The Marlins are ripping off other owners

[VanCitySportsGuy]

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/the-upcoming-cba-and-the-battles-within-it-part-2-revenue-sharing/

They have a surplus of 16 million this season from revunue sharing. It's a joke that teams like the Red Sox, Yanks, Cubs, Mets, Dodgers, etc... work their asses off to increase local revunue only to have other owners just pocket the money.

From the revunue sharing list, there's a chance the Jays could be number 1 because Bud Selig hands the Jays 5 million dollars each season just because they're located in Canada. If that figure wasn't included in the article, that would push them in the 36 million dollar range.

It will be interesting to see what happens in the new CBA. Revunue sharing was meant to make the smaller markets/low payroll teams more competitive. The new CBA needs to have a clause where if teams don't put revunue sharing money back into the club than they will face harsh penalties.

[Stu]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Jayson Stark just wrote a pretty good article about this as well.

http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insid...CMP=ILC-INHEAD

His suggestion was to make them spend every cent they receive in revenue sharing on their payroll and signing bonuses. If not, they'd have to return the money.

It's an insider article so I won't post the whole thing, but this quote pretty much explains why it will never happen:

"They're never going to do that," one prominent baseball man told Rumblings, "because the small-market teams would never agree to it. Talk about welfare, there's zero incentive for these teams to take that money and spend it.

"If they get better, they draw more people. If they draw more people, they get a better TV contract and they sell more hot dogs. And if you do that, you lose your $30 million a year [in revenue-sharing money only]. Then you actually have to run your franchise like a real business and make it work."

[VanCitySportsGuy]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

I would allow teams to spend it on not just MLB players but also scouts, front office people, and draft picks.

But what the unnamed baseball person said is true. Some teams are better off just pocketing the money. Just because you spend more on payroll doesn't always mean you will become a better team.

It will be interesting to see if any owners push for a salary cap later this year.

[DGetz]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Gotta say I think it's more than fair the Jays get money for being in Canada. I mean they're picking up most revanue in Canadian dollars but paying contracts in US dollars and trust me, that isnt a favorable exchange rate

[countryboy]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Baseball needs a salary CAP. Period

[mjb2124]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Baseball needs a salary CAP. Period

A cap AND floor would make the most sense.

[VanCitySportsGuy]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

A cap AND floor would make the most sense.

Sure a cap and a floor would make the most sense .... for teams with cheap owners like the Pirates and Royals. A cap and floor wouldn't make sense for the Yanks, Red Sox, Mets, Dodgers, Angels, Mariners, Cardinals, Astros, etc...

[countryboy]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

A cap AND floor would make the most sense.

Exactly. I couldn't agree more.

[countryboy]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Sure a cap and a floor would make the most sense .... for teams with cheap owners like the Pirates and Royals. A cap and floor wouldn't make sense for the Yanks, Red Sox, Mets, Dodgers, Angels, Mariners, Cardinals, Astros, etc...

makes the most sense for FANS. And that is what counts the most. All teams would be fairly competitive.

[Stu]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

makes the most sense for FANS. And that is what counts the most. All teams would be fairly competitive.

Unfortunately the fans are the last thing they're worried about.

[Beantown]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

A floor is def. needed....don't know about a cap, though.

Just don't know how successful it'd be in baseball.

[mjb2124]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Sure a cap and a floor would make the most sense .... for teams with cheap owners like the Pirates and Royals. A cap and floor wouldn't make sense for the Yanks, Red Sox, Mets, Dodgers, Angels, Mariners, Cardinals, Astros, etc...

It'd be good for the game overrall IMO.

[rspencer86]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

A cap AND floor would make the most sense.

No doubt about it, both are needed. I know that this comparison has been made over and over again, but just look at the NFL. A major contributing factor to its popularity is the fact that every team has a real shot of at least being competitive, year in and year out.

Being a Royals fan, I am obviously biased. There's no way that the Royals can blame their despicable performance squarely on payroll disparity alone—we have major problems with scouting, coaching, and front-office leadership. But there's no way in my mind that a salary cap and floor wouldn't help level the playing field.

I truly love baseball, and always will. It's tough cheering for the Royals anymore. A bunch of friends and I made the 4-hour round trip from Columbia to see the Royals play the A's yesterday at Kauffman Stadium. We saw our starting pitcher get rocked, our utility infielder-turned starting centerfielder get cracked in the mouth by a fly ball, and our Royals painfully lose 13-6. Between innings, we would imagine what our fortunes would be if we were able to keep our star outfield of Jermaine Dye, Johnny Damon, and Carlos Beltran. We wondered how the A's would be doing if they had the means to keep their "Big Three" together of Zito and Hudson and Mulder.

I hope one day I'll see the day when the Royals—or any other team—can thrive in a system that allows them to keep their home-grown talent. There's no doubt that would be good for baseball. Until then, teams like the Marlins will see no advantage to going out and spending a few more million on players, and will instead pocket that money.

-Ryan

[mjb2124]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Being a Royals fan, I am obviously biased. There's no way that the Royals can blame their despicable performance squarely on payroll disparity alone—we have major problems with scouting, coaching, and front-office leadership. But there's no way in my mind that a salary cap and floor wouldn't help level the playing field.

That's the way I am with the Pirates. I certainly can't blame the payroll on all of their failures. They've made terrible decisions in the past in player development, scouting, trades, Rule V draft etc.... That's on them. Being in a small market requires perfection from the Ownership and GM.

However, the big picture is another story. We have Jason Bay. Bay's a great player. When free agency hits, what are the chances he stays with the Pirates? Zero. Even if the Owners empty their wallets, it still wouldn't be close to the offers some other teams could put out. A lot of the problem is the small market size. The city of Pittsburgh just can't compete with a NY, LA, HOU, BOS etc... Larger captive audience = larger revenue stream.

Even with revenue sharing, it still doesn't make a large enough impact. It certainly helps when it's used appropriately (which I don't think the Pirates are doing and I feel they should be FORCED to use it appropriately), but it's really not the end all solution. At least a cap/floor would even things out more IMO.

[Stoud]

Re: The Marlins are ripping off other owners

Gotta say I think it's more than fair the Jays get money for being in Canada. I mean they're picking up most revanue in Canadian dollars but paying contracts in US dollars and trust me, that isnt a favorable exchange rate

How do you figure? I'm sure that when the Jays started out in Toronoto the exchange rate was something like 60-65 cents to the american dollar...

But didn't they recently change the currency in Canada? Isn't it now like $1.50 to our Dollar, which would mean that they make more money than they have to pay back in US contracts? How is that not a favorable exchange rate?

Perhaps I'm just misinformed here, but I coulda sworn....