The Yankees Must Be Destroyed!

I know it's the season for giving, but this is ridiculous. First the Yankees sign C.C. Sabathia to a seven-year contract for $161 million. Not long after, they sign A.J. Burnett to a five-year deal for $82.5 million. Then today, the drawn-out Mark Teixeira derby has finally come to an end, with the Yankees giving him $180 million over eight years. Add these huge contracts to the players that the Yankees already have on payroll and it looks like they'll have another $200 million-plus worth of salaries this year.

Now I know that complaining about the Yankees spending way too much money and trying to buy championships year after year is nothing new. But it seems ridiculous that some teams are allowed to spend such ridiculous amounts when there are plenty of teams out whose total payroll will equal less than the annual combined salaries of these three players. In fact, barring any big acquisitions, the Florida Marlins entire 2009 payroll will probably be close the amount that either Sabathia or Teixeira will make individually.

The MLB instituted a luxury tax system a few years back, but it obviously hasn't had much effect on the Yankees, who continually surpass the tax threshold by tens of millions of dollars each year. By going over the luxury tax limit, a team has to pay an amount of money in tax penalties at the end of the year. Since the implementation, the Yankees have received this penalty every year, accounting for over 90% of the total penalties that have been enforced by the league. Let's compare this system to the salary cap systems in place by the other two big sports organizations in the country. (I won't elaborate on the NHL's system because I have no idea how it works, nor do I care enough to bother doing the research.)

The NFL has a hard salary cap. There's a team salary number that escalates each year. If a team's annual salary goes over the amount of the predetermined salary cap, then they can get fined and have contracts voided and stuff. Because of these stringent fines and restrictions, teams always make sure to stay under the cap. This is why you see so many players getting released and jumping around from team to team; it happens to a lot of established veterans. Contracts are set up that in most cases, it's cheaper to release a player than pay him a veteran-level salary for another couple of years. If a team wants to sign a high-cost player, they have to make sure to clear room for him first.

The NBA uses a soft salary cap system. There's a predetermined annual salary cap value that increases each year, but teams aren't necessarily fined or penalized for going over that payroll number. Instead, restrictions are placed on the team prohibiting them from making big additions to their payroll: they can only sign free agents at the league-minimum price, players can only be traded for players equaling near the same amount of money in annual salaries, etc. Above the salary cap, there's also a luxury tax threshold, in which teams have to pay a tax to the league if their total annual payroll exceeds it. There's also a maximum salary amount for individual players, ensuring that the already ridiculous contracts can't increase to even more ridiculous levels. With the continually skyrocking values of player salaries each year, I think the whole maximum salary thing is a good idea that needs to be looked at in the other leagues, particularly in regard to rookie salaries in the NFL.

With MLB, it doesn't seem like there's as much of an effort to curb the inflation of annual player salaries. This offseason has just been part of the growing trend, with the three biggest free agents (Sabathia, Teixeira, and Manny Ramirez) each asking for multi-year contracts worth over $20 mil per year. The value of annual salaries keeps climbing with no end in sight, and the Yankees continue to be head and shoulders above every other team when it comes to payroll. So it's unfair that MLB's payroll system works in a way makes no significant attempts at parity between teams. But some consolation can be taken in the fact that money doesn't necessarily buy championships. The Yankees haven't won a World Series since 2000. They haven't been the American League champs since 2003, and last year they didn't even make the playoffs. So I guess the Yankees' crazy spending habits don't necessarily make them a juggernaut destroying the fun of baseball. It just makes them jerks who try to go out and buy championships every year. That's all. And as long as they continue to do so, they'll still be my second least favorite team (the Dodgers being my least favorite, of course).

Baseball will have to find some way to address the issue of rising salaries at some point. If it spirals out of control, then eventually it could end up being no better than boxing, which has lost most of its credibility largely due to the ridiculous amount of money involved in high profile fights. Look at the biggest delevopments in recent years: Floyd Mayweather wins a close match by decision and then retires immediately after so that he never has to risk losing the title to a decent opponent. Stuff like that won't really build up a sport's standing among the general public. Or look at Oscar De La Hoya: he fights once every year or two, gets his ass kicked every time, yet still gets title shots and tens of millions of dollars per fight solely based on his name and reputation, even if he hasn't done anything worthwhile in nearly a decade. A ridiculous amount of money goes to marketing the fight and paying the boxers themselves, and the fans end up picking up the bill by having to pay $60 to watch the fights on pay-per-view. Eventually, if you screw people over too many times, then you'll lose them. That's why UFC/MMA is the hot thing right now and boxing is pretty much an afterthought. The NFL gets away with this too by charging fans an arm and a leg for regular season games, along with charging full price for preseason games. But at least they have that salary cap to keep the issue of player salaries somewhat under control, even if they happen to be ripping off their fans at the same time.

So if baseball doesn't try to reel in the amount of money flying around to some degree, then the sport risks pricing itself out of the reputation of being America's pasttime, instead becoming just the sport of overpaid millionaires. That's why it's always refreshing to see a team full of low-paid, young players doing well, like the Tampa Bay Rays last year or the Florida Marlins in 2007. I guess the developments of this offseason just mean a continuation of past trends. The top-tier free agents will always get ridiculous amounts of money thrown at them. And barring any massive rebuilding efforts, the Yankees will be a behemoth team with a huge payroll, always playing under the mantra of "World Series or Bust". All we can do is continue to sit back and try to have fun, rooting for the underdogs every step of the way, because there's nothing better than seeing a rag-tag group of misfits facing a team of high-priced all-stars and shoving their money back in their overpaid faces.


P.S. Go Giants!