John Henry has made his opinion clear…
Henry believes that Major League Baseball should implement a salary cap. Or at least seriously explore it.
Larry Lucchino shares Henry’s belief on the matter.
Do I?
I wouldn’t mind it.
But when followers of the game argue their perspectives, they seem to be flawed at times.
Many speak about the game’s “parody.” How there has been a greater amount of different World Series champions over the past 20 years or so, than there have been Super Bowl champions (NFL) in the same time-frame.
True, it may be. But it isn’t the only way to view the financial differences from one organization to the next.
The team that has spent the most money every single year for the past eleven seasons has been the New York Yankees.
And the minimum amount of games that they have won has been 87 games. That total of course being their low, back in the year 2000.
So using only one team isn’t the best way to describe a correlation between “team payroll” and “wins.”
But since eliminating the “outliers” would be the most obvious approach to level the playing field, from a financial aspect–as Henry and Lucchino mentioned. Then the highest payroll is a great example in this regard.
The Red Sox owners are speaking from the heart, to some extent. They play in the same division as the Yankees. And the way that the Yankees run their ball-club directly effects the Boston Red Sox.
There are two reasons why John Henry is an advocate for some type of salary cap:
- John Henry is an owner. They do care about the money that they spend, believe it or not. And Henry does not want to feel obligated to have to spend the 200+ million dollars that the Yankees are spending, currently. If this were an NL team, where they only have to meet the Yankees on rare occasions–and would really only have to worry about running into them during the World Series. And once there, the regular season seems irrelevant (sometimes anyway, crap-shoot-theory). Then I can see a team like the Phillies caring much less about the Yankees spending, than that of a team competing with them within the AL East. That being said, there is some animosity toward the amount of money that the Yankees spend each season from teams around the league.
- John Henry has the best run organization in the game. Money matters. But Henry knows that at least right now, the Red Sox have a good general manager. They have a strong farm system. They have a great group of “talent evaluators.” They have a very good understanding of the value of draft picks. Ditto that understanding in regards to avoiding paying players loads of money as they decline–basically a reluctance to throw around 7 and 8 year contracts. Henry realizes that Epstein generally separates what his heart says from what his brain says–evident by allowing players such as Pedro Martinez and Derek Lowe to walk (there will be more “fan favorites” walking in the future, trust me on that).
Simply put, John Henry realizes that the guys who make the big-time decisions within the organization know what they are doing.
They are not as reliant on money as some other large-market teams might be.
But that doesn’t exclude them from having money play-in as a luxury.
The money that the Red Sox have had, allows them to do things that some other teams cannot do.
One obvious example of that is signing free agents such as Daisuke, JD Drew, Julio Lugo, etc. But over the past few off-seasons, the Red Sox have avoided handing out large contracts. So this is not a yearly thing by any means. The team has grown very adept about how and where they spend the money, and have been improving each and every year in that area (it seems anyway).
Trading away players, and absorbing partial-salary when a player does not perform well enough, is another advantage that large market teams have. Edgar Renteria is an example.
See, in a perfect world, every team would have a General Manager/Front Office that could make good moves, while spending as little money as possible. In this world, the top-tier payrolls would have a distinct advantage. If every GM was skilled at their job, and there wasn’t much difference between the minds that are within each organization, then the extra money that a club would have, would play an even more significant role.
This however is not that perfect world.
Teams who spend a lot of money will fail some of the time.
Teams who spend less money will succeed some of the time.
There will be exceptions, always.
But using the 2008 Seattle Mariners as an example of a large-market team who failed, may hold some water. However, it cannot be the only example. That team made decisions that were not smart, simply put.
“Sabermetrics” supporters/experts were all over the Adam Jones+ trade for Erik Bedard. And “all over it” in a negative light. They understood that Jones was cheap, young, and an everyday player. Not to mention, an up-the-middle defender–one that had a good bat, and star potential.
And Erik Bedard, although a pitcher with great stuff, was injury-prone and under contract for only a short period of time. This wasn’t Johan Santana. It was a good pitcher with great stuff, but it was not arguably the best pitcher in the game in Santana. A pitcher that had been relatively healthy his entire career–a left-hander that had thrown 219+ innings in four consecutive seasons. It was Bedard. Not Johan “The Great.”
But paying Johan would still not have been easy for the Mariners. But at least they would have been acquiring a truly great pitcher, the best in the game.
Money matters.
But being smart matters more.
It may be exaggerated, as the hypothetical “every GM on the same level” is simply not ever going to happen. It’s unrealistic.
But the top payrolls have an advantage if they are going to go about everything properly.
If they build the farm system, most importantly. If they stay away from paying players too much as they decline. If they try and avoid losing draft picks as often as possible–and of course accumulating as many as possible, too. Then the large market teams will hold an advantage.
That advantage may not be as significant as some believe. But it cannot be ignored either.
The Red Sox are the best example of this, as I already mentioned.
They can develop players from within, but if they are missing a position. Say, SS. They could go out and spend just about as much as anyone to address this need. And that is an advantage. There is no doubt about it. Not every team could spend $15 million a year on a free agent if they desperately need that player.
The Red Sox could.
The Yankees could.
The Mets could.
Etc.
Eliminating the outliers makes some sense, and that goes for teams that spend too much AND teams that spend too little.
And the cap may be relatively high, so the Red Sox understand that at least for a while, they would still have a financial advantage over the average team.
But Henry and Lucchino definitely speak from the subjective here. Because the aspect of all this that they are most concerned with, would be the Yankees spending less than they are now.
But really, don’t take this as me being sympathetic of the Red Sox and their “financial disa
dv
antages.”
Because their financial situation is far from a “disadvantage.”
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