Dodgers ruining baseball

[Shoeless Moe]

From ESPN today...

The $120 million or so the Dodgers are in line to pay in luxury tax penalties on top of their payroll is more than the projected Opening Day payroll of 10 teams.

In the past 411 days, the Dodgers have:

Signed Ohtani to a 10-year, $700 million contract, with $680 million deferred

Traded for right-hander Tyler Glasnow and signed him to a five-year, $136.5 million contract extension

Signed right-hander Yamamoto to a 12-year, $325 million contract

Signed Smith to a 10-year, $140 million contract extension, with $50 million deferred

Signed two-time Cy Young winner Blake Snell to a five-year, $182 million contract, with $66 million deferred

Signed Edman, acquired at the 2024 trade deadline, to a five-year, $74 million contract extension, with $25 million deferred

Signed outfielder Michael Conforto to a one-year, $17 million contract

Signed reliever Blake Treinen to a two-year, $22 million contract

Signed outfielder Teoscar Hernandez to a pair of deals totaling $89.5 million over four years, with $32 million deferred

Signed Korean infielder Hyeseong Kim to a three-year, $12.5 million contract

Signed Sasaki

Signed closer Tanner Scott to a four-year, $72 million contract, with $21 million deferred

In total, they have guaranteed $1.778 billion -- nearly half of it ($874 million) deferred. For a team that already had Betts and Freeman under contract -- a team that over its six previous full seasons won at least 100 games five times -- to turn over more than half its roster and add nearly a dozen impact players registered as baseball gluttony.


THE ANGER -- from disillusioned fans, from dispirited front offices, from owners made to look like they don't care -- is very real. And it's growing to the point where people at the highest levels of Major League Baseball acknowledge it concerns them. Most worrisome is the rhetoric that fans are done with the game. That what L.A. is doing is unfair. That the financial imbalance ruins the sport.

[Balticfox]

I agree. I'll really be pulling against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the next few years.

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by Shoeless Moe

Most worrisome is the rhetoric that fans are done with the game.

Is any of that coming from Dodgers' fans though? What are they saying?

[Aquarian Sports Cards]

same nonsense we heard about the Yankees in the late 1970's early 1980's. Steinbrenner's ruining baseball etc.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Andrew Friedman rules.

[campyfan39]

I'm loving it!
Yet, I do think there should be more regulation, but that ship has sailed. It's like college sports now; once you let the lid off, there is no putting it back on.

[BobbyStrawberry]

I don't mind it at all. They will be a fun team to watch and root against. As already stated, they're basically the new Yankees.

Also, no salary cap allows players to earn what they're worth...let the other poor billionaire owners open up their wallet if they want big name players

[Shoeless Moe]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Andrew Friedman rules.

A DEI hire could do as good of a job........Friedman is just writing blank checks.

All the credit goes to the owners financing it.

[Snapolit1]

What is ruining baseball is the cheap ass billionaires who own teams who don’t want to spend money to put a great team on the field. They’d rather hold an asset that appreciates in value year after year after year even if they are bad and don’t make the playoffs. It’s like one of us buying a house in a nice neighborhood and refusing to do any maintenance on it, knowing full that in 10 years we will sell it to a developer at a huge profit and he can knock the house down and build a new house in a desirable neighborhood. Those are the aholes ruining baseball. Every owner in baseball could afford to spend money like the Dodgers do.

[packs]

I agree. The revenue sharing has not amounted to increased competitiveness and there should be enforcement from MLB for these teams to actually spend the money to become competitive.

[Balticfox]

That being said I've never seen a player get better/play better because he's paid more.

[Carter08]

I wouldn’t mind some sort of a salary cap but a salary floor might make some sense too.

[packs]

I just don’t see the purpose of a cap in MLB. Very few teams are actually spending money and the teams who aren’t don’t want to be competitive. The cap is supposed to force competition but teams like the A’s aren’t competing under any circumstances.

[D. Bergin]

Everybody wants to "Moneyball", but when everybody else is also Moneyballing, and big market teams are now paying extra for those players that used to be a bargain, it's not quite as effective as it once was.

[BobbyStrawberry]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Everybody wants to "Moneyball", but when everybody else is also Moneyballing, and big market teams are now paying extra for those players that used to be a bargain, it's not quite as effective as it once was.

Somehow the Rays are still doing it better than anyone else. Whatever their secret is to unlocking pitchers' untapped talent, other teams haven't caught up with it yet.

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by packs

Very few teams are actually spending money and the teams who aren’t don’t want to be competitive.

I disagree. Throwing money around doesn't automatically improve a team. Nor is it even a necessary let alone sufficient condition.

[egri]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Everybody wants to "Moneyball", but when everybody else is also Moneyballing, and big market teams are now paying extra for those players that used to be a bargain, it's not quite as effective as it once was.

I always thought that book was overrated. Billy Beane always said how the playoffs were a crapshoot, but when other teams had success in the postseason and his didn't, it wasn't just bad luck. Then at the end, when it looked like he was going to go to Boston, the moves he wanted to make would have broken up the core of a team that two years later won the World Series.

[Shoeless Moe]

Cost to attend a game. (Just noticed this was from using 2023 data, guessing it has gone up for all)

The Los Angeles Dodgers are the most costly team to see, costing $219 for a family of four. The Miami Marlins are the least expensive team at $83.

The most affordable Boston Red Sox tickets cost $35.90, on average. That's double the overall MLB average cheap ticket price of $17.67.

When the New York Yankees are on the road, ticket prices for the competing home team have the largest increase of any other visiting team.

Attending a game between "natural rivals," such as a Chicago Cubs vs. Chicago White Sox, costs families an average of $48 more.

Seeing a game on a weekday rather than a weekend (Fri-Sun) can save families $25, on average.

Family Outing Expenses by MLB Team

While MoneyGeek found that the average price is $140, the cost of a family day out at an MLB game can vary significantly depending on the team. For example, attending a Los Angeles Dodgers game costs $218 when factoring in the cost of four tickets, parking, four hot dogs, two beers and two sodas. At the other end of the spectrum, a trip to a Miami Marlins game totals $83 for the same expenses.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Average NFL ticket $120 each.

[Casey2296]

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Breaking Dodger news, another signing.

https://m.youtube.com/shorts/5GeTUor2pUw
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[Shoeless Moe]

Originally Posted by Casey2296

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Breaking Dodger news, another signing.

https://m.youtube.com/shorts/5GeTUor2pUw
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Hahahaahaha