I was extremely happy to see the Tampa Bay Rays beat the Boston Red Sox in the American League Championship Series.  The city of Boston has enjoyed too much recent success from their sports teams.  Also, the Red Sox have one of the highest payrolls in the league.  I’m not sure who I’m rooting for in the World Series.  It’s been a long time since the Phillies won it, 1980 I believe.  That’s almost 20 years before Tampa Bay was even a team.  However, the Phillies play in a large market and my favorite teams are in small markets, the Rockies and Twins.  The Phillies have great young players in Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley and Ryan Howard.  They also have Brad Lidge who is from Colorado.  On the other hand, the Phillies can afford to sign the so called best players since they don’t really have to worry about their payroll as much as the Rays.  Well, the Phillies are up one game to none so I guess we’ll just see how it plays out.

I think baseball needs to implement a hard salary cap.  There are too many players that are way too overpaid.  Whether you believe it or know it, we are in a recession.  The average Joe Fan can’t afford to go to many, if any games.  Few players are loyal to their original teams.  They think they deserve more money if they have one or two decent years.  I remember about 20 years ago when Kirby Puckett took less money to stay in Minnesota than he could have received from a lot of teams – and he had a good year every year.  That’s loyalty.  It also shows how salaries have gone out of control.  Puckett was the highest paid player in the league at $3 million per year.  Middle relievers with ERA’s around 4.50 make that much money now.  Bench players make that much money now.  What’s the highest salary now?  It’s almost $30 million per year.  I must admit that since the late 1980’s, my salary has gone up by at least 10 fold.  However, in the late 80’s I was in high school working part time for minimum wage!  Stop the madness!  Average Americans aren’t going to be able to afford going to games anymore.  Marketing suffers also which contributes to the bottom line.  Why do I want to spend my hard earned money on a Matt Holliday jersey when he may not be a Rockie much longer.  Many teams are going to struggle for a long time.  It’s a shame that organizations with talent in management and scouting aren’t rewarded better.  The Minnesota Twins always seem to be competitive but they can never make a trade for a big time player or sign a big time free agent.  They use their management and scouts to select the players that give them a chance to win.  By management, I also include Ron Gardenhire and the rest of the Twins major league and minor league coaches.