by David Beck
EEEEEE!Contributing Editor
Installment 4 -- March 20, 1998
Got a joke for you.
"What happened when Mike Piazza and Rupert Murdoch met a 900-pound gorilla?"
"I don't know, but if the gorilla is a baseball fan, Mike and Rupe will get whatever they want."
While the advent of player free agency occurred around the late '60s, early '70s with the Curt Flood challenge and the Messersmith/McNally decision, the real red-letter date with respect to its impact was the day Reggie Jackson signed a contract with the New York Yankees in 1977. While the advent of team free agency has been coming up on us over the past few years with the ever-increasing price of major league ballclubs, the red-letter date occurred yesterday:
Thursday, March 19, 1998. The major league owners approved the sale of the Dodgers to Rupert Murdoch for $311 million.
This is three times the value of the price of an average major league team.
Before the sale, one baseball economist put the value of the Dodgers at about $180 million. What is going on here is simply another step through the nightmare that free agency hath wrought. This is not just any old sale of a major professional sports franchise. It is different because of the scope and magnitude of what the guy who bought the team plans to do with it.
Murdoch has paid a gidzillion dollars for a baseball team, and the "experts" say that he is sure to lose money. Is Murdoch then really just buying a plaything? Is he paying what he must to have one of those rare luxurious diversions? Is he merely forking over a mint in order to get his expensive-taste jollies watching Dodger games? [Did he become a zillionaire by routinely making stupid purchases, by throwing his money away? -- GP]
In my arguments against free agency, one of my points is that to most owners, a team is a toy. Certainly any owner revels in packing a bunch of impressed acquaintances into the nicest luxury box in the park, but the first and foremost pleasure in doing the "owning thing" is the challenge to actually somehow, in some way, turn a profit with his or her toy, especially when the pundits boldly declare that it is impossible to do so.
Murdoch is not buying a $311 million playtoy. As enigmatically brassy as Murdoch is, he is the epitome of the most severe business acuity. He will immerse himself in proving the experts wrong, and he will make a profit with his playtoy. He will take that challenge and wring it, choke it, and squeeze it until it is dead.
And he will, in the process, make baseball-as-we-have-known-it dead.
Preaching gloom-and-doom, am I? Going a little overboard, am I?
Here's how he's going to do it.
Many may consider that the baseball fan gorilla in the joke should be a "Dodger" fan. At first glance it would appear to make more sense that it be a Dodger fan. Mike Piazza is asking for his $15-million-a-year contract. Murdoch is paying grandly for the team and certainly would be in a position to pay Mike the big bucks, all at the joyous disposition of Joe Dodger Fan.
But you see, it is not Joe Dodger Fan that Murdoch wants.
It is Joe Fan.
It is plain old Joe Baseball Fan that Murdoch is going after. It is indeed Joe Sports Fan that he wants, for Murdoch will certainly seek to build the Los Angeles sports empire around the Dodgers. It could include the NHL Kings, the NBA Lakers, and the likely new NFL expansion team to go into the soon-to-be-considered state-of-the-art football stadium in Chavez Ravine.
For any man to institute and reign over such a domain is Herculean in itself, but what is profoundly significant that Murdoch is not stopping at little old Chavez Ravine. For Murdoch is not just little old Rupert Murdoch in a nice suit getting buddy-buddy with Los Angeles. He is the emperor of the entire Fox Group, international media conglomerate extraordinaire. And Murdoch knows that with the media growth today and in the future, all he has to do is a mere decent job of marketing this team and he'll capture not just Joe Fan, but Joe Japanese Fan, too. And Joe Korean Fan, Joe Venezuelan Fan, and Joe Kuala Lumpurian Fan as well.
Don't toss your cookies just yet, but you can see where this is going. It was bad enough that Ted Turner called his Braves "America's Team." The Dodgers could very well be "The World's Team."
Okay. Now. Go ahead. Time to toss 'em.
Finished yet? You'd better hope so. Because it is real; this is exactly Murdoch's goal.
Now, yeah, I know I'm just some nobody nutball writing on the 'Net, and this may sound like the typical conspiracy-theory rambling frequently found in the medium, but bear with me as I make my bold predictions of what will happen. If all this turns out to be is hysterical blithering on an obscure site, then I am no worse for it, but if I am shown to be right, then at least I can say, "Look, I told you so."
Murdoch has seen the future of baseball and he knows it is the exact free agency garbage I've been railing against for years. Free agency to him will not be garbage but his gold mine, and he will use it to help build his empire.
For one thing, the "profit" he intends to make will come out of implementing the current strategy of the modern-day, vertically integrated media power, and that is using a high-profile arm -- in Murdoch's scheme, the Dodgers -- to bring added prestige, added strength, added -- well, mmmm-money, yeah, that's it -- to the business. The trend in the expansive, super-corporate, astronomic-stakes business today is to get all of the different parts to complement each other. It is a necessary trend to compete and stay way, way up there with the big boys. Time-Warner, Disney, all those guys are doing it. It is what the whole Ted vs. Rupert feud is all about.
Murdoch is about to rip apart the traditional time-worn standard that each major league team stand on its own. Much as the player is no longer loyal to any team, the team will no longer be loyal to the community or feel bound to do anything the community wants for the community's sake. Oh, the team will put out all the window dressing and pretend to be a "part of the community," and it may well do very nice things, very charitable things. Very good and very nice indeed. But it will only do so because it is a part of the grand scheme. "Community Schmoozing" is will be a new division in the corporation.
And what exactly is Murdoch's scheme when it comes to the game itself? It is actually very simple.
Murdoch will take another traditional time-worn baseball business practice, that of owners trying valiantly to keep player salaries at a reasonable level (when you finish laughing in about four hours I'll continue. Done? Good. Let's continue, then....), and he will shred that, too. Now, again, you may think I'm kidding -- that owners actually work to keep player salaries down -- but as I mentioned in my earlier free agency discourse, owners could pay players five times what they are paying the highest paid players now. They don't because they still hold on to the first traditional time-worn standard of teams standing on their own, and they all know that the teams by themselves are simply not Fortune 500 ventures. They aren't even close.
Murdoch will change that. He will demonstrate that, as salaries continue to rise, owners will be forced to draw from the conglomerate to "be successful." (In quotes because being successful does not just mean team wins.) He will justify it by pushing it as a wise business decision to meet the demands of the times, that in today's world it is needed to ultimately benefit the team on the field because it first benefits the conglomerate. Then, of course, he'll throw in the gratuitous "It will then benefit the community." As soon as everyone sees that his program so charitably advances baseball's best interests, he will make his assault on all those "rules" the owners said Murdoch was required to follow in order to be in the "owner's club" and maintain the "integrity of the game."
The firm, reasonable opposition that will come Murdoch's way? Pshaw. Murdoch will roll right over it. If he violates the most inviolate of baseball sacrament, what are people going to do to him? Wag their fingers at him and give a good glower? And if he does his worst, who's going to kick him out? The commissioner? (Don't take so long laughing this time....)
Murdoch will pay Piazza his $15 million. In a heartbeat. He will, of course, not make it look like that; he'll hem and haw for a bit to establish the requisite position of strength. But he knows that no matter what, even if Piazza starts to suck, he still draws. Murdoch will then go and shrewdly overpay the best ballplayers he can get, and then use the "rich Dodger tradition" as a marketing springboard to market them worldwide.
Yes, fellow Giants fans, the fact that I referred to a "rich Dodger tradition" makes me want to toss my cookies even when I have no more left to toss, but stuff is there that Murdoch can use to indoctrinate the most unsuspecting fan. Kirk Gibson in '88 alone gives him a ton, but there are also Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Ebbets Field and that Brooklyn romanticism, Sandy Koufax, Dodger Stadium, Drysdale's and Hershiser's scoreless innings, all the no-hitters, Rookies of the Year, the five World Series titles (six including '55), the '70s infield, Fernandomania (tossed more cookies yet?), and what is most pertinent to Murdoch's scheme today, the "international" connection with players such as Hideo Nomo and Chan Ho Park.
The marketing campaign is already in full swing. In the exhausting coverage of the deal, the Los Angeles Times ran a full-page ad not from the Dodgers but from Fox, that said (among other neat little bits), "As we enter our 'rookie' season, we look forward to being a part of the beat team in major league baseball." I know this is typical blather, but this whole thing will be taken international on the most colossal scale. The sad reality is that the world is more and more unswervingly devoted to bread and circuses.
So what does this do to competitive balance?
It trashes it, but this is not something that is new.
It is a given. This year teams like the Pirates, the Tigers, the Expos, and the Brewers will suck. Teams like the Yankees, the Orioles, the Braves, and the Indians will do great. There they are, Dave Beck's predictions for the 1998 major league season. In fact, just look at the year's payroll outlays and slot the teams into their respective divisional finishes and you've got my picks. Indeed, look at the baseball preview publications, and for the most part they'll be the same. But this is a point belabored.
What is relevant now is what Murdoch will soon do.
He will spend up-the-gazotch -- yes, more up-the-gazotch than your typical George Steinbrenner will -- in order to buy those World Championships. He knows that fans will only buy into a winner, boldly joining most fans in their blatant disregard of the zero-sum law.
The thing is, Murdoch will have the power and the cash to make certain that the Dodgers are that winner. What will then happen is that there will be a body known as Major League Baseball that will essentially have one Harlem Globetrotters team and a bunch of Washington Generals teams.
For those not familiar with this expression, I am referring to the way that the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team entertains. The team performs all kinds of circus-like antics while playing something resembling a basketball game, and they always win. The team that always loses is the Washington Generals. It is part of the spectacle. I remember once hearing a Globetrotter player insist, however, that the Generals are always really trying to win and that each game is a legitimate basketball game. Yeah, um, right.
Essentially what is portentous about the imminent Murdoch era is that as the Dodgers become the baseball equivalent of the Globetrotters, everyone will let them do it because, first, Murdoch will have built such a huge worldwide following of the Dodgers, and secondly, he will be successful in spewing the idea that this will further benefit all the teams. There will be simply too many damn Dodgers fans, and in the long run, what is good for the Dodgers will be "good for baseball." [Scary question: What happens when Rupert Murdoch sneezes? -- GP]
In order to keep the "competitive balance," however, there will be a handful of other teams allowed to challenge the Dodgers, perhaps even take a World Series or two from them over the next fifty years, just to make it all look like it's on the up-and-up. One of these teams will certainly be the Yankees, another team with that splendidly marketable "rich tradition."
What about the weaker teams? One of two things will happen. Either they will fold because there will simply not be enough fans to support them, or the enormously popular teams like the Dodgers will simply subsidize them in order to keep them around to serve as the Washington Generals of the major leagues. Don't think that would happen?
Can you say "luxury tax"?
The fact that revenue sharing is in effect is a bright red flag for all this. Do you think for two seconds that the least viable teams in the majors can assemble a World Championship-caliber team with revenue sharing income? With the way the economics of baseball is going?
With the greater and greater disparity between the have's and the have-not's (or as Gregg put it, the HAVE'S and the have-not's) in the Murdoch era, there is no way the Dodgers and their dominating buddies will disburse enough in revenue taxes to allow that to happen.
Believe me, as I write this I do not feel well. The prospect of an interminable future of watching the Dodgers adored around the world while the Giants helplessly languish as their patsies is unbearably nauseating. But EEEEEE! is a newsletter devoted to just saying what is. I'm not happy about it, as excruciatingly barfitory as it is, but it is what is to come.
I can't emphasize the following point enough.
The most significant reason this is very likely to happen is because of the condition that the major leagues has found itself in, one that millions of devoted and intelligent fans see all too clearly. I hear it all the time, and it reveals itself in some variation of the simple expression:
"Baseball has become less of a game, and more of an entertainment enterprise."
It is now a show, not a contest.
It is now a money-making venture, not a pastime.
Each team is now managed within an irreversibly systematic economic super-structure; the provincial sincerity of operation and unique fiscal simplicity of "the league" is now ancient history.
Baseball will soon be a legitimized circus, with the Rupert Murdoch Dodgers forging its dynasty much to the glee of its legion patrons around the world. It will no longer feature the true valiant struggle between two noble contestants to determine who can boldly display the heart and courage to emerge victorious based on wise strategy, faithfully developed talent, and profound loyalty to the cause. This is what is real about baseball.
Excuse me -- what was real.
Some questions that may be asked:
For one thing, if it tries, that only goes to prove exactly what I've been saying: that it is no longer the game, but the pandering to the gargantuan entertainment web that incorporates telecommunication networks, cable and satellite services, computer services, traditional entertainment venues such as music and motion pictures, print publications -- any and all media-oriented elements.
Secondly, there are only so many Rupert Murdochs and Ted Turners. I cannot stress enough that it is the vast media access that is the key. Not many other teams will have it, at least not with the scope that Murdoch and a few others will. And if teams want it, they may have to go through the big players like Murdoch to get it. Turner didn't spaz out about Murdoch joining the club just because he doesn't like him, he did it because he now has to compete with him for media control of the majors. Certainly a number of large media corporations are out there, and let's say the Murdoch precedent sticks and all the other teams do hook up with some mega-media company. At that point there is still only so much of the saturation one can handle. Joe Consumer is still going to be very selective, and Murdoch is counting on him selecting the Dodgers.
Thirdly, if all teams plug into their respective promotional media giants, and there is "parity" at that level -- that is, the Dodgers end up not being the dominant team, then it will certainly be no different than the condition of "parity" that honestly competitive baseball has traditionally had. So what is the big deal then? It is simply that you'll be paying butt-loads more for it all because Murdoch began this little game.
And fourthly, the crucial attraction for Murdoch's purchase was, again, the Dodgers' tradition. He is all about selling the product. He would never in a million years buy -- for any price -- the Expos or the Padres. How much marketable tradition do the Brewers have? Go ahead. Make a list. Yeah, that's what I thought. And remember, I'm talking marketable tradition. Guys like Robin Yount were great, but....
Because of what happened later that year, in October to be exact. Everyone knows what happened -- a marketing executive's dream. First, of course, you had Reggie -- Hollywood could not have sketched a more colorful character. Then you had the setting -- World Series, Yankees-Dodgers, a deciding Game Six, in Yankee Stadium no less. Then you had the event -- three late-in-the-game home runs, consecutive, on the first pitch from each of three different pitchers. Now I couldn't even tell you if I got all that exactly right. If it isn't, who cares? It's the legend.
To what did people attribute this bonanza? Reggie's free agency signing. What a fit. And the big bucks for Reggie got more bucks for baseball. Indeed the whole Reggie thing certainly set up what Murdoch is doing today.
He'll certainly pour out the promotional stuff, but I will reiterate that the glitziest most far-reaching media spectacular will mean diddly unless he gets the wins. And he will get those wins. He'll spend what he must to get those free-agent horses in his stables. If those players are home grown, he'll overpay them too.
Please understand that I am not saying baseball will turn into pro wrestling. Murdoch will win because the free agency system will allow him to purchase and assemble what will essentially be the National League All-Star team.
In Murdoch's scheme, even though he'll expect some substantive income from ticket sales, his main objective is to get more fans. More specifically, get more paying fans. This may not even necessarily mean selling people tickets at higher prices, but just getting them to buy into the Dodgers somewhere. In fact, he may even lower ticket prices if that means more people packed in the park for the world to see.
Oh I hope so. Big-time. I hope his failure is along the magnitude of slipping on the biggest banana peel there ever was, flying hundreds of miles into the air, and landing face-first into the most putrid, wretched pile of refuse and having to slide through it for a distance of no less than thirty miles, with the rawest of sewage and fecal slime splashing into every Murdoch orifice there could be. Sorry, got a little carried away there. But it was fun. And all I have, I presume.
Anyway, yeah, I really don't want to be right about all this here, trust me. My first and foremost concern here is the Giants, and that is exactly why I am sounding this alarm.
But yeah, I hope like nothing else that Murdoch does make embarrassingly crappy executive decisions. I hope he gets hopelessly embroiled in an unending pattern of hiring goofs to screw up his team. I hope they all suck at appraising talent. Murdoch could also thoroughly misinterpret the times and discover that major league baseball will only remain chiefly regional in interest and that no single team's appeal could ever reach a national scope, let alone an international one.
I would not be more pleased.
The best, and perhaps only roadblock to his scheme is a good one, and it sure would be nice to see. That is for the fans to refuse to buy into it. It is that simple. If no one buys, his grand design is dust.
Really then, when it all comes down to it, the big question is this:
Will they buy it?
Will Joe Fan be sold?
Stay tuned. (Literally.)
EEEEEE! Contributing Editor David Beck is a history teacher at a Southern California high school. He has also taught social studies, math, government, and economics, as well as "Dogwood: Narrowly Escaping Our Own Tentacles."