The Stealth Story in Sports 2004

January is named for Janus, the mythological Roman god of doors. Janus was a god with two faces; one face for each side of a door. The Romans selected this particular god to be representative of the first month of the year because for them, January represented not only a new beginning to look forward to, but also a time to look back and reflect. In honor of the myth of Janus, this first column is dedicated to a look back at the most significant event in sports during 2004.

The most significant event in the world of sports is so far off everyone’s RADAR that once you read what it is your reaction will probably be something along the lines of “Oh yeah. I’d completely forgotten about that.” The National Hockey League player lockout that has resulted in the cancellation of half of the 2004-2005 schedule may well overshadow the Red Sox’ World Series victory as the most significant story of the year.

One may ask how a story that gets next to no coverage in the major American media can be considered important, let alone the most significant of the year. Within that very proposition lies the answer. Each side of the dispute stands to lose millions of dollars as each day passes without the skates being laced up and the arenas being filled yet there has been a grand total of one negotiating session since the lockout began. Hockey has tried desperately to narrow the gap between it and the three other major sports in the United States, but if an agreement is not reached within the next two weeks it will become the first of the four to cancel an entire season. What should be most alarming to both sides, and die-hard NHL fans, is the complete lack of coverage. If there were a similar situation in Major League Baseball, the National Football League, or even the National Basketball Association, the hue and cry from fans and the media would be immeasurable by comparison. President Clinton was asked to intervene during the 1994 baseball strike while the current impasse in the NHL is buried on the back pages of America’s sports sections if it is covered at all.

Any agreement will alter the face of the NHL. Overall player salaries are guaranteed to decrease. Cancellation of the season could lead to the folding of some of the less financially sound franchises as there have been reports that some owners are actually making more money (which could also simply mean losing less) by not putting teams on the ice. More importantly, any chance of the NHL narrowing the popularity gap between it and the other three major leagues in the near term has been dashed. Fans will be slow to return to NHL arenas if they return at all. Many a baseball stadium sat half empty from 1995 until the McGuire/Sosa home run derby of 1998. If the American sports fan is willing to turn its back on the American pastime in the aftermath of a labor dispute, hockey will suffer the same fate with much more dire consequences. Hear that echo? That is the sound of a pin dropping in Philips Arena during a 2005-2006 game between the Atlanta Thrashers and the Carolina Hurricanes.

Given the lack of coverage and the questionable popularity of the sport, one might expect the overall impact on the sporting world to also be negligible. Alternatives are easy to find during the first half of the NHL season with college and pro football in full swing and pro and college hoops just starting up. The impact will be in the abject lesson the situation could serve as for the other major sports…particularly Major League Baseball. Baseball and hockey share many similarities in their structure and cultural positions. Each is traditionally regarded as a national sport although the football has surpassed baseball in the United States and lacrosse is Canada’s official national sport. The professional rosters of each sport are predominately populated with comparatively young athletes, many in their teens, who came up through the minor leagues rather than the college system. Most importantly, neither has a true salary cap.

NHL owners held a hard line on their demand for a salary cap turning down the Players Association offer of a 24% reduction in salaries. The players’ offer sounds pretty generous until one considers that nearly 80% of league revenues are dedicated to player salaries. Should the current impasse result in either the implementation of some sort of salary cap, or the implosion of the league, the end result will be that Major League Baseball will be the only major professional league without a salary cap of some kind. The effect on baseball’s competitive balance cannot be denied. Even with the implementation of the so-called luxury tax, the World Series Champion Boston Red Sox boasted the league’s second highest payroll. Currently, Boston, the Yankees and the Anaheim Angels have surpassed the luxury tax threshold. It is not a coincidence that these three teams have combined to win six of the past ten World Series. Parity in the NFL is one of the major factors that have helped football surpass baseball as the favorite among sports fans in the United States. Baseball can survive more fiscal insanity than hockey, but probably not for much longer. We have already witnessed the threatened contraction of two franchises and the first relocation of a franchise in over thirty years. Only a salary cap will narrow financial and competitive disparity we now see. As the goodwill generated in 1998 dissipates, baseball needs to take notice of what is happening in the NHL in order to restore competitive balance and return it to the level of popularity it once enjoyed. The NHL lockout highlights this need and demonstrates the consequences if baseball does not take heed. What could be more significant than the fate of professional sports as we know them?