The Chris Moeller Archives

Damn Yankees

During the early 1950s, a pair of writers named George Abbott and Douglass Wallop collaborated on the book for a Broadway musical that would be called "Damn Yankees." It told the story of a Washington Senators (team now defunct) baseball fan who makes a pact with the devil to help his team win the American League pennant. The title alluded to the general disdain that most baseball fans feel towards the richest, most-often-crowned team that also plays in the largest city in the United States and the Major Leagues.

Well, that richest team was just crowned again as World Champions last night-- and for the 27th time in their history. Twenty-seven is a lofty number to be sure, but let's surround it with a little context. During the middle part of the 20th century, the Yankees enjoyed their greatest stretch of success, virtually owning an era that stretched from the late '40s to the early '60s. The 2009 title, in contrast, is the team's first since 2000. Nine years isn't a long period of time, compared with Chicago or Boston championship droughts or visits by Halley's Comet. But if you consider the fact that the Yankees boast a $200 million and more payroll, $70 million more than the second-highest in the league and $130 million more than even the league median, your jaw begins to rise a bit.

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that your favorite team is the Minnesota Twins. They're the Minneapolis/St. Paul entry in the same American League, a circuit that the Yankees have won only 40 times in the last 89 years. Your team boasts a 26-year-old catcher (Joe Mauer) who is already one of the greatest sluggers at his position in the game's history. You have a recent (2006) league MVP patrolling first base, a former World Champion shortstop, one of the game's most-consistently dominant closers, and a solid starting lineup and pitching rotation that produced an 87-win season in 2009. Now suppose I tell you that next year, your team is allowed to keep all of its current players for the same price as '09, but that they're now allowed to quadruple the size of that payroll. Boggles the mind, doesn't it?

I won't join in with the chorus of Yankee-haters today that's going so far as to label the Yankees' 2009 championship illegitimate, but you'll forgive me if I also don't stare in awe of their recent. The Yankees, by all rights, should play in every World Series. Period. They can outspend their injuries and their contractual mistakes. They can replace the too-heavy player and coaching baggage at will. As Yankees, middling journeymen players get an October spotlight opportunity to become immortal, professional choke artists are afforded 8th and 9th chances at post-season redemption, and a career Yankee/team captain with Hall-of-Fame numbers comparable to a Paul Molitor gets a split-screen with Babe Ruth on a national Pepsi-Cola television ad throughout the season. Everything's better in the Bronx.

Is a salary cap a good solution in leveling the field? Maybe-- if it's important to you to have George Steinbrenner pocket an extra $80 to 90 million each year instead of spending it. We tried suppressing free agency once before, and the result was 20 Yankees championships in the 41 seasons between 1922 and 1962. Since Marvin Miller came on the scene in 1965, promptly liberating the players, the Yankees have claimed only seven more titles in 44 years. You'll forgive me if I'm not eager to race back in time to the so-called "Golden Age" of the game.

What about this idea? The luxury tax? Said tax is in place now and will cost the Steinbrenner clan upwards of $20 million next year, but it doesn't seem to have slowed them down much, and the smallest-market recipients of the Yankees' extra profits currently have no mandate or obligation to invest that money back into their clubs, and why are we subsidizing the most badly-run clubs anyway?

We could all try voting Republican. Despite the 27 titles, the Yankees haven't won one under a GOP presidential administration since Eisenhower. This is true, actually. Since prevailing over the Milwaukee Braves in '58, the team went oh for 5 under Nixon, oh for 3 under Ford, oh for 8 under Reagan, oh for 4 under Bush 41, and oh for 8 under Bush 43-- a combined zero for 28. Pretty amazing. Even the Florida Marlins, with their solitary pair of championships in 1997 and 2003, spread it around better than that. Also, the Supreme Court tried this solution in a celebrated judgement in 2000, and we all know how well that turned out.

No, friends, the solution is simple. A level playing field is, indeed, vital to the game, and the best way to achieve it is to bust up the New York City/Tri-state market. Franchises relocate, and when they do, the economic studies always suggest that it's the corridor linking Manhattan to the graceful estates of Connecticut that would best absorb an incoming Major League Baseball franchise. Let's hear no more talk of Portland, OR, San Jose, or Las Vegas. A true home team for the ESPN crew in Bristol, Connecticut is what we need.

Oh, Papa and Baby Steinbrenner will scream bloody murder at first with cries of "market-share-this" and "territorial rights-that," but sacrifice has always been the name of the game. Baltimore gave up its territorial rights to Washington D.C. in 2004, decades after Washington had graciously surrendered its to Baltimore; the two Chicago clubs opened their arms to a new team up the road in Milwaukee, twice; the Los Angeles Dodgers surrendered Orange County and San Diego in separate deals; while the Cardinals signed off on expansion in Kansas City, Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta over the years. "Break up the Birds," they shouted after the Cards won 9 pennants and 6 championships between 1926 and 1946.

Cut the Yankees in half, financially, and you've still got yourself two $100 million-plus payrolls, my friend-- and a matinee-idol shortstop for each side. The new NYC team should also play in the American League to maximize fairness. Sharing a city with a league opponent didn't prevent both the Giants and Dodgers from winning championships during their halcyon days in the Big Apple. And New York City baseball fans deserve more baseball. Especially after their $850 million investment in the new Yankee Stadium as taxpayers only created 15 new permanent jobs.

Hey, that gives me another great idea. The relocated franchise could also play its home games in the new Yankees Stadium. That's double the return on investment for city residents-- 162 regular-season games each summer in the Bronx, instead of only 81. The Cardinals and Browns time-shared old Sportsman's Park in St. Louis for 33 years, from 1920 to 1953, and the arrangement didn't keep the Cardinals from winning 9 pennants and 6 championships between 1926 and 1946.

I think this idea is a winner. Everybody comes out ahead-- the Yankees, the club owners, the players, New York City baseball fans, even the second-class baseball fans that live outside New York City. If Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez can live and work-- and win-- in harmony on the same side of the infield, than anything's possible inside that magical ballpark.

posted by CM @ 8:33 PM