Baseball vs. Football.

[blueonion]

I have to confess, I put baseball below the EPL (English Premier League {soccer}).

I think you are giving baseball to much credit.

The BlueOnion

[brdmaverick]

baseball is a "put you to sleep sport"

Yankees- Redsox, 5-5 Top of the Ninth, Game 7 of the ALCS. I couldn't sleep right now If I tried. It's a shame a lot of you guys can't appreciate Baseball.

I agree, and I'm a SOX fan. I stayed up til 4 in the morning cuz i couldn't sleep. THose damn YANKEES.

[Tiki Fan]

Baseball is an intellectual man's sport. Those people who think that the sport of baseball is boring are either too unwilling or too stupid to sit down and trully understand the game. More than any other game (football included), baseball allows the fan to sit down and strategize every tiny detail of the game BEFORE the play takes place.

I agree that the competitive balance in baseball is seriously out of whack (and I say this as a Mets fan, whose team has a big budget). But if you're just talking about the sport as a whole, I find baseball more enjoyable. Bob Costas said it best: Baseball is the only team sport where you cannot get a win by just running down the clock. You have to earn every last out, and that allows you, more than in any other sport, to pull off a mircale at the end of the game to win it.

I am a big fan of both baseball and football - but baseball gets the edge in my mind.

[blueonion]

brdmaverick -

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate baseball and I think the game of baseball is a great game. But MLB is a terrible product as a whole for reasons I have already mentioned.

The BlueOnion

[Tiki Fan]

brdmaverick -

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate baseball and I think the game of baseball is a great game. But MLB is a terrible product as a whole for reasons I have already mentioned.

The BlueOnion

I certainly wouldn't call it "terrible" as a product - but it is certainly significantly flawed. Thanks, Bud Selig!!!

[faselt]

I have to agree with blueonion as an Indians fan that watched year after year as the Indians were neither able to bring in marquee players or to keep their best homegrown talent (Belle, Ramirez, and now Thome) from leaving in the free agent market for big money.

Once Thome left this year, a player who purportedly loved Cleveland and was the ultimate hometown hero, I realized there is no loyalty in baseball and as long as the yankees can go out and buy the best player at any position in baseball, MLB is dead to me. (I didnt watch at all this year).

The bottom line is that a salary cap needs to be instituted to keep competetive balance but these spoiled players with their guaranteed vastly overpayed contracts will never allow it to happen. Until both the owners and the players realize that they need to swallow their collective egos for the good of the game, baseball will continue to decline as a sport in the national consciousness, and football will continue to grow.

[Tiki Fan]

I have to agree with blueonion as an Indians fan that watched year after year as the Indians were neither able to bring in marquee players or to keep their best homegrown talent (Belle, Ramirez, and now Thome) from leaving in the free agent market for big money.

Once Thome left this year, a player who purportedly loved Cleveland and was the ultimate hometown hero, I realized there is no loyalty in baseball and as long as the yankees can go out and buy the best player at any position in baseball, MLB is dead to me. (I didnt watch at all this year).

According to your statement then, Cleveland has never had the best player at any position. Because NONE of the players who you described above ever went to the Yankees!!!

[blueonion]

faselt -

Amen my Cleveland brother! Amen!

Often times when I complain about baseball and the payroll structure, people try to defend it by saying, 'hey, look at Anaheim and Arizona.'

Anaheim and Arizona are not good examples. A good example is the mid 90s Cleveland Indians...because what Cleveland looks like today is what Anaheim and Arizona are going to look like tomrrow. They are going to be 'rebuilding' for another 10, 15 or 20 years (maybe eternity) and their fans will have to watch big market teams swoop in and take their players.

I wish the MLB would just contract my Twins so I do not have this cloud of guilt hovering over my head everytime they do well.

The BlueOnion

[emaja]

I agree that the competitive balance in baseball is seriously out of whack (and I say this as a Mets fan, whose team has a big budget).

You hit that nail on the head. You can spend a lot of money every year and still have a crappy team if you do not have the right men in charge. People hate the Yankees because, "They just buy a championship. I could win every year if I had $160 million to spend on a team." No you couldn't. The Yankees draft top talent, then Brian Cashman trades that talent to fill holes in their major league team. Remember for years the Yankees had the highest payroll and went nowhere. Only three WS appearances from 1965 to 1996. Cashman walks in and the trophies keep coming.

Baseball does need a salary cap, or at least a way to insure some competative balance. I think that baseball is still my favorite sport, but football has the parity that a league needs to have interest from all fans throughout the year. Every year in football, there is a chance for your team to go to and win the Super Bowl. The Rams, Patriots, Ravens, Titans, have all taken a short road to the top because of parity. In baseball, there are so few surprises that you can realistically eliminate half the league before spring training even starts.

[blueonion]

I don't want to argue over the ability to buy a championship in MLB but can anybody name a player on the New York Yankees over the past 8 seasons who has played for league minimum?

The point is not the championships but the large discrepancies of payroll and resources. It would be nice to be a fan and to believe your team of choice is playing on a level playing field.

Lets say I watched my Twins play this year, what is the best case scenario? I watched the Twins' player play their hearts out, beat the Yankees, win the ALCS and win the World Series. Yeah, that would be great but does it offset the eventually pain of watching the Yankees and other big market teams stroll into town and loot our players? LaTroy Hawkins and Torii Hunter come to mind? I am sure there may be more players but like I said before, I have turned my back on baseball just as MLB has turned its back on me as a Twins fan.

The BlueOnion