Lack of MLB Parity Is a Myth
by Joseph Munley on Feb 24, 2011 8:10 PM EST
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PrintNow that the Nuggets and the Knicks have finally completed the blockbuster Carmelo Anthony trade, the talking heads on ESPN and on sports talk radio shows across the country have been having a field day with the topic of whether or not the trade – a product of the ‘LeBron James Decision’ era – is good for the NBA or not.
On one such radio show, the Scott Van Pelt Show, a listener emailed the host with an interesting take on the whole situation. His take, in a nutshell, was this: The NBA is the worst major sports league for competitive parity anyway, so what’s the big deal?
His comment made me think, and I began to count backwards through the years. By the time I reached 1990 – at which time I couldn’t remember exactly who had won the NBA championship – I was amazed at the lack of parity that the NBA had displayed. So, I began to research the numbers a bit more. The results surprised me.
Since 1980 – that is more than 30 years ago – there have only been 8 different teams to hoist the NBA Championship trophy at season’s end. Eight teams in more than thirty years?!
That ridiculous number made me curious, and so I went back to the numbers and began to dig a little bit more. This time I focused on the other major sports leagues during that same time span.
I was more than a little surprised to learn that of all the major professional sports leagues, Major League Baseball - Yes, Major League Baseball - is actually the league with the most competitive parity in this regard. How can that be? For years I’ve heard rumors of the imminent demise of the game of baseball because there were only a handful of teams that were in a position to win the World Series. Well, if you look at the numbers, that argument is not only untrue, it is almost laughable.
Since 1980, 19 different teams have won the World Series. That’s not only miles better than the NBA, but also better than the NFL, the league that every sports expert on the planet points to as the shining example of parity in professional sports. The NFL boasts 15 different Super Bowl winners since 1980. The NHL has seen 14 different Stanley Cup winners during the same 30+ year time period.
So, what is it about Major League Baseball that draws the ire of sports fans when the issue of competitive parity is concerned? Obviously, it is the payroll issue. I get it. I am a baseball fan who realizes that the lack of a salary cap will one day bring about a very, very lengthy lockout. Of course, the salary and contract issue brings to light the Alex Rodriguez factor.
Again, I went back to the numbers; I went back to December of 2000 when A-Rod signed his game-changing 10 year, $252 million contract with the Texas Rangers. Surely, I felt, this is where the lack of parity would come in. I was surprised again.
Since A-Rod signed his bloated contract, MLB has seen 9 different champions. The NFL comes in a close second, having crowned 8 different Super Bowl champions in that time frame. The NHL is next with 6 Stanley Cup champions, and the NBA pulls up the rear again with 5 different champions in the nearly eleven years since the A-Rod contract was inked.
The truly staggering fact in my eyes is this: Since 2001, the Los Angeles Lakers, San Antonio Spurs, Boston Celtics, Miami Heat, and Detroit Pistons have all won an NBA championship. In the 21 years prior to 2001, only 3 other teams - outside of the five mentioned above – had won it all.
So, considering the numbers, I think it’s fair to say that Major League Baseball has gotten a pretty bad rap over the last decade or so. The truth is that you are more likely to see a different team win the World Series each year than you are to see a different team win the NBA championship, Stanley Cup, or even the Super Bowl.
Who would have thought that?
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you're right
I’ve seen this before. as far as champions go, MLB offers the widest spectrum. i dont think it’s because MLB offers parity in the truest sense, but baseball inherently has the most randomness involved in winning. Tom Brady can throw the ball 50 times/game, LeBron can shoot 30 times/game, but Arod can only bat 4-5 times/game.
the best players in MLB only affect the game a handful of times, whereas in the other sports, you can get the ball to your superstar as much as you want.
The NBA's cap makes it less competitive.
It’s hard for the NBA to have real competitive balance because it’s the sport where superstars have the most impact. If the best player on the court is on your team you are usually going to win, because that player can make the players around him better by drawing double teams and making good decisions. In baseball, the best players don’t have the opportunity to have the same impact.
But beyond that, the structure of the NBA’s cap is a huge problem for competitive balance. Since there are max contracts, teams can only offer so much to keep their players. Stars don’t mind taking less money to play together because they’re not taking THAT much less. If the cap worked the way it did in the 90’s and Cleveland had the option of offering LeBron James $30 mil a year he’d probably still be a Cav. This is proof positive that, no matter how much owners talk about competitive balance, the only goal of a salary cap is to keep their costs down.
by Let's Talk About Tex Baby on Feb 24, 2011 10:39 PM EST reply actions
the NBA has to be last in parity
even when the small market teams are good they get cheated out of championships (see Sacramento Kings 2002 Western Conference Finals)
I R TEH HAX!!1!
If parity means differant champ it is baseball.
If it means can go from the cellar to first round loss to Steelers, Colts, Pats etc.. then it’s football. Basketball is the most predictable of the 4 most years. I love Hockey but since I can’t see the puck it is impossible to predict anything but an ass whoopin.
My weenie is polywampus.( Richard thisle = Dick weed.) What in the fudalumdunges is going on here?
by cashman bashman on Feb 24, 2011 11:39 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
+1
“I love Hockey but since I can’t see the puck it is impossible to predict anything but an ass whoopin.”
I love it.
Baseball is the sport in which teams built to win a 162 game division can be undone by the format of a best of 7 playoff.
In baseball, 2 hot pitchers can carry a team (2001 Diamondbacks, 2003 Marlins). Football is second closest because of the injury/ hot team factor in a best of one series.
In hockey and basketball, the more talented teams generally win in the playoffs. I think it’s the playoffs that create the randomness.
by designatedquitter on Feb 25, 2011 3:11 PM EST reply actions
There's no comparison to the NFL
It’s the king of parity. 10 different representatives for the NFC in Super Bowl in the past ten years is unreal.
From 1980 to 1995… the MLB was at it’s peak of parity. From 1996 on… not as much anymore. It’s essentially been the same teams in the playoffs (more or less) over the past decade. Payroll really started to become MUCH higher once the Yankees began to rake in world series championships as well. I don’t think the MLB has terrible parity (this year looks like a fantastic year for baseball), but NFL beats it by a mile.
Very interesting, nonetheless.
March 31st can't come soon enough.
And Travis makes a great, great point.
Anything goes in baseball.
March 31st can't come soon enough.
by Chris McKeown on Feb 25, 2011 4:51 PM EST up reply actions
The trouble baseball faces is that there are two divisions that are pretty much locked. So while the overall parity is good across the total number of teams, there’s a lack of parity in specific divisions.
Since 1995, only three times has the division been won by someone other than the Yankees or the Red Sox. Since 1995, only one wild card winner from the AL East has not been either the Yankees or the Red Sox, and the AL East has won 12 out of 16 wild card spots. The NL East isn’t as bad, but out of a total of 21 playoff spots, the Braves account for 12 of them. So the idea of the lack of parity clearly isn’t a myth; the lack of parity exists, but in specific divisions as opposed to across the sport as a hole.
I tend to disagree
The worst NFL teams, if they draft well and make good decisions can turn around and compete for a Super Bowl in a few years…however the Pirates can have the best draft 10 years in a row and will never have an opportunity to win a World Series.
The numbers point to MLB parity over the years, but MLB Free Agency has become so ridiculous where the best players choose between a small handful of teams year after year. As the salaries become higher, and the small markets are still sitting at $30M, the numbers will level off.
DWTDD
The Pirates may have high draft picks every year but they have no idea how to use them, which is why they’ve been in the basement for 18 years. The Rays had a low payroll and high draft picks for many years and they turned them into a world series team in 2008. The Pirates problem has a lot more to do with incompetence than being in a small market.
It’s not all that different from the NFL in that respect. The Lions had a top 5 pick practically every year in the 2000’s, but until recently they made bad selections, so the team never got better.
As for free agency, it’s true that the top free agents generally go to the same handful of teams, but it’s also true that star players don’t always reach free agency in their primes because even small market teams are usually able to buy out their first few free agent years.
There are obviously inequities in the system, but the results in the last decade have been a lot of different teams making and winning the World Series.
by Let's Talk About Tex Baby on Mar 4, 2011 10:45 PM EST up reply actions
Plus...
… Teams like the Pirates & the Royals are cursed with ownership that have shown that they are more than happy to fatten their pockets with revenue sharing money while refusing to at least attempt to make their teams competitive.
by Joseph Munley on Mar 5, 2011 12:19 AM EST reply actions 1 recs
EXACTLY. I love how people fail to realize/admit/whatever just because a team has a payroll of $30 million, $50 million,etc
that doesn’t mean the owner is some poor schlub who is standing on street corners begging for spare change for a hope to be able to scrape up enough money to sign the latest free agent. They all have plentyyy of money and simply may not choose to spend it all on their baseball team. They have other investments, interests, etc. They certainly get the pity like they’re the underdog though. Luckily for us GMS’ biggest love was his team and he put his money into it to creat something great. And before anyone tries to inform me that the Yankees/Dodgers/Mets/Cubs/Phillies,etc get a ton of money from merchanise/tv contracts,etc and teams like Royals, Pirates don’t get nearly as much…yes I’m aware of that and yes that does play a part but the owner’s pocket and how much he’s willing to take out of it plays a bigger part. You think Ted Turner didnt’ have the money to make the Braves payroll considerably larger than it was? come on.
by MichaelGGBGrabow on Mar 7, 2011 11:38 AM EST up reply actions
The above arguments measure parity in different ways. Some look to the Champion, some to the finalists, some to division winners.
Each method yields different results. Every sport has teams that make the playoffs just about every single year over a long period. Every sport has teams that can’t escape the basement. It doesn’t matter whether there is a hard salary cap (football), soft cap (basketball), no cap (baseball) or all of the above (hockey).
As I said above, in baseball, winning the division practically every year does not assure championships (Braves 1 in two decades, Yankees 1 from 2001-2010). In basketball, with a smaller core of good players needed to be a champion, health of those players is more important. In football, management (including coaching) counts most.
Historically, baseball has had the least parity (or how could the Yankees have 27 titles?) but it seems to be pretty even in all sports now.
by designatedquitter on Mar 7, 2011 10:58 AM EST reply actions
Not you obviously, because you're not some rando who wouldn't be able to name 3 Yankees aside from Jeter and Rodriguez
but, I hate when people bring up them having 27 rings as if it all happened in the past 30 years because of money. The greatttt majority of those came well before massive payrolls/free agency, etc
by MichaelGGBGrabow on Mar 7, 2011 11:42 AM EST up reply actions
but let's be completely honest
and admit that the Yankees were not always the most scrupulous when it came to finding talent (and doing everything in their power to sign players before anyone else). That was a huge contributor to having the best teams in all those decades before the draft was instituted in 1965 (which is when they won most of those 27 rings, the rest coming in the late 70s, late 90s, and late 00s, as we all know).
The Yankees are pretty much the reason that there is a draft.
fair enough and that info is pretty interesting.
that story about the A’s is a (crazy) example of what’s going on nowadays…Yankees willing to pay for players they want while other owners would rather fatten their pockets and field a sub par team.
by MichaelGGBGrabow on Mar 8, 2011 12:56 PM EST up reply actions
They won 5 World Series in a row starting 1949, and they won three in a row starting 1996, and no other team in any sport is within 2/3 of their championship total.
In the National League, the wealth is more spread out, but for a long time 3 teams pretty much ruled. PS I can name virually every regular on the Yankees since I was starting following them around 1966.
by designatedquitter on Mar 7, 2011 1:12 PM EST up reply actions
No, they didn't
they won three in a row starting 1996
‘96, ’98-’00.
The Marlins won in ’97 (Indians).
I bet it's good to be playing again, huh?
oops, you're right. only 4 of 5. point remains the same
by designatedquitter on Mar 9, 2011 2:25 PM EST up reply actions
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