Question in the title. If I ran baseball for a year I tell you what I’d consider.
Much different penalties for over/underspending
I don’t think the owners or the players union or the agents really mind if a team spends way more than the others. What are the players going to do, demand they are paid less? Teams can lose draft picks and pay a ton in luxury tax, but it doesn’t seem to be a deterrent. So for overspending, I would allow a generous soft cap, as MLB has now. Then for every 20 million dollar
increment of spending above the cap, you start the season with a loss. So sure, Dodgers, blow out the soft cap if you don’t mind starting 0-4.
On the other end, allow a pretty generous floor for each team. Then for every 10 million dollar increment below, they lose a home game. It should be a pretty easy thing to teams at the bottom to give up home games since nobody’s going to home games of the Marlins, Pirates, or Rays anyway. So hey, the Dodgers might start the season with multiple losses, but they have the opportunity for free home wins versus the dregs.
A moratorium on new rules outside of player safety and rule integrity
Baseball has added a raft of rules in the last 10 years. I would put a stop to that. I would allow rules for player safety, so hello double first base. I would probably start experimenting in the minors with a hat that can protect pitchers from comebackers. If teams were stepping outside of the rules to create an unfair advantage, I would step in. I’m thinking about changes like adding PitchCom for example. But as for changing the game for stylistic purposes, that’s a hard no.
Stop with the broadcast carve-outs
Give customers a single price for all the games. If you’re going to carve out games for Apple or Amazon or NBC or whoever, issue credits to view the affected games or broadcast them through the outlet they paid for. Seriously, don’t make Grandpa have to figure out an Apple+ login to watch the game.
Pick one baseball specification and give them to every team
Stop screwing with the baseballs, Manfred.
