That's the real mystery, isn't it?  Who wants to watch baseball nowadays?  Certainly not World Series television audiences.  A 10 rating for the world series?  I remember when the complete ratings list used to always have Punky Brewster alone at the very bottom of the list with a 10 rating.  Baseball is less popular than ever, but there are more people than ever willing to plop down big cash to fill up the seats for 81 home games a year.  I suppose it's the fault of our growing income disparity.

And can you actually see a ball game at the ball park?  Your eye can only see the pitches break if you're close to in line with the pitcher and the batter, which means the expensive seats behind the plate or down close to the ground in the outfield, which for some reason is one of the cheapest seats in the park.  I've always found baseball when you can't see the pitch selection to be about as interesting as watching paint dry, but for some reason people don't seem to mind as long as you feed them some expensive hot dogs and beer.  The hot dogs and beer and not the game are the point.  Since nobody's watching the game anyhow, I'm still trying to figure out how to get people to plunk down big cash to swill expensive hot dogs and beer together without a game, but some sort of deniable pretext for the expensive beer-swilling appears to be socially necessary, as otherwise they would take a day off work to go to a brew-pub.  Anyhow, all the new ballparks suck.

Watching from 10 stories in the air works just fine for football, where so long as you can see the players' locations, it doesn't so much matter that you can't see where the ball is going to land.  For baseball, it's awful.  Watching where the ball is going to land is the whole game.  Baseball stadiums need to stay low.  Screw the mezzanine and the club seats.

It's the club seats that give the greatest share of revenue.  Baseball has figured out that people and especially businesses will pay more, a lot more, to sit in exclusive seats where they can be together and be treated specially, and for some reason it doesn't matter that they're placed on the second deck where the view sucks.  Since it's a private box, this means that everyone else has to be lifted up another two stories than they would be if these few people in private box weren't there.

I've got a solution.  Site the private boxes partially underground, at the very edge of the field, behind plexiglas, with peoples' eyes only a foot or so off the ground.  That way they get a great view and the entire rest of the stadium doesn't need to be lifted to nosebleed heights for just a few people in boxes.   Probably you can squeeze extra money out of businesses for actually giving them some good seats, and nobody's using the wall's viewing space anyhow. And put more seats in the outfield where you can actually see the pitches.  If nobody wants to sit there, make the beer cheaper.  Maybe they'll actually learn how to watch baseball between swigs.

"It's the club seats that give the greatest share of revenue.  Baseball has figured out that people and especially businesses will pay more, a lot more, to sit in exclusive seats where they can be together and be treated specially"

It's funny that you mentioned that.  Some years back, the hospital I was working at had a loge at the Gund Arena (now called the QuickenLoans arena), and once each year, they would raffle it off for charity.  Well, me and 11 other friends always won the bid for that, usually around $600, but that included parking and $300 for food and beverages.  That sounds like a lot for food and drinks, but it didn't go as far as you think, what with pizzas going for $25/ea, and beers for $4/ea.  

Usually, we went to a hockey game, a couple of times to a basketball game.  For one day/yr, we got to see how the richer set lives, and those loge seats are really nice!

Sadly, the hospital (somewhat cognizant about how it looked owning a loge when patients were paying increasingly more for medical bills) sold it, so we won't be doing that again.

Still, club seats at the stadium?  $110/ea?  No freaking way.

there's only one way to find out...

Nah, they're not the Bats anymore and they moved out of the cigar and piss hell hole/utopia War Memorial Stadium into a crappy new bank-named field a couple years before '06. The old stadium is still there but it's used by the local colleges instead. Greensboro is an interesting case because it used to be an amazing city for minor league sports. They were drawing record ice hockey crowds (20k/night) to Monarchs games in the pre-Hurricane days and the Bats were a top Yankees affiliate. Then, they got big-league fever, wanting to steal the Twins and hosting the Hurricanes for a couple years before they moved to Raleigh, plus an arena league team that failed horribly. After those set backs, the minor league popularity was pretty much ruined but hopefully it's starting to come back.

It is easy to buy small plaster models of what you think life is like.

The Marlins won their first World Series the old fashioned 1990s way--A smattering of highly paid all stars, some steroid users, and a good bench. Their second World Series win was more serendipitous--a young team with a few savvy vets went on a hot streak and came up with big time pitching and clutch hitting in the playoffs. Magic!

Those were the days that were for Marlin fans.  But, like it or not, the dollar sign on the muscle is what wins you world championships.  And, sadly, for a whole bunch of fans of small to medium market teams, they're smoking dope if they think their team has a shot at ending up in the Fall Classic.  Doesn't mean that spending right through the roof guarantees you a World Series ring (otherwise, A Rod would be wearing a fistful of them).  But, spending well over a hundred million dollars probably will get you an entree to the playoffs.

Right now, the total payroll of the Marlins won't even make the $28 million price tag for A Rod.

Illegitimi non carborundum.

sadly, for a whole bunch of fans of small to medium market teams, they're smoking dope if they think their team has a shot at ending up in the Fall Classic.

Hey, I'm smoking dope as I post this!   As a Red Sox fan, I'm in a bad place to lecture smaller-team fans about how their management should scout and sign players,  but the whole Moneyball era of VORP, WHIP, OPS, and other Star Trek style conventions to baseball rosters has lent some success to astute teams.  Hell, the Rockies even went to the Series last fall.   I agree with your dollar figures, but particularly in the horrible National League, "small ball" can reap gains with good planning.

I know, but the fact they had sucesss after essentially blowing up their team to me highlights the folly of what so many teams do, which is to only make marginal improvements, usually at a too high a price, out of risk aversion.

Isn't baseball's putting two expansion teams in Florida part of its problem? If there were 4 less teams the increased supply of players would balance the advantages of the big market teams considerably.

Just like ice hockey, expansion is absolutely MLB's #1 underlying problem. The pitching simply isn't there. Everyone goes five deep in their rotations April through June and no one even has a legit four in the whole league. Between that and letting steroids happen without ever reacting for more than a decade, Selig is unqestionably the worst owner in the history of baseball and quite possibly American professional sports.

It is easy to buy small plaster models of what you think life is like.

I think he's kind of a bonehead, but worst in history? I'm think there have been two Mariners owners alone worse than him, but then I don't follow the Brewers.

You could also argue baseball steroids perfectly. By not doing anything they got a popularity boost from all the home runs, and all they have to do now is act apologetic and crack down a little and all the fans forgive them.

The NFL doesn't have revenue sharing the same way that baseball does--and the NFL has a hard salary cap--no team can exceed the limit, end of story.  If I'm not mistaken, the NFL shares revenue from off-field licensing and merch +television related revenues, but home gates belong to the teams, as they should.  The fact that the 6 top ballclubs in MLB are required to give a few million each to about 10 who suck is bullshit.  

If baseball wanted to be "fair",  they should re-align in the style of English Soccer:  split up into 3 conferences of 10 teams each (with 12 in one of them, preferably the top circuit). Use cumulative records from the last three seasons to relegate and promote teams.    Give 6 playoff spots to Division A, 3 each to Division B and C.  Seed the playoffs by regular season record regardless of division and let the chips fall.  

Except that most of the NFL revenue comes from the TV contract, so that teams receive nearly the same amount of revenue.

Except that most of the NFL revenue comes from the TV contract, so that teams receive nearly the same amount of revenue.

That's because football is fun to watch on television for a great number of people.  Baseball is only interesting if one's own team (or one's own money) is involved. I'm not really yearning to watch the first place NL West team take on the first place AL central team in a hot interleague series on a Saturday afternoon in the middle of June.  But I will gladly watch the Red Sox play out the meaningless 6th through 9th innings against a fourth place AL West team on that same Saturday, because somehow I care.  Baseball doesn't need TV money as badly as football does--81 home games x 35K+ capacity buying tickets and concessions + luxury box revenues should be able to compete with 8 games (not including playoffs) x 70K ticket buyers + luxury box.  Baseball's money problems are of its own doing, and the idea that a shitty team with crap management should be given a fair shot because of a few hundred thousand fans (who don't even sell out the stadium) doesn't move me.  Having said that, the Pirates hired a new GM.  I wish them the best.  

I knew about the Premier league with the teams shuffling back and forth but I had no idea their playoffs were so wacky. I know inter league play is actually one of their bigger draws and they should find a way to make the Mets-Yankees, Angels-Dodgers, etc, play each other every year but I'd definitely like to see a return to some sort of more concentrated format where you're competing against a smaller number of teams in the regular season. I really feel like you've just got too many teams and players to be able to follow when games are every day. It's all so counter to how things are done now, I just don't think there's anyway the American audience will ever go for it. It's all sort of a moot point until they get Selig out of the picture, though.

It is easy to buy small plaster models of what you think life is like.

They don't have a playoff system at all.  It's 20 teams, and the schedule is a round-robin with a home game and an away game against each team for 38 games.

The sheer size of the system is impressive.  Apparently, it's not too hard to get your club team into the pyramid, with at least the theoretical ability to become a Premier League team if you can keep winning.

A system like this of course points out that the sports leagues we are used to are monopolies, and that there is really no reason that this needs to be the case.  In the US, a team can throw any old players onto the field, and will and still make money from people coming to see the stars of other teams play them, with no real consequences.  Another advantage of a system like this is that the minor league games are relevant to the championship because they can result in a promotion, and you have a lot easier time getting people to pay to go to lower league games than without promotion.

For TV viewers, a league of around 8-16 teams is probably best, because it concentrates the top talent.  I'd like to see a system like this implemented in the US, but the perception that the top talent is in the monopoly leagues is hard to break, so I can't really see something like this developing from the top down.  The only way I could really see something like this developing is from the bottom up staring as a regional amateur championship gradually turning into a national amateur championship, and then a national semi-pro league and then becoming a national pro league.