# Discuss the idea of a competitive tax pool in baseball **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [January 5, 2010, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767 "2010-01-05T18:03:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2010, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/21 "2010-01-06T00:01:42Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > 7 teams won the Super Bowl in 10 seasons and you think that suggests the NFL doesn’t have parity? Nah, you misunderstand me. I think the NFL _does_ have parity. But it’s hard to argue that MLB doesn’t when they have had a larger number of unique champions over the last decade. As far as the quote about why bad teams often make bad moves, I agree completely. Check out the chart [here](http://baseballanalysts.com/archives/2010/01/graphing_the_hi.php) and consider that the absolute worst player charted is the starting shortstop for the Royals - one they actually **traded for**. For bonus points take a gander at where their new Catcher is… ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2010, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/22 "2010-01-06T00:20:56Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > And I’d argue that it is. There’s a lot more to competitiveness than just who wins the title. > > Take the six teams in the three largest markets (New York, Chicago, LA). Add the Boston Red Sox, who represent all of New England and for geographic and historical reasons can afford a mega-payroll. These 7 teams made the playoffs 34 times in 70 tries (48.5%) during the 2000’s. > > Take the other 23 teams. They made the playoffs 46 times in 230 tries (20%). > > That is a huge, gaping disparity accounted for entirely by market size. > > Are there success stories among the 230 small-market seasons? Absolutely. Does management explain why some cities (St. Louis, Minnesota) have more of those success stories than others (Pittsburgh, Kansas City)? Yep. But that doesn’t change the fact that the smaller markets start out at a huge disadvantage. They have to bust their ass and get really lucky to achieve _occasionally_ what the big-market guys achieve year-in and year-out. > > If the Mets screw up, they’ll make the playoffs _only_ twice in 10 years. If the Pirates screw up, they’ll have 17 losing seasons in a row. I don’t disagree with any of this, actually. And that is certainly a valid way to measure “competitiveness”. Based on this metric I tried running the numbers for the NBA just for a comparison and found that those large markets you defined had roughly the same rate of making the playoffs as the smaller markets, so obviously the salary cap does have an effect on at least this method of measuring competitiveness, if not on the ultimate outcome of the season. Ran out of time to try it for the NFL but I wouldn’t be surprised to find results similar to the NBA. I’m not opposed to revenue sharing in general, as long as it is accompanied by a strong salary floor. If it’s just a mechanism for keeping down players salaries then that is where I draw the line. I pay good money to watch the players, not to line the owner’s pockets. Also, any shared revenue should be tied to market size, not to payroll. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2010, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/23 "2010-01-06T02:41:02Z")
[QUOTE=Jeff Pearlman, via MOIDALIZE] The 2000s were a great decade for competitive balance. Nine different teams won the title… [/QUOTE] Just to be pedantic, obviously this is not true; eight teams won the World Series in the 2000s; the Yankees twice, Red Sox twice, Diamondbacks, Angels, Marlins, White Sox, Cardinals, and Phillies. And therefore, four of the ten titles were won by the two biggest payrolls, the Yankees and Red Sox. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2010, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/24 "2010-01-06T03:03:13Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Just to be pedantic, obviously this is not true; eight teams won the World Series in the 2000s; the Yankees twice, Red Sox twice, Diamondbacks, Angels, Marlins, White Sox, Cardinals, and Phillies. And therefore, four of the ten titles were won by the two biggest payrolls, the Yankees and Red Sox. Using the list of market sizes in the blog linked by the OP: - Six of the ten were won by teams in the five largest markets - Seven of the ten were won by teams in the eight largest markets ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_the\_Turtle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_the_turtle/32/2926_2.png) [@Fear\_the\_Turtle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_the_Turtle)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2010, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/25 "2010-01-06T17:19:07Z")
I like the idea of the hometown team - the team that scouted, drafted and developed the player - getting a discount on resigning a player. But how do you prevent a player from getting locked in to a city that he legitimately doesn’t want to play for? Maybe he doesn’t like the management or ownership or climate or whatever. In the author’s example - he assumes Mauer wants to stay in Minn but will be overwhelmed by a large offer elsewhere. What if Mauer wants out of Min, even if it’s for less $$? How do you implement a system like this w/out overly restricting player movement? Or do we just not care about the player’s wishes as long as he gets paid? ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2010, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/26 "2010-01-08T04:53:22Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > See, I just don’t believe this. I think it is far more management than you are willing to admit. > > Winning leads to fans, which leads to higher payroll, which leads to winning. Do teams with smaller markets have to compete smarter? Absolutely. Do disastrously bad managerial moves hurt small-market teams much more than large-market teams? Of course. This is why poorly run teams making the same mistakes over and over with the same leadership (Royals, I’m looking at you) are so frustrating, even for non-fans of those teams. > > But the idea that a team outside of the largest markets cannot compete is just not borne out by the facts. St. Louis is not by any measure a large market (roughly the size of Pitt, actually) and the Cardinals were probably the second most successful team of the last decade. Minnesota has been very competitive with small payrolls, and the Marlins have one a WS while the Rays went to one. > > Put another way, the Royals spent $82 million on payroll last year (how???). The Rockies spent $84 million. I find it hard to explain why one team made the playoffs while the other languished with a 97-loss season other than management. > > Practically guarantee one? The Yankees have one exactly as many titles over the last 8 years (certainly the longest contract Verlander could get) as the Florida Marlins have. Hell, the Tigers have been in as many Series over the last six years as the Yankees… > > I would argue that competitiveness is not completely broken in MLB. The 2000s were a great decade for competitive balance. Nine different teams won the title. Compare that to the NFL (a bastion of parity we are told) - only 7 different teams won the Super Bowl (and one of them won three times). > > ETA: Of course the NBA was even worse - only FIVE different champs over the decade… and that’s with a salary cap. The Yankees have won 103 89 94 87 101 101 103 95 87 That is the wins the last decade. Who is going to match that? Nobody can guarantee a World Series win, especially since the first series is best of 5. But you have the best chance in New York Shitty. ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2010, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/27 "2010-01-08T15:23:57Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Using the list of market sizes in the blog linked by the OP: > > - Six of the ten were won by teams in the five largest markets > - Seven of the ten were won by teams in the eight largest markets I don’t dispute that, or any of the other factual claims made in this thread. Obviously being in the larger markets will make it more likely your team will be successful. The first point I was trying to make is that poor management has at least as much of an impact as market size. This easy to see by comparing teams in similar markets, or of similar payroll, and seeing the vast differences in both how they are run and how successful they were over the last decade. The second point is that the proposed solution might not even solve the purported problem. The NBA has a strong salary cap both on team payroll and individual salaries, and yet had fewer unique champions than MLB over the last decade. I also believe I have seen numbers that indicate that the popularity (both TV and in-stadium) of the NBA has declined while MLB has risen over the past few years. Another point I would propose, although perhaps not wholly endorse (I haven’t really given it full consideration), is that perhaps the largest markets winning the majority of the championships is not inherently bad for a sport. Those large markets do have the majority of the sport’s followers. And many of the world’s most successful leagues have far less parity than MLB - consider the EPL, where the top 4 teams have been the same for the last, what, 10 years? And only 3 different teams have won the title since 1995 or so. Is it possible that what is good for the league as a whole might not be what is good for fans of the KC Royals? ---
**Author:** ![Thing\_Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecb155/32.png) [@Thing\_Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing_Fish)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2010, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767/28 "2010-01-08T17:43:43Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > Another point I would propose, although perhaps not wholly endorse (I haven’t really given it full consideration), is that perhaps the largest markets winning the majority of the championships is not inherently bad for a sport. Those large markets do have the majority of the sport’s followers. And many of the world’s most successful leagues have far less parity than MLB - consider the EPL, where the top 4 teams have been the same for the last, what, 10 years? And only 3 different teams have won the title since 1995 or so. > > Is it possible that what is good for the league as a whole might not be what is good for fans of the KC Royals? This. I think fans of the small market teams need to feel that they have a legitimate chance to compete if they play their cards right, and to keep a good team together if they do manage to assemble one, so I think some financial reform is indicated. However, there is no doubt that from the point of view of selling merchandise and keeping TV ratings high, it is better to have a _higher_ likelihood of a Cubs-Yankees World Series than Padres-Royals in any given year. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/discuss-the-idea-of-a-competitive-tax-pool-in-baseball/523767.md?page=1)