Should Baseball have a salary cap?

[FRENCHREDSOX]

You say that jokingly, but, really, when you think about it, if the cap were set at a reasonable number, the Yankees will be the only team affected.

Well depnds on your definition of "reasonable number" but IRL the Yankees earn more & PAY more than anyone else.

Personally teams like the Marlins & Rays have shown (as well as others) that Payroll can be beaten.....however the Comp rule has to be changed.

[HoustonGM]

Well depnds on your definition of "reasonable number" but IRL the Yankees earn more & PAY more than anyone else.

The Yankees have a payroll roughly $70 million higher than any other team. After them, there's "groupings" of teams. The Red Sox, Mets, Tigers, White Sox, and Angels are (last year at least) around $120-$140 million. A $130 million payroll is roughly an average of $5.2 million per player, not that much more than the average player overall (compared to the roughly $8.4 million the Yankees spent per player, which is roughly double the average player). A reasonable salary cap would be in the $140 million range, and I don't see how anything lower than that is "reasonable."

[OregonDuck1989]

In all honesty I don't see how a salary cap would help parity in major league baseball. The Yankees would be affected early on, but they have smart management and owners and would be back to the playoffs every year within a couple of years...kind of like whats going on in the NHL with the Red Wings

[filihok]

In all honesty I don't see how a salary cap would help parity in major league baseball. The Yankees would be affected early on, but they have smart management and owners and would be back to the playoffs every year within a couple of years...kind of like whats going on in the NHL with the Red Wings

I don't think the purpose of a salary cap would be to exclude the Yankees from the playoffs

The only problem with all this salary cap talk is that we forget baseball is a business. Some owners own a team with the goal of winning. Other owners own a team with the goal of making money.

Owners won't approve anything that MAKES them spend more money.

[Jeffy25]

I don't think the purpose of a salary cap would be to exclude the Yankees from the playoffs

The only problem with all this salary cap talk is that we forget baseball is a business. Some owners own a team with the goal of winning. Other owners own a team with the goal of making money.

Owners won't approve anything that MAKES them spend more money.

Yup, like DeWitt of the Cardinals, wants the team to make him more money. quite clear that is the goal. field a good enough team to keep selling games out and that's it. and then you have someone like Steinbrenner that wants to win screw if the profit is there or not.

[kenny1234]

Yup, like DeWitt of the Cardinals, wants the team to make him more money. quite clear that is the goal. field a good enough team to keep selling games out and that's it. and then you have someone like Steinbrenner that wants to win screw if the profit is there or not.

I don't believe that there is a huge difference between Steinbrenner's and DeWitt's motivation. Both want to make money. The difference is that the two markets are completely different. In St.Louis, the Cardinals are the most important thing in town, and the fans will show up as long as the team is competitive. The Cardinals therefore make their choices in order to be competitive. For the Yankees, the key is to dominate the media spotlight - and that requires a whole different approach to management. They want people watching YES every night in the off-season - so they pursue top free agents and basically do everything they can to draw the attention of the fans. The approach is different because the markets are different - not because Steinbrenner has some crazy desire to win at all cost that doesn't affect any other owner.

[Jeffy25]

I don't believe that there is a huge difference between Steinbrenner's and DeWitt's motivation. Both want to make money. The difference is that the two markets are completely different. In St.Louis, the Cardinals are the most important thing in town, and the fans will show up as long as the team is competitive. The Cardinals therefore make their choices in order to be competitive. For the Yankees, the key is to dominate the media spotlight - and that requires a whole different approach to management. They want people watching YES every night in the off-season - so they pursue top free agents and basically do everything they can to draw the attention of the fans. The approach is different because the markets are different - not because Steinbrenner has some crazy desire to win at all cost that doesn't affect any other owner.

I realize that, but when Steiny started, he definetly wanted to bring back that winning tradition. I see DeWitt doing the bear minimum to show a winning team. But you are right on the head.

[kenny1234]

I realize that, but when Steiny started, he definetly wanted to bring back that winning tradition. I see DeWitt doing the bear minimum to show a winning team. But you are right on the head.

But why did "Steiny" want to bring back the winning tradition? I think that it was because a team in NY that doesn't win isn't going to make money the way that a winning team will. The difference in money in St.Louis is nowhere near as big.

[dickay]

how can you guys debate this same topic every other week??? i can't believe this is near 3 pages again lol.

[rushfan_2112]

I have a few ideas on how a salary cap can be implemented.

Idea #1 - Take a cue from MLS
For those who aren't in the know, MLS has a hard salary cap, but with a player exception known as the 'Beckham Rule'. All it means is that a team must abide to the cap, but can sign 1 player who won't count against it (Ala David Beckham signing with the LA Galaxy). Instead of a small cap and only one player, MLB could institute something, say $80 million, and give the exemption to maybe 3-5 players. It might help against teams like the Yanks or my beloved Red Sox from signing all the best players in baseball, and give smaller market teams like KC and Oakland a better shot at fielding a good team.

Idea #2 - Take from the rich and give to the poor
I think this would be the better of the two ideas. Take all 30 teams and put them into 1 of 3 brackets. The first bracket would be the richest teams (The Sox, Yanks, Mets, et cetera). The second bracket would be the middle-of-the-road teams (Atlanta, Houston, et cetera). And the third could be the poorest teams (Pittsburgh, Florida, et cetera). Implement a soft cap of somewhere between $80-$100 million, something that only the top 1/3 teams have a chance of going over, and for the money they go over, give maybe 3/4 of that money to the bottom 1/3 and a quarter to the middle, or something along those lines.

[StreetMedic]

not because Steinbrenner has some crazy desire to win at all cost

This may be the first time in history that the words "Steinbrenner", "crazy", and "not" have all appeared together within the same sentence.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not attributing any special significance to that, or anything...

[robinhoodnik]

The Yankee thing is silly. They won 6 titles in George's reign but also had a drought of nearly 20 years in that span. They also haven't won one since they went ape and spent wildly after 2000.

Boston? Lol, they went 86 years between titles! They spent big during most of that period, and at best, went to the WS once every decade or so.

[HoustonGM]

Idea #2 - Take from the rich and give to the poor
I think this would be the better of the two ideas. Take all 30 teams and put them into 1 of 3 brackets. The first bracket would be the richest teams (The Sox, Yanks, Mets, et cetera). The second bracket would be the middle-of-the-road teams (Atlanta, Houston, et cetera). And the third could be the poorest teams (Pittsburgh, Florida, et cetera). Implement a soft cap of somewhere between $80-$100 million, something that only the top 1/3 teams have a chance of going over, and for the money they go over, give maybe 3/4 of that money to the bottom 1/3 and a quarter to the middle, or something along those lines.

AKA revenue sharing and luxury tax?

[robinhoodnik]

The other 29 teams ought to send the Yankees thank you cards come to think of it. They absorbed jerks, juicers and plain old junk for the last 8 or so seasons that someone else would have been stuck with, the Yankees could at least afford to replace the busts and juicers with working parts, and can afford to work with the jerks.
Pavano, Giambi, A-Rod, K Brown, Hideki Irabu, Matsui (13mil for 9 homers last season!), Kei Igawa ($126,000,194 for 5 years, plus posting fee), Bobby Abreu got over 30 mil out of them. You could add a lot more names to this list without trying very hard.

[StreetMedic]

The other 29 teams ought to send the Yankees thank you cards come to think of it. They absorbed jerks, juicers and plain old junk for the last 8 or so seasons that someone else would have been stuck with.

/blink. blink./

Wait, you're not actually trying to argue that the Yanks were just trying to be nice guys and "help out" the rest of major league baseball by signing bad contracts, are you?

LOL

I think I may have finally heard everything.