No salary cap for the owners, am I correct? It’s the oldest strategy that the rich use. They put us against each other, while they take more of our money without us noticing.
Absolutely outstanding column today. Even small market owners are making big money. They make money every single day and every single year the value of their franchise increases. Every time we go searching for game to watch on another streaming service, understand that the owners are profiting.
I understand the argument that players receive roughly 47% to 50% of MLB revenue. That isn’t my point. My point is that players only share in the annual revenue generated by the game, while owners benefit from both that revenue and the long-term appreciation of franchise values. If a team goes from being worth $500 million to $5 billion, the owner captures that gain, not the players. So when discussing who benefits from the growth of Major League Baseball, looking only at revenue tells only part of the story.
This is the argument that gets lost every single labor cycle. The equity vs. income framing is the whole ballgame, and it’s rarely stated this cleanly. A player’s salary shows up on a paycheck and gets reported. An owner’s gain shows up as an appreciating balance sheet entry that never has to be realized or disclosed until sale.
The floor point is the tell. If cost control were really about competitive balance, the union wouldn’t have to be the one pushing for a spending floor every cycle. Ownership’s silence on that side of the ledger says more than anything in their PR.
Also worth watching for December: how “competitive balance” gets reframed once talks actually start. It’ll shift to “cost certainty” and “system health,” language that polls better but means the same thing.
No salary cap for the owners, am I correct? It’s the oldest strategy that the rich use. They put us against each other, while they take more of our money without us noticing.
Absolutely outstanding column today. Even small market owners are making big money. They make money every single day and every single year the value of their franchise increases. Every time we go searching for game to watch on another streaming service, understand that the owners are profiting.
Amen.
Eat the 1%
Amen. And agreed about the beauty of the Japanese’s NPB — but those owners have their players by the balls almost as badly as the old reserve clause.
True on the Japanese structure, different culture for sure.
What percentage of total revenue currently goes to the players?
I understand the argument that players receive roughly 47% to 50% of MLB revenue. That isn’t my point. My point is that players only share in the annual revenue generated by the game, while owners benefit from both that revenue and the long-term appreciation of franchise values. If a team goes from being worth $500 million to $5 billion, the owner captures that gain, not the players. So when discussing who benefits from the growth of Major League Baseball, looking only at revenue tells only part of the story.
The Padres sold for nearly $4 billion and we are still likely to have a lockout. Madness.
100% agree with 100% of this.
This is the argument that gets lost every single labor cycle. The equity vs. income framing is the whole ballgame, and it’s rarely stated this cleanly. A player’s salary shows up on a paycheck and gets reported. An owner’s gain shows up as an appreciating balance sheet entry that never has to be realized or disclosed until sale.
The floor point is the tell. If cost control were really about competitive balance, the union wouldn’t have to be the one pushing for a spending floor every cycle. Ownership’s silence on that side of the ledger says more than anything in their PR.
Also worth watching for December: how “competitive balance” gets reframed once talks actually start. It’ll shift to “cost certainty” and “system health,” language that polls better but means the same thing.