That's what is facing the major leagues: a steady decline in competitive balance or a conflagration from which the victors in the current labor strife will emerge from their bunkers to inherit scorched earth and the fallout from their misdeeds.
A strike will harm everyone. However, the solution being hammered out, a luxury tax to curb spending, has nothing to do with the problem.
Major League baseball derives enormous profits from its monopoly status. These are then divided between the owners who own the most lucrative territories and the players.
Imbalance is caused by owners owning exclusive rights to local revenue in vastly different markets--not paying free market salaries to players.
Owners in small markets have little hope of competing in the long term. While it is doubtful they are going broke, the deck is stacked against weaker franchises on the playing field.
As long as owners are convinced the problem is rising salaries, the problem will persist.
The players get to keep most profits because there is no way the owners can replace them. Because all the high quality baseball talent in North America is either in the majors or in the minors--waiting to enter the majors--there are insufficient numbers of qualified players outside the system to replace striking major leaguers. So the players win every labor dispute.
The only way to reverse this system would be to allow an alternate talent source to exist. Severing major league teams from their farm systems and making every minor league team independent would go some way toward accomplishing this goal.
It could be completely accomplished if the majors were broken up into competing, rather than cooperating leagues.
If players could be replaced by other leagues' surplus talent, who would go on strike? The stars, you say? That's what happened the last time NFL players went out on strike.
Unlike the majors, the NFL has no farm system, and many NFL caliber players outside the league.
During the last strike, these outsiders poured in and, within a few weeks, fans were more interested in the action on the field than the picketing stars, who saw the writing on the wall and came back.
Break up the majors and minors and labor stoppages cease.
Major leaguers get what they want because the structure prevents teams from finding adequate replacements. And while owners scream bloody murder about players' excesses, owners themselves have no qualms about using MLB's monopoly status to extort concessions from local governments.
Breaking up MLB Inc., would have the added benefit of creating more baseball as competing leagues compete with each other for local markets and TV deals. Teams would still lobby local governments for better facilities, but it in the same way that tennants always do. It would mean an end to the current form of extortion practiced by commissioner Bud and his 29 thieves: "Give us a new ballpark or lose your team."
What would happen if every major league team ceased operating?
New teams, new owners and new leagues would spring up overnight to exploit Americans' love of the game as entertainment. The owners could vanish and no one but their families, friends, creditors and co-conspirators would miss them.
Major League Bandits Inc., would best serve its customers by going out of business.
If it were not for all the people whose livelihoods depend on catering to major league teams and players, one would be tempted to say, "Let them strike and let MLB die a well deserved death."
A more practical solution comes from analyst Bill James, who argues that the visiting team is responsible for one half of the income generated in each game and should get that revenue.
Teams that draw well and create the most local income would still make the most money.
The Hot Corner appears each Thursday in The
Daily Yomiuri .