Who's At Fault For No Agreement On The Start Of The Season?

[StrangeSox 655]

Sounds like "MLB accounting" is similar to "Hollywood accounting" where they always find a way to show little or no profit.

 

Expect this trend to continue:

[Harold's Leg Lift 1,152]

"I can turn a $4M profit into a $2M loss and get every national accounting firm to agree with me."

-Paul Beeston President Toronto Blue Jays

[wegner 1,384]

This would have been a great opportunity to give the sport a tremendous boost.  Can you imagine what the tv ratings would have been for that Field of Dreams game?  It would have been a great reminder that this is America's pastime.  Just play James Earl Jones' speech before the game and play some damn baseball!!!

That being said...both sides are at fault, but I have a hard time siding with the players when they have mouth pieces like Blake Snell.

[Dick Allen 3,674]

30 minutes ago, StrangeSox said:

Sounds like "MLB accounting" is similar to "Hollywood accounting" where they always find a way to show little or no profit.

 

Expect this trend to continue:

 

[Dick Allen 3,674]

The Braves are the only MLB team owned by a public corp so their books are public. They made $94 million in 2018. They made $54 million last season, but after some accounting tricks, their $54 million profit was a $32 million loss.

The owners have told the players the industry has never made $250 million profit in one season. Yet in 2018, the only public company of the 30 teams made 40% of that.  Maybe it's just bad luck for the owners that the only team required to show their books made 40% of a figure they claim as an industry they have never done, but it's pretty obvious it's BS.

Edited June 16, 2020 by Dick Allen

[Harold's Leg Lift 1,152]

In 2018 the Braves reported total revenue of $442M and in 2019 they reported total revenue of $476M.  Baseball owners think everyone is really stupid.  

[southsider2k5 6,120]

1 hour ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

In 2018, the Braves reported an operating profit before depreciation and amortization of $94M. Last year, it was $54M--though after depreciation and amortization, plus stock compensation, the team showed a paper loss of $32M. 

That's also what is on the books.  Many of the revenue streams exist as other companies.

[Quin 2,257]

27 minutes ago, wegner said:

This would have been a great opportunity to give the sport a tremendous boost.  Can you imagine what the tv ratings would have been for that Field of Dreams game?  It would have been a great reminder that this is America's pastime.  Just play James Earl Jones' speech before the game and play some damn baseball!!!

That being said...both sides are at fault, but I have a hard time siding with the players when they have mouth pieces like Blake Snell.

The official mouthpiece for MLB is Manfred, who previously said there would 100% be baseball this season. Then backtracked days later.

The players have told MLB to just tell them when and where to play under already agreed upon terms and the owners have said only if the players agree to not file a grievance. 

The owners know that they have negotiated in such bad faith that they're holding the season hostage because they know they'd lose in court.

[ptatc 1,544]

34 minutes ago, Harold's Leg Lift said:

In 2018 the Braves reported total revenue of $442M and in 2019 they reported total revenue of $476M.  Baseball owners think everyone is really stupid.  

Revenues, yes. Profit no. The MLB players salary alone were 128 million. There are salaries, bills, debts, loans and such to be paid. Revenues do no equal profit. MLB had revenues of 10 billion last year. Did the owners profit 10 billion?

Edited June 16, 2020 by ptatc

[wegner 1,384]

Just now, ptatc said:

Revenues, yes. Profit no. There are bills, debts, loans and such to be paid. Revenues do no equal profit. MLB had revenues of 10 billion last year. Did the owners profit 10 million?

With revenues of 10 Billion, I would hope that they profited at least 10 million 

[ptatc 1,544]

1 minute ago, wegner said:

With revenues of 10 Billion, I would hope that they profited at least 10 million 

Deserved. I edited.

[ptatc 1,544]

1 hour ago, StrangeSox said:

Sounds like "MLB accounting" is similar to "Hollywood accounting" where they always find a way to show little or no profit.

 

Expect this trend to continue:

See regardless of what the owners say or open the books they will not believed. People will always go to the "fake books" They could say a team made a trillion dollars and people will say "wow, if they reported a trillion it must really be 10 trillion."

However you are correct in that the fighting between the two sides will create more problems for the sport as a whole.

[wegner 1,384]

1 minute ago, ptatc said:

Deserved. I edited.

Sorry but I could not resist.  Carry on!!

[Dick Allen 3,674]

Just now, ptatc said:

Revenues, yes. Profit no. There are bills, debts, loans and such to be paid. Revenues do no equal profit. MLB had revenues of 10 billion last year. Did the owners profit 10 million?

It's so funny how some just don't want to see what is obvious and don't want to picture owners making large sums of money, but even then, people want it both ways. JR is unique because he owns the Sox and Bulls, and most of the people in the Bulls ownership group, also have a piece of the Sox. Yet, if anyone mentions, well, the Sox could take a hit because the Bulls made a ton of money, it gets shut down because they are 2 separate businesses. Yet, you seem to have no problem with the players having to take a cut to pay Ricketts' loan to rebuild Wrigleyville even though those are separate businesses.  Like the writer for the Athletic said, they are capitalists when the money is flowing, but socialists when there is an issue. 

[ptatc 1,544]

1 minute ago, wegner said:

Sorry but I could not resist.  Carry on!!

As you should. I did that to someone a few days ago. As i tell my students, always question it because I do misspeak often (or in this case mistype).

[ptatc 1,544]

3 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

It's so funny how some just don't want to see what is obvious and don't want to picture owners making large sums of money, but even then, people want it both ways. JR is unique because he owns the Sox and Bulls, and most of the people in the Bulls ownership group, also have a piece of the Sox. Yet, if anyone mentions, well, the Sox could take a hit because the Bulls made a ton of money, it gets shut down because they are 2 separate businesses. Yet, you seem to have no problem with the players having to take a cut to pay Ricketts' loan to rebuild Wrigleyville even though those are separate businesses.  Like the writer for the Athletic said, they are capitalists when the money is flowing, but socialists when there is an issue. 

It's because in the MLB they don't until the sell the team. It's much more expensive to run an MLB compared to the NBA or NFL.  I cant say anything about the Bulls because I havent looked into that. My guess is that NBA teams make much more as JR said as much when he reportedly told his kids to keep the Bulls shares but sell the Sox ones dues to the differences on the sports. The fact that his kid is involved in the Bulls front office but not the Sox lends credence to this.

[Quin 2,257]

6 minutes ago, ptatc said:

It's because in the MLB they don't until the sell the team. It's much more expensive to run an MLB compared to the NBA or NFL.  I cant say anything about the Bulls because I havent looked into that. My guess is that NBA teams make much more as JR said as much when he reportedly told his kids to keep the Bulls shares but sell the Sox ones dues to the differences on the sports. The fact that his kid is involved in the Bulls front office but not the Sox lends credence to this.

I thought that was because Michael was just highly interested in running the Bulls, but didn't really care for the Sox?

[ptatc 1,544]

24 minutes ago, Quin said:

I thought that was because Michael was just highly interested in running the Bulls, but didn't really care for the Sox?

Could be. I thought there were stories years ago that JR pushed the family that way due to the difficulties of the MLB. 

I could be wrong though I'm old and my memories are going.

Edited June 16, 2020 by ptatc

[Harry Chappas 328]

42 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

It's so funny how some just don't want to see what is obvious and don't want to picture owners making large sums of money, but even then, people want it both ways. JR is unique because he owns the Sox and Bulls, and most of the people in the Bulls ownership group, also have a piece of the Sox. Yet, if anyone mentions, well, the Sox could take a hit because the Bulls made a ton of money, it gets shut down because they are 2 separate businesses. Yet, you seem to have no problem with the players having to take a cut to pay Ricketts' loan to rebuild Wrigleyville even though those are separate businesses.  Like the writer for the Athletic said, they are capitalists when the money is flowing, but socialists when there is an issue. 

Welcome to America in the year 2020. 

[ptatc 1,544]

32 minutes ago, Harry Chappas said:

Welcome to America in the year 2020. 

No kidding. Everything has to be a dichotomy. There is either one side or the other. No one want to try to work towards the middle and come to an agreement. One side is always right, one side is always wrong.

[ChiSox1917 457]

3 hours ago, ptatc said:

Revenues, yes. Profit no. The MLB players salary alone were 128 million. There are salaries, bills, debts, loans and such to be paid. Revenues do no equal profit. MLB had revenues of 10 billion last year. Did the owners profit 10 billion?

Youd have to be a fool to think their expenses ate up all that excess.

 

MLB franchises are gaining in value hand over foot. This value is predicated on them making profits. They would not be appreciating at such an insane rate if they were just breaking even every year

[southsider2k5 6,120]

15 minutes ago, ChiSox1917 said:

Youd have to be a fool to think their expenses ate up all that excess.

 

MLB franchises are gaining in value hand over foot. This value is predicated on them making profits. They would not be appreciating at such an insane rate if they were just breaking even every year

To be fair, I think a large portion of the value of professional sports franchises is a combination of their rarity, and of their public embrace.  A good portion of their valuations are based on being bid up by people who really desire not a business, but a sports franchise.  You can't go into this business without buying one of the 120 or so franchises that exist today.  It instantly makes you a public figure and also satisfies the childhood dream of running a team.  There just aren't a lot of businesses that bring that to a person.  These franchises aren't valued like a normal business on their PnL and their earnings expectations.  This is more like a bitcoin where the value is largely on what is represents than what money it makes.

This isn't to say they don't make money, because they do, but there is a different set of factors at play very specific to this one industry.

[jenksycat 87]

3 hours ago, ptatc said:

See regardless of what the owners say or open the books they will not believed. People will always go to the "fake books" They could say a team made a trillion dollars and people will say "wow, if they reported a trillion it must really be 10 trillion."

However you are correct in that the fighting between the two sides will create more problems for the sport as a whole.

You keep pointing to "people won't believe it" but its not really based on beliefs.  In the Hollywood accounting examples you can see the games being played to turn things into losses on paper.  There's not really any disputing that and the same would go for baseball.  Just because its not technically an issue 'legally' in the books doesn't mean its actually losses.  Also doesn't factor in any of the sweetheart deals these teams have with cities for their stadiums.

For once the owners just have to eat it, sucks for them but that's the situation we're in.  If a team randomly stopped drawing fans they'd still have to pay all their contracts out, they couldn't just argue to cancel the season.  No difference here, there's some risk in owning a team and it happened this year.

Ultimately I just will never feel sorry for a billionaire owner losing the equivalent of a few hundred dollars to me or you its just absurd.

 

[Dam8610 477]

5 hours ago, ptatc said:

Yes. After normal business operations it is a loss. As was said previously it would do no good to open books because those with a bias against the owners wont believe it anyway.

Even if you do take the wrong way to look at and say they made 54 million last year, they owners made about 40% of what the players did. I would hardly call that the owners being greedy.

Considering they did way less than the players did for it and there's way less of them, yes, 40% does seem fairly greedy.

[ptatc 1,544]

51 minutes ago, jenksycat said:

You keep pointing to "people won't believe it" but its not really based on beliefs.  In the Hollywood accounting examples you can see the games being played to turn things into losses on paper.  There's not really any disputing that and the same would go for baseball.  Just because its not technically an issue 'legally' in the books doesn't mean its actually losses.  Also doesn't factor in any of the sweetheart deals these teams have with cities for their stadiums.

For once the owners just have to eat it, sucks for them but that's the situation we're in.  If a team randomly stopped drawing fans they'd still have to pay all their contracts out, they couldn't just argue to cancel the season.  No difference here, there's some risk in owning a team and it happened this year.

Ultimately I just will never feel sorry for a billionaire owner losing the equivalent of a few hundred dollars to me or you its just absurd.

 

It's not about feeling sorry for the owners. I don't feel sorry for either side. It's about acknowledging the fact that the owners and the players are both being idiots and they are both the cause of this stalemate.

As I've said in many different posts I am not on the owners side in this. It's just that everyone else is so biased and anti-owner they cannot even contemplate that the players have at least some degree of fault here. This makes me the only person defending the owners view that the players have fault as well and makes it look like I'm against the players.

It's about to let it go because it's not going to change. The owners are evil and the players are saints.