How the Dodgers’ Big Spending Became an Argument Against an MLB Salary Cap

LAS VEGAS – Making the case that a salary cap would be unnecessary and even harmful to baseball, the sport’s most prominent agent pointed to a franchise that had traveled “from the outhouse of bankruptcy to the penthouse of world championships.”

The Dodgers are frequently held up as proof that baseball needs limits on player spending. Scott Boras argued the reverse.

In his view, the club stands as a testament to the value of baseball’s existing free-market system.

Then-owner Frank McCourt took the Dodgers into bankruptcy in 2011. A year later, Guggenheim Baseball Management purchased the team for a then-record $2.15 billion.

Powered by heavy spending, the Dodgers swiftly returned to the ranks of the sport’s marquee franchises.

Since the change in ownership, they have signed several of baseball’s biggest stars, among them Shohei Ohtani.

The team has reached the postseason in each of the past 14 seasons.

And it has captured the World Series three times over the last seven years.

“The revenues of this system and their ownership from bankruptcy to near a billion in revenues should be a model for what freedom allows — a process, capital, intellect, the hiring of executives, all of it coming together in something that has been dramatically beneficial to the league,” Boras said.

Boras addresses reporters at the General Managers’ Meetings largely to generate buzz around his free-agent clients, and he did some of that on Wednesday, representing the market’s top available player, Tarik Skubal.

But he devoted considerable time to the owners’ push for a salary cap. Fierce resistance from the players’ union is expected to trigger a lengthy work stoppage beginning Dec. 1, when the current collective-bargaining agreement lapses.

The Dodgers came up repeatedly in his remarks.

“Fans are telling you they love competitiveness, and they love owner genius,” Boras said. “When you’re in a market where your franchise is bankrupt, and you attract owners with the wherewithal to come in and fix things, to make the franchise competitive, to bring new ideas — this is why we want to keep our doors open, so the next idea, the next generation of owners, has the freedom to come here.”

In short, Boras argued the Dodgers could never have achieved what they have under a salary cap.

That, of course, is precisely the point cap proponents raise: the Dodgers’ market gives them an unfair edge, since they can generate far more revenue than most other clubs.

Which is why Boras also brought up the San Diego Padres, bought by a group that included the late Peter Seidler for $800 million in 2012.

“We’ve seen what Peter Seidler did in San Diego, a market that everyone universally regards as a small market,” Boras said.

Seidler poured money into the roster. The Padres have made the playoffs in five of the past seven seasons, and the market has rewarded them. After drawing 2.2 million fans in 2021, San Diego has topped three million in each of the last four years.

The Padres were sold this year for a record $3.9 billion.

Boras suggested that a system without a salary cap fosters a wider range of team-building philosophies across the sport.

“These are the things fans enjoy, that everyone enjoys — the mystery of the game is so complete, with such a diverse approach to championship play,” he said.

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