The Future of Baseball

I love baseball.

I grew up with baseball. Dad was baseball. Baseball was summers off from school with the radio at my bed listening until I fell asleep. OK, so I'm no James Earl Jones, but you know...

The one constant through all the years has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a blackboard and rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game, is part of our past. It reminds us of all that once was good, and can be again.

Anyway ... It's my favorite sport to attend, and the only sport that I can express an informed opinion or offer insight to. Give me a summer night, a beer, scorecard and hot dog and I'm a happy pappy. Recently, however, ticket prices have begun to creep beyond the grasp of the lower income group who might enjoy a night out. Or me. It is sad because the game may be on its way to becoming another corporate-ruled enterprise, like football and hockey, where the average fan has to wait until his boss gives him tickets to see a game.

Up until now, people have come. They come in that Field of Dreams way, like they had to be there.

POINT A: The average salary for a major league baseball player in 2006 was $2,699,292 per year. The league minimum is $327,000. Baseball's collective bargaining agreement called for the minimum to rise at the same rate as the percentage increase in the Consumer Price Index-Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers from November 2004 through November 2005.

POINT B: Currently, games are broadcast on free-TV, with the exception of the Phillies (and perhaps some others) who broadcast most of their games on Comcast Cable, unavailable with rabbit-ears.

POINT C: When was the last time the minimum wage was increased?

I'm afraid I'm only going to be able to be a baseball fan for another 3 to 5 years. At that point, I figure that salaries would have gotten so far out of hand that the owners would be forced to (a) put the games on Pay-per-View (b) charge Hockey prices for game tickets and (c) made it virtually impossible to see a game without paying for it - either at the ballpark or the TV. When I have to start paying for every game I want to see, even when I'm at home, the salary train will have careened out of control. Then, on principle, I will have soured on the Game as a Business concept and grown weary of men earning those exorbitant salaries to the point that I will have to make a hard decision: Abandon the game and its fan-unfriendly behavior or suck it up. I'm thinking the former.

This year alone, Alfonso Soriano signed a $136 million dollar deal that is ... GUARANTEED. Vernon Wells got $126 million and Carlos Lee got $100 million. But nothing tops Alex Rodriguez's record $252 million, 10-year contract, of which he still has four years left. And let me tell you, folks. They are good players, but there ain't a Hank Aaron in the bunch, so figure there's more room at the top.

Here's the scenario:

The owners are still spending last year's and the coming year's ticket money, so they have yet to feel the pinch. Next year, however, they will have paid the first year of Soriano's (and the others like him) contract and will start to feel financial pressure because they have out-paced their revenue base with the salaries they are paying. At that point, the logical solution is to raise ticket prices. This time, however, it will not be the customary fifty cents or dollar a ticket. This time it will be significant to the point of leaving some fans unable to attend, therefore equalizing the attendance-drop and price increase for a net gain of slightly more than zero.

This trend will continue for the next 4 to 5 years, until the owners have increased prices to the point that the average fan who attends one or two games a year will be unable to attend any games unless his boss gives him tickets (hence the Hockey analogy). By this time, tickets that are now $45 will be close to $100, and the ripple effect will have reached the upper levels, where nosebleed seats will cost what field-level tickets cost now.

When the fan-sponge has been squeezed to the point of near-dry, the owners will be forced to turn to TV. They cannot charge advertisers significantly more than they charge now, lest the network be unable to afford the coverage with what they would have to make up in advertising revenue. Even Fox isn't that stupid. With no commercial contract available to show their product to the new fans who were priced out of the stadium, they will be left with no alternative than to reach to the behemoth that is cable television, thus alienating the same people they alienated with the ticket price increase.

And don't forget, all this is going on while salaries continue to escalate. In 2001, there was a 12.8% increase, and in 2006 they went up 9%, so for the sake of argument, let's factor in a 10% raise in the average salary per year for the next 5. At that rate, the average salary - average salary - will be $4,347,235. The power of compounding. Compounding idiocy, not interest. I think that's a conservative estimate. The average this year alone may be more than $3 million, as the high salaries unbalance the line.

So, whom do you figure is going to foot the bill for the Alex Rodriguez Club members? You, dick pump. When advertisers back out and the revenue from newly-installed luxury boxes maximizes, the only card left in the deck is the fan. They will ask you to pay to see games on television, and they will use the new NFL Network as an example. The NFL Network is only available to subscribers of premium or digital cable. Both cost more than standard cable. Either they will make the games available on subscription (like Dish Network) or merely back-door the thing with an increase in your cable bill, trust me. You will be paying for it.

You'd better believe that every major sport is watching The NFL Network like a hawk to see if the thing earns money. The second it does, you can bet the owners meetings will take on a new tone. They will be busting their guts to figure out how they can balance their books on the backs of the fans. And we'll probably just sit there and take it.

And why shouldn't we? Were the one who goes to the games, buys the hats, the cards and the plush mascot for our granddaughter. We're the logical choice, after all. When government runs out of funding options, it turns to gambling, so we're paying for that. If they taxed us, we'd scream like Hell, but a lottery ticket makes us moist. Either way.

I'm not thrilled with the current state of Sports as Industry, so I cannot imagine the situation improving, especially when I see so many ordinary players making extraordinary salaries. I do not see myself paying high ticket prices or high cable fees because the owners were careless with their money. I don't like to be used as a cash cow, and the milk in this one is almost gone.

Slowly, the lower end of the fan-income scale is being priced out of games. Four tickets and all the parking-food-program stuff, and you're into a $200 night out with the kids. Anybody working in WalMart that has $200 to blow on a baseball game is living over their heads. But as long as their bosses have a box at the ballpark, they'll get a chance to go, but they'll still have to bring their own food.

People will not come.

People will most definitely not come.