Sorry, but we have to talk about baseball again

Now, maybe this is just a bit pessimistic of me, but the way the Brewers have been playing as of late hasn’t really given me much reason to feel anything but that towards the way things stand in Major League Baseball.

Baseball is a game of chances and opportunities. You only have so many outs to play with in a game, and you want to be able to make the most out of those opportunities while limiting the opportunities your opponents have. Any given night, a journeyman like Trayce Thompson can get a game changing, three-run home run off an ace like Corbin Burnes. However, the odds of that happening aren’t great, especially when extrapolated over the course of an entire season. The problem is, when one looks at the entire Dodgers lineup and the star power, potential and production that is there, they will eventually break through. They might not win every game, but they will win most. It’s also a lineup that the Brewers could never hope to replicate.

Since 1998, there have been three teams who have fielded a team that was in the bottom half of the league in team payroll that went on to win the World Series. Those teams were the 2004 Florida Marlins, the 2015 Kansas Royals, and the 2017 Houston Astros. In that same time span, the Milwaukee Brewers have fielded as many teams that were over the league average in payroll, two, as they did teams at the very bottom of that list. The highest the Brewers have been in terms of total payroll was in 2012, where they were tenth overall. The other time, in 2008, they were just in the top half at 15th overall.

Now, obviously throwing money at players doesn’t necessarily equate success. There are plenty of examples otherwise, and there have been a few times where underdog teams have broken through. However, three for 23, which is what teams paying less than league average have batted in terms of winning the World Series over the last two decades or so, is pretty poor. They’d be kicked off a high school baseball team if they hit so poorly. All of this seems to indicate that, while paying players doesn’t necessarily mean that you will win it all, it certainly helps your chances.

Which makes sense. If you spend more money, you can take more chances signing veteran free agents because your risk is minimized by the fact that you can sign more of them. As I said earlier, baseball is a game of chances and opportunities, and the more you have, the better off you are going to be. Sure, teams like the Marlins, Royals, and Astros can compete, but that was only because they completely tore down their teams and built their teams through the minor league system. The farm system is certainly a balancing force in the MLB, but all teams are only equal in that regard. The Dodgers were rated as having the second best current farm system by MLB.com. The difference maker is that they can also boast the highest payroll in the league at the same time. More op- portunities.

So, is this a problem? If you are a Brewers fan, I would say so. Now, whether it is a problem with the system or the way the team is run...well I could see it either way. From a league standpoint, having no salary cap certainly makes sure that there is less parity in World Series winners, as evidenced by the data above. If that’s what they are going for, I guess it’s working. The fact of the matter is that some teams have the ability to feel more comfortable paying top dollar for another spin on the roulette wheel of veteran players, which ultimately leaves them more competitive for titles. Now, while this isn’t an ideal system for many teams, the Brewers included, Milwaukee probably hasn’t played their hand as well as they could. Only fielding two teams where you were above league average in the last 20 plus years is not a key to success in this landscape. And I understand that doing so on a regular basis isn’t necessarily feasible, but when you look at the fact the Brewers have made the playoffs for the past four seasons, something that they have never done in their history, and one can’t help but be somewhat disappointed by the fact that they haven’t gone more “all-in” on at least one of these teams.

A C ERTAIN POINT OF V IEW

NATHANIEL U NDERWOOD R EPORTER