Hugh2

Lets think of it this way. You're the owner of a sports franchise, it's either a baseball, hockey, football, or basketball team. ALL THINGS ARE EQUAL HERE, the money, your revenue, your love for all four sports etc etc etc. The only difference is you have to pick being an owner of one, and whichever one you chose you're getting 5 #1 picks overall in a row. Which sport are you choosing? No one is picking baseball. I'm not a big enough hockey fan to put baseball last on that list, but I certainly wouldn't put baseball ahead of the NBA or the NFL.

I think in baseball that's more done to see what you have in guys and give them time to adjust to big-league pitching when the games don't count. In other sports, I think it's much more intentional.

So is Ryan Weber just not that good? or did they play him on purpose so they'd lose? or was he instructed to pitch badly on purpose??? What other options did the Sox have in their rotation? it's not like they were sitting their ACE. Not pumping resources into a s*** team is different than sitting all your starter. Unless of course, all the Sale injuries were fake. Maybe the Sox didn't want to play Sale because they wanted better draft picks all this time.

How much does that really happen? maybe you move up a few spots yada yada yada. But it's not like trying to throw a whole season, baseball is also very different. You don't have a fringe top prospect in the NFL AAA team down in Worcester that may or may not be able to be a starter next year. You need to figure those things out and being able to do so is very important. Playing a guy like Abreu, or Rafaela a few times a week is very very very different than "we want to lose, how do we play the game today so we definitely lose" I don't think the former happens in baseball. Lets say the Sox brought up Drohan, and Gonzelez, and played Rafaela and Abreu and they went on a TEAR in september and missed the playoffs by one game. NO ONE is sitting around thinking "omg no, we didn't get a top ten pick" rather you're excited for next year. Now, lets take another sport, like the NBA. You have no shot at the championship but you play your heart out to a .500 record. How content are you? how great do you feel about the future? Player development is so much different in baseball, you don't HAVE to have top ten picks every year to have a top farm system or even get a MVP caliber player. I just do not believe that any team, with malice and intent purposely try to lose a large sum of games during the year.

There's a very stark difference to tanking in the NBA "we are pulling players and not doing any matchups" vs. MLB. were you just don't put the resources into a team that isn't ready to compete. Like, there would be a difference between NOT playing Ohtani, and then consciously making the decision to not go out and sign him. The later is happens, and seems to be how "tanking" is done in the MLB but that's very different than what tanking in other sports is.

I'm curious, no arguing, if there's a zillion stories and its' that well known I figured it would be easy to say they purposely sat good players and started AAA guys, or they instructed players to tip pitches etc etc. I don't know how the functionally tanked.

No he shouldn't. But lets say he wakes up with a little stiff neck, and maybe you play him when you're in a playoff hunt, but no need to play him with a heightened chance of injury so I think you're more cautious with your long term access. I mean, did the Sox do a lot of that down the stretch? they mostly played their starters. I think this happens more in other sports like the NBA, I can certainly relate to spending money on a game and maybe you can only afford to do that once a year, and you're watching the JV team play. I don't think management goals are always going to be in align with what fans want, but I personally believe that it doesn't ever really make sense to tank in baseball. Nobody wants to lose, and the incentive to getting a #1 overall pick isn't the same in baseball as it would be in.....lets say the NFL.

How did they tank?

I don't fully disagree, I just don't think you need to push those guys either. For example, I don't think you're sitting a guy like Bello for the whole month, but do you skip a start, or give him an extra day of rest down the stretch when you're out of it? absolutely.

We could all argue this all day, and there are a million reasons we could all say we are right or wrong. But if we have to use an incident from 1991, 32 years ago, about 1 individual 22-year-old.....it kind of doesn't make the argument that tanking is a thing. If anything, it helps make the argument that it is not and that is an exception, it's also a young individual and not a team.

I think this is the only way you can intentionally tank. Unless of course players are purposefully trying to strike out or give up home runs. I doubt there are any players willing to do that on purpose. With fielding an inferior team, if it’s September first and you’re securely in last place, why pile up innings on arms, or play guys every day who are near a full season and can use rest? I think it makes sense to play younger guys more, not to lose but to see what you have in them. If you end up winning games with those players don’t you get excited for the future? Would t you be happy about that? You’d think in an “intentional tank” you wouldn’t be happy winning games there but I doubt that. Let’s say the Sox switched up months but ended with the same record, but played .600 ball in September with more of the youth playing. Does anyone really think John Henry is sitting around saying “damnit, why are these young guys who we have under team control for 6 years and could possible help win future championships playing so well!!!!!” I don’t think teams intentionally tank. It just makes so very little sense for baseball

Guys guys guys gusy, arguments like this about nothing, where we complain and argue about everything down to heated semantics battles are not ALLOWED until after the world series. You can't wait 10 more days????

The problem with the narrative that teams "suck" on purpose with the intent on losing more games to get a better draft pick is that in baseball you are far more likely to find your George Springers, Mookie Betts, and Aaron Judges later in the 1st round or after in baseball than you will in other sports. If you suck to get a good farm system, well....there are teams that don't suck and still are able to build elite farms.

I don't think it's that "tanking doesn't work" as much as it's the incentive to tanking in the MLB is not what it is in the NBA or NFL, generally speaking it just doesn't happen in baseball. I don't think.

OR maybe it makes more sense that teams should receive none, or a reduced portion of revenue sharing if they dip below a certain threshold.

To add to my comment above, a concept I've seen brought up time and time again is a salary floor. It can be reasonable, I think something around 100 million is fair. That's going to force the bottom 1/3 to 1/4 of teams to make decisions a little differently, I'm not so sure a financial penalty makes sense. I think it draft pick penalty makes more, yet taking away a top pick for a s***** club seems unfair. I think they can find a happy medium e.g. if you dip below you lose 25% of your bonus pool OR you become ineligible for any competitive balance picks. So, you're the A's and you have the #1 pick, you don't lose that pick.....but you shouldn't be getting extra picks in between the top rounds just because you don't make any money. I'm for the reverse ranking system of drafting across all sports. Parity helps build the brand, but giving compensatory picks for being a horrible franchise feels like moving the needle past even and too far in the other direction for me. A fair way to not completely get rid of that system is to remove those extra picks for teams that can't spend at least 80-100 million a year.

I don't disagree, but I will say how much is by design and how much is by function. Take the Red Sox for example, do they really need to go out and spend around $15-$20 million to bring a RH bat in for two years to platoon or plug up 2B/CF/RF (rotate those positions as you wish)???? no they don't it would be the easiest thing in the world to just roll with Yoshida/Duran/Verdugo if you have zero expectations of competing. Are you trying to tank? or do you just not want to spend $20 dollars if you know you're probably not going to win? Big market teams will always make that move and hope to get lucky even during bridge years, sometimes even in suboptimal conditions you see just that, E.G. the 2021 season. But small market teams who do not pull in the same amount of revenue do not have that luxury. Not every team is just trying to not spend money, but then again.......some are.

The MLB draft, despite not being anywhere nearly as marketable as the NBA or NFL draft is so much more complicated and comprehensive than any of the major sports. Some will say that you draft for BPA over need in baseball more than any other sport, yet teams will cut deals with guys at the top all the time so they can spread the money around. Literally, this is how we ended up with Marcelo Mayer. The Pirates literally drafted Henry Davis at #1, Davis was in everyone's top 5 but almost no one had him going #1 until it was rumored the Pirates were looking to cut a deal at the top. Then teams below often stay with their predetermined Picks, Texas likes pitching and stuck with what was largely considered the best pitcher in the draft in Jack Leiter, and the Tigers effectively already had a deal in place with Jackson Jobe, then Marcelo was right there for us. It's not very uncommon for the player who is highly regarded as the #1 player in a draft to go somewhere else in the top 3 or 4. Sometimes you end up making that decision and the guy you spent less money on ends up being the better pick as well. In the 2012 draft, Bryon Buxton was unanimously considered the top talent in the draft. That didn't stop the Astros from taking Carlos Correa and saving 1.2 million dollars.

"There's NO TANKING IN BASEBALL" - Tom Hanks

Not sure baseball could support 30 teams with that philosophy, heck I don't know if they could support 15.

Nobody is really tanking in baseball. The draft is more of a crapshoot than the NFL or NBA. MLB needs more than just 4-5 teams to stay solvent. Heck, if anything the good teams need someone to play.

I think they should keep the cap system but allow trading picks, this allows teams to increase their pool if they wish. Maybe you disallow top 5 or top 10 picks from being traded. They allow bonus slot money to be traded in the IFA system. It's not a stretch.

It prevents guys from moving themselves down in the draft so a richer club can sign them for more money. It doesn't work 100%, but the system the have now make it much more fair than it was.

That’s the type of s*** they should bring back if they want wheeling and dealing and exciting trade deadlines and winter meetings with more free agents. But. Big market teams exposed that system.

The 2011 draft was also the last draft where there weren’t any penalties for going over your bonus pools. I’m not even sure there pools then? But I do remember that in 2012 and from then on if you spend like that you start losing 1st round picks. I also remember the day when you could trade for a rental, let them walk and receive TWO supplemental first round picks.