The Year the Yankees Cut Payroll, MLB Owners Are Chirping About a Salary Cap
Baseball January 15th. 2009, 5:30pm
We’re unapologetic in our desire for a salary cap in MLB, and finally, some owners are behind us!
Mark Attanasio, Milwaukee: “I would ask, if it’s such a bad idea, what sport doesn’t have a salary cap other than us?”
Lew Wolff, Oakland: “It’s a very good question, because maybe this recession, depression, whatever we’re in may be a change for a lot more years” (Using the economy as leverage. Brilliant!)
Bob Nutting, Pittsburgh: “There’s no question that, a market like Pittsburgh, a salary cap would be advantageous.”
The target seems to be after the 2011 season. We’re not exactly hopeful. This, of course, does not mean you’re in store for three more years of salary cap debates. Not even we could stomach that.
Everytime we write about the salary cap, we get a few emails saying a cap would ruin the game, it wouldn’t work, Bob Costas is a fool for thinking the sport needs one, or simply that baseball doesn’t need one. Some folks cite this in-depth article, so we thought we’d offer a pre-emptive strike and get that out of the way.
20 Responses to “The Year the Yankees Cut Payroll, MLB Owners Are Chirping About a Salary Cap”
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January 15th, 2009 at 5:34 PM
Isn’t the NFL losing their cap in a year or two?
January 15th, 2009 at 5:37 PM
I never knew El DeBarge played for the Pirates
/pubic stash’d
January 15th, 2009 at 5:44 PM
I’m 50/50 on a cap. On one hand, I really think it’s possible to do it where it’s fair to the small-market teams, but on the other hand everytime a team with a lower payroll wins the AL or the WS everyone can make fun of the Yankees.
January 15th, 2009 at 5:53 PM
Anytime the Yankees have to follow rank (or get screwed over), it’s a good thing.
However, does anybody know what makes these three owners similar?
January 15th, 2009 at 5:54 PM
/fixed
//Open ended
January 15th, 2009 at 5:54 PM
I don’t think there is a reason to have a salary cap. The team with the second lowest payroll in MLB last season made it to the World Series. Their highest paid player made $6m. The top three payroll teams (Yanks, Mets, Tigers) missed the playoff. Teams like the Pirates are awful because they are run ineptly, not because there’s a small market.
They already have a quasi-salary cap with the luxury tax. The only team that pays money under that is the Yankees. It does curb the Yankees spending because it effectively doubles how much money they have to pay.
January 15th, 2009 at 5:57 PM
The problem is not teams spending too much money. It is teams not spending enough. If you place a hard cap at say $110m. That doesn’t mean the Pirates or the Marlins are going to raise their payroll to meet it.
January 15th, 2009 at 6:19 PM
What’s the problem with the current system again? I think its pretty well established that baseball has as much diversity of play-off participants and champions as any of the other sports. I guess people complain that the Yanks and Red Sox make it virtually every year, but my gut tells me their run isn’t any greater than Dodgers, A’s, and Red’s would have been in the 70’s and 80’s had we had three divisions and a wildcard then. And I know they haven’t broken any of the Braves records from the 90’s. So what more do you want of a system?
January 15th, 2009 at 6:23 PM
The issue to be addressed with a salary cap isn’t that low revenue teams can’t win – obviously if they run their operation well they can open up a window of opportunity to be successful for a few years. The issue to address with a salary cap is that the Yankees are able to do just about everything wrong and still be competitive. Sure, they haven’t won a World Series since 2000, but they also made blunders like signing Pavano and have still been in the playoffs almost every year. A team like the Rays or Pirates or Royals can’t afford a single mistake like the Pavano signing, but the Yankees just outspend their mistakes in order to stay successful.
This is supposed to be a sport, where everyone plays by the same rules. How exactly is it sporting when one or two teams have the ability to spend far more than other teams? Not that I blame the Yankees or Red Sox. In fact, I’ve always thought that Steinbrenner does exactly what I’d want my owner to do: whatever it takes to put a winner on the field.
I also think there should be a salary floor – because the loser owners that aren’t trying to put a winner on the field and just want to pocket the luxury tax dollars shouldn’t be allowed to do that, either.
January 15th, 2009 at 6:39 PM
+1 roarke
I’ve nver understood the diversity of playoff participants argument. Thats a huge logic hole in that one.
January 15th, 2009 at 7:08 PM
What’s the logic hole? If the Yanks or Sox don’t actually win, why do you care if they are still competitive while losing? The goal for every team should be to win and baseball has a system which prvides the opportunity to do so at a very competitive rate. A better rate than almost any other time in its history in fact.
January 15th, 2009 at 7:19 PM
They can’t even agree on the DH; how the fuck are they going to agree to a salary cap?
January 15th, 2009 at 7:35 PM
The problem is that a team like the Rays can be good for a couple of years, but in 2-3 years they won’t be able to afford all of the talent that they developed and they’ll go back to being a bad team until they get another crop of young talented players that can win.
The Yankees on the other hand can go out and spend as much as they need to to win, and when they do have young talented players they can afford to keep them and keep their window open that much longer.
January 15th, 2009 at 7:55 PM
The problem is that a team like the Rays can be good for a couple of years, but in 2-3 years they won’t be able to afford all of the talent that they developed and they’ll go back to being a bad team until they get another crop of young talented players that can win.
The Yankees on the other hand can go out and spend as much as they need to to win, and when they do have young talented players they can afford to keep them and keep their window open that much longer
I agree with this point. But the only reason that should really matter is if that leads to the Yankees winning an outsized percentage of the time. But results are showing that, at least with the sport in the current form, it doesn’t. I can’t pretend to know exactly why that is, whether it be that baseball talent happens to be the best when it also happens to be cheapest, or because talent evaluation is so difficult as to outweigh spending power, or simply that there is significant luck involved with the game. What does seem to be the case though is that the current system is producing an accepatable array of succesful franchises and champions. I just don’t get the outcry to change that. My guess is that if you take all the excess capital that the big teams spend on salaries and force them to redploy it they will find another, perhaps even more efficient way, to use it to their advantage.
January 15th, 2009 at 8:07 PM
Have you ever seen the different stadiums? and you know one league makes the pitchers hit?
My problem with a salary cap is that no one ever presents good evidence of why the sport need ones. Intuitively it seems “fair” but that is not the case at all. Salary cap would just be a wealth transfer from players to owners and putting on a arbitrary imposed limit which would likely lead to a sub par product (its economics).
January 15th, 2009 at 10:48 PM
Sox have locked up MVP winner Pedroia for 6 years and $40.5 mil, they’re about to sign MVP top 3 finisher Youkilis for 4 years and $40 mil. Papelbon filed for arbitration today, but don’t be surprised to hear a new deal worked out for him in the next couple of weeks.
Pedroia, Youk, Smoltz, and Penny all for about $100 mil. That’s 1/4 of C.C. (I’m pushing 3 bills) Sabathia, A.J. (I’ve had two good seasons…my walk years) Burnett, and Mark (Don Mattingly is my hero, even though I wasn’t old enough to remember most of his career) Texiera.
January 15th, 2009 at 10:56 PM
So the “story” here is that the small market teams think it would be better if there was a cap in baseball? WOWZERS!!&!*(&@#
January 15th, 2009 at 10:57 PM
One, the Yankees success is not self-evident. They run the organization well and make a lot of money. That’s why they have it to spend. They were the first club to realize owning their own network was a good idea.
Second, it’s not like the Yankees’ economic advantage is a pressing issue. It’s been that way for 60+ years. Even before free agency, there was no draft. The Yankees just signed all of the best kids. It wasn’t a coincidence Mickey Mantle etc. ended up in NY.
January 15th, 2009 at 11:11 PM
They do make a lot of money. But how well do they run the organization? The 96-2000 teams were built completely opposite of the way the team now is being constructed.
In all seriousness…Wang is a great pitcher, 1 or 2 on most staffs. CC had a helluva year. The Brewers pitched his arm off, not to mention he’s a cannoli short of 300lbs. Burnett has had two good years (final of both his contracts) and been injury-riddled. Joba is going from the pen to the rotation after they shut him down at the end of last year. 5th starter?
Sorry, I’m not scared of the Yankees this year. The Rays have almost the entire team back that got to the WS, the Sox are going in with at least six starters in their rotation…why should we care about how much the Yankees spend? They’ll be the highest-payrolled third place team ever.
January 16th, 2009 at 8:37 AM
The problem isn’t a salary cap, the problem is dumb teams. If you give KC, Pitt, or San Fran more money to spend, they’re not gonna go out and get CC or ARod. They’re going to spend their money on the Gil Meches and Randy Winns of the world.