MLB Trade Deadline: Criticizing High Payroll Teams?

There is a ridiculous sentiment growing amongst fans of Major League baseball teams with lower payrolls. That being when a franchise chooses to pay the players on their roster a large amount of money they are accused of “buying” their players and thus cease to be a “real” team. There are many flaws in this opinion because it’s not a cut and dry issue. 

 First off, there are many different reasons and ways a team can grow its payroll. A team with a number of aging veterans and not enough productive young players may jump into free agency with both feet and scoop up the best of the best to keep churning out wins. This practice has been most associated with the Yankees and Red Sox in recent years. This example does have the look of a team not concerned with building a cohesive unit and just wants to throw out as much high priced talent out there and hope they connect and play well. So I can accept the term, “ they bought their title”, as an opinion with some merit. 

 However, since it isn’t illegal to spend as much money as you want to succeed, why is this such a bad idea. It may not be the most respected way to win, but it is a legitimate way to win. The bitterness that fan bases of teams, who choose not to grow their payroll, leads to this popular opinion. 

 This idea has even grown to other areas of spending money to assist in success. A team like the Phillies, whose nucleus is built with a lot of home grown talent, has come under fire for buying players. This is where the argument really falls apart and just looks like whiny fans who are upset that their own organizations don’t try as much as other teams. When you have a lot of your own players grow together like, Rollins, Utley, Howard, Hamels, Madsen, Ruiz, Victorino. And most recently, Stutes, Bastardo, Brown and Worley, you have to eventually give them pay raises to stick around and succeed together. So how is giving your deserving employees a raise in salary an example of taking an easy way out and “buying” anything? 

 Also, now the Phillies and other teams are being criticized for trading away young prospects for higher salaried veteran players in an effort to continue to compete and improve to try and win a championship. Why is trading your own talent that you have gone through the time to scout, develop and make them strong enough that lesser teams want them, looked down upon? Teams with enough home grown talent should be commended for knowing how to build a minor league system and use it one way or another to build a winning team. 

 The fact that the Phils have had enough prospects to trade and acquire three of the best pitchers in baseball the past three trade deadlines is a testament to their minor league staff. 

This new and moronic badge of honor that is being given to teams who have won games and sometimes titles with a lower payroll is, in my opinion, another flawed philosophy. For starters, you can not sustain a championship winning franchise for a long period of time without raising your payroll at some point. When you start out with a core of good young players and they win, you will have to resign them to keep them with your team or at some point they’ll leave for a bigger payday. Then you’re right back where you started. The fact that fans of lower payroll teams do not look at the truth is beyond me. And that truth is the owners of these “small market” teams could care less about winning. If they happen to win with a young team, like the Marlins, that’s great. But when they tear the team up soon after to avoid giving their players raises to stay, thus build a cohesive unit for years, they show their true intentions. They want to make as much as they can and maybe do enough to keep the fans interested enough to buy tickets sometime. 

 The Oakland A’s are a popular example these days due to the movie coming out soon based on this “wonderful” winning team with a low payroll. Take a look at their payroll during this time they were winning. From the year 2000 to 2007 their payroll grew by 40 million dollars and they made the playoffs five times. They continued to win and to keep winning they had to grow the payroll at some point. What happened after the 2007 season when the finished in third? The organization slashed payroll by 30 million in one off-season and they haven’t made the playoffs since. 

 I grew up in the 80‘s, watching a lot of bad Phillies baseball. After their run in the early 80’s it was a wasteland in Philly. Except for an aberration in 1993, fans in this city have suffered with bad baseball.  The organization would cry money problems and the farm system was bad. Good players like Schilling and Rolen were upset at the direction of the team. 

 It wasn’t until the millennium kicked in and a new stadium and improving farm system emerged that baseball in this city became watchable again. A young Jimmy Rollins was the first piece of the current puzzle and the fans came out in droves to see this young,  up and coming team. In response to their fans paying their hard earned money to see this new era, the Phils organization was willing to get this run underway. The more money they have made, the more they have been willing to spend. And they have sustained this winning by making smart trades, one huge free agent signing, in Cliff Lee,  and growing their payroll over the past ten years. 

So if your a fan of a team whose farm system isn’t great and has an owner who doesn’t want to spend money, don’t turn your nose up at the teams that want to be profitable and win. Do not claim the purity of baseball is gone. As the years fly by the sports world continues to change. You don’t have to like the teams that are succeeding, but you also don’t have to spew venom at them because they are doing what you wish your team was doing. I spent a lot of years being an unsatisfied baseball fan and I’m not going to let bitterness of other fans ruin this winning era of Phillies baseball.