Brown's and Johnson's salaries for this year alone each outweighs the combined salaries of at least five teams' starting lineups. The bid for Brown this winter proved that in baseball the race is not to the swift, but to the rich. On Opening Day fewer than 10 teams will have any hope of making the World Series. The Clemens trade simply takes away the rest of the suspense in the race among those 10. In other words, March Madness is drama.
Baseball is a farce.
The ultimate insult is to the fans. When owners think we won't notice that small market teams are on a level playing field in the same way quadrapeligics are on a level playing field in a wheelbarrow race, any hope of connecting with the non-triple digit income fan is going, going, gone. Tropicana Field, home of baseball's Tampa Bay Devil Rays. After all, the only thing worth going to a baseball stadium for anymore is basketball.