The upcoming CBA

I've devoted a considerable amount of time, energy, faith, hope, frustration, anger and elation towards MLB over the years. It's time for some of that to end...well, all the negative stuff I hope.

This coming off-season (in which once again, my beloved A's will start before their due) is a big one. Everyone is all locked in over the NFL and NBA lockouts, but the NFL is resolved and the NBA is a nothing but a crime syndicate.*

*Seriously. It's all a fabrication. It's almost as bad as FIFA. Almost...

A major part of my frustration is based on the fact that I do in fact root for one of the more frugal teams in the baseball. Not to say that I'm complaining, I don't want this post to turn into a pity party, but forgive me as I get this off my chest: The current MLB revenue structure is one that is unsustainable.

It's not just the major media markets, its the private TV deals (YES, NESN) and the fact that revenue sharing does not encompass those TV agreements. The Yankees and Red Sox are not breaking any rules of course, but they are breaking baseball. The major league payroll discrepencies aren't the only telling statistic either. Draft over-slotting, International scouting, and free agent acquisition are all the same point: Money drives baseball. Maybe more accurately, money drives life, but that's a different post for a different day.

The following is a list of everything that I would like to see fix/changed/eliminated from the game that so many of us love so dearly. Not of all of this has to do with the CBA, but damnit, I'm going to list the changes I want to see here anyways. Mr. Commissioner, take these words to heart.

1. Implement a mandatory salary floor, in addition to the luxury tax. If a team (I'm looking at you, Florida and Pittsburgh) fails to spend X amount, call it 45 million on the major league roster, then they don't get a piece of the revenue sharing pie. The age old axiom of "You gotta spend money to make money" needs to hold water here. When owners are making money by ripping the heart out of fanbases by keeping an inferior team on the field and intentionally allowing free agents to be leave for richer pastures, we have a problem. It's tantamount to theft. Owners can sit back, field a sub-par team and still collect gate, concessions, etc in one hand, then recieve a check from the MLB Commisioners office with the other. It's basic, force teams to spend money. That's it.

2. In addition to the current revenue sharing formula, any "private media" contract will also be eligible to be shared. While the Yankees and Red Sox seem to always spend the most or almost the most amount on MLB talent every year, they still only spend a fraction of what they actually make. Those stadiums charge more money per seat, sell more accessories, and have the most lucrative TV deals. I realize it isn't their fault for being popular and making money, but it is still team money. MLB team money. This must be addressed and corrected. Put it this way: A team makes money by selling themselves. Revenue sharing forces a bit of baseball socialism, by redistributing that money. Why is it absurd to ask the Yankees for some of that 500 million TV contract? Shouldn't the A's, Twins, Rays, Pirates and Marlins get a fair portion of that? It will never really be revenue sharing until everything is shared. Bill James touched on this very subject years ago, and to my utter amazement, its one of the things still not talked about.

3. Free Agent compenesation should be eliminated. Type A and B free agent compensation is absurd. Firstly, it uses a crappy formula for both hitters and pitchers, and the Elias Sports Bureau is a bunch of idiots. Moving on from the flaws of that formula, the compensation is openly mocked and played by MLB teams. You can call it an inefficency if you'd like, I'd prefer to just call it a deficiency. Teams with higher payroll abilites can trade for a player in the final year of a contract solely for the Type A or B status that accompanies him. They can in effect pay 1 season for 2 first round draft picks if they play it right. The richest teams then have all the draft picks too. Umm, what? So, you can get ahead by spending, and stay there by spending more. I forgot that that was the idea behind baseball.

4. Hard slotting for the draft. Example: If you get drafted first round, 9th overall, you will get a maximum package of 4.3 million. Etc. Pretty clear. You shouldn't dangle a wad of cash in front of a 18 year old kid with a full ride scholarship offer. Don't buy him off. If he wants to go to college, let him. Don't tempt him with petty cash. Set the dollar amount in descending order from first overall down. Adjust year to year for inflation. Amatuer free agents can sign to a maximum of say, 50,000. I'm just throwing numbers out there, but I'm trying to light a match in a cave here, so give me a little space.

5. Elimination of all divisions. The best 4 teams from each league make the playoffs. If that happens to be the Phillies, Braves, Mets and Marlins one year, well, so be it. The playoffs are far too important to allow an inferior team in, or leave a superior team out. It shouldn't be this difficult for the masses to think that the playoffs should only include the best teams...

6. 7 game DS. I know this adds about 4 extra days. But 5 games? Come on. Wayyyy to small of sample size. Then again, so is 7, but if the playoffs were just extensions of the regular season aka H2H Fantasy baseball, would that be fair? Actually, yes, it would. Complete teams with depth would then come into play much more. Whatever, at least give us a best of 7 in the DS. More baseball is never a bad thing. Call it an expansion of the playoffs, without adding more teams. Everybody wins! Well, except the losers.

7. The higher seed in each series gets 5 home games, not 4. If you want a true home field advantage, let's give it the team thats earned it over the course of the season. I'd actually be ok with the wild car winner having 1 or even zero home games. "Earn it in 162!" I always say!*

*I have never, ever said that. It just seemed to work. Shut up. This is free.

8. All of this.

9. Expand instant replay for the love of cake! Don't just do homeruns and fair/foul balls. Extend it to plays at the plate, safe vs out and catches vs traps. I'm actually against the balls/strikes replay. I love how some Umps have a hitters zone or a pitchers zone. Baseball is all about the human element, so each pitch call can vary. That being said, we now posses the technology to get every other call accurate. Why wouldn't we as a fanbase and baseball as an institution want that?

10. I tried hard to come up with something here for my 10th change, but really I'm coming up emtpy. Also, why did the number 10 get arbitrarily picked to be the best? Top 10s, 10 best of, etc. Why? The U.S. uses a base 12 system, even that's completely idiotic, but again, that's a whole nother can'o worms. This list turned into a list of 9 because 9 is a legit number...and because I'm hungry and have writers block, so there's that too.

Some ASG thoughts

10 Years ago I loved the ASG. The idea of the best players in MLB's seperate leagues on exhibition against each other? Who wouldn't love that?

5 Years ago I was enthusiastic about the ASG. No, I was more enthusiastic about my recent discovery of a little website known as Fire Joe Morgan. Their take on the voting, the game mattering, who deserves what and so forth captivated me like the young wide-eyed child of yesteryear. The budding movement of baseball nerds such as myself was in full swing. We laughed at RBI's, and scoffed at Saves. OBP was the stat of choice for us.

Last year, I had a strong disdain for the All Star Game. I finally realized that its awful. The idea itself is fantastic, but the execution is just...deplorable. It had nowhere to go but up for me, and I thought that maybe, just maybe, it could be saved.

Today. I'm fuming. This is absurd. I'm doing what most sabermetrically inclined people tend to do when we feel slighted...we take to the blogosphere!! The following is a list of things that I would do to fix the ASG. I truly love baseball, and I think if this brief break from the regular season is the "All-Star" Game, then the people in it should be the best at their position. Hopefully by the end of this, I won't have broken an arm reaching for truth, or sprained my ankle getting off my high horse.

Change #1 - The Fan Voting
The voting is a popularity contest. It's a contest where the only merit is name recognition value. The reason for this is simple: Fans are ignorant. Actually I'm sorry, most fans are ignorant. Let me clarify further: Fans are not dumb, but ignorant of the facts and the numbers. For example, many baseball fans consider RBI's, vitally important. RBI's and batting average are what the vast majority of fans will cite when making the case for their All-Star ballots. Unfortunately, I have what Doctors call "The Burden of Knowledge" and I can't share those crude talent assessments. Think about it. Batting average has been the mainstream calculator of a baseball hitter's talent since...well, since Henry Chadwick. Again, I do not blame the fans themselves for their votes, I blame us. The sabermatricians. The guys with glasses and calculators who seemingly everyone says "live in our mother's basements." We can do a better job of helping the uninformed with answers instead of snark, with the correct stats over the old and obsolete. We can do better, and we owe the fans and more importantly the game itself to share our knowledge. Let us not change the voting system, but let us change the basis of the votes. If we can open the eyes of the casual fan to the beautiful truth of the numbers, then the All Star Game will win me back.

Change #2 - Every team gets a representative
How absurd. This isn't Pony League baseball where feelings will get hurt. This grown men being paid (very well) to play a game. They are, by definition, professionals. Lets treat them as such. If a team doesn't have any deserving players, then so be it. I hope that embarrassing the entire organization. Few things motivate as well as the fear of public humiliation. If a team gets snubbed from the ASG, I guarantee changes will happen. The fans would clammor, the owner rattle the President, the President yells at the GM, the GM to the manager, and the manager to his coaching staff and the players. That is of course assuming none of the coaches gets fired. Let's finally drop the notion that there should be fairness in the ASG. We shouldn't reward overall mediocrity when stuck on a pathetic team. If I do my job, but the rest of the office is in pathetic shambles, am I automatically considered CEO material? Come on.

Change #3 - Rosters
35 roster spots? Ummm, this is easy to fix. The ASG rosters should be like this:

C - 2
1B - 2
2B - 2
SS - 2
3B - 2
OF - 5
UTIL - 4
SP - 4
RP - 3
P - 3

Bam. 29 Roster slots. Just trimmed the fat. If it looks similar to a fantasy roster, well, it should. Because thats what it. Simple. If a MLB manager can't win a game with 29 of the supposedly best players in his league, then what is he doing managing his own team of 25?? 29 is a lot. I would personally like to see it cut down even more, but I felt that soon we would be approaching the point of diminishing returns of a smaller roster. DL players are still eligible. I split them up as follows:

12 fan voting
10 player voting
5 manager voting
2 final voting -comprised of players who received votes from the 3 earlier voting, but did not make the cut.

Change #4 - In game rules
-A roving lineup card. That is to say that any player, not just one, can start, play 2 innings, sit, then go back in if need be.
-No tie games.
-2 IP limit for pitchers, 4 consecutive innings or 3 consecutive plate appearances for a hitter.

Change #5 - It "matters"
The ridiculous fact that this sole game decides home field advantage for the World Series is almost beyond words. I hate this. The World Series is played months away, and it actually matters. The AL fans never flaunted the recent winning streak. The Giants have flaunted their rings. The World Series matters. The ASG, in truth, does not and should not. Let team with the best regular season record be awarded home field advantage.

Please Bud Selig, do the right thing and adjust, amend, whatever you want to call it, but just fix the All Star Game.