Money Can't Buy You Happiness...Or a Championship

Perhaps the Beatles song lyric should have been "I don't care too much for money, money can't buy A WIN"

As another baseball season comes and goes, the New York Yankees will be shut-out again.

This isn't new information, it was known several weeks back that the Yanks would be missing the playoffs, but with the MLBs largest payroll, it seems that no matter how much they spend, they're not winning anything.

And it's not just baseball, it's almost every major sporting league across the board and even into Europe. I'm not sure who came up with the philosophy of buying a team, but it has proved time and again, that it is not the best way to win a championship. The MLB just happens to be one of the best places to look, because unlike other North American sports industries, baseball has yet to institute any kind of salary cap.

If we take a closer look at leagues and the teams spending the most money, we will find a striking trend that almost all teams that spend the most, are falling into mediocrity, or worse.

Even in leagues with salary caps, there are teams who manage to work the cap to it's maximum potential, and still manage to finish the season before it's really over.

Major League Baseball

As I mentioned, this is the league that best shows the failure of the bloated salary. No salary cap means that the teams are free to spend whatever they have. Sure, a lot of this depends on revenues created by the team through ticket sales, jersey and merchandise sales, etc. However, when you have a difference in total dollars spent of 190 million dollars between the 1st and 30th teams in respect to payroll, it creates for an uneven market. But it does show us that purely buying a bunch of talented veterans doesn't make a consistent winner.

This year's World Series has proved that with a solid core of players and a good minor league recruiting system, money is almost meaningless. The Philadelphia Phillies spend the 12th most on player salaries in the MLB, putting them in the middle of the pack. Remarkably, their opponent this year, the Tampa Bay Rays, are 29th in payroll spending. Putting them 2nd last in that market and an astonishing $160 million behind the Yankees in spending.

Here are some numbers on the Yankees spending:

Total Payroll $209,081,577

Last World Series Championship 2000

Last Playoff Appearance 2004 (Lost in ALCS)

With another year down without victory for the Yanks, fans are growing tired of watching a bunch of overpaid players under preform.

National Hockey League

The NHL has recently instituted a salary cap to prevent teams with larger markets from being able to outbid many of the small market teams. However, it is still discretionary as to how much each team wishes to spend. The cap has worked as it was supposed to, as in recent post-lockout seasons we have seen the Oilers, Ducks and Penguins make it to the championship, all small-market teams pre-lockout.

If we look at the biggest spending team from last season we will learn this; they finished dead last in the Eastern Conference. The Tampa Bay Lightning spent the most on superstars like Vincent LeCavalier, Martin St. Louis and still managed to finish with 71 points and a .378 win percentage.

In pre-lockout seasons we saw the New York Rangers attempt to buy a championship and even last season the Rangers ranked 2nd in the NHL is payroll spending. Remember the failed Eric Lindros years?

Given the Rangers did have a much better season last year than the Tampa Bay Lightning, but they still have not won a Stanley Cup since 1994, and have consistently been near the top of the list in NHL spending.

Here's the numbers that get you a last place finish in the NHL:

Total Payroll $58,248,000

Last Championship 2004

Last Playoff Appearance 2006 (Lost in Eastern Quarterfinals)

National Basketball Association

The NBA has long been a place for overpaid players to lead teams to mediocrity. Although, there

has been some success lately in buying players to build a franchise. Last year's champion, the Boston Celtics spent big money on bringing Ray Allen (aka Jesus Shuttlesworth) and Kevin Garnett to Boston to bolster the squad. However, even in making such big moves the Celtics still did not top the NBA in payroll spending last year. No, that dubious title went to the 23-59 New York Knicks who missed the playoffs again.

The Knicks have been the laughing stock of the NBA and most of the sporting world for

the past few years. It has been years since the Knicks have had any success and they would have had even less post season appearances had the NBA East not been so amazingly weak. And if they continue to sink big salary dollars into useless players like Stephon Marbury, expect the trend to continue.

The Knickerbockers are in store for another poor season full of giant salaries as little has been done to improve on last season....other than yet another top 10 draft pick used for Italian Danilo Gallinari.

The Knicks figures are as follows;

Total Payroll $97,763,245

Last Championship 1972-73

Last Playoff Appearance 2004 (Lost in 1st Round)

National Football League

The NFL has a strict hard cap on team salaries, so it has been hard for teams to buy players and create championship teams. Also, the NFL seems to be a place for the underdog as many of the top overall picks have busted (see Ryan Leaf) and some of the less sought after players and late round draft picks have come up as real gems (see Tom Brady).

Last years big spenders in the NFL, and will someone please tell me how, the 8-8 Minnesota Vikings. Bernard Berrian and a host of O-Lineman seem to be leading the Vikes spending spree, but I'm just not sure how they managed such a feat. If your QB is *gag* Tarvais Jackson and your star Running Back is a rookie, then you really should not be spending large sums of money. Just think about what Minnesota in a couple of years when Adrian Peterson's rookie contract runs out and he finds out how ridiculously good he is and how much his team sucks. Then how are you going to pay him??

The Vikes don't have a hope in hell in making the Superbowl this season, so they did cut a few costs, and as of the 2008 season it was the Washington Redskins who were the new big spenders in town.

The Vikings details:

Total Payroll $121,216,248

Last Championship (Never Won) Lost in 1977 Superbowl

Last Playoff Appearance 2004 (Lost in NFC Divisional Playoffs)

English Premier League

This one was the real propeller in this research piece. The EPL is one of my favourite competitions and is ripe with big dollars for almost no reason sometimes. The "Big 4" as they are known consist of Manchester Utd., Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool. These clubs have the money to buy big name players in the July and January transfer periods. During this time much is spent to shore up new talent, or seasoned veterans, expected to help push the team to victory. In the EPL, this does work...sometimes. Chelsea have been the big spenders as of late and have won the EPL, but not in 3 years now. That title, as well as the Champions League title belongs to Man Utd. who are 3rd in EPL spending (behind Chelsea & Arsenal).

Big dollars have been spent with little result from many of the teams, including Tottenham Hotspur. The Spurs are the leagues worst team, the proverbial ugly duckling of the EPL. Roughly $190 million USD was spent by the Spurs in an attempt to improve on an 11th place finish in the tables last season. That is good enough for 6th position on the payroll list behind the Big 4 and Manchester City who have gone on a spending spree, including the $56million USD purchase of Robinho, since being purchased by the Abu Dhabi United Group this summer.

There has been little to

celebrate for Ramos & the Spurs


However, with all of Hotspurs hasty spending, they remain the only team in the EPL this season without a win (0-2-6) through 8 games. The sit in last position and are in serious jeopardy of relegation.

I'm not sure what it is that convinces an owner that if he buys a group of individuals they will mysteriously form a team. It is also curious that in the N.A. market, in three of the leagues the highest spending teams were from New York. I know in NY they say they like everything bigger, and I guess that includes salaries, but not potential.

Now I could say something amazingly stereotypical like, "There's No I in Team", but I won't, instead I will just say that money doesn't seem to be the way to go. There are teams out there proving this everyday. So the next time Mr. Steinbrenner sits down for a calzone, he may want to rethink his strategy, and work on creating a team, not a new set of multi-millionaires.