Now this is Moneyball!!
A match-up between the two largest payroll teams in each league. The Phillies and their $129 million dollar payroll do battle with the Yankees $207 million dollar payroll.
This follows a lead-in where every playoff series except one was decided by the team with the largest payroll winning over the team with the smaller payroll. And the one series where the smaller payroll did win, it was a virtual toss-up (Angels over the Sawks).
So you would have won five of the six playoff series simply by picking the team with the larger payroll. Following the trend, pick the Yankees to win easily over the Phillies.
Fun Moneyball Factoid:
The difference between the Yankees payroll and the Phillies payroll ($78.2 million) is greater than TOTAL payroll of 14 of the 30 franchises in major league baseball.
Is this good for baseball?
Is this a level playing field?
Isn't this rigging of the game in favor of the large media, large population franchises good for TV ratings in the short-term, but bad for the game long-term.
And then to hear my favorite little doorstop of a reporter from New York make the case that Yankee fans are the best fans in the world. For what? For continuing to come through the turnstiles in record numbers in the midst of the recession. Wow, they really have it tough.
Tell your problems to Saints fans who continued to support their team after their city nearly got blown off the map. And who continued to support the team even after losing a significant chunk of their population in the aftermath.
The New York metropolitan area, even after the current financial crisis, still has a population base of over 10 million fans to draw from and only one other team to share that base with.
It must be hard for New York fans when the system hands them the baseball version of the Globetrotters and invites the Washington Generals in on a nightly basis to "compete". And then puff out your chests and act like you accomplished something real or "earned" the title of "best fans in the world". Please!!!
Someone do a public service and please seat Mr. Lupica under the already crumbling structures around the "new" Yankee Stadium. I guess a billion dollars doesn't buy quality stadium construction these days.
Baseball's problem now and in the future is that a city like New Orleans--that supports the NFL and the NBA--would not be able to compete in the current economic and competitive environment of major league baseball. So where to expand? What community leader is willing to subject himself, his city and his wealth to this kind of a rigged game. Go to Vegas, at least you might get a free drink and a dancer.
In 1990, the Kansas City Royals had the top highest payroll in major league baseball. And the Yankees were somewhere in the middle of the pack. The Pirates were a viable, competitive franchise.
In 2000, the Yankees and Red Sox were nudging to the top along with the Braves and the Texas Rangers under owner Tom Hicks. Even then there were other teams within shouting distance of the leaders.
Today, we see a "haves" and "have-nots" division of the teams, with the top two or three teams having the odds of making and advancing deep into the playoffs heavily stacked in their favor. We have the top franchises treating their "business partners" with a "let them eat cake" attitude regarding revenue sharing.
It may be good for New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and maybe Chicago (eventually) but last time I checked, that accounts for eight of the thirty franchises in baseball. I'm not sure how long fans in the other cities will continue coming in record numbers to see AAAA baseball in their towns.
It is time to admit that the increasing disparity in payrolls--that has grown ever greater since the mid 1990s--is an indication that the so-called "luxury tax" has been largely ineffective. It functions as little more than temporary "hush money" to the smaller markets so that the larger market teams can continue to treat them like doormats under the facade of competitive balance.
Even MLB knows this. This is another George Mitchell Report that is gathering dust or being used as a doorstop at the league offices. This report is from 2000!!! And nothing substantive has been done to address the problems identified.
http://www.mlb.com/news/press_releases/press_release.jsp?ymd=20000701&content_id=388144&vkey=pr_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb
"Baseball's current economic system has created a caste system in which only high revenue and high payroll clubs have a realistic opportunity to reach the post-season," Mitchell said. "That is not in the best interests of baseball fans, clubs or players."
The economic analysis set out in the report further indicates that the limited revenue sharing and payroll taxes approved as part of the 1996 Collective Bargaining Agreement with the Major League Baseball Players Association have "produced neither the intended moderating of payroll disparities nor improved competitive balance."
It is past time for these guys to take another more serious run at this issue. For the good of The Game.
GO PHILLIES!!!! I'm sorry but rooting for the Yankees to do well is like rooting for Goldman Sachs. It just doesn't seem right.
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