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THE FIVE THOUSAND DOLLAR MAN

Ahead of the 1892 season, the American Baseball Association floated an idea that would allow teams to keep their star players for longer while still allowing plenty of free player movement. The ABA commissioner suggested to executives from the APBL and MWBA that, instead of limiting themselves to contracts that had a maximum length of three or four years, perhaps teams should offer longer-term contracts to key players. Both member leagues quickly agreed that this was a sound idea, and perhaps one that could secretly keep down costs since salaries normally didn’t rise significantly during each season of a multi-year contract.

The result was that numerous important players signed lengthy deals over the winter and in the early days of the 1892 season:

• Buffalo ace Edward Millard signed a six-year extension to his contact ($2,700/yr)
• Charles Woodram (2B for Jersey City) & Charles Wilkerson (ace for Philadelphia) both signed five-year deals with Providence ($4,000/yr each)
• Joseph Selby, ace for Richmond in the SEAL, moved to Rochester on a seven-year contract ($3,000/yr)
• Rochester also signed highly rated Scottish OF Matthew Robinson for eight years ($3,000/yr)
• Cleveland signed a pair of Midwestern semi-pro players – Leland Hirsch and Frederick Hood – to five-year contracts
• Detroit signed star SS Kiefer Hyneman away from rivals Chicago with a seven-year deal ($3,500/yr)
• Indianapolis bought two-time NEBA Batsman of the Year Ed Hayward and gave him a seven-year contract ($4,000/yr)
• Milwaukee signed Indianapolis Team of the Year 2B Lionel Bernard for seven years ($4,000/yr)
• Missouri brought six-time Team of the Year member SS George Shay back to the MWBA with a five-year deal ($3,750/yr)

This all led up to yet another history-making moment for Milwaukee legend Hans Ehle ten days into the MWBA season on April 16th, 1892. He was in the last year of his contract, with both he and the Bavarians front office keen on locking up the now 28-year-old for as long as possible. At the end of negotiations that lasted all of Spring Training and shortly into the season, Ehle signed a seven-year contract extension for $36,400.

The above meant Ehle would be making $5,200 a year from 1893 to 1899, and that made him the first player in the history of baseball set to earn five thousand dollars per season. Given that Ehle had topped 19 Wins Above Replacement in a season twice already and was theoretically just hitting his prime, some argued that the highest-paid player in baseball was still underpaid.

Nevertheless, Der Kaiser was now baseball’s first truly “big money” player.