</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by joshuaaaaaa:
<strong>
My problem is that he's one of the owners totally against any sort of salary cap, against any sort of arrangement that would make the financial health of MLB better. If he said "Okay, lets talk about a salary cap", I think lots of owners would fall in line behind him and that a better situation for everyone would result in the long term.
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Joshua(x6) makes a good point. So does Costas in "Fair Ball" (some of you knew it was coming

):
Baseball is
not a business like every other. In other businesses, it is in your best interest to crush the competition. The less competition you have, the more money you can make. In baseball (and all team sports) you can't crush all of your competitors, because if you did, your marketplace would cease to exist. That's the whole idea of the "competitive balance" thing. You want to turn a profit literally ($$$) and figuratively (WS rings). But you can't do so at the expense of your competitors.
Steinbrenner knows that revenue sharing would hurt his profits literally ($$$) and a cap would hurt his profits figuratively (WS rings). He therefore will do what he can to make sure they don't happen. And
that, my friends, is pure evil. And near-sighted to boot. Since he's the owner of the highest profile club in the largest market, he has the most pull in the baseball world. If he were interested in competitive balance (read: the health of baseball's future) he would use his gargantuan influence to try and level the playing field.
If I could, I would quote the whole book here. I can't, so read <a href="http://shop.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/results.asp?WRD=fair+ball+bob+costas&userid=18ETE8 F5B6&mscssid=1PMME7ARAA1J9N32VBTXA8MQAL80FMC5" target="_blank">Fair Ball</a>
<small>[ 04-09-2002, 03:03 AM: Message edited by: JML ]</small>