Tony-OH

They may be since the prices of franchises are not going down. The owners are not the "good guys" in this situation. Despite my despise of Scherzer and the MLBPA for trying to get rid of anything that would make things more competitive for small market teams, I don't have some love of the owners like they are for the common fan. As I've said, I do believe the small and mid market teams have more of interest in making things more competitive since that affects fan interest, but large market owners are only worried about making the most money they can while paying the players the least amount. I think the one thing we can agree upon is that neither side really cares about the fans because they just take them for granted as long as their business models show that they can be profitable. I may be wrong, but I think fan interest in the MLB if they miss games because of work stoppage, coming off COVID, is going to be very hard to regain. This is not 2004 anymore. People have a lot more entertainment opportunities and although core baseball fans (45 years and older) will probably return because summertime without baseball would suck, I think they are going to see a major drop of fan attendance and support.

Yep, agreed that's the main crux of this argument. I could really care less how they split up the money. As a fan, I care about the competitiveness of the sport for all 30-teams and enjoying the game on the field. Again, this is why I think a system that makes profit sharing is so important. Make the game competitive for all and then share the profits with players on all teams. The problem is that the Dodgers, despite their $280 million payroll are way more profitable than the Tampa Bay Rays so the Dodgers owners are going to want a system that sees them paying out say 40-45% of their profits to the players when they would be paying a much bigger share than a team like the Rays. AND, the reason why the Dodgers are so profitable is because of fan interest that allows them to make huge profits in TV revenue, merchandising, gate, sky boxes from corporations, concession, and fan advertising at the stadium. The reason why the fans are so interested? Because they are in the playoffs ever year now because they have a $280 million payroll when the next highest is $203 million. So the Dodgers don't want anything that support competitiveness because that threatens their model.

Agreed, which is why I find it so laughable when I see people defending the players like they are some underpaid coal minor who is making $8 an hour doing back breaking work while the CEO of the company has 20 houses around the world. The average major league salary is over a million a year and the guy who is spokeman make over $40 million a year. Cry me a river over that unfairness. lol

I don't know if that's true at all. Of course owners were rich before they bought their teams, that's why they were able to buy the teams, but no one buys a team to lose money. But if you think fans aren't how the owners make money, then how do they make money? Without ratings, those big money TV contracts aren't coming in. Who creates the ratings? Fans. Gate receipts, merchandising (huge cash cow), concessions, advertising within the stadium are all revenue streams driven by fans. So how else do the owners make money if not from the fans. Are you suggesting that a team could have no fans and no interest and still turn a profit?

Exactly. The reason why I support "tanking" as an option is because we suffered through an organization that kept middling pay rolls and ended up with sub .500 records. Would I rather lose a 110 games a season and get the 1st overall pick vs winning 71 games and getting the 9th overall pick, absolutely. You have to hope that the means are worth the end. Now I get watching a team lose 110 games a year and be uncompetitive for 3 or 4 year in a row stinks, it does. But, if Elias can build a sustainable team that can be competitive year in a year out because of that tanking, than the tanking was worth it. If the Orioles were forced to have a floor, then maybe they end up winning 68 or 71 games and maybe they end up with the 8th or 9th overall pick. All I know is that the system looks a lot better with Rutschman and Coswer in it and really you can say Mayo too, because without the money saved on Kjerstad with #2 over pick, they would not have been able to afford Mayo and he would be in college right now looking like the #1 overall pick in 2023.

Well if you think winning 71 games a year instead of 55 makes you more competitive, then sure. As for caring about the fans, the owners do a bit more because that's how they make their money. Players don't care whether ten fans show up or 50,000, they get paid the same. So do the owners care about the fans happiness out of some kind love in their heart for the common family, hell no, its all about the Benjamins of course. As I've said before, this is a Billionaire vs Millionaire fight. The only reason the fans matter even a little bit is that the owners are trying to figure out how to drain them of as much money as possible and to do that, they need to keep them interested. The players have shown nothing in their negotiations that take the fans into consideration at all. That's their right of course and God bless them for trying to get more of the owners money, but at some point they have to realize what their demands does for competitiveness across all 30 teams. They seem to have no concern over that. They look at 30 teams as 30 employers and how do they make those employers give them as much money as possible. To hell with any fan interest lost. They still get their money.

We'd all love that, but of course, the NFL can do that because all of their TV revenue comes from National broadcasts vs regional like in baseball. As long as the big market teams have their cash cow regional networks, it will be hard for MLB to ever create system where things are competitive across the board without some kind of salary cap, luxury tax, or something. Making the small markets pay more with a floor won't help competitiveness unless of course you mean winning 68 games a year vs 55 makes a team "more competitive".

You can certainly disagree. What is wrong with it? What tells you the players care about anything other than making the most money possible, even at the cost of competitiveness for all teams. Perhaps I missed something. I'm always willing to take more information in and change my mind based on the new evidence, but all you have to do is listen to ultra rich elitist Scherzer to know what the players want.

Of course a team needs good management, but I will say a big market teams can make more mistakes and still be competitive since they can take on more salary to make up for this mistakes. The current system has the average payroll at $127,742,064 in 2021. The Rays and Brewers are the only team with a below average payroll that made the playoffs last year. Neither made the World Series. Of course a team can catch lightening in a bottle for a season or two before having to pay the big contracts, but for the most part, having an above average pay significantly improves your chances of making the playoffs on a consistent basis.

A $160 million payroll would have been 10th in the league last year. They absolutely should be able to compete with that IF the system keeps the big market teams in the low 200s or upper 180+. The problem is before the luxury tax came to be, teams were getting into the $300 million range. I'm with you when it comes to watching a tanking team. It sucks. If it weren't for my interest in the minor leagues, I probably would have lost interest in watching just the Orioles over the last few years, especially last year when they brought up non major league players to the major leagues. This is why I'd rather make adjustments to control and earning free agency which would enable teams to bring up prospects vs 31 year old knuckleball pitchers who can't get AAA batters out.

The problem with that is this statement is just not true. Year and year out, the big market teams are in the playoffs. Do they get beat there, sure, because a 5 or 7 game series is a crapshoot and you can take any team in the league and they can beat another in a 5 or 7 game series. Can big contracts backfire, sure, but when they backfire for a big market team they shrug, and go off an just buy another guy. Teams like the Orioles just can't do that. So that teams like the Orioles (small market) at a disadvantage because they just can't out buy their mistakes like the big markets can. Tampa is the model you and some others like to point out as being successful, but I think worth mentioning that Tampa has been playing 3D chess while the rest of the league plays checkers for years. I think teams are starting to catch up in a lot of ways, but the other thing to consider is the Rays don't draw well (lots of reasons for that I know) and have only made the playoffs the last three years after missing for five years straight. They also have never won a World Series. The Yankees have been in the playoffs 6 out of the last 7 years, The Dodgers have been in the last 9 straight post seasons, Astros 6 out of seven, and Red Sox 5 of the 8 with two World Series wins. Really only Mets, White Sox and Angels have played poorly while being a big market team and well, they have bad management.

The one thing that our country proves on a daily basis is the general public is dumb, uninformed, lazy, and easily influenced by what they are told. Anyone who is small market fan (that's basically us now that the Nats exist) that is pro player after reading everything that they want (basically if the players got what they want all small market teams would basically be irrelevant year in and year out), either doesn't care about the Orioles ever being relevant on a year in and out basis, or is so caught up in a pro union stance because of their politics that they can't see how them getting what they want will do. There are ways to make profit sharing exist that would help spread some of that owners cash to players, but the players are just focused on no caps, penalties and salary floors. I guess no one cares that tickets for good seats now sit between $45-90 for one game out of 162. One game out of 162. I know fanboys and girls don't really understand how little players and owners for that matter care about the common fan. They love their favorite player and think those players love them back, but really, most players could give two squats about the fans. Sure, they'll say the right things in the press, but just watching these negotiations and how players like Scherzer (who makes over $40 million/year) talks about the horrors the players have to endure under this awful system that stops him from potentially earning $50 million a year. So sad, yet fanboys fall for this schtick because it's easy to blame the greedy Billionaire owners. As I've said before, the owners bear some fault in all of all this too because they won't open the books, but honestly, right now, the owners are the only things stopping this sport from being all about the big markets with the rest of the team just there to be the Generals to the Globetrotters.

Floors are stupid and do nothing but make a team overpay mediocre talent. The system is simple, if teams don't spend then the fans have the choice of not watching or supporting. Forcing teams to spend "x" amount of money to meet a floor, while Big market teams can spend what they want is literally lunacy for any chance of fairness across all 30 teams for competition purposes. No matter what you think, having the ability to spend $200 million or more on a pay roll DOES make it much easier to compete year in and year out, particularly over a 162 game schedule. Clearly the playoffs are a crapshoot, but there's a reason why the big market teams with the huge payrolls are in the playoffs year in and year out.

I don't that's necessarily true. Greedy out of touch ultra rich players are also worried about how they can increase their 30 million+ a year contracts. We no cap or penalties for the big market teams, who knows how big a contract Scherzer and his greedy brethren can squeeze out of a big market Billionaire owner?

Scherzer has become the spokesman for the ultra rich out of touch baseball player. I've lost any respect i ever had for him after his ridiculous comments that sows he cares about nothing but making as much money as possible, even if that means just the big market teams get to compete year in and year out.

I just find it interesting. If Early really didn't like him, why would he keep running him out there and give him a chance at 20? did Weaver care that he probably was throwing more pitches than any starter he'd had before? I kinda wish I had the answer, but every quote I read Weaver had nothing nice to say about Garland and vice versa.

I get it. This is why we NEED baseball. It's supposed to distract us from all of this BS.

All I said was that sounds like a MLBPA press release, which it did. You posted it. You didn't say anything else. You and everyone else should be smarter than to believe press releases from EITHER side. You said there were many reasons why people should not choose mediation. You've yet to come up for the reasons for the MLBPA. No one are angels in this. Sounds like if anything, you are buying the press releases. Whether you want to agree ot not, it's not me being pro owner, it's me seeing through the bullsh@$.

Sounds like a press release from MLBPA. You should be smarter than believing propaganda.

No kidding. Neither is the current process.

This doesn't make sense to me. Why is this "so early in the process?" Look, the only person/group who doesn't want arbitration/mediation are the people who think they can win. It's pretty clear they are stale mated. It's pretty clear it's going to take some kind of mediation to help bridge this gap if we have any chance of a full season this year.

We can disagree, that's fine, but it's clear to me that the MLBPA cares nothing, and I mean nothing, about the fans that ultimate pay their very large contracts. An argument can be made that the owners, particularly the large market owners, don't care either, but at least the owners have offered to bring in a mediator. That to me is a stp in the right direction. BTW, can you tell us some reasons why the MLBPA does not want mediation on Feb 4 with spring training due to start in two weeks (we know it's not starting on time)?

What if they realize they are so far apart that the better action is to bring in a mediator? I don't get how anyone would fault the owners for wanting mediation.

Don't respond to me any more. I'm not going to be called ignorant and everything else you throw at me because of your fanboy obsession with the MLBPA. I will not be called ignorant on my own site. If you disagree, that's fine, but call me anything else and you will no longer post here.

Why would this change anything? What is what the players countered with is so off the mark that the owners felt it's best to just bring in mediation? Anyone who turns down mediation knows they are not trying to get a fair deal, but believe they have a chance of beating the other party. My guess is the MLBPA is secretly negotiating with the big market owners and trying that angle.