NEW YORK (AP) – When the Milwaukee defeated the powerful, rich Los Angeles Dodgers On Thursday night, they hosted the first World Series between two of baseball’s lowest spenders in 35 years — just as team owners argue that clubs like the Brewers need salary cap space to compete consistently.
Milwaukee will face Cleveland or Tampa Bay in a best-of-seven series for the title starting Oct. 23, ensuring that two clubs in the bottom half of the big league payrolls will play in the World Series for the first time since 1991. The Dodgers, New York Mets and New York Yankees will watch from home this season with payrolls that each cost more than the Brewers, Guardians and Rays rosters combined.
The low-budget World Series showdown will begin six weeks before a likely management lockout, a work stoppage that threatens the 2027 season as owners and players fight over the sport’s lack of a salary cap.
Speaking at the All-Star Game in July, Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred argued for a cap while asserting that the exceptions did not reflect parity.
“Our worldview is that, over a very long period of time, there is a very strong relationship between who makes the playoffs and who makes the playoffs, despite the exceptions that we have,” he said.
Milwaukee, which won the NL pennant with a four-game sweep of the Dodgers, as of August 31, payroll was the 19th highest in MLB, while Tampa Bay was 25th and Cleveland 30th. The last time both pennant winners were among the bottom 50 percent in player spending was when Minnesota (15th of 26 teams) beat Atlanta (19th) for the 1991 championship.
In terms of market size, Milwaukee ranks 30th and among MLB’s smallest designated market areas, defined by Nielsen as non-overlapping geographic regions that group counties based on television viewing areas. Cleveland is 22nd and Tampa Bay is 15th.
If the Guardians win the AL pennant, it would mark the first World Series involving two teams in the bottom half of MLB cities by DMA since St. Louis (24th) beat Detroit (18th) in 2006. No small-market team has won the World Series since Kansas City in 2015.
Three years after the Twins won the 1991 title, players went on strike as owners pushed for a salary cap, leading to the cancellation of the World Series. No such cap was added, and owners only proposed one again this summer.
Since the 1991 Twins, the only World Series winners with less than half that payroll have been the 2002 Anaheim Angels, 2003 Florida Marlins and 2017 Houston Astros.
“It’s how the game is played at that time that dictates winning outcomes,” agent Scott Boras said Friday. “There is no doubt that the odds of winning and success increase with talent, but we all know that talent has many variables in how it performs. »
MLB owners have proposed a salary cap with a floor, a system players say they will never accept. A lockout is expected to begin on December 2.
Opening day payrolls were led by the Mets ($358.4 million), Dodgers ($323.3 million) and Yankees ($302.8 million). The Brewers were at $125.9 million, the Rays were at $90.5 million, and the Guardians were at $75.5 million.
“Don’t believe what you hear from the owner who complains, ‘I don’t have the resources to compete,'” Players’ Association President Bruce Meyer said during the All-Star Game. “They all have the resources to compete. Our proposals include provisions that would give them more resources and reward the teams that actually compete.”
Manfred says spending a lot increases the chances of success.
“It defies human experience to ask a fan to think that the bottom of that spread has the same chance of winning as the top,” he said. “There’s no doubt that in any sport, not everyone is going to win once every 30 or 32 years, depending on how many teams you have, but the data in our sport is stark: Your opportunity to make the playoffs if you’re a team in a larger market is significantly higher and your opportunity to advance to the next rounds, that advantage increases with each round.”
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