Ripples of the 1994 Baseball Strike

Yesterday was the 12th anniversary of MLB strike which resulted in the canceling of the rest of the season, the canceling of the World Series and the introduction of replacement players the following spring. The games were cancelled over pure greed but even the greed of the players and owners wasn't enough to kill the game but it did change it in ways we still see today.

The post 1994 baseball landscape features "have" and "have-not" teams to an extent never seen before. For example - this year the payroll of the Yankees is equal to that of the Devil Rays, Royals, Pirates, Marlins and Rockies combined! Fans in Kansas City have virtually no hope of seeing a playoff team never mind a World Series champion under the current arrangement. The only way for them to see a playoff team is to go to see one of the better teams when they visit Kaufman Stadium.

It is almost as bad for fans of "have" teams. In an effort to squeeze every last dollar out of the fan - tickets to games, parking and food and beverage costs have become ridiculous. It is impossible for a blue collar fan to have season tickets any more. You have to drop the equivalent of a new car payment just to see one game at Fenway Park (with that new car being a BMW or Mercedes). Most fans see just one game a year if they are lucky and when they go to that game they aren't shy about booing the home nine if they feel like it. For the money they pay - the fan feels entitled.

The high cost of seeing a MLB game has had a positive consequence - the rise of minor league baseball. Single A or Double AA teams are popping up all over and giving families a relatively inexpensive option to see professional baseball.

The attendance figures for 1995 were down as fans stayed away from the ballpark in a big "screw you greedy bastards" gesture to the owners and players. When the fans started returning two things were cited as major reasons; Cal Ripken's chase of Lou Gehrig's consecutive game record and the HR chase of Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa of Roger Maris' sacred 61.

With the HR race came steroids and the complete blind-eye from players, owners and sportswriters. Mark McGwire was one giant bursting zit and nobody said anything about the possibility of steroids. Instead MLB had him star in a "chicks dig the long ball" commercial. Barry Bonds' head grew like the Grinch's heart on Christmas morning and yet nobody said anything. Personally what was most insulting was the omerta that told us "nothing to see here". Respected sportswriters expected us not to believe what we saw with our own eyes.

When the steroids story broke we had sportswriters covering their asses with "absent a positive test how could we write about it" drivel and owners and Congress stepping in with "think of the children" pleas. Personally - I'm much more concerned about an average student shooting heroin into their arms and ruining their lives forever than I am about some athlete using steroids in hopes of winning a college scholarship. Heroin is much more prevalent in schools than steroids but where are the Congressional hearings on that?

What really brought professional baseball back to being the money making machine that it is today was numbers. Yes numbers. Sabremetrics and fantasy baseball saved MLB and yet nobody ever mentions numbers as the main reason baseball is where it is today.

Many of the pre-1994 fans stopped going to major league games because they were and are sick of the naked greed. The casual fan remains the casual fan. However, in 90% of the cases of the passionate fan - scratch the surface and you find a numbers guy. Chances are excellent that the passionate fan has sabremetric leanings or plays fantasy baseball. Just check out any of the blogs dedicated to baseball teams. How much of what you read from those blogs have to do with the numbers?

So what does MLB do to honor the very constituency that pumps cash into their coffers? They try to screw them by saying MLB owns the numbers. Luckily common sense prevailed in the courts.

The naked greed of MLB is still being felt today (and unfortunately always be a part of pro baseball). I know that Gordon Gecko said that greed is good but witnessing so much greed by MLB at some point makes you sick to your stomach.

The greed of the owners and players hasn't killed baseball yet but it hasn't been from a lack of trying.