Outrageous MLB Salaries!

[dodgersfan]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

Check this out,how long it takes Manny Ramirez to earn your wages.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espnradio/salary/index?athleteId=3951623

Rudy

[aeneas01]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

what i love is this idea that a workforce comprised almost entirely of multi-millionaires needs a union! the average MLB salary is $3mm. a man making $3mm needs a union to protect him from..what? oppressive working conditions? unfair and low pay? MLB players..right there in solidarity with their minimum wage union brethren.

yeah, the notion of multi-millionaire athletes represented by a union is pretty goofy - but i'm fairly certain baseball players weren't the multi-millionaires they are today when the union was formed. in fact the average starting salary for a mlb player was about 15% higher than what the average joe made in 1966. no wonder ryan pumped gas in new jersey during his early days with the metropolitans! and, needless to say, the history books aren't replete with examples of unions voluntarily disbanding once their initial demands are met - they seem more agreeable to sticking around.

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[kingjammy24]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

gotta love unions... i was never a fan of nolan ryan until after i saw him interviewed years ago. he mentioned the days when he was forced to pump gas during the winter to make ends meet when he played for the mets. he went on to say that his work with the mlbpa was his most important, meaningful contribution to the game.

what i love is this idea that a workforce comprised almost entirely of multi-millionaires needs a union! the average MLB salary is $3mm. a man making $3mm needs a union to protect him from..what? oppressive working conditions? unfair and low pay? MLB players..right there in solidarity with their minimum wage union brethren. anyway, yes i remember the curt flood case where flood said that he may be highly paid but he's a highly paid slave because a team can ship him whereever they want, whenever they want, without his choice. curt had a choice; he could quit baseball. aren't we all pretty much wage slaves? the only difference is most of us aren't paid $3mm/yr. for $3mm/yr, i would be more than happy for an MLB team to ship my ass wherever, whenever and i wouldn't raise a peep. ship my ass to kansas city! as long as that $3mm/yr check cashes, i'm a happy guy. anyway, i find it deplorable and dehumanizing that poor nolan had to pump gas in the offseason. thank god the union stepped in and ended the barbaric need for off-season jobs.

rudy.

[godwulf]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

yuppies!?! when did they start letting yuppies into ballparks?! sweet merciful jesus. what's next..blah blah blah etc

So I'm bothered by self-important people who go to the ballpark to socialize and be seen, and dare to suggest that there just might be some of those folks in N.Y., and now I'm John Rocker.

Dude, you've got problems.

[aeneas01]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

robert: it's true that ultimately you reach a point where it's all just monopoly money and it doesn't matter whether it's $30mm/yr or $130mm/yr; the point is it's more than you can possibly spend. sure the dimaggio's of any era never wanted for much....

exactly what i was pointing out - but to take it a step further you would think any ball player that makes more money in 12 months than the average fan will make in his entire lifetime would be the target of the same sort of criticism that seems to be reserved for ramirez. yet every player that makes $2,000,000 per year or more qualifies - heck 1/3 of the guys on the woeful pittsburgh pirates roster (sadly, my team) make $2,000,000 or more. apparently fans are ok with players that equal the fan's lifetime salary in just one season but draw the line when a player makes 5-10 times this amount. because, of course, that's obscene. mama mia...

...but you wonder how the different eras compare in terms of the lesser-known players. i once saw a really great documentary about the brooklyn dodgers. a part of it discussed how many of the players lived in middle-class neighborhoods and during the off-season, many had to get regular jobs, including selling appliances or doing manual labor. the 2009 MLB min. salary is $400k. the absolute worst player in all of baseball will make at least $400k. unless you go insane with it, $400k is enough not to necessitate an off-season job selling stereos.

gotta love unions... i was never a fan of nolan ryan until after i saw him interviewed years ago. he mentioned the days when he was forced to pump gas during the winter to make ends meet when he played for the mets. he went on to say that his work with the mlbpa was his most important, meaningful contribution to the game. of course ryan went on to make close to 200 times the national average in 1992 - $4.2 million that year compared the $22,900 the rest of the nation was averaging...

anyway, i thought your baseball ticket figures were interesting. in real, inflation-adjusted 2002 dollars, an average ticket in 1964 was $13.01. in 1997, the average ticket in real 2002 dollars was $13.51. when correctly adjusted, ticket prices really haven't exploded. (in 1988, the price was $8.97!). what has genuinely exploded are player salaries. in 1964, the avg salary, in real, adjusted 2002 dollars, was $85,909. in the same real, adjusted 2002 dollars, in 1997 it was $1,472,150. so much for the common knee-jerk reaction that player salaries are behind ticket price increases.

exactly - very tough to argue that ticket prices have severely outpaced a fan's income during the past 50 years. as far as skyrocketing mlb growth trends are concerned, soaring club values deserve a prominent place in your graph!

in the 1949, dimaggio made $100k. in adjusted 2002 dollars, that would be about $755k. not even the major league minimum in 2009. baseball revenue has exploded, player salaries have exploded, but ticket prices, as you say, have pretty much stayed the same. the game today is no less affordable than it was in the 50s and 60s.

imo you can't use cpi driven inflation models for this debate, i.e. $12,100 worth of goods in 1949 would cost $100,000 in 2007. imo you have to use a wage or gdp index when attempting to compare incomes - for example when a gdp model is used dimaggio's annual salary works out to around $5 million in 2009 dollars. this strikes me as somewhat more accurate given that dimaggio's 1949 salary was about 15 times the 1949 median home price. a 2002 salary of $755k would to equate to only 4 times the 2002 median home price. but, to your point, still nowhere near the dollars other mlb stars are currently pulling in.

what i hope this does is finally dispel this common myth that a) ticket prices are exploding out of control and b) ticket prices are a result of player salaries.

in 1929, the average MLB payroll 35.3% of total team revenue. in 1990, it was 33.4%. meaning in 1990, the average MLB team spent less on player salaries than they did in 1929.

i agree - this should put to rest the notion that the manny's of the world are pushing ticket prices beyond what john q. public can afford. but i think your labor ratios are a little low - i thought the figure was around 50%. but ratios can be very misleading - just because ratios are up doesn't mean hard profit dollars are down.

in my past life as a numbers guy for hotels and resorts everything was tied to ratios - food cost ratios, labor ratios, cost of goods ratios, profit ratios, casino drop ratios, housekeeping ratios, etc., etc., etc. - the culture was such that management focused more on ratios than the dollars that were hitting the bank. i mean it was so bad that food and beverage directors and executive chefs would shoot down expensive dishes like beluga caviar or fresh abalone flown in because the cost ratio was above 55% and they were shooting for a 32% food cost, which their bonuses were tied to. what was lost in this ratio madness was that the hard dollars brought to bottom line was more on these 55%+ food cost items than it was on many of the 30% food cost items. go figure...

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[kingjammy24]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

Somebody gave me a seat there once, a couple of years ago, and I took it for about three innings, and then took the elevator upstairs. Nothing but yuppies...I can only imagine that in New York, it's, if anything, even worse. You can have those seats.

yuppies!?! when did they start letting yuppies into ballparks?! sweet merciful jesus. what's next..minorities? homosexuals?

and you're right about NYC!! oh man..wall to wall yuppies over there. them and their 26 world championships...did i ever tell you about the time i went to some yuppie party out in the 'burbs? they served salsa and when i asked them where it was made, they said NYC!!!! what the f.?! that's not salsa!! that's when i whipped out my Pace Thick 'N Chunky and showed them what was up!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSxnieYctVM

i bet you tough guys over in PHX serve Pace Thick 'N Chunky! nothing but real salsa and seats in the nosebleed section!

rudy.

[kingjammy24]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

i'm always a sucker for an economics discussion.

chris: i'd rather hold fans accountable for what they agree to pay than owners for what they try to charge. a ticket only costs a certain amount once it's actually been bought and paid for. that said, i agree that the notion of taxpayers funding ballparks is unfair. but again, it goes back to the fan's cries that a team is part of the fabric of a city, part of the character of a city. it's not just a walmart. its a part of the city's history and makeup. so apparently, the government sometimes subsidizes it lest they hear it from the fans when the team moves to another city.

robert: it's true that ultimately you reach a point where it's all just monopoly money and it doesn't matter whether it's $30mm/yr or $130mm/yr; the point is it's more than you can possibly spend. sure the dimaggio's of any era never wanted for much but you wonder how the different eras compare in terms of the lesser-known players. i once saw a really great documentary about the brooklyn dodgers. a part of it discussed how many of the players lived in middle-class neighborhoods and during the off-season, many had to get regular jobs, including selling appliances or doing manual labor. the 2009 MLB min. salary is $400k. the absolute worst player in all of baseball will make at least $400k. unless you go insane with it, $400k is enough not to necessitate an off-season job selling stereos. here's an amusing photo. the top home is arod's (one of them). the bottom is mantle in front of his home, in 1956, well after he'd already "made it" in the bigs:


i know the mantle pic may be deceptive as we can't see how far mantle's house wraps around

anyway, i thought your baseball ticket figures were interesting. in real, inflation-adjusted 2002 dollars, an average ticket in 1964 was $13.01. in 1997, the average ticket in real 2002 dollars was $13.51. when correctly adjusted, ticket prices really haven't exploded. (in 1988, the price was $8.97!). what has genuinely exploded are player salaries. in 1964, the avg salary, in real, adjusted 2002 dollars, was $85,909. in the same real, adjusted 2002 dollars, in 1997 it was $1,472,150. so much for the common knee-jerk reaction that player salaries are behind ticket price increases.

in the 1949, dimaggio made $100k. in adjusted 2002 dollars, that would be about $755k. not even the major league minimum in 2009. baseball revenue has exploded, player salaries have exploded, but ticket prices, as you say, have pretty much stayed the same. the game today is no less affordable than it was in the 50s and 60s.



what i hope this does is finally dispel this common myth that a) ticket prices are exploding out of control and b) ticket prices are a result of player salaries.

in 1929, the average MLB payroll 35.3% of total team revenue. in 1990, it was 33.4%. meaning in 1990, the average MLB team spent less on player salaries than they did in 1929.

i remember in 1990 when i could get the best seat in the house for $20. the problem is i was also making a hell of a lot less back then. i think people are looking at old prices in the context of their current salaries.

rudy.

[aeneas01]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

does it really matter if manny makes 40 times the national average or 500 times the national average? in either case he will make more in one year playing ball than the average joe will make in his/her entire lifetime. according to the baseball almanac dimaggio pulled in $100,000 in 1941 while the rest of nation was trying to get by on $2,400 (social security wage index history). yet we're told dimaggio played during the golden years when ball players took the field for the love of the game and played for peanuts. sure, dimaggio's pay represented "only" 40 times the national average while manny's pay will represent 500 times the national average. but, honestly, what's the dif when the dust finally settles? when all is said and done both dimaggio and ramirez, like many other well paid professional athletes, will make more in 12 months than the average joe will make in 40 years. to complain that players such as ramirez are making even more than this strikes me as somewhat goofy, know what i mean? if a guy laps your entire lifetime earnings in 12 months complaining about the number of times he's lapped you seems a little pointless imo...

so have baseball tickets really gone through the roof? are ball games no longer accessible to the average joe because of the huge salaries megalomaniacs such as ramirez demand today? seems like a reach to me. in 1964 the average ticket price was $2.25 while average income was $4,600. in 2009 the average ticket price will be $25 (or so) while average income is estimated at $45,000. using these figures ticket prices have increased 14% since 1964 - 14% in 45 years. this doesn't strike me as something out of control - in fact it strikes me as roughly the same deal it was almost 50 years ago. quite a bargain.

it would seem that baseball has never been more accessible nor more affordable than today - especially when one considers the enormous amount of alternative access fans now have. in 1964 you were pretty much looking at going to the park, listening to the game on the radio or reading about it in the paper the next day. but today fans can follow any game, pitch by pitch, on the internet while listening to the radio stream of the game in another browser - or fans can pretty much tune into any game they want on the tube with the mlb package. yet fans continue to complain that they're being squeezed out, that baseball is becoming less and less accessible. because of the manny's of the world. crazy daze...

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[xpress34]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

While I agree that ultimately the fan is the 'bottom line' source of revenue, the owners and teams need to be held - at least to extent - accountable to the fans for what they pay for players and what they charge us for tickets.

Why do I have this opinion? Well, at least here in Denver, the Rockies got a sweetheart deal... part of the Expansion Deal in the late 80's / early 90's with MLB included them getting a Baseball Stadium built - not just playing at Mile High.

And yes, the Rockies got one of the most beautiful parks in the majors built - by who? The FANS (i.e. Taxpayers). It didn't cost the team ONE RED DIME... and who collects ALL the revenue the stadium produces??? The OWNERS and the team. The City of Denver collects tax revenue, sure... but the other cities that voted for small sales tax increases to help the 'Stadium Disctrict' get the Stadium built see little to nothing back.

Tax revenues are a given for any business that builds in your city - but for the Tax Payers to finance a stadium that gives them NO return on their investment??? We don't build Wal-Mart's stores for them...

Just my .02 and rant... any other cities in the same boat???

Oh, and while I'm on the subject, incumbent teams (read: BRONCOS) use scare tactics (If we don't get a new stadium, we'll have to move the team) to get votes to have the Tax Payers build their new stadium as well! And again - what did the taxpayers get back? NOTHING. Just the same Tax revenue they were already collecting from Mile High.

[ahuff]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

During my basic economics courses, in high school, I learned about supply/demand. In addition I learned how economics is basically a system of votes each time we spend our money. I got to utilize my votes just the other day. The day Cubs single game tickets went on sale I tried my best to order tickets via their website. I finally got through and found tickets. A bit of background . . . Two years ago we went to a Cub game and sat in section 201. Face value of the tickets was $20 x 4 tickets. Though, I paid around $10-15 a ticket just a day or two before the game, from an ebay season ticket holder. (Not a bad deal I must say.)

This season, I was given the choice of sitting in Section 242 (exact same seats just in right field instead of left). When all mandated fees were included, I was somewhere around $65/ticket (though I think it was actually a bit higher). That is a 325% increase in the total amount I would have spent on just tickets (and in only 2 years)!!!!! Sure, some of that is fees that I didn't incur last time, but even the face value of the ticket went to $32 (an increase of 60% in 2 years). Can you imagine if our salaries did the same thing? I can only dream. Well, I figured I would vote for food on my family's table, rather than a Cubbie game. I have a better view watching the game on my TV, anyway.

[godwulf]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

[quote=kingjammy24;127635who said anything about improving the game? the OP complained about high ticket prices. the thread is about high salaries, not improving the game. i simply explained one way to ensure a reduction in ticket prices. anyway, for many fans a reduction in ticket prices would "improve" the game.

is it really that difficult to understand? if the owners are cash-starved, they'll reduce costs, including ticket prices. common sense says that people would enjoy The Game more if it didn't cost them so much. imagine sitting behind home plate at yankee stadium for $30. that's not an improvement? that doesn't make the game more enjoyable one tiny bit?[/quote]

I don't know about Yankee Stadium, but here at Chase Field, all the seats behind home plate are reserved for full- and half-season ticket holders. Somebody gave me a seat there once, a couple of years ago, and I took it for about three innings, and then took the elevator upstairs. Nothing but yuppies yakking about business, making cellphone calls, wait staff and vendors standing between you and the game half the time - only maybe one person in ten even watching the game. I've enjoyed root canals more. I can only imagine that in New York, it's, if anything, even worse. You can have those seats.

[camarokids]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

david

you place blame on the players and the owners. where do you suppose they get all the money to pay these "outrageous" salaries? blame the fans. they supply all the money and then cry about how it's spent.

it has nothing to do with "growing a set". fans whine about high ticket prices, as they purchase tickets in record numbers, then they whine about the cost of ballpark food, as they scarf it down. if teams don't spend money, they whine about not having a competitive lineup. insane. why don't fans grow a pair and stop attending games that they feel are too expensive? if fans stopped going to games, what sort of message would that send? this all starts and stops with the real source of the revenue: the fans.

"I guess as long as the stadiums are filling up and people pay the ticket prices, it will be business as usual"

you answered your own question perfectly.

rudy.

You are right Rudy!

The fans are to blame as well. It has been said before that the fans need to go on strike.

But the problem is there are MILLIONS upon millions of fans.

If any type of strike was organized I am afraid it would be ineffective.

No fans, no TV contracts, no stadium/ticket revenue.......

But, I would have to say in some cases the owners do need to just say NO....

[kingjammy24]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

"It will be interesting to see if and how the economy affects the game."

some teams have already instituted ticket price freezes, incl. the red sox, while others have actually reduced prices.

"If you think the salaries are not a turn off think about ARod. There are a number of reason people don't like him that have nothing to do with money, but the thing that started it was the $25 million a year salary."

i agree that the initial reaction was disgust but that's happened with every big contract for the past 20 years. when canseco became baseball's first $5mm man, people expressed the same disgust as when arod became the a $25mm man. my feeling is people would've eventually gotten over the disgust if a) he would've turned out to be a likeable guy b) he would've delivered the goods (eg: world series appearance) and not continually choked in the post season. from a business perspective, im sure arod was a good investment in terms of putting fans in the stands and drawing eyeballs to the tv. but when you spend $252mm on 1 player and still can't even appear in the world series, then people are going to feel ripped off. so i think the disgust towards arod is a combination of him just naturally being a wanker and also him failing to deliver.

"If he had gone to the Rangers for $12 million a year do you think he would have become the magnet for anger that he is now. It all started with the $25 million."

agreed on both points. boras really set him up with that contract and the "highest paid player" title. of course, it's not boras who has to go up to bat for the next 5 yrs and hit 'em out of the park. boras is laughing all the way to the bank while arod desperately tries to live up to the pressure of being a yankee and the highest paid player. if arod had simply settled for $12mm a year he wouldn't have had so much pressure. of course, arod says the reason he took steroids was because of all the pressure but he's the one who signed up for it in the first place! genius. willingly signs the biggest contract in baseball and then runs to steroids because he's crying about all the pressure he got himself into.

"But why we pay players who don't hit .200 or pitchers who can't get anybody out millions of dollars is beyond me."

supply and demand. apparently it's hard enough to find a guy who can hit .230 in the majors. anyway, a guy who can't hit .200 isn't going to be in the majors long, much less make "millions". i don't see many guys hitting .190 even staying on a major league roster. but i get your point..why pay mediocre players millions...because we pay great players tens of millions? it's all relative.

"One way to fortune is to be an athlete who doesn't produce or a CEO who leads his company to bankruptcy."

amen!

rudy.

[earlywynnfan]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

the only reason advertisers pay big bucks is because they know a lot of fans are watching. the only reason networks pay big bucks to acquire the right to air games is because they know a ton of fans are watching. you can't sell ad space for a premium when noone's watching. it still goes down to the fans. if fans didn't watch it on tv, advertisers wouldn't pay to air commercials and networks wouldn't pay so much to air the games.

rudy.

Did someone just mention soccer??

Ken
earlywynnfan5@hotmail.com

[cjclong]

Re: Outrageous MLB Salaries!

It will be interesting to see if and how the economy affects the game. When money is tight people have to give up luxuries for necessities. With the Texas Rangers last year the rise in gas prices (along with a losing record, of course) caused attendance to drop. This is not only affecting people at the bottom but also many of the large companies that buy the luxury boxes. I am going to continue to go to games and enjoy baseball, but the huge salaries turn me off. If you think the salaries are not a turn off think about ARod. There are a number of reason people don't like him that have nothing to do with money, but the thing that started it was the $25 million a year salary. If he had gone to the Rangers for $12 million a year do you think he would have become the magnet for anger that he is now. It all started with the $25 million. You can at least make an argument for paying successful people money. But why we pay players who don't hit .200 or pitchers who can't get anybody out millions of dollars is beyond me. One way to fortune is to be an athlete who doesn't produce or a CEO who leads his company to bankruptcy.