{"id":1799,"date":"2009-12-18T11:38:43","date_gmt":"2009-12-18T18:38:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2009\/12\/18\/world-series-for-sale\/"},"modified":"2009-12-18T14:12:31","modified_gmt":"2009-12-18T21:12:31","slug":"world-series-for-sale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2009\/12\/18\/world-series-for-sale\/","title":{"rendered":"World Series for Sale"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00c2\u00a0What do Bud Selig, Bill Veeck, the Hot Stove, and Joseph Heller have in common?\u00c2\u00a0 More than you might think…<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The musical chairs game of Major League Baseball\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s free agency has begun and already, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve witnessed some big names shipped to some big-name places.\u00c2\u00a0 The New York Yankees turned Austin Jackson and Phil Coke into Curtis Granderson, allowed Hideki Matsui to sign in Anaheim, re-signed Andy Pettitte,<\/a> and have yet to decide on the future of Johnny Damon.\u00c2\u00a0 John Lackey is now a member of the Red Sox.\u00c2\u00a0 Cliff Lee joins Chone Figgins in Seattle.\u00c2\u00a0 Roy Halladay replaces Lee in Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

Does a pattern emerge here?<\/p>\n

Once again, teams like the Kansas City Royals, the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the Washington Nationals remain conspicuously absent from the buyers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 lane.\u00c2\u00a0 Players like Matt Holliday, Jason Bay, and Orlando Hudson remain unsigned.\u00c2\u00a0 What are the chances that Washington makes a play for Holliday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s $10 million-plus-per-year price tag?\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Holliday would lend the Nationals instant credibility, provide protection in the lineup for Ryan Zimmerman, and sell some tickets while the nation\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s capital waits for the debut of Stephen Strasburg.\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a better chance that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d rent the movie The Last Holiday<\/em>, starring Queen Latifah, than there is that Washington would make a legitimate offer to <\/a>the Matt Holliday.<\/p>\n

Everyone close to the game sits back and decries the fact that every year, the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.\u00c2\u00a0 The competitive gap between the haves and the have-nots widens exponentially with every passing off-season.\u00c2\u00a0 The Yankees steamrolled through October and early November 2009 propelled by the initial momentum they gained by wiping the floor with the not-quite-ready-for-primetime Twins.\u00c2\u00a0 No matter the guts or fortitude of their opponent, the 2009 Yankees simply had too much talent.<\/p>\n

While this collection of talent didn’t congeal overnight and New York\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s success relied as heavily upon the role players and the team concept instilled by journeyman Nick Swisher and the pie-in-the-face antics of A.J. Burnett, at the end of the day, the Yankees won, because they could afford to win.\u00c2\u00a0 C.C. Sabathia, whose salary far exceeds that of every one of his contemporaries, tossed the first pitch of the World Series.\u00c2\u00a0 The final pitch of the World Series was thrown by the highest paid closer in the game, picked up by one of the highest paid second basemen in the league, thrown to the league\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s highest paid first baseman, and backed up by one of the game\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s highest paid catchers.<\/p>\n

However, many baseball fans examine the facts above, freak out; declare that the Yankees buy championships; and determine that they ruin baseball\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s competitive balance.\u00c2\u00a0 Then these same people run out and buy a bright pink Red Sox hat.\u00c2\u00a0 It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not that simple.\u00c2\u00a0 The Yankees are far from the cause of the competitive imbalance that plagues today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s game.\u00c2\u00a0 In fact, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re simply the biggest symptom of a problem far more inherent and deep-seeded in Major League Baseball.<\/p>\n

The major issue in question is the conspicuous absence of a genuine salary cap and a comprehensive system of revenue sharing.\u00c2\u00a0 Take a look around.\u00c2\u00a0 The NFL is undeniably the most profitable and entertaining professional sport.\u00c2\u00a0 By using a strict salary cap, non-guaranteed contracts, and a system of revenue sharing that ensures the success of most teams in the league, the NFL has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry, while simultaneously ensuring that its teams are generally on an even playing field.<\/p>\n

Conversely, baseball, more than any other professional sport, suffers from the shortsightedness and greed of its governing bodies.\u00c2\u00a0 The majority of baseball owners invest in teams not to put an exciting and competitive product on the field, but to line their own pockets.\u00c2\u00a0 Owners like the late Bill Veeck, who went bankrupt on a number of occasions trying to entertain his viewing audience and win a championship, are rare commodities.\u00c2\u00a0 Instead, fans in Pittsburgh, Cleveland, or Kansas City are forced to watch last place teams, despite their franchises receiving basically free money in luxury tax payments and television-generated revenue.<\/p>\n

In sports, the division between the first and second division, should never be financial.\u00c2\u00a0 It should always be decided on the field, during the season, not in some conference room in late December.\u00c2\u00a0 However, until baseball has a commissioner willing to take a stand against the greedy owners, whose best interests\u00e2\u20ac\u201daccording to Veeck\u00e2\u20ac\u201dnever coincide with the best interests of the game, and to battle the unreasonably powerful players\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 union, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll never see the competitive balance in baseball restored.<\/p>\n

Joseph Heller\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s comedic masterpiece, Catch-22<\/em>, is named after the conundrum that pilots during World<\/a> War II generally did not want to fly in missions, because they feared being shot down.\u00c2\u00a0 However, in order to avoid a mission, a pilot had to prove that he was insane.\u00c2\u00a0 By regulations, the only way to judge sanity was based on a person\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sense of self-preservation.\u00c2\u00a0 Simply, if a pilot didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to fly, then he wanted to live, and thus he was of a sound mind, and had to fly.<\/p>\n

Welcome to baseball economics, as written by Joseph Heller.\u00c2\u00a0 Owners unwilling to pay the exorbitant prices for star players demand a salary cap in order to return baseball\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s competitive balance.\u00c2\u00a0 However, at the same time, these same owners don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want a salary cap, because a limit on payroll also means that there must exist a payroll minimum.\u00c2\u00a0 Thus, cash-conscious owners will never allow the implementation of the very limitations that they demand.<\/p>\n

Would anyone be surprised if it eventually came out that no one would be able to meet with Bud Selig while he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s in his office, a la Major Major?\u00c2\u00a0 Instead, interested parties would be greeted by his receptionist, who would then alert Selig to their presence, allow him time to climb out the window, and then show them into his office.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, like Heller\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Yossarian, baseball fans are stuck flying an unending string of missions with no logical or illogical way out.<\/p>\n

Until something really changes, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re only left with one question:<\/p>\n

Who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to buy the next World Series title?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00c2\u00a0What do Bud Selig, Bill Veeck, the Hot Stove, and Joseph Heller have in common?\u00c2\u00a0 More than you might think…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":53,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/53"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1799\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}