RIP Marvin Miller

[JSngry]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/sns-rt-bbo-newssxaec01a2-20121127,0,6243142.story

Maybe today's baseball players are overpaid. Maybe they're not. (seems to me like the market is bearing the current cost well enough)

But remember - there was a time when they had no way to affect the process one way or the other. Marvin Miller was a key agent of that change.

I was a fan. RIP, and let us not forget what we give up when we give up our insistence on having a say that matters on the things that matter.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

One part of me says that what Marvin Miller did was great for professional sports (athletes) and yet another part of me, the part that has seen so much labor strife in every major sport since Miller's breakthroughs, wishes he never did what he did.

Every time there's a strike by these multi-millionaries today, I find less & less sympathy for them. The door has swung too far the other way, as is often the case in businesses that get unionized.

[Dan Gould]

I agree with both Kevin and Jim. What Miller did to restore a basic aspect of freedom to athletes was incredibly important.

But in addition to the things Kevin mentions, he's a man who ripped his successors in the player's union for every inch they've ever given up on steroid and HGH testing. That's a bridge too far as far as I am concerned.

There's labor militancy, and then there's Marvin Miller.

[JSngry]

Better to be able to ride a pendulum than to have to fear getting struck by a hammer, I say. The pendulum has no choice but to swing back and forth. The hammer goes but one way and has but one function.

Here's a good article: http://latino.foxnew...ller-dead-at-5/

As far as having sympathy for striking millionaire athletes, I think it's progress when you don't need to have sympathy for them. You have sympathy for people who can't handle their own business. I'd say the athletes (and the owners) are handling theirs quite well at this point, and that is progress (and the cost of it). I have no real "sympathy" for either side at this point. I just like to watch the games, period.

But - If there was a market for my services to the point where I could get a bajillion dollars for doing what I do, would I pause and think to myself, "I'm not worth this. No man is." Perhaps I would. But then I would also look at the man who is offering it to me and think, "if that's the case, then why does HE have it to offer it to me?"

And then I sign. And maybe try to get a little bit more, just because no man is worth that much, but some men have that much.

Edited November 27, 2012 by JSngry

[JSngry]

Per the steroid/HGH issue, yes, there must be change there, more transparency on the player's side. It's part of accepting the responsibility that comes with the freedom.

Let the pendulum swing that way now.

[Mark Stryker]

http://keitholbermann.mlblogs.com/2012/11/27/marvin-miller-rip/

[JSngry]

http://keitholberman...vin-miller-rip/

Excellent.

[GA Russell]

Here's his LA Times obit.

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-marvin-miller-20121128,0,7875985,full.story

I don't like what pro sports has become, primarily because most people can no longer afford the tickets. But post-free agency, there is no doubt that the teams as well as the players are making a lot more money.

[T.D.]

RIP.

I always had the highest respect for Miller, and the fact that I pay less attention to pro sports than I ever did has nothing to do with him (it's probably changing tastes accompanying aging...).

[JSngry]

I don't like what pro sports has become, primarily because most people can no longer afford the tickets.

That's true, and yes, it's a drag, but you and I are both old enough to remember the time when there was a Game Of The Week on TV (TV meaning three or four channels, right?), and unless you lived in a few select cities, a game on TV besides that one was a pretty big deal. You were an Astros' fan as a kid, right? Remember what a stone-cold thrill it was to get one of those rare Sunday afternoon games on TV ca. 1966? There were only, like, what, 5-6 a season, if that?

Today, you can pretty much watch your team play every game (if you live in the region), and if you can afford to pay not a whole lot of money, you can have access to every game of every team, every night, TV and/or radio!

I do think that baseball remains this most affordable of the major sports, just because a team has 81 games to make their gate money. Most people can't afford to go regularly, but if you want to take your "typical family of four" to one or two games a year and don't demand primo seats, it's do-able enough. I occasionally think about a Mavericks game, and even nosebleed seats are in the OUCH range. Cowboys games, don't even think about it (and not just because of price). But me and the wife can go to a regular Rangers game with good seats for right around $100-150 combined, less than that if we don't mind sitting up a little and not so much behind home plate. We could go to more games if the tickets were less, but we could do the same if gas was less, bills were less, if everything was less. But if everything was less, our incomes probably would be too, so...

That ability to bleacher-bum it to every (or almost every) game is (probably) gone in most parks, but so are the rock-and-roll package tours that used to give you the ability to see 9-10 bands with hits for, what, a buck-fitty? I guess the lesson is to get it while the gettin's good, because it won't be, always, and when (not if) things change, to look for the bright side as well as the dark.