The fact that fans outside New York had basically no reason to be excited about baseball for several decades played a big role in the massive relocation of teams that began in the 50s, as well as the rise of football which eventually passed baseball in popularity.

The other American League teams developed a kind of sick codependence on the Yankee dynasty. While it was killing their fanbases, they depended on the attendance bump that home games against the Yankees brought. And in the worst cases, like the Kansas City A’s, they grew dependent on the cash the Yankees could pay them for their players.

Say what you will about competitive imbalance in the AL East today, it’s nowhere near as bad as it used to be.

According to Time magazine that week, as soon as police removed the dead body “standees scrambled for the two vacant seats, and the game began”.

Dual ownership leading to the 1899 Cleveland Spiders (what was effectively a minor league team playing in the majors)

Routine violence in the NL at the end of the nineteenth century – one of the reasons the AL took off was that they cleaned the game up.

For all who are saying that MLB had to go to California, they could have admitted the PCL as a third major league; it was remarkably close to matching the AL and NL until the Dodgers and Giants came West.

1876 — the original New York and Philadelphia NL franchises do a crude cost-benefit analysis and refuse to play the remainder of their schedule. They are expelled from the league.

1890s — dual ownership. 12 franchises, 8 owners. Those who owned two teams could shift all the best players onto one.

1899 — contraction. To solve the dual ownership problem, the NL expels Baltimore, Washington, Louisville and Cleveland.

1910-1922 (approx) — the gambling era. It was a lot bigger problem than just the Black Sox. Nothing before or since has done more to erode public confidence in the game’s integrity.

1936-1964 – total Yankees domination. It’s not just that the Bombers had great teams, as they’d had with Ruth in the 20s, but starting in the mid-1930s their domination of the game was so total that severely damaged the other 15 clubs, and especially the other 7 American League clubs whose fans had absolutely nothing to hope for.

1953-1971 – the relocation era. Six of the original 16 teams left their home towns, and at least 6 others threatened to, alienating fans across the country. The Giants/Dodgers move gets the most press today, but some of the worst moves included A’s-to-Kansas City, Braves-to-Atlanta, and Senators-to-Texas. Those moves didn’t even result in successful franchises in the new cities until decades later.

Did Jeter believe that Monahan did not treat his bruised ego correctly after the off-season contract kerfuffle? Was it because Minka Kelly’s birthday was Friday the 24th and his birthday was Sunday the 26th and he wanted to spend time with her and not the Yanks?

2 Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa’s home run chase of the Roger Maris record.

Dark Side

Mention of drug abuse in the 80s, nothing about PEDs

The people Bud Selig has approved to be in The Club have been almost uniformly disastrous not just for the teams they own but for baseball in general. It would be naive to think that this is the worse bunch of owners in history, since owners have always been terrible no-goodniks, but this latest batch seems to be hitting new lows. This is what happens when you prize personal fidelity to the commissioner’s office over liquidity and competence.