Dollars and nonsense

Who to believe? What to believe? Who cares anymore?

We come to this point in this game of baseball bargaining -- the bottom of the ninth, the near point of no return, the brink of disaster, the height of stupidity -- because owners and players are bull-headed, plain and simple.

They believe what they believe. Maybe it makes sense. Maybe it doesn't.

A whole heck of a lot doesn't.

How can a player who makes a minimum of $200,000 a year complain about salary constraints?

Well, players will tell you that this whole thing is not about money. It's about principles.

Liars, liars, liars. It is about money. It is, it is. Owners want players to make less money, or at least not make as much of it as quickly. The players don't want that. They want to keep raking in the millions.

The players talk about fair, open markets. They want fair bidding wars. They want George Steinbrenner on the phone and Tom Hicks sending a limo to their house. The players say a fair, free market should determine what a player is to be paid, not some pre-determined salary structure.

You can talk capitalism and the American way all you want, but really. Come on. To that argument we offer this: $2.4 million. Guaranteed. That's the average salary of a major league player today.

Players won't be getting ripped off if owners try to slow down these astronomical salaries. We won't revert to 1960s payrolls. Tom Glavine does not have to become Norma Rae.

Two point four million. Sounds pretty fair to us.

How are we supposed to believe anything the owners say?

The Loch Ness Monster in this whole labor disagreement is the owners' claim that they're losing millions of dollars. There are a lot of people that swear it's true. They've seen it.

The players aren't among them. They see only shadows. Fuzzy shadows.

It's a hoot, isn't it? The owners say they have to fix this one overwhelming problem -- that is, that they're losing their French-cuffed shirts -- and the players don't believe them. The players think it's a myth. A hoax.

These two sides hate each other, and they have for a long, long time. Back when players were fighting for a voice in their future, before free agency. Way back before owners colluded to drive down salaries in the late 1980s and were fined $280 million.

Not only do they hate each other, they trust each other about as far as they could throw El Guapo. Commissioner Bud Selig says a couple of teams are on the brink of bankruptcy … and everyone scoffs. He claims some may not be able to make payroll. They scoff again (and scoff more when the teams meet payroll). He claims baseball needs a whole new economic system.

But he won't open the ledgers, not completely, so others can verify baseball's dire predicament. More scoffing ensues. As everyone who has heard of Enron or WorldCom knows, accountants can do wonders with numbers.

The truth is, there is a widespread belief that baseball is fudging its numbers. It's a $3.5 billion business, for crying out loud. And remember, Forbes, a respected business magazine, did a study that found baseball is not nearly as bad off as it claims to be.

So what you have are proven liars, historically speaking, trying to convince us that they are now telling the truth. We have Bud Selig -- who has a mountain of questionable business dealings of his own -- crying wolf.

No wonder no one is listening.

How can anyone ignore that the playing field is tilted toward richer teams?

Baseball says Milwaukee and Kansas City and Cincinnati and Pittsburgh and other small markets -- meaning low-revenue markets -- don't have a chance to win a World Series.

Many players will argue that it's not the markets and the payrolls as much as it's the management of those clubs that makes them losers. You'd be stunned how many players espouse this particular theory. Some of them, evidently, actually believe it.

Well, it's nonsense. Yes, as the players point out, there are small-revenue teams that do well once in a while. Oakland. Minnesota. Maybe a Cincinnati breaks through every now and then. And, yes, there are plenty of high-revenue teams -- the Orioles, let's say -- that don't win despite their payrolls and revenue streams.

But it doesn't take someone from the Harvard Business School to figure out that the teams with more money, the ones from bigger markets, can buy and keep the best talent. In fact, those teams can buy the so-so talent, too ( Raul Mondesi, now of the Yankees, comes to mind).

Here's that whopper of a win-loss record that owners keep throwing around: Since 1995, teams with a payroll in the top 25 percent have won 219 out of 224 postseason games.

It's simple. Talent wins ballgames. Talent costs. Good teams have the talent, and more of it, because they can afford it.

Yes, there is a lot being spewed out there, from both sides, that doesn't make a lot of sense. The whole game has been played that way. For way, way too long.

Let's just hope it ends soon. One way or the other.

It's time to be getting home.

John Donovan is a senior writer for CNNSI.com. Comments? To e-mail Donovan, click here.

 

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