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From: david@fisher.UUCP (David Rubin)
Newsgroups: net.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: Impending Strike (in defense of the players)
Message-ID: <714@fisher.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 31-Jul-85 09:44:11 EDT
Article-I.D.: fisher.714
Posted: Wed Jul 31 09:44:11 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 1-Aug-85 23:52:27 EDT
References: <693@spuxll.UUCP> <375@uvaee.UUCP>
Organization: Princeton University Department of Statistics
Lines: 88

> >If there is an LCS and WS this year, then the teams that play in them
> >will play under the cloud of an aborted season. But don`t bet on it.
> >Burned by the lack of strike insurance, and still smarting from the 1981
> >defeat, the owners will wait out this one a long, long time.
 
> 	I hope so. As a fan, I'd hate to see the rest of the season
> ruined, but I am tired of this crap. I think the owners deserve to 
> make money and the players are'nt hurting for money, are they?

Tell me the owners aren't making money.  It's not as if they were
involuntary participants in the salary rise.  

In fact, since the last general agreement, which the owners were
presumably happy with at the time, baseball revenues have risen 52%
while player salaries have risen 48%.  If baseball is in a WORSE
financial situation than in 1981, it isn't due to salary increases.

The owners have been grossly cooking the books.  Steinbrenner, for
example, writes off charitable contributions and Tampa hotel losses as
Yankee losses.  Turner "sells" the cable network rights from the
Braves to WTBS for LESS than the Milwaukee Brewers get from their
local station, despite the incredible revenue generated by Turner's
nationwide broadcasts of the Braves.  Why?  So millions of dollars
generated by the profitably of the Braves are claimed as profits for
WTBS instead.  Baseball IS profitable (else why are they paying these
salaries?), and the owners are seeking to mammothly increase their
profits by restricting player movement.  'Tis more than passing
strange to see the UNION appealing to the free market...and even
stranger to see the owners claim that the players must assume the
burden of controlling the owners' "irresponsible" behavior.

This is not to say ALL owners are making money hand over fist, just
that some who are will go to great lengths to hide it.  As a whole,
baseball is doing quite well.  The answer for teams in trouble is to
more equitably distribute revenue among the owners, not to demand the
players forego what their services bring in an open market.

> I have no sympathy for the players. Hell, I'd do what they are doing
> ( if I was capable of it) for 10% of what the average player makes.

But you're not, and I'm not going to pay $8 to see YOU play, and I'm
not going to watch YOU on TV.  If Prince can make 17 million dollars a
year, I have no problem with the thought the top baseball stars can
make 10% of that.  The latter, at least, I find entertaining.

> Anyway, if you consider what is best for the fans ( thats US ), the owners
> should really stick it out, show the players a hard line and maybe, just
> maybe, three things will happen:
 
> 	- The players will think twice about striking next time.
> 	- Ticket prices will remain stable.
> 	- Cities like Pittsburg will not lose franchises due to 
> 	economic woes brought on by high player salaries.

It used to be said of the Bourbons that they had forgotten nothing and
had learned nothing.  It must be said of baseball owners, if they
seriously advance such arguments, that they have remembered nothing.
Remember the last strike (no, not the one in the exhibition season, but
the one that split the 1981 season)?  Remember how the owners stuck it
out (thanks to "strike insurance" -- the underwriting from Lloyd's that
insured there would be a strike!)?  THIS is the next time.

As for ticket prices, since 1967, as the CPI has more than tripled, the
top price for a baseball ticket has almost doubled.  Ticket prices
aren't any less stable than the prices of food and clothing, and are
far more stable than the prices of gasoline, automobiles, and homes.

As for Pittsburgh, fan attendance has always been lower than the
performance of the team has merited (well, for a decad and a half).
It is a lack of interest in baseball in Pittsburgh, not high player
salaries.  If enough fans went to the games, and if enough fans
watched on TV, and (this is the really unfair part, but may be the
root cause) if Pittsburghers had enough discretionary income to make
sponsoring the Pirates a more valauble proposition (presuming
Pittsuburghers began tuning into Pirate games), then the Pirates would
not move.  Blaming it on Johnny Ray's salary or on Lee Lacy's
departure for a higher salary seems a bit simplistic to me.

> 	What does everyone think? We might as well discuss this
> issue, since in all probability it will be the only thing to talk
> about come mid-August.
> 						- Jay C.
>  

Well, you asked.

					David Rubin
			{allegra|astrovax|princeton}!fisher!david