I heard, the fans were getting older, and were not being supplemented by incoming younger fans.
I don’t know that he’ll for sure be wrong. I do know I am pretty tired of it being a foregone conclusion the team that has won the NL West for 11 of the past 12 years will do so again, enough to at least consider dropping my MLB.tv sub. Survey of one.
I probably won’t, but fan apathy can’t be a good thing.
I see your point but just look at the difference in viewership between the 2023 and 2024 World Series. Big markets bring more money and have more fans. How would the Rockies vs Royals World Series be good for baseball when it’s a minority of actual baseball fans?
Sure. How sustainable is that, though?
It’s fine if you only want a regional league with a few powerhouses. It’s pretty absurd to think about having 30 viable teams, let alone expanding, with the current state of affairs.
But, who knows. San Diego lost the Chargers and life went on. What will be will be.
Murray Rothbard;
You are correct and that’s the problem.
Viewership of the playoffs and WS goes up when the large market MLB teams are in them. Because their local fans watch.
But the NBA and NFL get ratings even when non-large market teams are involved. Might that be because all teams have a fair chance at winning due to some sort of payroll equality?
Have been watching MLB since 1956. Quit a few times. Have enjoyed watching the small market teams on MLB.TV the past 10-12 years as the good ones have to have smart FO’s, coaches, and hustling bright players. The large market teams are boring. They hit HR’s or K a lot of batters. Their defenses and baserunning are poor. But they bully their way to victory.
This might be it for me. This MLB offseason has simply been a joke. Now the large market Blue Jays – an inept organization – are out there signing the name FA’s left because they’re incapable of developing and managing young players….and they too are a fundamentally-challenged and boring team to watch play.
MLB has turned into highlights and people checking in on it to see how their rotisserie league team is doing. 90%-plus of the posts on here come from people looking at stats and regurgitating truthless narratives. Few actually watch games. I doubt that those 90%-plus of the posters ever played baseball other than wiffleball. No understanding of the sport at all.
Horseracing has withered to a shell of its former self in America for the same reason: Generations of people that didn’t understand the sport but wanted to bet on it. In time they found other outlets….like having a rotisserie league baseball team.
NFL ratings are higher than MLB. For national games.
But add up the viewers on the RSNs, and every day there are more people watching baseball than the NBA or the NFL.
Baseball viewership has become very regionalized. Football fans in St Louis (for example) are far more likely to watch an NFL game between the Seahawks and the Dolphins (especially if it’s the only game on) than baseball fans in St Louis will watch a game between the Mariners and Marlins.
Bright young players developed within the system who hustle and display good fundamentals…that was exactly the tripe put out in 2019-21 which would have been 3 straight 100 loss seasons but for the pandemic. Were you invested and glued to the TV every night or at OPACY?
By volume, fans are interested in stars, not a team full of Mateos. Maybe you don’t define them as “real fans” but their money is still green.
The NFL has 12 teams that have never won the Super Bowl, and the NBA has 10 teams. MLB only has 5 and 4 of them are contending right now!
Sorry but that is incorrect.
People like to watch the closer teams get to elimination, that is why the supper bowl will always get higher ratings regardless of which teams are involved. 7 Game series sports viewership is comparable across the board. see
NBA Finals 2021 Milwaukee Vs Phoenix average viewrship 9.91 M
By comparison the Ranges Vs Arizona was 9.08M Viewers
Though the NBA has seen 4 Finals that have had average viewership less than 10M since 2000 (those early Spurs dynasty finals where a snooze fest, and I like the Spurs).
Where Baseball has had 2 WS with an average viewership less than 10M and one of them was the COVID year which was a down year for all sports.
Are you accounting for # of games available? You can’t add (for example) viewership for 7 different baseball games versus 1 football game because you will count some of the same people 7 times. Its not a unique viewer, whereas the superbowl is all unique viewers.
I think I have watched less than 10 World Series games in the last 40 years, and very likely not full games. If the Orioles ever made it I would watch every game, so I would be “7 viewers” counting that way. I’m 0 in every other year..
But I’ve watched every superbowl in the last 41 years. My team’s only been in 5 of them.
ISD –
“According to MLB” – I think this is key – in 2024 they said average fan was 44, down from 49 in 2019. I find that very difficult to believe. I want to see an independent survey.
@Thornton
I was only speaking to what I have heard anecdotally. I did not know MLB had 44 as (I assume to be) a median age for their fans.
Rubenstein at the WEF whilst complaining that an organization is playing within the rules and reaping the benefit of creating a better product than their competitors? The joke writes itself!
Owners vs owners in the CBA negotiations isn’t gonna be great for them.
If they institute a salary cap they should get rid of market based revenue sharing and shorten team control to 3 years.
Huh?
The only way that a cap/floor system could work in baseball – as something that owners and the MLBPA would agree to – is if MLB has quite a bit more revenue sharing.
The current payroll disparity is primarily just a reflection of revenue disparity.
I could see a hard cap — but only if it required teams to spend 92% of the cap each year. And set it low enough that small-market teams can spend that 92% without going under.
They will never get 92%. I have been saying 80%. That would be 200-250M range, for example, between cap and floor. But no loopholes to get around either boundary like deferrals.
I remember when a team would develop players, make a shrewd trade or two, maybe sign a free agent and hand it over to a good manager and then go on to win.
But now it’s a team whose owners have hundreds of billions of dollars who buy the best players they can. Do you remember when people complained that the New York Yankees had the best team money could buy? No one cried about it more than the Dodgers and their fans. Sure I admit we all wish our teams could do that, however don’t the Dodgers and their fans look hypocritical. It’s sad and it’s bad for baseball so enjoy the game for the next two seasons.
What are you talking about? when the Yankees were dominating the league the Dodgers were mired in the Fox/McCourt ownership. Competing with the Yankees was the last thing on our minds.
“Toronto impressed Sasaki with its answer to a burning question: Why had his sizzling fastball lost velocity in 2024?”
Just like companies asking people to do some “sample work” in interviews. Tell me why I lost velocity then go fudge yourself
The Orioles were the most profitable team in baseball the past three years as we raked in over $250M in profit. Entering this offseason, team payroll was in the cellar of baseball at $77M. Out of the $37.5M that was intended for Corbin Burnes, there is still over $20M left on the table that we expected to be spending. With the additions of Morton, Sugano, Kittredge, Sanchez, O’Neill and picking up the options on Dominguez, O’Hearn and Perez the payroll has climbed up, but still sits under $150M. Given the existing rotation, bullpen and players due to return from injury later in the season, does it make sense now, more than ever, for the O’s to pull the big triggers and purchase themselves a World Series, especially considering that it will still have payroll under $225M on the year? By sacrificing the two draft picks received from the QO’s on Santander and Burnes, and adding four 1 year contracts totaling under $75M of payroll this season, the O’s could sign Jack Flaherty, Nathan Eovoldi, John Means and Nick Pivetta or Max Scherzer. This amount of depth guarantees the absolute best 4 arms will represent the postseason rotation at their best levels of performance, it guarantees the best possible 9+ arms anchoring the pen at their best levels of performance, it guarantees that we will be able to handle injuries in stride as well as being able to play it safe if we are made aware of any potential injuries similar to the Grayson Rodriguez circumstance at the end of 2024, and it guarantees that Elias will have the depth available to him at the All Star Break should a scenario emerge where a trade is eminent or of the utmost importance, without having to effect any of the young core that we covet so dearly. If the postseason monkey is a hurdle that requires special attention to overcome, the ability to lock a game down after 3-4 innings in a 1 run game would be the best way to accomplish that by far, especially if it is necessary on multiple occasions due to the monkey being more about a series win than an individual game, with the added bonus of adding confidence and relief throughout the team by possessing the knowledge of a weapon like that sitting up our sleeves. Is it possible to have a better all around situation where you’re able to punch a World Series ticket with such authority without having to not only take on a ton of payroll or sacrifice a number of young franchise players of the future, but also without having to tie yourself up or lock yourself down for any number of years beyond the 2025 season, especially with the factor of players having a much greater desire to come to Baltimore over other organizations knowing that we not only are defending World Champs, but young and talented enough, and well supported enough by a phenomenal front office, to ensure a continued trend of winning for a decade and beyond. Above all else, the impact this would have on the city and the fan base with the golden opportunity to finally be the team that makes the big splash and strokes the necessary checks, with the added potential bonus of a dual championship when the Ravens play to their potential next year and bring the Lombardi trophy back to Baltimore. One thing is for sure, the organization will see the return on their investment ten times over when fans not only have an opportunity to attend three full playoff series(since we will easy win the division with the #1 seed overall), but finally purchase all the merchandise and memorabilia with the ALCS/American League Pennant Champs and World Series/Fall Classic/World Champions writing plastered everywhere. We will definitely break records for attendance and overall revenue. Two draft picks that we already got for nothing in return, four separate one year contracts at a maximum value of $75M, and you will see a change throughout the city and at the yard every home game that will change the physical atmosphere around the world, and The Charm City will rock like it’s never rocked before, but absolutely will rock again because this will only be the beginning. The early days of a dynasty unlike any that has been seen in baseball in decades, or any sport, for that matter, in a long, long time.
“By sacrificing the two draft picks received from the QO’s on Santander and Burnes, and adding four 1 year contracts totaling under $75M of payroll this season, the O’s could sign Jack Flaherty, Nathan Eovoldi, John Means and Nick Pivetta or Max Scherzer. This amount of depth guarantees the absolute best 4 arms will represent the postseason rotation at their best levels of performance, it guarantees the best possible 9+ arms anchoring the pen at their best levels of performance, it guarantees that we will be able to handle injuries in stride as well as being able to play it safe if we are made aware of any potential injuries similar to the Grayson Rodriguez circumstance at the end of 2024, and it guarantees that Elias will have the depth available to him at the All Star Break should a scenario emerge where a trade is eminent or of the utmost importance, without having to effect any of the young core that we covet so dearly.”
OrioleOrange;
I had to stoped reading there.
Every one of those pitchers has had major injury issues in the past.
There are no guarantees in this life.
Amazed that no one’s explained that to you.
Samuel, having depth in the bullpen matters little if you can’t hand it a lead.
Depth at the 4/5 spot of the rotation just means no embarrassing “TBA” every 5 days like Dave Trembley.
The average TOR rotation pitcher may drop a clunker (unwinnable start, like 7 ER, 4 IP, think Daniel Cabrera 2007) 4 times a year. A 4/5 guy will have one every 4 starts, say 8 times a year. (Fill ins are even worse). Multiply that by 2-3 pitchers and you have 12 extra unwinnable games/year. That’s the difference between 1st and 3rd, or the difference between 2025 Yankees and Orioles.
ALL pitchers are vulnerable to arm injuries, not just expensive ones.
If the Orioles were smarter than everyone in the room, they’d have more playoff wins than everyone in the comments section at the least.
Orange-there will be no dynasty. The young core will be here only until the day arrives they can sign a big boy contract. They will be called “greedy and disloyal” immediately by “real” Oriole fans.
Baseball needs a Commisioner who has some balls aka Bowie Kuhn and not just puppet.
More importantly than all of these well thought out financial arguments…the Dodgers te-signed minor league catcher Chris Okey.
A salary cap won’t do anything. Using the Forbes numbers, most teams spend between 45-50% of revenue on player expenses. A salary cap won’t change that. What is needed is more equal revenue distribution. More revenue to the teams on the lower end will equal more spending.
This assumes teams will spend additional revenue will spend it on player payroll. Maybe some teams will. Others will count that as more profit to spread around to owners.
Separately, the MPBPA will not agree to a CBA without a significant concession that guarantees the league’s payroll pool will stay relatively the same. This means a salary floor and it will be a very big number the MLBPA demands that most small market teams will not agree to. Those owners will not give up the level of profits they’re accustomed to. Back to square one.
bigyoonit;
Golly…..
How do the NFL and NBA do what they do?
That’s not really as big a problem as people think. 20 of the 30 teams spent between 40%-60% of revenue on player expenses. 5 teams spent less than 40%, 5 spent more than 60%. One interesting thing to note, five of the six teams that Forbes projected to be operating at a loss were the five teams that went over 60%.
As far as “level of profits they’re accustomed to” goes, that’s another thing people get wrong. 21 of the 30 teams had profit of 15% of revenue or less. And of the 9 that were over, only 3 had profits more than 20%. I’m not going to fault any business that only turns a 15% profit.
The owner do have a major card in their bag that would get the players to agree to just about anything: free agency after 5 years instead of 6.
Every time we write a deferral article, there should be an emphasis on the California State Taxes. Cory Seager needs ZERO deferrals because Texas has a ZERO percent state taxes. California State Taxes are near FOURTEEN PERCENT.
Ohtani is saving as much as 90 Million Dollars in California State taxes.
Deferrals are a Win-Win for Everyone, except fans who like to complain about an issue that does not impact their lives.
Except for the place where the guy works and needs to provide services to their citizens.
Other sports do it without deferrals and operate in the same states
Number of different teams winning the championship since 2000:
NBA – 12 (salary cap league)
NFL – 13 (salary cap league)
NHL – 15 (salary cap league)
MLB – 16
A big factor in that is just the variance of short-series postseason baseball.
Exactly.
It’s OK for 4 teams to have most of the best players as long as they randomly blow it a lot.
MLB has longer regular season. What’s your point?
Baseball is just much harder to play, A Quarterback today completes almost 70 % of his passes, an NBA shooter 45-55%, and hitting a 100 mph fastball 25% Pitching is outlier, and still baseball has only 5 teams that did not win a World Series compared to 12 and 10 in the salary cap sports!
Here’s an answer…Tokyo Pirates, Shanghai Marlins, Mexico City A’s, London Rays…. according to owners some teams can’t support $150m payrolls.
Kasten should just say that it’s great for the Dodgers. Few teams have the resources, television market, and location advantage to compete with the Dodgers in acquiring players. Japanese players are lured by the Dodgers proximity to Japan. Also, the Dodgers are legally deferring money in player salaries. I can only hope that this will hamstring them in the future when that money comes due. As long as MLB allows the Dodgers to gobble up the best available players without more punitive consequences for doing so, they should remain the dominant force. No wonder Kasten and Dodger fans think it’s so great. By the way, the Dodger fans who are accusing other teams’ fans of crying would be crying just as loud, or louder, if the shoe were on the other foot. I don’t read replies so feel free to reply any way you wish!
After watching him in Washington, Kasten always came across to me as a bit of a BSer.
Players will never agree to a cap unless there are (at the same time) concessions elsewhere. I don’t think a salary floor would be enough to get players to sign off. Increase minimums and increased bonuses for All-star and end of season awards. There’s going to have to be something BIG to get players on board
All the other leagues and players associations do it. Not having a cap isn’t even good for the players, except the few who sign 9 figure deals with a half dozen teams. The MLBPA has its own members confused.
desertball;
If you haven’t noticed, a lot of things are changing quite a bit in America. The driving force has been a change in thinking and the behavior of the American people. For what it’s worth, we can vote in elections. More importantly, we’re constantly changing our habits, primarily due to options offered to us via technology. Primary areas changed in the last 15-20 years: How we read the news, what we watch on TV and movies, how we shop, how we communicate…..and other ways we spend our money. Once the momentum picks up and habits change, it doesn’t suddenly go back to what it was.
MLB is a defective product. There are more Americans living in areas that have teams that don’t compete the majority of the time than the number of Americans living in areas that do year-after-year. This business model is doomed.
They are already to high the lock out will make them sweat and cave, they gave too much power to the players union and some needs to be taken back
I think a lot of the hand-wringing comes from people who don’t understand economics. Deferrals, whatever else they do, mainly allow a player to exaggerate their income and get bragging points among their fellow multimillionaires and fans.
The main issue that a lot of people seem to have is that players are making a fortune off of something they wish they could do. Unless you want to watch people with skills similar to you and me playing, it doesn’t make much sense to worry too much about what the players are getting paid.
Deferrals are tax dodges. I would do the same.
People already do the same thing. It’s called a 401k.
Joe that’s only because our “owners” found it to be a cheaper alternative to pensions.
A lot of companies provide the same contribution to a DC plan as they would to a DB The difference is first, the long-term risk of how to invest the money falls on the employee, and second, DC plans are much easier and cheaper to administer.
Even from an employee perspective, unless you are spending most of your life at the same employer, and retire from them, a 401k might be better for you. If you are working a series of 5-year gigs, your DB plans won’t amount to much.
People would also stay with their companies for 40 years because they would take better care of good employees with promotions, raises, and pensions.
A DB plan is always far more expensive. Public safety employees can work 25 years and retire with 50% pension for life. Equate that to the 4% rule for a 401K and their 60K annual income is a 1.5M 401K balance – at age 47 when they retire, not 65. That’s why companies don’t do them and many municipalities are going bankrupt trying to keep up with them.
I have a state defined 403b, I contribute 5% (mandated) and they add 10%. Best benefits around. I can also open my own 401K with no match. Far cheaper for companies to add 2% to a fringe rate, when they will contribute 2% only if you contribute 5% and you’re not vested for 5 years, so well more than half the employees never get more than what they put in.
I think the only broken part of the system is the international part. The dodgers aren’t outmaneuvering any team or outspending any team or outworking any team. They simply have the luxury of being the team closest to Japan. I think a draft or NBA-like RFA system would be huge improvements.
Outside of that, everything else LA is doing is fair game and the other 29 teams could do it too if they tried, instead of whining. The Rays literally had this front office and wasted it.
When every team gets 335 million in local TV revenues rather than between 30-60 million, they can all do it. Otherwise, not a chance.
Amazing how Dodgers and Yankees fans think everyone is bringing in the same amount of revenues. It isn’t the NFL or NBA where that sort of thing happens, but then again those teams have a salary cap and floor. Just like MLB should.
Then again, when America has “leaders” and corporations that think as long as they get theirs, the hell with everyone else, that is the example the kids here have seen all their lives.
The reason the dodgers and Yankees have the money available is that they run the business side optimally. Any other team can also do that.
Random cities have made huge markets for themselves in football and basketball just by doing great business.
Football and basketball are salary cap leagues in which ALL revenues are shared. MLB is not.
reflect
The reason the dodgers and Yankees have the money available is that they run the business side optimally. Any other team can also do that.
=========================
You had to know that was wrong when you wrote it. A city with a 20M metropolitan are has a much. much higher level levels of revenue than an area with a 2M Metro area.
You can admit it; it is that obvious.
The Rays ” literally had this front office and wasted it” by not spending $300 million, you mean.
Thus proving the point.
They have non-Japanese players too
Turning now even smaller market teams into the Washington Generals for the traveling Dodgers Globetrotters Tour isn’t in the long range interest of MLB. But with the blackouts they’ve already created a generation of out of market fans.
Kasten is likely right. It was a boon for BB when Steinbrenner did it. We now have almost continual BB coverage now. Having BB fans for 29 other teams discussing Soto all off-season is great marketing.
Baseball markets it’s $$$ conflicts well and not it’s players. Creating negative publicity isn’t long range healthy
But the game keeps growing and the EE didn’t kill it, did it?
Kasten finding a new window dressing for trickle down.
“Don’t worry…us having everything is good for EVERYONE!”
The players could wait out an entire season over the salary cap. Could they wait out two? Can the owners wait out two seasons? Would such a work stoppage damage MLB beyond repair?
Rubenstein by himself probably has more money than almost all of the owners. Is he just another Angelos?
It looks that way!
Before Samuel or someone comments about 156M/15th for this year let me just say 18M committed for 2026 (among bottom 5) and ZERO for 2028 (tied for last). A slow start in 2025 can lead to a fire sale and they can go back to a 60M payroll within a few weeks.
I will keep saying it until I see a TOR pitcher sign a long term deal and young core extended.
So many people saying “this isn’t a socialist or communist business” (or something similar). In reality, yes it is. It has to be. Any sports league needs competition, otherwise they can’t sell their product. In business, If company A makes a better product and puts a company B out of business, that’s good for company A and they will succeed. That doesn’t work in baseball. They need the competition, and the tougher the competition the better.
It’s essentially a public trust. If anything the antitrust exemption makes it currently like a social state.
Cap and a floor, if you are over the cap you have to trade off people
Salary Cap is a trick by the greedy billionaire owners to rip off hard-working ballplayers. The NFL’s 50/50 split is a farce for players, same with the NHL.
If the players got a favorable split, then maybe OK. But MLB owners have always represented the league’s late 19th Century origins through their dim view of their workers.
Stay strong, players.
Exactly.
MLB’s 39/61 split is much better (for the owners).
Let the players cover team expenses from their share then. That 60% has to cover more line items than onfield labor. That’s not even covering the entirety of labor expenses.
The other leagues pay 50%.
Most businesses are paying around 50% to labor off the top. My wife has 120 employees and thats pretty close. Plus bonuses.
Try a non-profit. Labor is 74.6% of total expenses, FY25 Our revenue is 9 digits.
Last for-profit I was at was about at 62%.
Two-thirds of MLB team pay 40%-60% of revenue toward player expenses.
Understand your point but something has to change. The sport will not survive if it continues on like this having 2-3 teams with the most realistic chance each and every year of going to the playoffs and the WS. What the Dodgers are doing is within the rules but it’s a travesty. If I were a Dodger fan I would find it difficult to be a fan as I am sure that shooting fish in a barrel is not a sport.
Over the last ten years, Wild Card teams have made the World Series more often then the team with the best record in a league. The past World Series was the first in a decade where the two teams with the best records met.
Wild card has a hot team benefit.
So you’re saying it’s better to be hot than good. I don’t think that’s what “shooting fish in a barrel” means.
I think over 162 games..the wild card is often hotter in a short series than maybe the division winner who got cold. It seems to be the case. Adding a round might have helped.
But let’s say we just played a single series…. White Sox vs Dodgers. There’s a very healthy statistical chance that the Sox might win a short series.
Some team that wins 20 games in September to nab a wild card is much better in the moment than maybe the team that coasted to a division pennant by 15 games and won it in August basically.
Thus disproving the whole “only two or three teams have a realistic shot” line of nonsense. Thanks.
Im not a person who has advocated one or two teams having a chance. But we’re closer to some teams locking up playoffs spots. 162 games need to matter to sell tickets other than when the Dodgers are in town. It’s more complex.
We’re letting what, half the league in the playoffs now?
I also think the off time the bye allows kills momentum.
Mets fans, and most of the so-called experts, thought they had locked up a playoff spot before the 2023 season. And, as shown, having the best team does not automatically equate to winning a World Series.
There always has been, and there always will be (at least until a more equitable revenue sharing distribution), a small circle of teams that are the better teams season after season. A salary cap won’t change that. A salary floor won’t change that.
No, it won’t now. But as more higher revenue teams follow this model..they’ll eventually squeeze more teams out of the playoffs. Central divisions don’t seem to have too many flush teams outside of maybe the Cubs.
There’s what’s short term and what’s longterm in play.
Carrying water for billionaires, the new America.
How about the owners open the books and we base the cap on reality.
As usual nothing will get done unless one side or the other is forced to. There in all likelihood be no agreements during the offseason when the CBA expires. If they would that would benefit all parties especially the sports reputation and fan happiness. A whole year without baseball would be awful. I can easily see Trump getting involved. “I can get a deal done between the owners and players in 24 hours”! All parties need to think outside the box. If no salary cap then teams that exceed the cap lets say loose their first round pick and increase the luxury tax say 10% and lower the first tier 10%. Of course any deal would have to come with a salary floor. I think we fans are equally tired of deadbeat owners who have little concern for winning while most concern is with maximum profit.
Revenue sharing has little effect on winning a championship! The NFL has 12 teams and the NBA has 10 teams that have never won a championship. These leagues have less parity than MLB in my mind. To win you need a committed owner, good coaching, and the best players you can get. There are only 5 teams that have never won the world series and 4 are contenders as we speak. Only the Rockies seem to be stuck in anonymity!
You’ve brought this argument up many times now. I have to respond.
Of the NFL teams that have “never won the championship:”
Buffalo – been to the Super Bowl 4x – lost all 4. But won 2 AFL titles in the 60s.
Cincinnati – been to the SB 3x – lost all 3 – started 1968
Browns – no SB, but won 8 NFL championships in the 50s
Texans – have never passed the Divisional round, expansion team 2002
Jaguars – made 3 conference championships – expansion team 1995
Titans – have lost a SB, won 2 AFL titles in the 60s.
Chargers – have lost 1 SB but won an AFL title in 1963
Lions – no SB appearances but won 3 NFL titles in the 50s
Vikings – lost 4 SB’s in the 70s.
Falcons – lost 2 SB’s, have been around since 1966
Carolina – have lost 2 SB, expansion team in 1995
Cardinals – have lost 1 SB, but won 2 NFL titles long ago
Therefore, of those 12 teams:
– 6 won championships in the past when the championships were known by a different name.
– 3 of the others are expansion teams within the last 30 seasons – 1 has made the SB 2x, 1 made the conference championship 2x
– That leaves 3 teams
– – The Vikings, who were a dominant team in the 70s and made 4 superbowls
– – The Falcons, who were a Secret Base study for how inept the franchise has been, has made 2 super bowls
– – The Bengals, who have made the super bowl 3x and were so bad for so long they were known as the Bungles.
Let’s look at baseball
Rockies – Expansion team since 1993, 1 WS appearance
Rays – Expansion team since 1998, 2 WS appearances
Mariners – Started 1977 – no WS appearances, 3x ALCS in the 90s
Brewers – Started 1969 – 1 WS appearance (1982), 2x ALCS recently
Padres – Started 1969, – 2 WS appearances
Yes, less teams. But many teams you are counting from much longer ago and forgetting about some really, really big gaps.
Blue Jays – Last won WS in 1993, have not been back
Twins – Last won WS in 1991, have not been back
Reds – Last won WS in 1990, have not been back
A’s – Last won WS in 1989, have not been back
Mets – Last won WS in 1986, made 2x WS since then
Tigers – Last won WS in 1984, made 2x WS since then
Orioles – Last won WS in 1983, only 2x ALCS appearances since then
Pirates – Last won WS in 1979, had the 3x ALCS appearances way back in early 90s.
Indians – Last won WS in 1948. Been back a few times. Were so bad they made a great movie and a couple bad sequels about them.
Red Sox – went 86 years between titles
Cubs – went 108 (?) years between titles
So with baseball you have:
2x – 90s era expansion teams who have never won
3x = late 60s/70s expansion teams who have never won
BUT
9x – teams that have not won since 1993 or earlier
2x – teams that went 3+ generations without winning and were known pre-eminently until then for their futility.
If you look at it the other way, baseball had its parity in the 80s
– A different WS champ every year 1980-89
– A total of 16 different teams appear in the WS
In the last 10 years to match payroll with success
Dodgers – #1 in payroll, 2 WS titles in last 10 years, #1 win PCT last 10 yrs
Phillies – #2 in payroll, lost 2022 WS, #16 win PCT last 10 yrs (but 82, 87, 90, 95 last 4 years)
Yankees – #3 in payroll, lost 2024 WS, #3 in win PCT last 10 yrs
Mets – #4 in payroll, lost 2015 WS and 3 other playoff appearances last 10 years, #11 in win PCT last 10 years (plus they are the Mets)
Blue Jays – #5 in payroll, 5 playoff appearances in last 10 yrs, #13 in win PCT last 10 years
Astros – #6 in payroll, 2 WS titles and 2 losses in last 10 yrs, #2 win PCT last 10 years
The Mets are the Mets and widely acknowledged to be poorly run, spend on anything. The Jays are getting that reputation.
But they both have had much more success over time than many cheap franchises – they are over .500 in the past 10 years with playoff appearances.
But look at the bottom of the league with payroll
Miami – owner known to be a cheapskate, 62-100 last year
A’s – we’ve heard about this guy too, 69-93
Rays – here is your cheap bare bones owner who does just enough to make the team competitive consistently (the model franchise for the Orioles, apparently), recently higher but sold off last 2 yrs
White Sox – Most. Losses. Ever.
Pittsburgh – Bad for years
Washington – Owners known to be having a fire sale after winning their one title
Guess who else was down there until this winter? The Orioles, the worst team 2017-21, known to have the cheapest owner in baseball until he died a year ago.
I don’t know about you, but really looks like $ tied to success in baseball, and that when you account for the championships won by NFL teams before it was called the super bowl and/or MLB teams who haven’t won in forever, sure looks like the NFL has the lead in parity.
That’s even with the refs giving all the games to the Patriots before and now the Chiefs.
I am disappointed that Kasten’s answer wasn’t, “Your team can do this too.”
Stay on-message, Dodgers, stay on-message…
End private ownership of teams. MLB gets control of all teams/stadiums with each city getting a cut. Team appoint a CEO? and TV/ad/merch revenue is spread out evenly with some caveats. Local taxes are considered in money allotment. Billionaires don’t get to pocket the extra cash.
More than 2/3 of respondents to MLBTR’s poll:
“I want the actual players, who are the whole reason I watch, and who are responsible for all of the revenue that every team generates, to earn less money.”
If there is a floor the players as a whole will make MORE money. The top 1% are the only ones who have reason to complain. Are they so unwilling to help their fellow players?
Given how the top 1% act regarding taxes in real life, I think we all know the answer.
Correct to some extent. The average right now is 148M per Spotrac, right about the middle (the Orioles are 15th, closest to that average)
Bottom 5 teams are at 63M and below
Top 5 teams are at 223M and above
Teams 11-20 (the middle 10) range from 177M-106M
Although the average lies right at the 15th ranked team, those top 5 teams are doing some heavy lifting. and the bottom 5 are barely contributing
Obviously all the lowest paid players are those without much tenure in the league, but the league minimum in baseball compared to what the top stars are paid is embarrassing. At least in the NFL that gap is a lot narrower depending on position (QB’s might compare to the disparity across all MLB)
I think you answered your own questions, which is why if they tried to be smart and implement a cap and floor, let’s say 10% on either side of the 150M average, so hard cap 165M, hard floor 135M, all the complaining will be from your top stars, the Yankees, Dodgers, etc. and from the cheapskate teams….but not the lower paid players.
It needs to be fixed, the 2027 season will not exist as a result, but it isn’t going to get better on its own.
The most profitable MLB business model is to have a low payroll and collect money from higher spending teams – even better if your team can have a few successful seasons – this model is followed by about a third of the league
The next most profitable MLB business model is to control your media rights and have a reasonably competitive team year in year out – probably about 5 or 6 teams do this
Most of the rest are still profitable with payroll in the middle.
Then there are the Mets who are neither profitable nor successful but at least they are trying – they are part of. a bigger business model
Baseball franchise values have trailed NFL and NBA growth due to mediocre business models – the White sox want to build a $2 billion stadium for their $1 billion dollar franchise for example – the minor leagues feed into the mediocrity – every team controls 200 players but can only produce 2-4 solid contributors per year – reducing the number of meaningless games played and having more training and development would probably yield better results but the clinging to old ways lead to old results – MLB needs new approaches if they want to stay relevant – everyday we wake we make a choice and the MLB chooses to be mediocre
Let’s start with a floor first and see how that works out.
I would gladly sacrifice a season if it ment having a cap and more importantly for the team I grew up rooting for a FLOOR. I love my pirates but I’m all for forcing cheap ass Nutting to spend money,he is in the running for worst owner Fisher close 2nd . I’d love to see MLB force out owners like Nutting & Fisher
Do y0u think businesses shouldn’t turn a profit? For 2023, 21 of the 30 teams either lost money or turned a profit of 15% of revenue or less. Only 3 turned a profit of more than 20% of revenue. The actual dollar profit for almost half the teams wouldn’t be enough to cover one year of Bregman. For two-thirds, that is less than one year of Soto.
The idea that owners are pocketing hundreds of million of dollars is a falsehood. The idea that a business shouldn’t turn a profit is asinine.
So here’s my view of this. There are a number of franchises that would not be financially viable but for revenue sharing. They simply would not exist. They’re sort of like free players in those pay to win mobile games.
The existence of super teams and super stars on them figures to raise revenues overall, thus increasing the amount that revenue sharing recipients receive. It’s actually a fun little symbiotic relationship if you ignore the pseudo-competitive aspect of it.
In fact, there may be franchises that actually benefit MORE from Ohtani being a Dodger than they would from him being on their small-market team. Like the Rays, who can’t PAY people to go to a game… Same for Soto being a Met.
And so this is why I imagine these small market teams and owners not complaining nearly as much as their fanbases. They’ve all opened the books and know what’s best for one another. And it’s this.