I don't disagree, which is why I said in my prior post that owners who don't adequately re-seed revenue in their teams should be beaten with sticks. And that includes Tom Fucking Ricketts of my Cubs. I think there need to be mechanisms with teeth in place at both ends of the spectrum.
I read all the glowing comments about Arby's from you guys living in Texas and shake my head when I contrast them with my experiences with SoCal Arby's locations. I know Arby's has different franchisees all over the nation, so I'm wondering if that might explain the disparity at least in part. Either that, or you guys have no fucking standards.
Understood. And as I stated earlier, whether to even have a luxury tax (or a salary cap, which MLB does not have) is a separate issue. There are many who share your opinion, and I agree that there are some legitimate arguments on that point. I also think that owners who simply take revenue sharing checks without making real efforts to improve their teams and put truly competitive product out on the field should be beaten with sticks and driven out of baseball, but I don't quite know how to accomplish the latter except through widespread fan apathy. With that said, I also think small market team owners and their clubs start out at a competitive disadvantage in general. And with regard to driving wages down, I don't really perceive that the players are hurting too much under the current arrangement. Especially those playing for the Dodgers.
Don't necessarily need a cap per se. Just need enough teeth in the enforcement mechanisms in the current arrangement that teams will be dissuaded from abusing the arrangement. Either that, or get rid of the CBT entirely. But if they do that, I fear what MLB will become.
I agree with the quoted part of your post, but I'm addressing what I think is a separate point. I assume every fan wants their team's owner(s) to spend $$ and put resources back into the club. That would be the situation in a perfect MLB. But a huge part of the reason for the CBT is to encourage competition and prevent wealthy owners/clubs from effectively disenfranchising smaller market or less wealthy clubs/owners. And make no mistake, big market clubs do have some inherent advantages. However, if that rule/tax isn't sufficiently onerous to achieve its purpose, then (to paraphrase Anton Chigurh) of what use is the rule? Whether to even have the luxury tax is a separate issue. But if you're gonna have it, it's got to have enough teeth to even have a chance to achieve its purpose. And it clearly doesn't. The Dodgers (and probably several other clubs like the Mets and Yankees) clearly believe that paying the tax is simply a cost of doing business. Hell, the Dodgers are looking at paying $169+M in tax (and even more in the future), and they're not even blinking.
MLB apparently needs to make the CBT a lot more stringent than it already is, because the Dodgers don't give a damn about paying it as things now stand.
Likewise, I'm not saying Kawhi wouldn't give Jordan legit competition. Leonard is a great player, future HOFer, and an incredibly multi-faceted and versatile defender. I was primarily taking exception to the notion that he'd be able to "bully" Jordan.
Nobody could "bully" prime Jordan. He's the greatest player of all time and the most cold-blooded. The only way prime Jordan is losing a 1x1 game is if he's got a height disadvantage of 5-6" or more, and even then I bet he'd likely win. Kawhi and Jordan are about the same height. Jordan dunked on that his entire career.
The former. At least I don't remember getting the runs from it . . . which might be the best thing I can say about the last couple times I tried Arby's. "Arby's: At least we don't give you diarrhea!" The campaign slogan that will replace "We have the meats!"