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3:56:00 PM EDT
NBA Defense and Competitive Balance
A couple of notes (a short one and a long one):
1) On cue this morning, Doug
Russell of Sporting News radio, in discussing the NBA playoffs was discussing
the importance of defense (a novel, earth-shattering analysis) and described it
as a "lost art" in the NBA. Huh? This stuff will never cease to amaze
me. It's just as clear as can be that calling defense a lost art in the NBA
compared to some golden age is simply nostalgia for a past that never was,
unsubstantiated by reference to any meaningful criteria.
2) Howard Bryant, on the sports reporters today described the Tigers as a feel
good under dog story, "something we haven't had in baseball in a long
time."
Let me clarify some of what I wrote about competitive balance the other day.
First, in reference to Bryant's comments, were the Marlins not a feel good
underdog story in 2003? Or the Angels in 2002? Or the White Sox in 2005? (show
me all the people predicting, at the start of 2005, that they were a championship
contender).
There is confusion about competitive balance in baseball, and central source of
that confusion is this: there is a difference between fairness and competitive
balance. The Yankees' financial advantage is, of course, unfair. I am a Yankee
fan, but I have no trouble acknowledging that. But, it does not follow that the
sport lacks competitive balance in the way that the doom and gloomers claim.
And, I have to ask: why is competitive balance so much less discussed in the
NBA, despite the indisputably more predictable outcomes in that sport over the
past fifteen years? It's partly because baseball's commissioner engaged in a
deliberate strategy to run down his sport in advance of the 2002 negotiations,
which included a sham report on the game's finances and repeated overblown
claims about why so few teams had hope and faith.
We've been hearing for years now that, as chowndawg5 below writes, we would
have a competitive balance problem if so many big market teams weren't run by
idiots. But, who is that a reference to? The Red Sox are very well run. I
wouldn't call Brian Cashman an idiot. When is that day actually going to come
that all the big market teams press all their advantages such that the same
group makes the playoffs every year? If it's so obvious what big market teams
should be doing, why haven't they all been dominating the sport over the past
decade. The fact is that money translates into winning less well than people
accept. Because of the Yankees historic success in the late 90s, combined with
their high payrolls, that association became fixed in the public mind, combined
with the commissioner's incessant whining about the "problem." But,
if money were a guarantee of winning, why haven't the Yankees become a runaway
freight train since 2002? The inconvenient fact of the Yankees' success is that
in the late 90s, they had high payrolls that were, nonetheless, in line with
other high payroll teams. In 1998, when the Yanks won a 114 games, they had a
lower opening day payroll than the O's. In 2001, the last year of their
dynasty, according to Buster Olney, they had an opening day payroll a few
hundred thousand dollars more than the Dodgers and Red Sox. Their payroll really
jumped the shark beginning in 2002, and they've made the World Series once
since then.
I have also been hearing since 2000 that the A's could not continue to be
competitive, as other teams figured out what they were doing. Well, they were
still right in the thick of the race in 2005, just as they always are. The
Twins were slated for contraction and then won three division titles in a row.
The Cards have become a perennial power on a mid-level payroll. The Rangers
dumped Arod after the 2003 season, slashed their payroll, and have become more
competitive. More fundamentally, the division structure itself mitigates the
competitive balance problem. The Brewers, Reds, and Astros don't compete with
the Yankees, they compete with each other (and the big market Cubs, and a fat
lot of good that does them). The same goes for the Tigers, Indians, Twins and
White Sox. The Yanks and Red Sox are stuck with each other. Yes, I realize that
bodes ill for their division mates, but the Orioles have squandered their many
significant financial advantages and the Blue Jays are a well-managed team
capable of contending. But, again, even acknowledging that this is unfair to
the rest of the division, the problem is more localized than the standard
narrative accepts.
Let me reiterate - none of this it makes the current structure fair. But, no
one of note has ever argued that money played no role in success in
baseball, just that it's been overstated, which it undoubtedly has. Here’s a
quote from Dave Berri, co-author of the just-released, The Wages of Wins, via the the sabernomics website:
I stand by what I've already said: the competitive balance problem is overblown as are the claims about the link between payroll and winning. The past five seasons have only made that more clear.
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The Yankees and Red Sox are well run (now) and contend every year as a result. But look at the recent histories of the Orioles and Mets, for example. Further, I'd argue that if Cashman had free reign over the Yankees they'd be even better over the long haul. The sabremetric analysis you point to is surprisingly poor as it supposes that there would be some sort of linear relationship between money and wins which is simply absurd (or it uses it as a strawman argument which at best undercuts their own argument). The old adage that every team is going to win 40 games and lose 40 games is a decent place to start (even the Royals, which might not beat a good college team this year will win 40). Even taking their problematic results - 18% is a HUGE number over 162 game season - you're talking about the difference between winning 80 games and 94 games. In other words the difference between being average and getting into the playoffs. Of course money isn't the whole story, but it is a big story.
5/29/06 7:15 PM