Quote:
Originally Posted by Goody
Ok check this out. The Texas Rangers finished the year at 87-75.
They had a payroll of $68,178,798.
One hundred and thirty three million less than the Yankees payroll.
That's 133 million. No decimals in there.
|
The difference between the Rangers' and Yankees' payroll is not quite a fair comparison, since the Rangers are not directly competing against the Yankees for a division title. The Rangers are competing against the Angels, Athletics, and Mariners. So it is more appropriate to compare the Rangers' 2009 opening day payroll to those of its divisional rivals.
Angels: $113.7 million
Mariners: $98.9 million
Rangers: $68.6 million
Athletics: $62.3 million
The top team in the division has a payroll 1.82 times larger than that of the lowest payroll in the division. Numerically, it's a $51.4 million difference, equivalent to 15.8 players at the average opening day MLB player salary of $3.24 million.
In the AL in 1956, the highest team payroll was $492,000 for the Yankees; the lowest team payroll was $215,250 for the Senators. Between the teams competing for the AL title (remember, there were no divisons back then), the highest payroll was 2.286 times larger than the smallest payroll. Numerically, the difference was $276,750. That's the equivalent to 18.8 players at the then MLB average player salary of $14,708.
So, the situation in the AL West in 2009 was really not all that different from the situation in the AL as a whole in 1956.