Major League Ready

Doc, I am impressed You just proved an ability to be objective that is obviously not present in the vast majority here. Salaries have risen astronomically. In other words, the owners have ponied up. The players could have elected to let minor league players participate in this good fortune. However, the people who should be the most sympathetic could have chosen to include MiLB players and they said we will going to keep every penny for ourselves. This group someone ignores this and make the owners out to be 100% at fault. BTW ... The salaried employee is a very good solution to MiLB players.

The MLBPA does not fight for better wages for MiLB players because it would come out of the MLB player’s pockets. There is X amount of dollars available for player salaries. If Forbes is to be believed and I think that’s a credible source, the teams are spending those dollars except when they are in an obvious rebuild mode. There are players who individually make more than some of the teams every year. It cracks me up that the vast majority of fans put all the blame on the owners. Players and their agents have shown the players are out to get every dime they can get. Yet, somehow it’s only the owners that are greedy. It would be great if the owners came out and stated the want to REALLOCATE $1.5M/year to payroll for minor league players. The major league minimum would not change so the only players impacted would be those in arbitration or beyond. If the average pay is 4.4M, I would guess the average pay for this segment of players is at least $6M year. If on average 15 of the 25 players on MLB rosters are in this group it would cost those players 100,000 year of 1.66 percent of their salary. MLB pays their players 10 what Japanese players make which is the next highest paid league and the average pay of MLB players has tripled (after being adjusted for inflation) in the past 20 years. The player's association could have opted to include minor MiLB players in this tremendous increase in player wages and they chose not to do so.

It appears to me that you are making an assumption Jorgenwest's primary point or logic is based on the Twins not being favored in any of those games. That's not at all how it reads to me. He stated the odds of the Twins winning will not change significantly regardless of it's Hughes or any of the other options. That does not even remotely suggest the nature of the argument is that the Twins won't be favored in those games. At least that's how I read it.

Gomez or even Jackson at the price they signed are good examples of what you are saying. Grossman would have brought something back (nothing great but something). My hope is that not signing these guys leaves room to sign Lynn or Cobb. Neither one of these guys are top of the rotation guys but still good assets and would give us good depth of solid starting pitching. We have not had that in a long time. It would be wonderful to have a problem of excess if we are so fortunate as to have Gibson, May, Sanchez or Hughes or a couple of them exceed expectations. I am sure we can find someone willing to take our excess for a decent return. Santana | Berrios | Odorizzi | Lynn | Gibson | Mejia | Hughes | Sanchez | Gonsalves | May - I like our odds of coming up with a solid rotation out of this group and maybe even having some trade assets at the deadline. I am not sure how we workout the roster issues but that seems to have a way of working out.

Gomez was a great value at $4M as was Jackson at 2/6M. It might be that they just don't want to give up on Kepler developing against LF pitching which I can get behind.

You are absolutely right Morrison had a career year but given the money we are talking it makes no sense to assume this decision had any bearing on them not signing a RH OFer. AT least Morrison is in his prime and its reasonable to believe last year was a break-out season. I also think it is a stretch to say their were multiple viable options available. The only guy you listed that was considered in the top 50 available free agents was Gomez. Gomez was good last year and he might have a couple good seasons left in him. Perhaps the front office did not believe in him or he simply might not have been interested in coming back here. I just not that as simple as there were several good options.

Gonzalez, is a LH hitter. I forgot about Jackson. He had a nice year last year and is still in his prime. That would have been a decent move but he is the only FA that would have move the needle. Gomez had a good year last year too but he was bad a couple years before that so I would not have cared for him. Holiday has been declining for about the last 5 years so I don't think he is a difference maker and Bautista had an OPS+ of 76 last year and will be 37 this year.

What free agent OFer other than Martinez would that describe?

You are making an assumption that my problem is how much the players are getting paid and that assumption is incorrect. I don’t care. What bugs me is the fans perspective on financial matters. For example, The Twins should sign Darvish no matter what. In other words, the owners should ignore the fact this is a business but players should not. My favorite is MLB owners should be willing to make little or no profit but players should get every dime they can. The realty interesting thing about this particular position is that it is usually made in the context that it would help our team get desirable FAs. If the owners followed this practice it would not change the MN Twins position at all. The players would just get more money. Actually, if all the teams sacrificed their profit the Twins would be in even worse relative financial position because the big market teams would add more to their potential budget then the twins would under such a practice. Also, positions such as the league would lose talent are formulated with little consideration of the driving factors. For example, you concluded MLB would definitely lose talent in the long run. To whom? There is not another league paying even remotely close to MLB. The NFL pays less than half in terms of average salary. Fans support this positions without any realistic consideration of the factors associate with a potential future state. BTW … MLB attendance has declined for three consecutive seasons. Do you think the rising ticket prices necessary to pay these enormous salaries has anything to do with this fact? https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2017/10/02/final-2017-mlb-attendance-dips-below-73-million-for-first-time-since-2002/#6b3e3c61326f

I agree with one of the general constructs of your past couple posts in terms of the money is not getting spread around. The big names are getting paid big-time on guaranteed deals regardless of how they produce going forward. Of course, this too is a value judgment and when they perform their impact on the revenues is worth the salary. At least it would appear the teams have come to this conclusion. Frankly, I have mixed emotions on minor league pay. It's a business expense just like MLM salaries so owners should not care if they are paying MLB or MiLB salaries. I am guessing the players see this as their slice of the pie. If an X percent increase goes to MiLB players it costs the MLB players. Raise the average MiLB slary by $20K means there is roughly $100K less to go to MLB players. One last note. Who deserves what when slicing the pie is a different premise than sociological value.

Monopoly status is irrelevant in this context as monopolies do not drive down wages and the laws protecting wages have nothing to do with monopolies. This is a link to the Department of labor Laws. https://www.dol.gov/general/aboutdol/majorlaws If there is an effect of monopoly status it would be to create the capacity for excess profits and therefore higher than normal wages. You are also mischaracterizing these statement. The OP suggested players were not treated fairly. I wanted to know from what perspective. The comparison to US Military and Homeleand security was a measure of sociological value. So, the comparison is obviously relevant in context. If its not a sociological perspective the other pertinent perspective is that of free market economics which is a perspective most fans look at from an emotional point of view. For example, a primary disagreement here is that we would lose two sport players. Fans say sure we would without any real consideration of the economic factors at play. For example, there are not enough two sport players to make a significant difference or that all of the others sports except the NBA pay considerable less. Fans make this sort of statement don’t stop to consider baseball contracts are guaranteed and NFL contracts are not. You also completely ignored the fact that I posted right after the quote you posted that this was not a debate of what anyone deserves. Anyone who has been part of related negotiation knows eveyone believes their function is where all the value is formed. There were no coaches that helped these players develop and marketing people had nothing to do with the growth of the league, etc.

Dave, You are sure right in regard to the potential to manipulate numbers. However, these numbers were not supplied by the team. Detailed financials are simply not available so I got that information from Forbes. I am sure they are estimating these numbers. There is no way the teams are giving them even remotely complete information. https://www.forbes.com/mlb-valuations/list/#tab:overall This is not too tough for me to believe. Revenue suffers when the team does not perform for whatever reason. There is not much you can do to trim costs unless you bail on the bigger contracts.

I never once addressed revenue split in any fashion which is why I was so ardent. You insisted on remaining on revenue split when my questions clearly indicated my argument was from a different perspective. What’s a fair split does not dictate salaries in a free economy. What’s fair is also very dependent on who’s perspective is being given. I have been in literally hundreds, probably thousands of conversation/negotiations in dozens of companies across numerous industries. There is a strong tendency for individuals or groups to over value their function. John Kennedy once said “success has a thousand fathers and failure is a orphan? We all believe analytics are extremely important to winning. Are the analytics guys get a piece of the pie or are they paid based on alternatives employment options for those involved. The developmental guys in the minors can have a huge impact, right? I bet they feel they deserve more. How about the marketing guys that have contributed to annual growth and popularity of the game. The list goes on. Who is entitled to what is very difficult to justify or quantify which I why I focused on other forms of valuation. One of the angles I was addressing was could owners pay less and retain talent level and therefore the popularity of the game. You answered we would lose talent but offer no data or even logic. Are there even enough 2-sport players to make a difference? Most are football players, right? How do NFL salaries compare? The average NFL salary is 1.9M and MLB is 4.4M https://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenhausen/2016/12/15/average-player-salaries-in-major-american-sports-leagues/#558d4fb21050 Is it likely players that are football and baseball prospects would opt for MLB even if the salaries were equal because of guaranteed contracts and to protect their bodies. We have always been able to attract and retain talent in the past. I think so. Has baseball not kept pace with inflation? The average salary in 1995 was $1.1M According to this Forbes article, https://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenhausen/2016/04/07/average-baseball-salary-up-20700-since-first-cba-in-1968/#3ccff70a3e48 the average salary in 1995 was 1,110,766. Adjusted for inflation suing this online tool https://inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_calculators/inflation_rate_calculator.asp that would equate to $1,621,718. Players earned an average of 4.4M in 2017 which is 270% of the rate paid in 1995 after adjusting for inflation. My opinion is that fans are extremely bias. For example, your position that players are underpaid but owners are making insane profits. There were 15 MLB teams that made less than the top players (single player) in 2016. Four teams lost money. Compensation levels and models in all other industries include a risk component. Players bare no risk. Fans ignore all these things. I fully expect very biased perspectives and perhaps that’s the real point here. How many people do you think would characterize executive compensation at 1,000 times the average American income as underpaid?

Because I find the premise baseball players are underpaid ludicrous. A US marine deployed to a combat zone receives "combat pay" at the rate of $225-250 per month. The median pay for a Marine Lance Corporal is $22,800. Annual compensation while in combat = $25,800. Clayton Kershaw get paid roughly $1M per start. That equates to 38.75X the annual salary of a deployed Marine Corporal for one game. That Corporal would need to fight in combat for 1,279 years to receive the same compensation for 1 year of Kershaw’s contract. He would have to fight in combat or 7,093 years to equal Joe Mauers contract or 12,596 years to equal Giancarlo Stanton contract. How about a Homeland Security Agent Special Agent. They would have to work roughly 3,000 years to equal Stanton’s contract or we could say it takes 300 Homeland Security agents to equal one Giancarlo Stanton. The notion baseball players are underpaid is a product of fanaticism. Mostly, I just wanted someone to actually address the question I posed directly. Let’s try again and see if anyone is actually willing to answer a question directly. If the government said the MLB monopoly has pushed ticket prices to a point of being prohibitive to many families paying taxes for these stadiums or the revenue just was not there and MLB paid half of the $4.4M average compensation would we lose any talent? Would an average compensation of $2,2M be considered incredibly lucrative for playing a game? Would players be thrilled to play for that amount of money? Could they go to Japan or Korea and make ½ of what they make in MLB? Let’s see if anyone is actually willing to address these questions.

You completely ignored my response/question. Of course, they would strike. I am not debating this point and never even remotely suggested they would not fight for every penny. This is not the question or position I have stated. If you want to answer the questions I posed do so. You are changing the question so that you don't have to address the position I posed. The truth is there is no competition for MLB players paying anywhere near what they earn. In other words, normal market forces do not apply.

You are not answering the question I posed. Would they loose players to another league, industry or profession. Is there a competitor to MLB that pays more than 50% of what MLB pays?

I don't think the normal requirements of attracting and retaining talent apply to MLB. They would not loose any talent if they paid 1/2 of what they are today. The owners cant agree to do this across the board because it would be a violation of antitrust laws. I would guess they are also satisfied with the profit level and relative certainty of that profit. Substantiating industry data is not as simple as going to Baseball Reference and putting in some parameters. It requires detailing assumptions, validating measurements and methodologies and other supporting documentation. My team has done a few of these for state governments and large corporations that required 200-350 pages of validation. I am providing an opinion based on a extremely unusual level of access that has been a product of my profession. I would be the last guy to suggest that type of information be accepted at face value but I was not thinking about that when I made the comment.

NBA players may very well be more overpaid. That was not in question. The question was are the owners screwing the players. Could they get away with paying less? I would not be inclined to take a hard position either way. However, it's very hard to argue they could not pay considerably less at this point and retain all of the talent. Are players not going to play for an average of $3M/year vs $4.4M? I think the owners could get away with expanding their bottom line but the point was really nothing more than the premise MLB players are under paid is absurd!

Not sure what you are asking. Obviously, I am generalizing and estimating MLB players get pid 2-3 times what they could make in any other league. That's the competition for MLB in terms of attracting and keeping talent. It's hard to be real specific given the limited financial data. I have looked through all the Forbes data and done some surface analysis. All of the teams spend in relatively the same fashion if you look at over the course of a 10 year period. There profits are similar to other industries. My source is 15 years of consulting for the largest corporations in the US and be granted access to all their financial data via NDA's. You can also find financial metrics for any industry through the resources provided by any of the brokerage and trading firms. Again, not sure what you are asking for specifically but it comes down to this question. Could MLB players get paid anywhere near what they do anywhere else in the world. Perhaps another way toto look at would be to ask if MLB players elect to do something else if the pay was 1/2 of the current level. Would we loose any talent to other leagues. If not, one could make an argument the owners could have played hardball once the salary levels reached an average of 1-2M per year. They could have said take it or leave it. Hired whomever was willing to play for a year or two and eventually players would have jumped back in before giving upthe opportunity to make millions playing a kids game. They would have gotten a black eye with the public but I would have to believe they could have kept a considerably bigger piece of the pie. MLB could have donated 50% of whatever addition profit they kept to worthy charities and I would bet that black eye would have healed quickly. House the homeless and battered women and people would be OK with paying average players $2M or $3M instead of $4M.

"Players Screwed". You have to be kidding me. If the MLB owners decided to pay half of the percentage of revenue they pay to today,they would still be paying the highest rate for players in the world. In other words, they would not loose any talent and it's not like any prospects would decide not to play baseball because it did not pay enough. How many industries do you know that pay 3X what they need to pay to be competitive for talent? Do you think Forbes is a credible source? If you look at team spending over a period of several years, all of the teams spend at about the same rate. Obviously, rebuilding teams are less aggressive but its not like MLB team profits are different than other healthy industries. The game the top talent and their agents are playing is to try to get paid for as many years as possible when they are no longer playing at a high level or perhaps even at replacement level. BTW ... They are asking to be paid 10X in a single year what the average American makes over a 50 year period and they want to be paid that rate for 2 or 3 years while they are likely at replacement level. I am not sure why we should look at this scenario and conclude the problem is greedy owners.

It's pretty easy to calculate actual cost. What I am wondering is how they are forecasting and determining market value. Has there been a considerable gap in forecasted vs actual performance. Of course, this includes how long the player will add significant value. It seems like there was a tendency be overly optimistic. Does WAR even have any significant role in contract valuations. Honestly, I have never dig into it by it seems highly suspect. How accurate has Streamer been? I have never seen a metric this suspect used in any form of valuation in any other industry. Are we seeing an adjustment this year? There are more business school educated personnel in front offices now. There appears to be an adjustment in-process this season. Are the front offices finally recognizing the odds of defying aging and the cost of losing cost controlled players. It will be very interesting to see how this shakes out in coming weeks.

Are the estimates you referenced in the highlighted part of your post the average production per WAR after signing or are this calculated based on the price free agent signed and there war for 2-3 seasons leading up to free agency? I think you are confusing production per WAR with what players are signing for in comparison with this historical WAR. For example, Lorenzo Cain averaged 4.6 WAR over the last 3 years. He signed for $16M/year which equates to 3.8M per WAR. Zack Cozart signed for $12,666,667 per year. His war the previous 3 years was 2.97 which equates to 4.265M per WAR Chatwood was hurt sand missed a lot of time so it's hard to go by his historical numbers. Streamer projects him at 1.9 WAR which equates to $6.666M per WAR. There is a lot of variance but the premise that the market value is $10M per war is not accurate unless they are signing them even though they expect their production to be half their historic rate. One would think they are basing their offers on the previous 2-3 years productivity and the end result has been much poorer than expected.

That's why fans in every sport with no managerial credentials somehow think they know how to run the team better than the people who had the requisite credentials to get the job. Point being winning and spending effectively are at worst highly correlated and probably more accurately described as essential when other teams have a serious revenue advantage.

How do you come to the conclusion that spending on free agents is valuable but doing it efficiently is not important? It would be important if we were in a top revenue market. In our case, there are teams with 100M or 200M of incremental revenue. Please explain how we are supposed to construct a World Series while spending our already disadvantaged revenue position inefficiently. If you have listened to Falvey, he has stated on a few occasions in different ways this team needs to get the most out of their investments. Is this not the a pretty much universal premise in any business? I tend to follow Brock's position ... stretch but don't go nuts.