Total Pageviews

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Show me the Money!

The main reason that I chose to get my Master's degree in Sport Management was so I could become a baseball agent.  Jerry Maguire was going to have nothin' on me - I was going to be scouting and signing players, going to all kinds of baseball games for free, and meeting all sorts of famous people while traveling all over the country.  Life ended up taking me in a different direction, and I'm actually glad that my sports-agent dreams did not come to fruition.  The money-side of baseball is very complex, and baseball players make way more money than they need to while sometimes being treated like cattle.

While current events in baseball's off-season are headlined by player trades and team acquisitions, record-breaking contract signings have been the talk of the "Hot Stove Season" (Albert Pujols and Prince Fielder come to mind, with Fielder just committing yesterday to a 9-year, $214-million deal with the Detroit Tigers, where his father, Cecil Fielder played back in the 80s).  But did you know that baseball executives also have to renew their contracts during the off-season?  Major League Baseball Commissioner, Bud Selig, was not spared the joy of signing a new contract recently, with a hefty new pay raise attached to it.

When I heard that Mr. Selig signed a new contract, first I was disappointed (it should come as no surprise to my blog readers that I am not a fan of Mr. Selig).  Then when I found out how much money he was and will be making, I almost fell over in disbelief.  Each baseball team had been paying Bud $600,000, which multiplied by 30 teams means that he was making $18 million a year!  Who knew?  I thought maybe he made a million or so, but eighteen???  Well now that he has a new contract, that 18 million has gone up, and now Mr. Selig will be making $22 million a year!  That is just unheard of!  The only good thing about that is that maybe now he can buy himself a personality!

There have only been nine Commissioners in Major League Baseball so far (though it seems like Bud has had the job forever!), and I guess they've all been paid a hefty salary (Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, MLB's first Commissioner, was paid $42,500 back in the 1920s).  But you just don't typically think of these guys making a lot of money - they don't wear a uniform, they don't appear on cereal boxes, and they don't hit home runs.  But they do help keep the game of baseball going, and they have implemented policies and procedures that have preserved the integrity of the game (like Selig's harsh ban on performance-enhancing drugs - you get caught with some of those in your system and you're out for 50 games).  Don't get me wrong; Commissioners have come up with some pretty dumb ideas too, like inter-league play and the lifetime ban of Pete Rose (he shouldn't be in the Hall of Fame, but he would make a pretty good hitting coach!).  But overall, Commissioners have brought us baseball fans a lot of pretty good things, like the Wild Card playoffs, the home-field advantage for the World Series to the League that wins the All-Star Game, and the realignment that brought the Atlanta Braves back to the National League East.  Of course, I could do a way better job than Mr. Selig for way less money, but I don't think the opportunity will ever come up.

Oh, and speaking of money and contracts, did you see that pitcher Tim Lincecum and the San Francisco Giants agreed to a two-year, $40.5 million deal?  Perhaps Tim can now afford to cut his hair!

Monday, January 9, 2012

OUCH! That Stove is HOT!

Happy New Year, my friends!  With baseball season only a couple of months away (pitchers and catchers actually report to spring training in six weeks!!!), I am back to blogging on my other blog - the serious one that doesn't allow me to be as opinionated.  So please check out my first post of the year, but read it quickly before my editor takes the humor out of it:

http://www.prosportsblogging.com/2012/01/09/ouch-that-stove-is-hot/

(And for you non-baseball fans who don't know the term "Hot Stove," it refers to the off-season when team owners and General Managers sign free agents and trade players.  I think it was given that name because back in the day, people used to gather around a hot stove in the wintertime waiting for radio reports on the most recent trades and acquisitions).

Thanks as always for all your support!