Baseball Success and Your Payroll

This article (which seems to show up in one publication or another every year) examines how baseball is a game where money doesn't necessarily buy success. While I agree that it can't buy the World Series ring, it definitely makes it easier to outlast the rest of the majors and make it to the playoffs on a more consistent basis. For example, if Travis Hafner, Victor Martinez and Cliff Lee had all gotten injured this season, who would have replaced them? The higher payroll teams have a chance to go out and make a big deal before the All-Star break in order to bridge the gap. A team like the Indians would probably roll the dice with rookies or re-treads.

So, I agree that money doesn't necessarily buy success, but it should buy greater consistency of success. Plus as we Clevelanders know there is nothing worse than watching a player rise through the ranks of your organization, only to hit their career peak and then be purchased right out from under your nose by teams with monstrous payrolls. Manny Ramirez and Jim Thome were home-grown players and cornerstones of this franchise. They were the Indians' versions of Jeter and Posada, except arguably better.

Anyway, I won't go any further into this rant because it is bad for my health to be as bitter as I can get when I start talking about the economics of baseball.

In the article, the Cleveland Indians and Mark Shapiro are mentioned.

The Indians ranked 26th, with salaries totaling $41.5 million. The only teams with lower payrolls this season were Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, and Tampa Bay, perennial doormats. For every dollar the Indians spent on players, the Yankees peeled off almost five.

But in baseball, money can't always buy a clutch single. In 2002, Shapiro traded away several higher-price players, receiving raw minor leaguers in whom he saw future stardom. This year, rookie outfielder Grady Sizemore (salary, $318,300) and fourth-year catcher Victor Martinez ($500,000), among others, bloomed. And the Indians were bargain-basement contenders whose hopes of qualifying for the playoffs were alive until the regular season's final day.

According to Business Week's exhibit the Indians have two of the five biggest bargains in baseball, in Grady Sizemore and Coco Crisp.

Here were the five players that they listed.
Player Team
• Morgan Ensberg - Houston Astros
• Brad Lidge - Houston Astros
• Grady Sizemore - Cleveland Indians
• Coco Crisp - Cleveland Indians
• Jason Bay - Pittsburgh Pirates

Hopefully Shapiro gets Coco and Grady signed to 4 or 5 year deals this off-season. They will get reasonable raises and we can have the security knowing that they will be playing the best defensive outfield in the American League for the next few years, at minimum.