A Short History of Chicanery

A-way back in 1915, when the Colonels—one honorary, one engineering—bought the New York Yankees from a gambler and the crookedest cop New York had ever seen, they had it in mind that they had been promised the chance to acquire superstars Tris Speaker and Joe Jackson by the American League president, Ban Johnson.

This was an outrageous presumption for a pair of new club owners.  But when the promised players were not forthcoming, the Colonels vowed to run Johnson out of the game.  This they proceeded to do, even though Johnson was a blubbery old man who had dreamed up the American League to begin with.  That wasn't very nice—but Ban Johnson would never interfere with their plans again.

Next, when the owner of the Boston Red Sox wanted to unload most of his championship team—including the star players they had snatched away from the Athletics in the first place—the Yankees bought up every one they could, and even let Harry Frazee sign over Fenway Park as collateral for a loan.

This plunged the Red Sox into the cellar for most of the next decade, and did absolutely nothing for competitive balances in the American League.  Somehow, the Colonels seemed to care about the suffering of fans in Boston, or Philadelphia, or St. Louis.

Some years later, when he got tired of the uneven returns on simply buying up minor-league talent, Yankee GM Ed Barrow followed Branch Rickey''s lead and started his own, massive farm system.

This infuriated Commissioner Kennesaw Mountain Landis, who saw that the minor leagues would be reduced to mere vassals by such arrangements.  He was right—but the Yankees didn't care.  The farm system gave them a great way to parlay their big-market revenue into a real advantage in the time before broadcasting, spending it on scouts, young talent, and minor-league franchises.

Later on, when the league was expanding and TV was destroying the minors, GM George Weiss, and owners Del Webb and Dan Topping, convinced a pal who didn't know much about baseball to buy up the Athletics, and turn them into a virtual farm team for the Yankees.

Was this completely unethical?  You bet it was!

When George Steinbrenner took over the team, of course, he plunged right in and signed the very first, major free agents, incensing his fellow owners—and bringing the Yankees their first championship in years.

For years afterwards, when all the rest of MLB was trying to collude and keep payroll costs down, George would repeatedly go off the reservation and spend like a drunken sailor.  This didn't always work out on the field.  But the team did get richer and richer, becoming the second wealthiest sports franchise in the world, according to some estimates.

Year after year, decade after decade, one ruthless, uncaring Yankees owner after another went on breaking the rules, cheating and finagling, and running down anyone who tried to get in their way.

That is to say, they played the game of capitalism the way it was supposed to be played, constantly enriching themselves by re-investing profits to make their product better than ever.

Now Hal Steinbrenner has decided to join the MLB herd, and return to the sort of gentlemanly, uncompetitive, "owners' socialism" that has done so much good for every other sport and every other business in this country.

Bully for him.  But he may find it's not so easy to sell mediocrity in this town.