Talk is Cheap, Just Ask Hank Steinbrenner
By Brian Phair
What an off-season for the mouths of the New York Yankee organization. It began when the front office made a mess of the Derek Jeter contract situation, insulting their captain on several occasions. Once that dust settled, Brian Cashman continued to insult Jeter by telling fans he would have to move to the outfield before his contract was finished, because his skills fit best in the outfield. Just this past week, the next chapter in the Yankee mouth-off war came from a more obvious source, Hank Steinbrenner. Hank is no George, and never will be, but he certainly inherited the ‘I don’t filter what I say and people need to deal with it’ gene. The main difference between Hank and George? George earned the right to mouth-off by building the Yankee Empire. (more after the jump)
The term ‘talk is cheap’ is an ironic one for this situation. The 1st and most obvious reason is because the subject Steinbrenner was ranting about was revenue sharing and the financial situation in the league. The term cheap can never be associated with the Steinbrenner family, because George was instrumental is driving player salaries to the heights they are now and the Yankees have had the highest payroll in baseball for years. On multiple occasions, George single-handedly elevated the norm for salaries by signing players to the highest salary ever at that time (i.e. Dave Winfield 10-year $30 million in 1980, Alex Rodriguez 10-year $275 million in 2008). For Hank now to complain about revenue sharing, when the reason it exists is because of teams like the Yankees and their super-salaries, is plain ridiculous. Let’s look at revenue sharing a bit.
"At some point, if you don’t want to worry about teams in minor markets, don’t put teams in minor markets, or don’t leave teams in minor markets if they’re truly minor. Socialism, communism, whatever you want to call it, is never the answer. –Hank Steinbrenner"
The system was implemented in 1997 to create a sense of competitive balance in baseball every season. Because teams like the Yankees, Mets, and Red Sox have massive salaries, they are able to outbid smaller teams in the open market, thus preventing lower-salaried teams from having the best talent. Free agents will follow the money, as they should. Why take $2 million a year when someone offers you $5 million? If there wasn’t such a massive discrepancy in salaries, revenue sharing wouldn’t be necessary. That’s just the 1st part of the issue Hank was complaining about this past week.
Hank is bitching about paying $130 million in luxury taxes and revenue sharing. Let’s begin with the fact that paying luxury tax is a choice he made. When the league set the luxury tax threshold for the 2010 season, Steinbrenner and his team had the choice to remain under that number and not pay a dime to the tax fund. Whether you like the system or not, it is the individual team’s choice to exceed that salary figure. If the team makes the choice to sign players to contracts that exceed that dollar amount, then they also make the choice to pay 40% of every dollar over that amount to the league, regardless of where that money is going. As of December 2009, $174 million of the $190 million paid in luxury taxes since it was implemented came from the Yankees organization. The intent of the fund is to control team salaries and prevent teams like the Yankees from sky-rocketing that number.
Does the system need to be modified? Maybe, but it doesn’t change the fact that no team is forced to pay luxury tax, it is a choice. No team needs to exceed the luxury to be successful either. Two perfect examples? The 2 World Series teams in 2010, the Texas Rangers and San Francisco Giants, neither of which paid luxury tax last season. Their 2010 team salaries were 27th and 10th respectively, and they were able to beat the 1st (Yankees) and 4th (Phillies) highest team salaries in baseball in the Championship series’. It further reinforces the fact that a higher-than-the-threshold team salary is a choice Steinbrenner has made and not a necessity.
Until the end of time, a Steinbrenner will be ranting about something to the media at a regular interval. George was successful in swaying opinions and using his powerful position to influence change, but Hank just sounds like a whiny little kid. For the health of baseball, a revenue sharing system and a luxury tax is critical. They both could use a little tweaking, but without them, the competitive disparity would be even greater in many instances, making the game less enjoyable to watch. Who knows what the Yankee salary would be right now if it weren’t for the penalties they incur on a yearly basis. It is entirely possible that without these tools, we would be discussing the Yankees $300+ million salary, creating a $265+ million gap between them and the lowest salaried Pittsburgh Pirates.
I take everything out of Hank Steinbrenner’s mouth with a grain of salt, as should the rest of baseball. America’s game is about what happens on the field of play, not what people say, especially those not playing the game. In every sense of the phrase, ‘talk is cheap’. The real conversations and story lines revolve around the game itself. Let’s play ball…Red Sox opening day is just over a month away.