A DIFFERENT KIND OF PLAYOFF

Baseball is very popular in South Korea. Many KBO stars have made it to the U.S. major leagues. The nation takes pride in its national team when it plays in international contests.

South Korea is a nation of only 51 million. It does field one league with ten sponsored teams (major corporations). The teams play 144 games in the regular season.

But the championship playoffs are interesting alternative to the American version of the post-season.

Five teams make the playoffs in Korea.

The 4th and 5th place teams are the Wild Cards. They play a one game winner-take-all contest. The winner of this Wild Card games goes on to play a best of five series against the 3rd place club the Semi-Playoff.

The winner of the Semi-Playoff plays the 2nd place team in a best of five Playoff series.

Then the winner of the Semi-Playoff series plays the 1st place team for the championship. The championship series is best of seven.

What is clear about the KBO playoff format is that it rewards regular season play. The regular season winner has an automatic berth in the championship series. It also makes teams that finish lower than the league winner to "earn" their way to the championship round.

One negative to this format is that the league regular season winner has to wait until their opponent goes through a playoff gauntlet. This year's Wild Card game was held on October 16. The first championship game (against the 1st and 2nd place clubs) began on November 4.

MLB continues to talk about future expansion or re-alignment. That also means potential more playoff games, which in the current format dilutes regular season accomplishments of the best teams.

WAIT TO NEXT YEAR

The hot stove league is colder than the outside temperature.

There have been many reasons and theories floated about on why several marquee free agents have not signed contracts a month or so before pitchers and catchers report to spring training.

Player agents think "collusion" by owners in trying to cut down player salaries.

Teams retort that they are being cautious about spending, especially the big market spenders like the Yankees and Dodgers who have been aggressively managing their rosters to get under the luxury tax threshold. The CBA's luxury tax is a soft salary cap - - - it does not stop a team from over spending that amount, but it comes with increasing severe penalties including loss of draft picks.

Under the current trend, baseball draft picks are more important than signing a old free agent. General managers believe in the mantra of "controllable" players - - - young stars that the team can hold onto for six seasons. A team with a core group of players in their mid-20s (like the 2016 Cubs) can win a championship at league minimum salaries. The league emphasis now is on drafting and developing home grown players, and pushing them through the minor league system faster.

Owners are getting leery of having large amounts of "dead money" on the books. A veteran free agent wants more years to their final contract than their performance. Teams used to view the extra two years on a long term deal a player "bonus." But with the tax ramifications and the looming prospect of broadcast revenue going down (as cable viewership and advertising rates to drop by 2020), owners do not want to be spending tens to hundreds of millions of dollars on players who are no longer on their roster.

Some teams are also gearing up for tax code changes. Two have been touched upon briefly in the media: new depreciation rules and entertainment deductions. Under the Bill Veeck Rule, baseball teams were allowed to depreciate player contracts (Veeck convinced the IRS that a player's performance level will drop over age like a piece of equipment) as well as deduct the actual salary paid to the player. This double deduction was a tax windfall to teams, especially with big money deals. But that is apparently going away under the recently passed tax bill. On the revenue side, limits on corporate entertainment expenses will adversely impact sky box sales and corporate season tickets given to clients or vendors. Teams cannot budget renewals of those big ticket items if corporations will not be able to deduct the cost.

And then there is future spending concept.

Next year's free agent market is much better than 2018: Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Clayton Kershaw, Dallas Kuechel, Charlie Blackmon, Daniel Murphy, Adam Jones, Gio Gonzalez, Andrew Miller, Nelson Cruz, Elvis Andrus, Andrew McCutchen, and Craig Kimbrel could be available.

As Yahoo Sports reported, Cubs team chairman Tom Ricketts and president of baseball operations Theo Epstein talked about that dynamic during the Cubs Convention this past weekend. "It's a number of factors. Every team has to make decisions in their own best interest, and that's what's going on," Epstein said  when asked why this off-season has been so slow-moving. "But there's some macroeconomic trends in the game that probably after the last collective-bargaining agreement teams are just trying to position themselves the best way they can, probably in some cases with one eye on next season's free-agent market, trying to get their payroll where they want it to be. It's hard to say it's any one reason. It's probably a combination of factors. But I don't know that we've ever seen anything quite like this."

"Next year's free-agent class is different than this year's free-agent class," Ricketts said, putting it mildly. "I think what you're seeing with teams out there would rather have dry powder a year from now. … There's a lot of pieces and parts, but ultimately, I think teams are trying to keep their powder dry."

Perhaps, but the Cubs' front office keeps stating its desire to add a starting pitcher before this off-season is over. Epstein opened the door to that acquisition perhaps not being of the bank-breaking variety, though, indicating over the weekend that it could be a move that simply provides depth for a starting staff realistically no deeper than five guys at the moment. Until then, Jake Arrieta, Yu Darvish and Alex Cobb are still the top free agent starters who have not generated much interest or a bidding war for their services.

The Cubs also have other looming financial commitments if you look further into the future. Kris Bryant (who just set an arbitration renewal record deal), Anthony Rizzo, Kyle Schwarber, Addison Russell and Javy Baez are all slated to become free agents after the 2021 season. The team's top four starting pitchers - Jon Lester, Kyle Hendricks, Jose Quintana and Tyler Chatwood - are all slated to become free agents after the 2020 season. 

Epstein has admitted in the past that he has had to be creative in structuring his payroll because he is working with a tight budget from the business side of the team. Saving money on this year's budget can be used next year. But Epstein is also very fond about "his guys" like Schwarber, Bryant and Russell to let them get away to free agency. He needs to start balancing long term extension offers to the key players. 

So this off-season will probably remain very quiet until the end of January as teams take a much longer term view of their operations and finances.

EXPANSION

MLB is floating the idea that the league should expand teams. It is currently dealing with an odd 30 team, 2 league set-up. The idea is to add at least two teams to balance out the leagues.

However, that may not be a great idea. It dilutes the talent pool. It weakens the overall product.

But for owners, the division of $2 billion or so as entry fees is incentive enough to open the club to new members.

The potential new franchise cities include Montreal, which had the Expos but could not support the team; Mexico City, because all sports commissioners want their brands to be international; Vancouver, because it is foreign but too close to Seattle's market; Las Vegas, which wants any pro team but still has the gambling stigma; Austin Texas, because it is hip; Charlotte, but that may not be politically correct; Nashville, because it is central; or New Orleans, because it is NOLA.

If the MLB wants to even things out, it could always contract two teams. As it stands, the high revenue, big market clubs are subsidizing the small market teams. If a team cannot draw enough local support to survive on its own (like Tampa Bay or San Diego), then fold those teams into the remaining 28. The player's union would object since it would be losing 80 pro contracts.

But MLB has to start to realize that new public stadium financing is an impossible sell. Municipalities are bankrupt. Sports economists have been saying for decades that city financed sports facilities are dead money deals and do nothing for local economic development. Long term bond debt cripple city budgets and negatively impact other critical areas such as school funding.

The are no known billionaires crazy enough to buy a new franchise and build a new stadium with their own money. The political climate in the US is anti-government, anti-crony capitalism, anti-establishment. Public financing for private sports franchises is the last thing voters want to happen with their tax dollars.

Also in the head wind is the fact that the billion dollar cable team network deals have evaporated. The Yankees network is a dinosaur. The Dodgers network is a financial disaster for Time-Warner. Cable operators are balking at paying premium sports fees. And viewers are abandoning the cable box for streaming services which do not pay content providers as well as old network programming deals. Baseball may be at its peak revenue, but the trend is a steep drop-off.

Baseball owners are first and foremost businessmen. If they can see the massive changes that will come to the sport, there is no reason to rush into an expansion franchise. Just wait until the baseball economy tanks and pick up an existing weak franchise on the cheap.

EXPANSION

With a new commissioner, there is always renewed debate in whether MLB should expand to 32 teams. The main reason is to balance out the leagues and scheduling issues. The other side is that more teams mean a more diluted product (lesser talent).

Yes, the U.S. population has grown since the last expansion, but that does not equate to fist full of dollars baseball fanatics. Most of the growth in the population are in the lower middle class, which is continually hard hit by the endless mild recession.

Still, the proponents like the idea because more teams means more coverage and more league revenue. If MLB can franchise two more teams, that means maybe a billion or two dollars split among the 30 owners, or maybe $33 million of free money per team.

Expansion to new cities will be hard with the Athletics and Rays already looking to relocate. Some possible new locations: in California near Sacramento, in Texas at Austin and San Antonio. Brooklyn or north New Jersey, if you can get the Yankees and Mets to play ball (good luck with that). It might be time to finally move a team to Las Vegas … maybe. The South is lacking for teams, with Charlotte, Nashville, Memphis or Louisville being possibilities. Also another team could be in Canada, with Montreal getting a long look. The league has often thought international expansion into the Latin market (Mexico, San Juan, even Havana if diplomatic relations are opened).

But not lost in this discussion is the fact that contraction is probably the better answer. MLB continues to subsidize a half dozen teams already through revenue sharing. MLB gives smaller market teams who struggle to compete bonus provisions like protected picks in the draft, and capping spending by big market money teams on international player signings.

It would make more sense to contract the 30 teams down to 28.

Miami and Tampa Bay play to low attendance crowds. Combine the two clubs and move the franchise to Orlando, where you can get the excess tourist trade on a game by game basis.

The powers that be have been kicking Houston around for being a mismanaged bottom feeder for a long time (being exiled from the NL Central to the harder AL West for example). So why not improve the franchise by merging it with the Oakland A's who want out of the Bay Area. Plunk the new Houston A's in San Antonio if Houston can't support a team.

The players union will balk at losing 80 40-man roster spots with contraction. But on the flip side, that means more money for the players on the newer 28 team rosters.

Most likely nothing will happen for a long time.

TARPGATE

It is one thing for a team to want to lose, i.e. tank a season.
It is another to break the rules in order to lose.

There is a real problem with the league office's decision to uphold the Giant's appeal on the rain called Tuesday contest at Wrigley Field. The game was official when the rain came down and made the field unplayable, even after 4 hours of delay. It was not a mechanical issue, as the Wrigley tarp is a manual operation.

The Giants were livid because they believed the Cubs grounds crew were lax in trying to get the tarp rolled out onto the infield. By the time the tarps were placed, there was standing water on the infield. Loads of drying agent and sand could not correct the saturation.

However, the difficulty with the tarp was not mechanical, but Mother Nature. The intensity of the rain made the tarp heavy. Also, reports that the Cubs have cut back on the number of grounds crew members in a cost-savings measure probably raises more eyebrows than the game suspension issue.

The rule clearly states that the game is official after 4.5 innings if the home team is in the lead. That is what happened Tuesday. The rule also clearly states that such a game is not suspended if rain does not allow resumption of play. That is what happened Tuesday.

The Giants were still not happy. The team is in a close pennant race. Every win counts. The manager believed it was "unfair" not to conclude the game because of the alleged botched tarp placement. Any rule can be interpreted as unfair if you are on the brunt end of a ruling.

But as Brian Hanley remarked on the radio this morning, he was more concerned with the Cubs GM Hoyer not sticking up for the letter of the law. He has never heard of a general manager in any sport consenting to removing a win from his team. And I agree with that statement; the Cubs front office was too remorseful after the incident to the point of waiving the rule in the eyes of the league. And this only makes sense if the Cubs want to lose games if the plan is to get the number one draft pick next year. Hoyer and Epstein are always telling the media that they are looking for loopholes in order to leverage an advantage; by agreeing to take a win from their record by breaking the rules is clearly a strange way to meet their plan objectives. It is also a major middle finger to the fans, especially those who left Wrigley thinking they saw a victory. No fan wants their team to lose on purpose, let alone break the rules in order to lose.

The strained explanation by the league:

Major League Baseball announced today that Executive Vice President for Baseball Operations Joe Torre has upheld a protest filed by the San Francisco Giants regarding the calling of their rain-shortened game against the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field on Tuesday night.

An examination of the circumstances of last night’s game has led to the determination that there was sufficient cause to believe that there was a “malfunction of a mechanical field device under control of the home club” within the meaning of Official Baseball Rule 4.12(a)(3). Available video of the incident, and conversations with representatives of the Cubs, demonstrate that the Cubs’ inability to deploy the tarp appropriately was caused by the failure to properly wrap and spool the tarp after its last use. As a result, the groundskeeping crew was unable to properly deploy the tarp after the rain worsened. In accordance with Rule 4.12(a)(3), the game should be considered a suspended game that must be completed at a future date.

In addition, Major League Baseball has spoken with last night’s crew chief, Hunter Wendelstedt, and has concluded that the grounds crew worked diligently in its attempt to comply with his direction and cover the field. Thus, there is no basis for the game to be forfeited by the Cubs pursuant to Rule 4.16.

Who in their right mind was calling for a forfeit? The Giants were looking for a suspended game. 

Apparently, it was the information provided by the Cubs that the team failed to deploy the tarp "appropriately" because it was not properly rolled up after the last use? It is a tarp that is on a roll. 

It is not rocket science. And if the grounds crew worked "diligently" to cover the field to avoid a forfeit, then that same finding would have negated the ruling on suspending the game.