r/buccos • u/TheAthletic • 7d ago
MLB memo reveals lockout plans: League will scrub website, ban contact with trainers
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7670102/2026/10/07/mlb-memo-lockout-plans-teams-players-ban-contact/?unlocked_article_code=1.HFE.MLAw.oo5FFHGPAPWs&source=emp_shared_article&smid=re-share-ta105
7d ago
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u/SouthCopy8453 6d ago
So doing the math here, the owners want to have equal tv revenue sharing across all teams. If they institute a salary cap then it would make sense to believe that all teams will spend close to that amount, similar to what happens in the NFL, NBA, and NHL. So this would in theory actually raise the average payroll in the MLB
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u/wagsman 6d ago
The majority of players would benefit from a cap and floor. Because teams will be forced to pay the lower level players more to meet the numbers.
The people that will hurt the most are the handful of players that could get a half a billion dollar contract every 2 years, and cheap owners like Nutting.
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u/wbaumbeck Skenes 6d ago
It would almost certainly raise the average players salary but it would put a cap on the salary for the top end guys.
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u/StanielReddit 6d ago
Yeah, poor Shohei Ohtani. What will players do when they can’t earn $100M a year anymore! Looks like they’ll have to play elsewhere where the leagues pay more…
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
The real problem is what are the poor billionaires going to do with all that extra cash??
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u/vinniemac274 6d ago
What extra cash?
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
You can't be serious. If a guy like Nutting was losing money, you think he'd be around?
The biggest disconnect is understanding that the money that the owners make is different from the money that the team makes. And there is money that the owners decide not to spend on their teams that is made through their teams.
Every year, the large market teams dump enough money into the pirates to make them division winners. The pirates make just as much off of streaming as every other team no matter how many watch them, and Nutting pockets it.
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u/vinniemac274 6d ago
"The money the owners make is different from that team makes."
How does an owner "make money?" Nothing you replied makes sense. We know that Nutting doesn't let the owners (he is not the only owner) take dividends. Also, there is no legal mechanism to move personal cash into a business without all of the other owners doing the same. Everybody knows this
Furthermore, we know the Pirates lost money between lockdowns and losing their TV deal.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
the team's value continues to increase, because major league baseball's value increases. No matter what, Nutting can cash out as the biggest winner of any situation.
streaming revenue is shared equally among all the teams.
the revenue to expense percentage is less than major market teams. Other teams spend more money, but they also spend a larger percentage of their revenue than Nutting does.
lock downs were 6 years ago, and now the Pirates make money off people watching the Yankees and Dodgers, not just local revenue.
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u/vinniemac274 6d ago
-"The teams value" that isn't cash. You can't spend it. It's kike saying you should vacation in Dubai because you own a house. -streaming revenue is negligible.
-the Pirates DO NOT make money off of Yankees Dodgers, as the real money is local TV contracts.
- since you don't know revenue is, you're just maliciously making it up.we KNOW that the Pirates spent more than revenue in recent years
Why do you lie?
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u/tonytroz 6d ago
Just because there's a salary cap doesn't mean the owners get a bigger piece of the pie. In an ideal world they make the extra cash because the league is growing and thriving from competitive balance which means the players also get extra cash because the revenue is split 50/50.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
And the assets they own don't increase in value?
You can be mad at the millionaires, but the billionaires always win.
Every piece of free agency and collective bargaining agreements have been efforts to create some level of equality ir a better balance, that has never existed from the time of professional baseball.
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u/tonytroz 6d ago
Unless someone creates a rival league that is fan/player owned that offers the same contracts (which would be impossible since they'd have zero infrastructure) that problem will never be fixed.
We're just purely talking cap/floor here it's not directly generating more revenue for the billionaires except by growing the game which also benefits the players. You're right that the billionaires are winning either way which is also why they could reduce or cancel an entire season (like in the NHL) and not lose their teams.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
I agree with you. He will never be fixed because the owners will never allow it to be. That by itself should be enough to know who are the bad guys.
Because everyone goes to work and wants more money and believes they should get paid more money if they are worth it. Once they are looking at someone else's money and it's a lot more than theirs, they have no problem telling that person they can't make that much.
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u/Silly_Collar_5850 6d ago
They actually need a clause in whatever comes down saying that shared revenue needs to go towards the on field product or owners will just pocket everything they can.
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u/catgoesmeow22 6d ago
Will the owners finally have the balls to make a stand or will thry cave like usual and let the Dodgers continue to reign hell on us all?
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u/DrSillyBitchez 6d ago
I think it will also help smaller markets hold talent. For example the pirates are around 70 mil below the proposed floor, so what do you spend 70 mil on? A contract for Paul skenes. Is he going to get a deal with a team like the dodgers? No they’ll have to trade players to meet the cap, they can’t afford him. He could always go somewhere else but if your choice is Pittsburgh or Cincinnati or Toronto you might as well stay home. That applies more to slightly lower talent too like bubba chandler or Konnor griffin after his already extended contract. That would greatly improve parity and fan happiness which would also make you sell more tickets and jersey s
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u/Theclevelandchubb Hoist it 6d ago
It is necessary and tbh I don't really give a shit if shoheis earning potential is only $50-60 million a year not 70-80. I don't feel one bit bad about the fact the dodgers will lose their cash cow TV deals and it will be shared amongst all teams. In the end all players but the superstars should be for this as their pay will go up.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago edited 6d ago
Fans will do anything to not hold their own team accountable.
These players have seen the difference in organizations since they were drafted. Taking aim at their earning potential, while already representing one of the markets that doesn't want to pay them to begin with, will make them even less likely to want to come to one of the places that forced that to happen. They will gladly take less money to be treated better somewhere else.
And they'll still be boohoo millionaires, and they still won't want to play here. Then what? That whole argument is so shortsighted.
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u/Theclevelandchubb Hoist it 6d ago
Not really the NFL has seen a ton of success and pretty much any other league that has a salary cap. Look at the NFL teams all spend the same for most part. The difference is that it makes the league more competitive every team has a shot. I don't give a rats ass about the owners or the players because the players are making millions a year playing baseball. The fact that the average pay across the league would go up should be enough but the league is run and only listens to the superstars. Yeah you obviously have teams like the brewers who have been amazing and working with a lowerish payroll but as a team like that you absolutely need to be perfect in your signings and draft. The dodgers can afford to not hit as they will just go sign the best player available. You will absolutely still have teams run by morons who will still suck but that's the nature of it I guess.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Maybe I'm watching a different NFL than you. Because statistically, the MLB has more parity than any other league going back over 40 years.
Would the Dodgers are doing is still nothing compared to what the Chiefs and Patriot have done for the last 10-15 years.
The only argument you can make is that a team like Kansas City was able to get one of those dynasties that seems more difficult to achieve in MLB. And you are overlooking that those organizations were among the best ran in the league, so people have actively taken pay cuts to be a part of those teams.
Which means if you institute the same situation in baseball, players will also take a pay cut to be on a team that is well ran.
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u/Iforgotmypasswordmeh 6d ago
The older I get the more I realize that it's just dumb to compare sports like this. Terrible ownership and management tends to lead to terrible results... look at the Pirates, Reds, Browns, Jets.
The MLB might have more parity but it probably has a lot to do with the amount of players and how the draft works and how long it takes to develop them.
Like MLB stars that get drafted were generally 2-3 years out from making an impact on a MLB team. Hall of Fame talent might make it in under 2 years and you're talking generational talent to make it like under 1 year or same year as draft. The MLB draft isn't fixing your problems, it's taking who you think is best available as an investment and maybe crafting the team around them or just trading them away for pieces you need now.
The NFL draft is generally draft them and they're playing week 1 if they're a first or second round pick. You can literally nail a first round pick and be set at that position for 10 years if you're smart and sign them early enough.
I know we're comparing apples to oranges here but the NFL draft probably has a solid 50% immediate impact rate through the first two, possibly three rounds. The MLB draft is larger and there's obviously more players so idk.. first 5 rounds?? most of those guys aren't playing an MLB game for 3 years. A good portion of the NFL guys that made it are signing big payday contracts when the MLB guys drafted at the same time are making their MLB debut.
You mention what the Dodgers are currently doing is nothing compared to what the Patriots and Chiefs have done and that simply comes down to baseball in general being harder to be good at than football. A replacement level team in baseball should win roughly 48 games a year. Lets say there's a replacement level team in the NFL... they don't win a single game...
The Patriots and Chiefs success was a result of insanely high level coaching and quarterback play. Like we're talking Mount Rushmore of coaches and QBs here.
I want to say there's more parity in baseball because there's not near the pro level depth compared to the NFL. There's guys playing MLB games that are AA or AAA talent but a hole needs filled so they're on the roster. The NFL guys are generally NFL talent because there's really no place for them to go other than the practice squad.
A low level NFL guys getting destroyed for a week or two and he's probably gone. A low level MLB player getting destroyed for a couple months might hang around because he's simply the best option they have.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago edited 6d ago
I think that everything you said is true. Especially about terrible ownership and management creating terrible results. Said perfectly. The Dodgers had terrible ownership and management for 30+ years, and they were also terrible.
Then they did everything right once the new ownership came in, and invested in every aspect of the organization. And instead of recognizing everything that went into it, people only want to blame major league payroll. They ignore everything the Rays have done without MLB payroll.
They think if they fix that, everything will be equal and players will want to join every team, and that's just ridiculous.
The only thing comparison between leagues is good for is emotional perspective. Are you as sick of the Chiefs being in the super bowl every year as you are the Dodgers being in the world series?
Would you rather see more teams win it, or have your team win it every year, even if it's not best for the game?
Then, do you spend the rest of the time being mad that you aren't winning it, even though you wanted parity?
But in the end, there is not a single defender of the way this organization is run, and that speaks volumes. And I personally feel it isn't responsible to hold other teams accountable for their mistakes before they correct them.
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u/Theclevelandchubb Hoist it 6d ago
I don't think that players take pay cuts to be on a winning team. What dodgers player right now has taken a pay cut? Maybe some of the lesser guys but shohei didn't, freeman didn't, tucker didn't. The NFL is a bit of a different animal when one player the QB can change the team dramatically. I am talking from a financial standpoint the players in the leagues with a salary cap are doing just fine. The revenue has went up when caps are implemented. I mean if the TV deal money is spread across all teams then basically since overall pay is going up the TV money is basically being reinvested into all players and not just lining the pockets of teams like the dodgers and guys like shohei everyone gets a piece of the pie.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Will Smith did, Muncy did, Yamamoto took less than what the Mets offered. Teo did. Evan Phillips did. Roki took less than the Padres offered...etc
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u/Theclevelandchubb Hoist it 6d ago
Could it be that these guys just signed for very similar to what they were offered elsewhere but they knew the dodgers already had a ws roster and they wanted the ring. I mean it boils down to the dodgers outspending everyone. If the dodgers didn't have a ws roster already these guys would have left. They have a ws roster because they outspend everyone.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
I'm sure that's a factor and I'm not sure how people expect it to dissipate when it's been a decade-long endeavor.
They have been investing in their prospects and other countries far greater than any other team has. They treat their families better.
Just boiling it down to payroll is a very incomplete picture and irresponsible.
The Dodgers were terrible for over 30 years. They were almost destroyed by a divorce. Being a big market is not being exempt from all the same issues any other team can have.
The second they got new ownership that started to invest in their team, they got better. And yes, they have a bigger pool to play with. But other teams are not maximizing their pools.
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u/FearlessMode2104 6d ago
Effectively telling teams a lockout is coming, but telling teams to tell their fans they don’t expect a lock out for the sake of ticket sales, is disgusting.
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u/v3rmin_supreme 6d ago
What are the odds that this will incline Skenes to stick around? Or is he 100% leaving. I was positive he was leaving but after this season now I’m not as sure.
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u/tonytroz 6d ago
If there's a salary cap theoretically the Pirates could afford to offer the same deal as the Yankees/Dodgers which would greatly increase the chance he sticks around. In the current system they would offer him like $40-50M/year which would be about 3x as much as any Pirates player currently makes. In the NFL for instance the highest paid player is in a small market (Patrick Mahomes making $63M/year in Kansas City which is a similar sized market to Pittsburgh).
That being said there are still benefits to playing in big markets even in a salary cap league. In the NFL you can make the same salary playing for Cleveland as you do playing in LA or NYC but that doesn't mean every player wants to go live in Cleveland and play for one of the worst run franchises in sports. Unfortunately the Pirates are also in that category until they prove otherwise.
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 3d ago
No, baseball is definitely not fine. If it were fine, there wouldn’t be relative unity on this topic among the owners and many of the sport’s fans.
David vs. Goliath can be interesting but not as a general rule. Spoiler alert, Goliath almost always wins. That’s about as uninteresting as it gets.
Sadly, I do agree with you that the types of changes the sport desperately needs are unlikely to be implemented — at least to the level I’d like to see.
However, I also disagree with you that they’re going to get in the full 162. I think that is beyond wishful thinking.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 7d ago
Start with a salary floor. If all the teams have respectable payrolls and still can't compete, then you can start discussing a cap. But in the meantime, you are right. It's not fair to the players. And it's not just the ones getting huge contracts. Those contracts raise the minimum salary and qualifying offers for everyone.
Nutting being cheap is a bigger problem than the Dodgers not.
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 7d ago edited 7d ago
Nope. A floor without a cap is pointless. Don’t get me wrong, they need a floor and a real floor — not a soft floor. However, they also need a hard cap. It has gotten completely ridiculous.
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u/SlipperyRockScranton 4d ago
This is not happening
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 4d ago
Probably not. However, a guy can always dream that baseball will finally, at long last, join the 21st century.
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u/SlipperyRockScranton 4d ago
Yeah. I guess it might be a thing, but it’s not worth losing games
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 3d ago
Wait, it’s not worth losing games to gain a competitive system?
I strongly disagree with that position.
It’s worth losing multiple entire seasons to finally, at long last, gain a competitive system.
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u/SlipperyRockScranton 3d ago
No. Baseball is fine. It’s always been a league of haves and have nots. Two of the major teams this year don’t spend a lot of money. That makes it more interesting. David vs Goliath.
More importantly, it’s not going to happen. The players will never play under a salary cap. You will see some minor changes to the game, but nothing significant. Should be settled just in time to get 162 games in
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 1d ago
Yeah, I’m not buying this argument at all.
You can say that baseball has always been a league of haves and have-nots, but that gap has never been greater
You could play this game all day. In the 50s you could’ve said baseball has always been a game exclusively for whites. But times changed and so did baseball.
Just a few years ago, you could’ve said pitchers always hit in the National League. That’s just how it has always been. However, times changed and so did baseball.
And now, with the gap being greater than ever before, times have changed and so must baseball.
I don’t give a shit about how things used to be. That doesn’t justify a shitty system now.
Every other major North American sports league has a salary cap for a reason. Baseball should implement one as well.
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u/Exotic_You7797 7d ago
That’s just not true, right now the American League playoffs is dominated by bottom 5 payroll teams, and even on the national league side the pirates were playoff contenders, the brewers are the best team in the league, and the cardinals held on for quite some time, and the nationals had one of the best offenses in the league, now imagine of any of them were at 170 million dollars, the pirates could’ve made the playoffs, the brewers would likely be unanimous favorites, the nationals could’ve afforded pitching, and the rays white Sox and Cleveland, would all be absolute monsters, with cleavland almost tripling their payroll if they implement the floor, in no world is a ceiling as impactful as a floor, because the majority of teams in the league who aren’t contending either misspend their money or don’t spend any at all, so forcing them to atleast spend enough to make a competent ballclub is much more beneficial than forcing teams to water down their roster, not just for competitive play, but for the sport as a whole
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 6d ago edited 6d ago
Buddy, the goal is to win the World Series, not to be pretty good in the regular season. Nobody throws a parade for a playoff appearance.
To be fair, baseball's economics are so fucked up that Hollywood made a feature film about a team that was pretty good in the regular season and never did shit in October. It was called Moneyball, it was a huge hit, and it's one of the strangest movies ever made. It's the triumphant tale of a mediocre team whose iconoclastic GM and his numbers-based approach revolutionized the game and turned them into a consistently good regular-season team that never got over the hump.
But holy shit, were they awesome in July.
I do agree the Brewers are that rare small-market team legitimately good enough to win it all. It's been a few years since we could say that about anyone. As for the AL teams still alive, the Rays are pretty good, and the other two aren't at that level. The Pirates definitely would've made the playoffs in the American League.
The broader point is that the last true small-market champion was Kansas City in 2015. They were immediately stripped for parts and have been rebuilding ever since. A system where a team outside the top five or six markets gets one title every 10 or 12 years isn't a good system.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Also, Moneyball was incredibly successful. The point of the story was not how to win without spending money. It was how to analyze players in non traditional ways to compete.
In the end, he published the book and sold rights to a movie because either he was going to make some money off of his efforts, or not.
All of his guys got hired away and are responsible for several Championships using his methods, improving them (exit velocity, launch angle) and adding an important ingredient; money.
The A's stayed unsuccessful because their secrets got out and they'd still didn't spend money.
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u/Neb-Nose Clemente 6d ago edited 6d ago
Well, we’re definitely going to disagree on that one.
The object is to win the championship, not prove how smart you are.
The A’s ended up in exactly the same place after Moneyball as they were before Moneyball.
Now, just a few short years later, they’re not even in Oakland anymore.
If that’s success, I would hate to see what failure looks like.
The approach worked. Why? Because all of the wealthiest teams combined those market efficiencies with fatter wallets to win those championships. However, without the wallets to match, they’re just pretty good teams; and generally speaking, pretty good teams don’t win championships.
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u/Exotic_You7797 6d ago
So you just completely missed my point then? My entire point was those 8 or so teams I mentioned are all 50% or more under the proposed salary floor, so forcing them to spend 70 million extra dollars when all of them as is are already great teams would make much bigger strides in competitive balance then limiting teams that actually want to pay to win games
For example, the Mets, and Yankees, two of the largest market teams in the league, with the highest payrolls, neither have won a World Series in 20 years, the dodgers, people completely forget about their history because they only remember short term success, they have won 3 World Series in almost 30 years, and and then there’s Boston Houston and the cubs, when two hadn’t won a series in over a 100 years, and one hadn’t won a series every until moderately recently, the ladder few did exactly what you said, they “stripped for parts” after a year or two when in reality that happens to every championship winning team and that’s what starts a rebuild, the amount of players on the 2020 dodgers and the 2024 dodgers is minimal, the amount of players on the 2016 cubs and the 2020 cubs is again minimal, and that stays the same for litteraly every championship winning team, because after winning a championship players values skyrocket and even these large market teams are unsustainable to keep them
Now let’s look at the small market teams, the cardinals have the second most World Series ever while predominantly being a smaller market team their whole franchise history including 1 less than the dodgers in the last 30 years, the pirates, the epitome of the bottom of the barrel has some of the most World Series wins, and when they won it wasn’t because they were a large market team it was because they knew how to get their moneys worth in what they spent, Cleveland, while not winning one in a long time, has with the smallest budget in the league made the playoffs what feels like every year for forever including making it to the World Series not too long ago, same with the brewers,
What do all these teams have in common? They know(or atleast knew) how to play the market, they bought low and sold high, that’s how the rays are so good right now, they knew who to keep, and who they could sell to get more future prospects to continue the cycle, and that’s why they I can almost promise you will have a longer dynasty the the dodgers do now, because the dodgers need championships to excuse their spending, once the rings stop flowing, and according to the history of baseball they will, then the dodgers are gonna be like Houston, where they seemed like the deadliest team in baseball but after about a decade if that they’ve fallen from grace and they fell hard
while the majority of the smaller teams don’t want to compete, they are completely content with grabbing their money from the fans and from money sharing and gtfo, and that won’t change if you put a cap in, you’ll just see the best teams be worse but still easily make it to the playoffs, but if you put a floor in even without a cap, then these great teams who their owners don’t care about, will be forced to actually look like contending ball clubs, and I dont meant they’ll be buying tatis off the market or anything like that which they most certainly could, but the teams will be able to keep their franchise players because the owners have to spend the money anyways and can’t just claim their hands are tied and sell them off to the highest bidder, and will make the game a whole lot more competitive
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
I actually agree with 100% of what you just said.
The lower market teams who spend on their infrastructure are still successful at a higher rate than those that spend at the major league level and don't spend on their greater infrastructure.
Rays/Guards vs Mets/Padres, etc.
And I guarantee that if those smarter teams spent an extra $70 million, they would be perennial contenders.
And because of the organizational incompetence here, spending $70 million extra would end up overpaying whever just to meet the floor because there aren't enough free agents interested in working for a dumpster fire.
So in our case, we get no investment in the infrastructure or the MLB, and are so hopeless in our situation, all that's theoretically left is to make others not invest in their businesses.
What sucks to me is that Moneyball seems to have inspired 1 group of teams to win using more information. But another group was inspired to use this information to justify paying bottom dollar for their talent and using their team as a feeder for those who care about long term success.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Buddy, 3 or 4 of the 5 teams left are small market teams, depending on what your view of the Sox is. The other big ones like the Yankees and Padres and Cubs and Phillies are going to watch on TV. The Dodgers give the Pirates enough money today to buy the 2 more bats needed to win the division every year. A cap means you don't get that money, but neither does he. A floor means he has to put it in the team.
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u/dirtyracoon25 7d ago
A floor forces all owners to try and win games instead of making money. I agree 100%. The cap is no where near as effective as a floor.
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u/tmackenzie100 6d ago
It forces the major market teams to subsize the lack of revenue that small market teams experience. I can assure you Bob Nutting's stance on winning and making money will remain unchanged.
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u/dirtyracoon25 6d ago
You think the top markets are going to want to continue to run their businesses the way they do so that others can get rich off of their backs and lower their teams value?
I can tell which way you vote and can tell you the big boys that someone else listed like the Dodgers, Yankees, Cubs etc will not go for that.
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u/tmackenzie100 6d ago
They will be just fine. They will lose revenue but they won't have to pay their players as much. When the owners of teams like the Yankees are complaining about the state of things, you know it's time for a change.
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u/MisterBarten 6d ago
Can’t have a cap or a floor without the other. You need both for either to be effective.
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u/tonytroz 6d ago
Start with a salary floor. If all the teams have respectable payrolls and still can't compete, then you can start discussing a cap.
Why drag this out for another 4 years for a problem that has already been solved in the other 3 major sports leagues? Of course small market teams can't compete long term without a cap. That's literally the entire point of a cap.
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Because those other leagues still have less parity than the MLB. They haven't figured anything out.
My argument is that if those teams actually acted like they tried to win. And it was proven, they couldn't then we can deal with that. When half the teams don't cover what would be the barrier of entry to a salary floor today, they have no right to discuss what they've been trying to do to win.
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u/tonytroz 6d ago
Because those other leagues still have less parity than the MLB. They haven't figured anything out.
That's not true at all. Parity isn't just about different teams winning the championship every year. MLB is dominated by large market teams. Just because the Yankees are on their longest championship drought doesn't mean they're not competitive. Since 1995 they have only missed the playoffs 5 times. Since 1995 the Pirates and Royals have only made the playoffs a combined 6 times. That's the parity you're talking about???
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Major league baseball has had 24 different world series winners in the last 40 years, more than any other league. I'm guessing you didn't google that on purpose.
The NHL and NBA have both had eleven back to back champions in the same 40 years.
Since free agency, the yankees have won 6 championships, 11%. They won 28% of them before that.
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u/tonytroz 6d ago
Lol. So you completely ignored my post and just went with championship winners anyway even though that's the worst metric of parity. Ok let's break it down then:
Major league baseball has had 24 different world series winners in the last 40 years, more than any other league.
Big Market Winners (top 15 MLB official market score) - NYM, LAD x4, OAK, TOR x2, ATL x2, NYY x5, LAA, BOS x4, CHIW, PHI, SF x3, CHIC, HOU x2, TEX
Small Market Winners - MIN x2, CIN, MIA x2, ARI, STL x2, KC, WAS
Wow, what parity! A different big market team wins 3 out of every 4 years! And that's being super generous by counting some of those teams as small markets. WAS, MIN, STL, and PHX are all mid-size markets much bigger than Pittsburgh. The only true small market teams to win WS in the last 40 years are Cincy (36 years ago), KC (3 playoff appearances since 1995 but one championship since 1969 is parity right?), Miami (last one was 23 years ago), and St. Louis who had the 10th highest payroll the last time they won which was 15 years ago.
But hey, Pittsburgh winning back to back Stanley Cups as one of the smallest market teams and Patrick Mahomes being the highest paid player in the NFL in Kansas City isn't parity. No definitely don't want to see that in the MLB!
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u/Mindless_Formal_6647 6d ago edited 6d ago
It’s actually less than that . Arizona and STL are at least middle markets. WSH had the 7th highest payroll the year they won.
It’s really only KC in the last 30 years that was a traditionally small market team.
So when someone says 24 different teams won in the last 30 years, it’s pretty useless without context.
Edit: Arizona was 4th in payroll the year they won.
A much better metric would be the payroll rank the year they won the World Series .
KC was 17th, STL was 11th , and MIA (2003) was something like 25th. That’s it . That’s not really parity in terms of every team having a shot to win
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
You can't tell the other people in the race to run slower because you don't want to run fast.
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u/tmackenzie100 7d ago
One does not work without the other. The money to cover the tems benefiting from a salary floor has to come from somewhere.
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u/Ok_Card9080 Jason Kendall 6d ago
I don't know how people still don't understand this. So, you force owners to spend to a certain level with a floor, but what does that do to the Dodgers? They just continue spending astronomical amounts because there's no limit, and the small market teams STILL can't compete with them, or the Yankees, or the Mets when it comes to landing top players.
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u/Silly_Collar_5850 6d ago
But in the meantime, you are right. It's not fair to the players
The MLB is the only North American sports league with a Supreme Court blessed antitrust exemption and both the players and the owners profit immensely from that. They are (or should be) on the same side, and they should be making concessions to the public so that fans in half of the league's markets aren't paying money to watch irrelevant baseball by June. The current trajectory is going to render baseball irrelevant in most of the country.2
u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
I totally agree. And the owners have always profited more, and the value of their product has increased disproportionately to their employees' earnings.
And they have learned to tie their earnings into non-victory related successes, like real estate, luxury tax, streaming rights, etc.
So while I agree that both sides need to come together to do what's best for the game, one side is more responsible than the other for its current condition.
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u/MrRogersRaisedMe 4d ago
I’m hearing rumors of a $170M floor. Just thin of what our roster would look like with another $70M of talent on it
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u/Fit_Asparagus5204 Bae 6d ago
Step 1: don't pay players as an organization and even stiff them from time to time.
Step 2: force the players to make less to accommodate the organizations stiffing people.
Step 3: assume those players will forget the first 2 steps and be as proud to wear black and yellow as any other color because (insert delusion here.)
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u/Dontworry8888 5d ago
Thanks for showing me a video of a guy who has never heard of a home equity loan.
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u/dirtyracoon25 7d ago
Hopefully they get rid of team control of a player for 6 years. Stop screwing the players.
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u/NickCageFreeEggs 6d ago
Yes, let's care more about the finances of millionaires /s
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u/dirtyracoon25 6d ago
Besides the cheap fucks who don't want to spend, who does giving 6 years of control to a team benefit?
I'm sure players hate it and owners who are willing to spend hate it.
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u/provolone12 6d ago
Cap and floor
Dont come back until you have both
Dodgers are yet again going to win the world series, you know the last time there was a 3peat in any major US sports league? the Yankees in the late 90s
the NFL/NBA/NHL are as healthy as theyve ever been because of the parity in those leagues
So yeah, I dont want to see baseball back until we have the same systems those leagues have