Jayson Stark is Here to Remind You That MLB has More Parity Than the NFL
By Jason McIntyre
So with the NFL touting six new playoff teams in 2012 … well, Jayson Stark decided somebody needed to speak up for baseball. (Don’t you have a hot stove to tend to, Jayson?)
"Which sport has had more parity lately? It isn’t even that close. Over the last six seasons, 36 of the NFL’s 72 playoff teams repeated. That’s 50 percent. But over in baseball, only 19 of 48 repeated. That’s 39.6 percent."
Give me a salary cap and a level playing field over parity any day. Parity might sound good for baseball, but when you’ve got a St. Louis-Texas World Series nobody is paying attention to, does it matter?
"Since 2004, only five baseball teams — the Yankees, Red Sox, Angels, Phillies and Cardinals — have reached the postseason five times or more. In the NFL, NINE teams have done that — the Patriots, Steelers, Colts, Ravens, Chargers, Giants, Packers, Eagles and Seahawks."
Man, the Seahawks have been to the playoff five times in that span, and the Cowboys haven’t? Wow. Those MLB teams don’t surprise me – they’re all big spenders. The other 20-something teams are interchangeable and move in and out of the playoffs. [ESPN]
* Couched with potentially because, depending on what metric you want to use, it’s really very close between the NBA and MLB. It’s impossible to compare by attendance because of the size of the stadiums. Do you really want to compare revenues for a sport that plays 162 games vs. one that plays 82 games? TV Ratings seems like the best comparison, since both sports play a seven game series to end the year. But MLB fans will argue they are competing with the NFL/college football in November; NBA fans will argue they’re competing with summer vacations in mid-June. If you care, here’s the rating for the 7th game of the World Series in 2011. Here’s the rating for the 6th game of the NBA Finals in 2011.