The Point Everyone Is Missing In This National Debate
The debate has been going on for weeks now about baseball returning. Are the players selfish? Is it the owner’s fault for not paying them fairly and going back on a deal? Should the both just “shut up and play” for the good of a nation? All of these points are missing the focal point behind this entire issue and whose fault it is. Once we as a country start realizing that the owners created this monster, the debate is over.
How Did The Owner’s Create This Issue?
This is an easy answer; they created the market. The owners are the ones who agree to pay a player hundreds of millions of dollars. The players are not the ones that started this drastic upwards trend in the amount of money that gets thrown around in contracts. Nolan Ryan didn’t just out of the blue walk into the Houston Astros office when he was a player and say pay me a million dollars. No, he looked at the market saw Catfish Hunter was making 3.2 million over five years and said I’m better than him, so I should get more. Hence, the first Million dollar per year player. Fast forward 40 years, now over 35% of the league makes $1 million a year. The owners drive the market. Once the Angles agreed to pay Mike Trout $430 Million, Mookie Betts’ market was taking shape. The entire “return to play” dispute would all be avoided if the Owners just said: “nope not dishing out that much money” years and years ago or agreed to have a salary cap or something to control the insane amount of money that is being thrown around.
How Do They Fix it?
Point blank, they don’t for this year. What their best hope would be is to “bite the bullet” here and pay the players what was initially agreed to, not this unbelievably ridiculous deal proposal that was just sent to the Players Union, 50-50. It is what was agreed to and makes the most sense for both sides. Once the next labor agreement comes up, that is when the owners need to make their push to try and fix a wrong they created. Will it happen? No shot. The damage already came and went. It would be like using a cup of water to put out a bonfire you start with gasoline. It’s too late to fix the problem, but if they wanted to, that would be their only hope.
Conclusion
It is simple, the owners created this monster, and now they don’t know what to do about it. The issue is not with the players; if owners have a problem with paying the players what they deserve, they need to look themselves in the mirror. The players are just becoming part of their environment. They are not the ones that set the market for the players; the owners are. Similar to how the market for Mookie is going to drop, why? No owner will pay him $400 million after losing a whole year of revenue and with no idea how much income will come in once the big Rona decides to stop ruining everyone’s lives. There is no argument here; the owners are the issue, not the players. Take your stupid “the players are making millions of dollars” excuse and shove it because guess what? That’s not their fault. Just like all of us have very little control over how much money we make a year, the players are in the same boat. So if you are looking to blame someone, there is one group and one group only to blame, Major League Baseball’s Owners. Thank you and Goodnight!
-Kevin Perdios (@Perdios95)