Hal Steinbrenner is lying to you...

 ...and so are the owners of the Atlanta Braves, the Chicago Cubs, the Boston Red Sox, the Philadelphia Phillies, and maybe about half of all teams is the atrocious corporate entity known as MLB.  

How do I know? Check out this list of the most profitable sports franchises in the world for 2026:

Holy simolees, Batman! Not a single MLB club is on the list of the top 20, most profitable sports franchises (not sure how Mercedes F 1 is a franchise, but never mind) in the world, supposedly from Forbes.

It's a joke.  

(The most hilarious parts being that the Yanks are supposedly less profitable than the Rangers. Or the Jets, even with the NFL's version of corporate communism.)

For starters, the self-same Forbes has for years—even decades—named your New York Yankees one of the top 2 or 3 wealthiest sports franchises in the world, usually just behind the Dallas Cowboys.  From the most recent Forbes assessment I could find online, they value the Yanks at $8.2 BILLION.

Forbes further claims that this figure represents 11.3 times the annual revenue of NYY. Do the math—or, all right, let the all-knowing, all-seeing brain within your computer do the math—and that puts the annual revenue of the Yanks at $725,663,717—give or take a few pennies that Hal always snatches out of the till.

There are differing figures for the Yankees' payroll this year, but at max it is $332 million.  

Take away the payroll from the revenue, and we're talking about $393 million.  Even subtracting the $100 million in taxes that Hal complains so bitterly about—and another $100 million for everything else, those incompetent scouts, trainers, and front office—and we're STILL talking about an annual profit in the ballpark of $193 million, or enough to crack the Top Ten on Forbes' own list.

What's more—and I know this will come as a shock—there is every reason to believe that the Yanks are not being fully forthcoming about what they actually make.

For instance, while estimates of the average price of a Yankees' ticket vary greatly, some sources have it as high as $128. Multiply that times the 3,392,659 fans the Yanks drew in the regular season last year, and we're talking $482,495,616—or ALREADY the team's entire payroll this year and about $150 mill to boot.

But let's say it's even at the low-end estimate of $67 a ducat.  That's still $227,308,153—just $105 mill short of payroll. 

What's more—that $67-128 does NOT seem to include the 56-68 luxury boxes, where 12-100 customers pay $2,500-$20,000 each, or the 4,300 "premium club level seats that go for $200-$900 each.  

(And how IS it that every single financial figure regarding the Yankees is so madly vague and speculative.  Could it be...on purpose? And why has no local news source ever set out to pin down the real figures?)

All of which is before we figure in...concessions, parking, souvenirs (at and away from the ballpark), and...what's that other thing...don't tell me...

OH YEAH! Broadcast rights. TV (on the Yanks' own channel, and so many others), radio, phones, computers, etc.

In short, it's difficult to believe that the Yankees are raking in less than at least $500 million a year in profit, and quite possibly over a billion. Which would leave them topping this new Forbes list.

I don't mean to single out Hal, who lies as he breathes. I'm sure the rest of MLB is lying, too, probably on command of Maximum Leader Rob Manfred.  

Why would they do this? Um, maybe to help set the table for the upcoming basic agreement Armageddon?

I know, I know. It's a very small thing, with so many monstrous lies going around in the real world, and a possible, true Armageddon looming (You guys have been killing it on that, by the by, and I want to join in as soon as I have the time.).

But let's be clear. It's just not true that, say, the Atlanta Hawks are out-profiting every team in MLB. Or the Edmonton Oilers. Or the New York Jets.