EDITOR’S NOTE: Boyd Bergquist was the sports director at KETS-TV in East Tree Stump, Nebraska for almost 40 years. Known across the Husker state as the voice of the Boy’s High School Basketball Tournament, Bergquist was a four-time winner of the Marv J. Butz “Golden Cob” Award For Excellence In Nebraska Broadcast Journalism. That background, along with his quick if not cliché-riddled wit and love of single-malt scotch makes Bergquist a perfect fit to be our “sports” guy.
As promised, this will get right to the point. This past October showed us six new realities about baseball…no matter what it looks like after this impending lock-out.
1) Cleveland is the new Milwaukee.
As were about to hear all throughout this lock-out, the “low-payroll” teams aren’t supposed to be able to compete. But since we just saw a World Series with two teams toward the bottom of the payroll ladder, that argument has a giant hole in it. But the “salary cap” proponents will just pick a new poster child, and that will be the Cleveland Guardians. That’s the team that best fits the profile; they’re another “low-payroll” team that consistently makes the play-offs then doesn’t win in October.
2) The Brewers are the model for the future.
Let’s be honest. All this “salary cap” stuff is really just one group of owners who can’t compete against another group. The battle lines don’t fall where you are being led to believe. The narrative being sold is “small market” teams like Kansas City or Pittsburgh simply can’t compete against the fat wallets of the Los Angeles Dodgers or New York Yankees.
As mentioned, Milwaukee blows a hole in that story. So does the fact that there are several high-dollar payroll team out there that aren’t competitive either. One need look no further than the New York Mets for an example. The Los Angeles Angels over the last 20 years are a perfect long-term example. The reality is the way the current Competitive Balance Tax works is is the big spenders cut checks to the bottom end teams.
In short, the Kansas Citys and Pittsburghs of the world love the current system because they are essentially on baseball’s version of welfare. The big spenders don’t really want a salary cap because they are heavily invested in being able to win the free-agency bidding wars. The 20-ish owners in the middle who don’t have big wallets and are above the revenue limits to get the “welfare” checks are the driving force behind a salary cap.
But the Brewers uphold the old-school secret to success, which isn’t about money. It centers on scouting, developing talent, and getting results from that talent before they go for the free-agency pot of gold. Along the way, you pick up the journeymen, the “late bloomers,” and the other role players which complete every championship team’s roster. Make no mistake, there’s a salary cap coming of some sort in baseball; even if the time isn’t now, those clouds have only been thickening on the horizon far too long for there not to rain at some point.
Once that happens, teams wanting to stay dry won’t have the option of buying a bigger umbrella. Instead, there will be a lot more learning how to stay dry with a hat and the collar of a trench coat.
3) The 3 best teams in baseball are:
Nobody won more games in the American League than did the Tampa Rays. Nobody won more games in the National League than did the Milwaukee Brewers. The only other team to win a game against the Brewers in the post-season was the San Diego Padres. Yeah, I know the Padres are a top-ten payroll team, but they still managed to find guys who could at least put up a fight come October.
4) The Dodgers are old.
…and it showed. The Dodgers looked gassed out in the series against Milwaukee. That’s another problem with the “big money free-agent model.” The “big ticket” guys generally are that way because they’ve amassed a track record over time. That’s why so many “big payroll” teams are loaded with older players. That’s why with only two exceptions, the top end of list of teams in terms of payroll and average age are almost identical.
5) Old still won.
Despite the Brewers being one of the youngest teams in the game, their manager Pat Murphy is 67 years old and has a very “old school” approach to the game, as will expanded in the next point…
6) That Pesky “Moneyball.”
J-Dub illustrated this in an episode of his series Sports Analogies Hidden in Classic Movies; that “Moneyball” thing is basically the wrong execution of the right idea. The problem is the movie Moneyball wants the viewer to believe Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt) made the Oakland A’s perennial play-off contenders by using analytics to determine things like Scott Hatteberg should be a 1st baseman rather than a catcher.
Instead of today’s analytical fascination with launch angle, exit velocity, and most of that other crap, Murphy and the Brewers used their number-crunchers to find guys who can do the little things it take to win. That’s why the Brewers hoisted the championship trophy despite leading the league in balls hit on the ground, lowest launch angle, and stolen bases. That carried through to the World Series where Milwaukee notched more stolen bases (9) than home runs (3).
That approach also carried the day. Teams that can steal bases are also the ones who can a) get guys on base b) get guys in scoring position, which means c) they can manufacture runs instead of relying on strictly slugging at the plate.
Nothing is more “money” than winning.
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