Don't Show Me The Money.

Before I write a single word of this post, please refrain, at the end, from pointing out that I am a Yankees fan. We're all aware. I don't know how many times I have to say this, but I am a baseball fan first, and a Yankees fan second. Being a Yankees fan does not mean that I'm a fan of high contracts, as you'll soon find out.

All right. Let's do this.

Something has been bothering me for the past few years, and I finally have an acceptable outlet to vent my frustration, since multiple Little League parks have banned me after screaming nonstop about this to many an unfortunate 7-year-old:

THERE HAS TO BE A SALARY CAP IN MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL.

A long, long time ago, before teams like the Marlins and Diamondbacks existed, before steroids became the hot topic, even before Jamie Moyer started pitching (26 seasons and possibly counting), free agency was just a twinkle in Andy Messersmith's wistful eye. Players spent most of their careers with one team, unless that organization felt it was in their best interest to trade that player. Sure, they were paid well, but for the most part, contracts were reasonable. There were no bidding wars, no negotiations, no haggling for prospects. Hell, there wasn't even a draft back then. Just players being plucked off of high school fields, college diamonds and sandlots around the country (and a few from outside, but nothing like it is today), who would sign with the team that approached them with the best number. However, those numbers didn't reach the astronomical levels they have since a combination of Messersmith, Curt Flood, and Catfish Hunter introduced the concept of free agency in the baseball lexicon.

Since that pivotal moment in the history of the national pastime, contracts have gone through the roof. For God's sake, Alex Rodriguez signed two different contracts for over $250 million. TWO SEPARATE CONTRACTS WORTH A QUARTER OF A BILLION DOLLARS WERE SIGNED BY THE SAME MAN. That's obviously the most prominent example, but make no mistake, contracts all across the game have gotten completely out of hand. The minimum salary for a Major League Baseball player is $480,000, and that's normally reserved for bit players, bench riders and no-name relief pitchers. Comparatively, the President of the United States makes $400,000. One swings a piece of wood to hit a ball. The other is the leader of the free world. See the problem?

If you got over half a billion dollars just to play baseball, you'd be excited too.

We're not even through the worst part of it yet. With television deals, a 162-game season with potential playoff games, and more merchandising than you could even think of, teams are pulling down more and more money, which gives them ample resources to sign someone like Manny Ramirez to an 8-year contract worth $160 million (Red Sox in 2000), or Derek Jeter to a 10-year, $189 million one (Yankees in the same year). Not that these players aren't great. In fact, most huge contracts are signed by players that are considered to be legendary, even in their playing days. But that doesn't excuse the fact that teams like the Cubs or the Twins, both of whom are going through some real rough seasons lately, can sign players like Alfonso Soriano (8 years, $136 million that runs until 2014, the most expensive contract in Cubs history) and Joe Mauer (8 years, $184 million that runs until 2018, highest contract ever for a catcher) to eye-popping deals that the teams know will eventually come back to haunt them. And yet, it continues to happen, and will continue until something is done about it. Men like Ruth ($910,000), Gehrig ($360,000) and Johnson ($195,000) played without ever topping a million dollars in their career, let alone in a single season. Furthermore, legendary players like Mays ($1,858,000), Aaron ($1,565,000) and Mantle ($1,010,000) never dreamed of reaching the financial figures that players like Colby Rasmus ($2,700,000 just in 2012 to hit .223 and score as many runs as RBI with 75, his career high) and Chris Young ($7,000,000 this season to play in 101 games and do little of worth in the games he didn't miss) make today as somewhat passable players. Hell, Jackie Robinson, whose sheer presence in the major leagues made hundreds of blacks, Hispanics and Asians even eligible to enjoy today's major bucks, never approached even a fraction of the kind of money players like Andrew McCutchen and Adam Jones will make over the next several year, and their production, while of an All-Star caliber, will never touch that of the man who made their careers possible. Nothing sounds right about that to me.

On the other hand, in regards to teams with the financial means to throw money at players like Pedro Martinez throws punches at senior citizens, teams like the Rays ($65 million in 2012) and the Athletics ($50 million) have managed to use the draft, international signings and bargain free agents to field somewhat competitive teams over the past decade. So it's not like the financial structure of a team is indicative of their talent and caliber on the diamond. But to say that a team can become a contender without buying a superstar is simply ignorant. And small market teams, such as the ones listed above, and others like the Royals and Padres, both of whom are in the bottom 5 in payroll but boast extremely strong farm systems, often develop and cultivate stars that, eventually and unfortunately, leave them for the promise of more money than they could ever hope to spend from a team like the Phillies ($174 million, 2nd in 2012) and the Tigers ($120 million). So, any players that hit the big time often make or break a team, financially and emotionally (in some cases).

If the allure of insane amounts of money really wasn't a problem, this man would still be in St. Louis with the team that drafted him.

So how do we fix this? How does baseball recover from monstrous salaries? Well, it will take a lot, but it can be done. The first step, and this is the most crucial one, is that players have to agree to take less money, not just in the interest of the team (less money to one player allows a team more flexibility to buy other good players if necessary), but in the interest of the fans that they entertain. Will this happen on its own? Probably not. Excuse me, definitely not. Which leads us to the second step: the salary cap. If a ceiling is put on both how much money a player can earn per year or per contract, and on how much a team can spend on outgoing or incoming free agents, then the problem of outrageous contracts goes away pretty quickly. For instance, there have been reports that the Orioles and Brewers, both of whom are relatively small market teams, have interest in signing Josh Hamilton this offseason. For his part, Hamilton has already stated that he's looking for a 7-year contract worth $175 million. Believe it or not, that's not completely unreasonable. Now, if there were a salary cap for teams of $100 million, or for free agents to not make more than $10 million a year, you could see Hamilton patrolling left field in Baltimore or Milwaukee for the better part of the next decade. Under the current circumstances, though, this could almost never happen.

I'm not saying you have to handcuff teams and players. While it's true that the Hall of Famers from seasons past made much less money for what we still view as superior production, there will come a time in the not-too-distant future that humans, by natural or artificial means, will become more physically capable to crush those tiny spheres with bats that will look like toothpicks in comparison to their arms, or to throw said spheres at a speed previously incomprehensible to our current state of mind. Naturally, as the game becomes more difficult to play at a high level, the pay increase should jump accordingly. The issue remains, though, that the lack of a salary cap still cripples the concept of parity. In all honesty, no salary cap doesn't just cripple parity, it brutally beats it, nurses it back to health, then cruelly slaughters it in a fashion not unlike the last 20 years of whatever it is the Pirates consider to be "playing baseball." Parity cannot truly exist if 10 out of 30 teams have a capital that far outgrosses the combined GDP of many of the South American countries that produce the players who become a part of the vicious circle. And it starts and ends with those teams.

As much love and respect as I have for the man, George Steinbrenner may have been one of the worst things to ever happen to baseball, simply because he was willing to spend however much money it took to get players like Reggie Jackson and Dave Winfield, a trend that should have died out with him, but instead became even more commonplace. Even more to blame is that despicable excuse for a human shell, Scott Boras. Because of him, dozens of players throughout the years, whether he's represented them in the big leagues or "advised" them in high school/college have held out for higher and higher signing bonuses/contracts/merchandising rights/what have you. Has anyone ever heard of Darren Dreifort? No, nobody has. He was a player that Boras negotiated quite a deal for after he was drafted second overall in 1993: 5 years, $55 million to pitch for the Los Angeles Dodgers. And how did he do? From 2001 to 2005, he pitched 86 games, 26 as a starter like he originally was, a total of 205 2/3 innings (which Justin Verlander normally reaches 3 weeks into any given season), and missed the entire 2002 season, finally retiring after the deal expired. And yet, players continue to sign with Boras (yet another fantastic example of how greedy athletes have become), and teams continue to dread negotiating with him. Understandably so, of course. I would hate to sit at a table facing someone who's spent years playing for me and has given as much back to me as I have given to him, and have to listen to a slimeball like Boras explain to me that I should dig deep into my pockets and find $375 million lying around to pay a 31-year-old right fielder for the next 15 years, at which point he'll be limping around the bases after a slow roller back to the pitcher. No, I certainly do not envy a general manager or owner in that respect.

BUT THIS CAN BE DONE. AND IT SHOULD BE. IT MUST BE. I'M BEGGING YOU, OH POWERFUL SELIG, HEAR MY PLEA!

A salary cap requires players, managers, GMs, owners and agents alike to ignore their massive sense of greed and entitlement, and get back to brass tacks: playing the game for the love of the game, and for the fans that fund these ludicrous contracts in the first place. It can't possibly be that hard to do; men did it for centuries before free agency, for much lower salaries in a more difficult playing environment than that of today. It'll take a major renaissance of the baseball spirit, but if it can be enforced consistently and swiftly, this sport can return to what made it the national pastime in the first place.