Why this year, as opposed to any other year since 2000 when the Yankees have led the league in payroll, and NOT won the World Series?? If anything, the Yankees have to do good this year to remain somewhat relevant. If they miss the playoffs again, things will be pretty scary for baseball next off-season. They may just buy another team to give them twice the chances. Baseball will NEVER have a salary cap... NEVER. To pine for one is ridiculous, and like the NBA, you will still have the perennial haves and have-nots regardless of a cap. And if you still continue to pay attention, you'll realize that the current parity is actually better than what you have in the NBA.
I love the game of baseball. I hate what the MLB has done to it. I find more enjoyment out of hanging out at Reckling Park than I do watching the Stros on TV.
Its true, I just read this info in a dc sports column yesterday. He considered the Nationals because they offered him the most money and are close to his hometown. He ultimately signed with the yankees for less because the yankees give him a better chance at winning. Again im not saying that he signed solely for the chance of winning more, but the yankees were not the highest bidder in the negotiations. He was so quick to accept the offer that he didnt even wait for the nationals to counter it.
You're suggesting the Nationals offered MORE than $180 million? I seriously doubt that. Even the big market, contending Angels and Red Sox weren't in that neighborhood. Why on earth would the last place Nationals invest that much in one player? They would still be right around last place.
The Nationals know they suck and in order to compensate for that they had to pay more to get him to play there.
Poor Giradi.. If he wins the series he will hear heck anybody could win with that team... If they don't than there is the constant speculation that your gone... Get off to a bad start and the rumblings could start in June...
i find it hard to believe the nationals offered more than 180 mill....not saying its not possible. at this point a little to hard to tell...you never know what people will say, a lot of times gms say one thing just to get the media all involved just to manipulate negotiations and such.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=3792214&name=gammons_peter Don't blame Yankees for living the American way Wednesday, December 24, 2008 | Print Entry Posted by Peter Gammons They are, after all, the Yankees, as Hal Steinbrenner and Brian Cashman have so boldly reminded us. Scott Boras knew that, and knew that no matter where the Red Sox went, he could always come back to the Yankees and get $10 million more because everyone knew how much Theo Epstein coveted Mark Teixeira. That's the way it is. All the innuendo about Teixeira not caring for Larry Lucchino and John Henry doesn't really matter, because Teixeira was going to New York. To the Yankees, who have a brand new Bloomberg ballpark and two Steinbrenner brothers who are sick and tired of hearing how the Red Sox have twice as many world championships as The Bombers in the 21st century. The Yankees patiently waited for a year and allowed Cashman to pass on Johan Santana so that when he rebuilt the Yankees, it would not be at any expense to the farm system he wanted to build. So the Yanks finished eight games behind the Tampa Bay Rays for one season? And, by the way, there may not be three free agents next year worth anything close to $423.5 million (the total amount of money in the contracts given to Teixeira, CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett). Now the Yankees are back in the high life, again, in a position where they will be the heavy favorites with the pressure that anything less than winning the 2009 World Series will be considered failure. Just ask Joe Girardi. The Yankees have the highest-paid first baseman, the highest-paid third baseman, the highest-paid shortstop, the highest-paid catcher, the highest-paid starting pitcher and the highest-paid reliever in the history of the game. Feel sorry for the Red Sox? No. Feel sorry for the Brewers and the Blue Jays and the Rangers? Yes, because for all the Yankees may pay in luxury tax and revenue-sharing money, for all the fannies they put in opposing teams' seats, for all Bud Selig does to try to level the playing field, the Yankees are back to being a smartly run business. And their business is to turn as much of the baseball business as possible into a game of fattening frogs for snakes, as Sonny Boy Williamson once put it. We have months to see how the Yankees mesh, what scabs they develop, what injuries they must overcome, whether the expectations make the game joyless despite the joy that Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera and Sabathia bring to the ballpark every day. We do know that the Red Sox and Mets are back in the Yankees' shadow; Boston still has close to $40 million to work with, and the Mets claim their baseball operations will not be harmed by the Bernie Madoff scandal, even though Madoff handled some of the revenues the Mets put aside to fund deferred contracts and some other payments. As much as the Red Sox obsess about the Yankees, the Sabathia, Burnett and Teixeira signings -- yes, historians, Teixeira's father was a high school teammate and friend of Bucky Dent -- this winter readjusts the landscape. The fact is that in Red Sox Nation, there were a growing number of fans who were more like George Steinbrenner than they wish to admit, who thought what didn't happen for 86 years had become an annual right, misanthropes for whom anything less than winning the World Series was, using George's word, failure. Now they're reminded that the Red Sox cannot win the revenue war, and that winning will continue to depend on the development of players like Lars Anderson, Jed Lowrie, Clay Buchholz, Michael Bowden and Justin Masterson. They can be reminded that last season Kevin Youkilis had three more extra-base hits than Teixeira, who had one more than Dustin Pedroia. This isn't like the Brewers not even getting a first-round pick for Sabathia. Even if the Red Sox change their minds about Jason Varitek and his representation by Boras (having turned down $10 million in arbitration for Varitek, Boras has to convince a team to give up a top draft pick and pay Varitek), they can take someone else's bad contract if a catcher comes in the package. They can afford to chance an investment in John Smoltz and/or Brad Penny. They can sign Rocco Baldelli if the doctors think it would be wise. Boras did a great job of pointing out how the Red Sox could be wounded by not shelling out big money for Teixeira, but if Mike Lowell and David Ortiz come back strong physically in 2009, they find a catcher and Josh Beckett gets healthy again, they can chase the Yankees and come October have two top-caliber starters in Beckett and Jon Lester. Come June, when a couple of teams have to move payroll because of the economy's impact on that team's or owner's finances, there may be some very good players (possibly Magglio Ordonez) to be repossessed. But the Red Sox can also resume the role of underdog, which to an organization priding itself on the flow of self-developed talent isn't a bad thing. We have seen how well Ben Cherington, the Red Sox's vice president of player personnel, and Mike Hazen, Boston's director of player development, have built a player development environment which has led to many seamless transitions from the minor leagues into the Fenway Park pressure cooker. And that will continue. It is more difficult these days, because the Yankees are not only rich and abetted by the mayor of their city, but also the Steinbrenners have turned the operation over to a very smart man in Cashman, who, with Hal Steinbrenner's empowerment, seems to be able to run the business without being affected by the irrationality of Hank Steinbrenner and team president Randy Levine. The aghast bad-for-the game thing doesn't work. This is the system the Yankees have and the NBA's Lakers and the NFL's Giants do not. It may cause a lot of owners to sit tight and make the middle-class of free agents squirm for the next two months, while the lower-class crawls. This is the baseball world; the union cares only for what Sabathia and Teixeira make, reminiscent of the Mike Barnicle/Pat Buchanan observation on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" that Washington focuses its bailouts on people who take showers before going to work rather than on those people who need a shower after they work. Boras doesn't want to be the good guy, and doesn't care who gets burned as long as his clients get the best deal; didn't Edward Bennett Williams do the best he could for Joe McCarthy and Sirhan Sirhan? Didn't Hal Steinbrenner invest $423.5 million to buy back the we're-the-Yankees-and-you're-not swagger? Look at it this way: The Yankees will still be helping some small-market owners pay down their interest. Will the notion that it is wealth, not meritocracy, that earns championships and Illinois senate seats damage baseball? Given the economy the next couple of years, perhaps when viewed in relation to the NFL's parity it will. For now, it's the American way. Wal-Mart eats up small-family businesses. The Yankees eat up the Brewers and the Indians, and there may not be an owner in any sport who, given the opportunity afforded to Hal Steinbrenner, wouldn't have done the same thing.
Sigh.... the Yankee loving media figures (Peter Gammons) just don't get it. NOBODY is blaming the Yankees for spending all of this money. It's their money.. and they're within the rules.. can't blame em.. I wish my favorite team was doing the same thing. Fans are frustrated at the system... not the Yankees
Are you kidding me. Baseball needs a strong Yankee team every year. It is good for baseball. When foreign viewers tune in and see the Yankees out of the playoffs they stop watching and caring. How many average folks cared about the World Series this year? Not too many. But put the Yankees in there and everyone stops and watches. The Yankees are truly America's team and the world's team.
Here is a good article (though a year old) to explain why the system isn't broken in the way most think: http://baseball.suite101.com/article.cfm/baseballs_revenue_sharing_problem
Here's another good one: http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/files/oracle/discussion/yankees_signed_teixeira/
More info. In 1998, the Yankees were the second highest payroll in baseball at 63 million, behind the Orioles at 70 million. After that they have been the highest payroll every year. However, in 99 the difference was less than $7 million between 1 & 2 (Texas) in 2000, it was a $2 million difference (Dodgers) in 2001, it was a $3 million difference (Dodgers or Red Sox depending on source) 2002 is where the jumps starts, with the Braves, Mets, Dodgers, Red Sox, Rangers and Diamonbacks being very close to each other, and the Yankees being between 17 and 25 million higher than that group. And it goes from there with big jumps happening in 2003. So, just for curiosity's sake, where did that Orioles team which was the highest in 98 end up last year? $67 million. Less than their team payroll in 1998. In 07 the Orioles did have a payroll jump to 90 million, but other than that year, they have been consistently at around 70 million since 1998. Revenues have gone through the roof, not to mention the money they get in revenue sharing, and yet their payroll has barely been impacted? Since the 2003 boom in revenue, the Pittsburgh Pirates have reduced payroll, from a high of around 55 in 2003 to just under 50 last year. The problem isn't the Yankees people. The problem is that the rest of the league is hoarding their profits. The Yankees payroll has gone up and up with the increasing revenues and their re-investment into their product, while most teams have stayed stagnant despite the increase in revenue. Should the Yankees be told "Look Yankees, the rest of us owners don't want to increase our costs so we are going to cap spending so you can't improve your team and pay a lot of money" ? I mean, I hate the payroll gap personally, but the problem has more to do with teams in baseball not spending money than it does with teams spending too much. Baseball was the second most profitable sport in America last year, yet every team in the NBA has a higher payroll than the bottom 4 baseball teams, and the middle section is very similar. Basketball teams, which have a hard cap, maxed out payroll dollars, and very few players making more than 15 million anymore, and they spend nearly as much as baseball teams, in the more profitable sport, without a salary cap do on 25 man rosters.
More interesting numbers: http://blogs.chron.com/sportsjustice/archives/2009/01/drayton_is_spen.html Since 2001, baseball's champions have ranked in the Top 10 in payroll just three times: those two Boston teams and the 2001 Diamondbacks. Mostly, they've been just outside the Top 10. An exception was the 2003 Marlins, who were 25th. The Astros have had a higher payroll than the World Series winner in five of the last seven seasons. They spent more than the 2008 Phillies, 2006 Cardinals, 2005 White Sox, 2003 Marlins and 2002 Angels. They spent less than the 2004 and 2007 Red Sox. The Astros have been pretty consistent. In the last eight years, they've been 12th twice and 14th three times. Those numbers are consistent with their revenues, which according to Forbes were 12th at $193 million in 2007. Season W.S. winner Payroll Rank Astros payroll Astros rank 2008 Phillies $98.2M 13 $99M 12 2007 Red Sox $143M 2 $87.8M 12 2006 Cardinals $88.9M 11 $92.6M 8 2005 White Sox $75.2M 13 $76.8 12 2004 Red Sox $127.3M 2 $75.4M 12 2003 Marlins $48.4M 25 $71M 14 2002 Angels $61.7M 15 $63.5M 14 2001 Diamondbacks $85.3M 8 $60.4M 17
Since this is a basketball board, if we're gonna talk about parity look at the NBA. In a league that sends over half of its teams to the playoffs, consider that 8 teams have won the championship in the last 29 years. 20 MLB teams have won the Series in the last 30.
The better team always wins in a 7-game series in basketball...not necessarily the case in baseball. An individual player can affect a game of basketball much more than in baseball.
Um...so? So in the last 30 years (rounded) only 8 teams have managed to be "the best" in their league, and that league supposedly has parity? Isn't that the exact opposite of parity? Salary arguments and salary cap discussions are used by owners to blind fans, and are used by fans as a therapeutic excuse. It's not to say that it's stupid to feel that way about salaries and what not, but it's not accurate.
Don't these two statements contradict themselves? If a single player can easily impact a basketball game, what is stopping a good player on a bad team to lead his subpar team past a superior team? Oh and for the better team always winning: While it was a lot of fun to watch the Warriors beat the Mavericks, I doubt many will say that they were the better overall team.
No they are not contradictive. A single great player can make an average team that much better in basketball -- see Lebron in 07 playoffs against the Pistons. As a result you only need a couple of great players to build a very competitive team in the NBA. The Lakers had Shaq and Kobe and...Robert Horry, and they won three straight titles. This is clearly not the case in baesball. You need a lot more to build a winner in baseball and a couple of great players would not do it (although would be a good start). As for the Warriors vs. the Mavs, I would argue that the Warriors were actually the better team and hence they won.
