Forgive me if this has been asked recently. Seems like a topic ripe for debate.
Why isn’t there a salary cap in the Major League? It seems to me that, of all major professional sports, baseball needs one the most, but is least likely to ever have one.
Still, for the good of the sport, shouldn’t there be one? Doesn’t the trend of escalating salaries lead to increased ticket prices, increased concession and souvenir prices, and decreased likelihood of families going to the park to lay out hundreds of dollars for a day’s entertainment?
Moreover, who wants to see 6 teams snap up most of the highest-profile players? For the sake of parity, shouldn’t the league institute a cap?
Baseball doesn’t have a salary cap for the simple reason that the MLBPA won’t agree to one. There’s a quasi-cap in place at the moment that states that a team that spends more than n dollars has to pay a “luxury tax” that is redistributed to small-market teams.
For some reason that I don’t know, the MLBPA is more admant about caps than the NFL and NBA’s player unions – those leagues both have caps – which, as you pointed out, is a detriment to the game.
And I’ll just leave it at that before I get into GQ (or Pit) territory.
(FYI, there’s no cap in the NHL either. It seems to be having the same problems as MLB.)
The Player’s Association has vehemently opposed it. They see it (rightly) as a way of cutting their salaries, not improving the sport. It was a major bone of contention in the 1994 strike.
They have set up a “luxury tax” arrangement, but it only applies to the Yankees.
There’s also debate as to whether a cap will do anything to increase competition anyway. The Mets spent a fortune and ended in last place, remember (I certainly do )
Also, the owners waited until any cap would be below what many teams are already paying, removing any reason for the players to go along. If they had proposed it earlier, the cap would have been in place without forcing teams to cut payroll.
Not just the players, but the large-market owners, as well. Considering it takes, IIRC, a 3/4 vote of all owners to pass any kind of rule change, 6 owners can pretty well block anything.
And the NHL’s agreement expires at the end of this season. Hockey people are already talking about a shutdown over a salary cap.
Yep. Steinbrenner especially doesn’t want to part with the sweetheart TV deal he has, and as you pointed out he only needs to bring a couple other owners along with him to get his way.
Oh, and thanks to everyone for realizing that I meant I was getting close to GD territory in my other post. I’m really not that stupid. But I am close sometimes
Salary caps are just a way for the owners to pocket a greater share of the revenue and articially depress players’ salaries.
The top 10 highest payrolls last season belonged to: New York Yankees, New York Mets, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Texas, Boston, Seattle, St. Louis, San Francisco, and Arizona. Only 4 of those ten made the playoffs. The other two AL winners were 18th and 23rd in payroll, the other two NL winners were 11th and 25th.
Oakland has been a consistent winner the last few years on one of the lowest payrolls, and Minnesota has made it two in a row. 2002 had a World Series with neither team spending $80 million.
Moreover, player salaries are stalling right now and not increasing dramatically on their own. The age of $20 million per year contracts is basically over for the next few seasons.
Baseball has been just as competitive as football in terms of different teams winning the championship. And basketball certainly hasn’t gotten any more competitive with the institution of a salary cap.
I will agree that more revenue sharing would help a lot.
The major leagues don’t have a salary cap because the players’ union refuses to agree to one. The owners would certainly like one, but the player’s union would never agree to it, and the union has tremendous solidarity, more than any other pro sports union.
Escalating salaries don’t cause higher ticket prices or concessions. It defies logic or economic theory that they would, since player salaries aren’t a direct cost. Since you can assume teams try to always set their ticket prices at whatever price will bring in the maximum amount of money, it doesn’t matter what player salaries are. If the Red Sox can charge $40 a ticket, why in God’s name would they drop their prices if the players took less money? You don’t think the Red Sox are going to give up million of dollars in profit for nothing, do you?
You would have a hard time showing any evidence that a salary cap would be “good for the sport.” A salary cap hasn’t really helped the NBA either way. There’s no evidence player salaries drive away fans, since baseball attendance has gone up ever since players started making millions, and the connection between market size and winning isn’t any stronger now than it ever was (in fact, it’s weaker than it was at one point, when New York teams won both pennants more years than not.)
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