I’m relieved the Blue Jays are going to the World Series. If my favorite team, the Dodgers, played the Mariners and beat them, it would be like throwing puppies and kittens into a wood chipper. That’s because the Dodgers are The Team that is Ruining Baseball. Thanks to their venture capital owners, they can afford to buy up all the best players, put them on deferred contracts, and crush the competition. They’ve won 12 out of the last 13 NL West championships, been to the World Series five times in the past 10 years, and won in 2020 and 2024 (and can win back-to-back titles this year).

Obviously, this type of dominance is bad for the sport. (Never mind all the titles the Yankees won from the 1920s to the 1950s when baseball’s popularity was at its peak.) That’s why owners, fans, and pundits are clamoring for a salary cap to prevent deep-pocketed big-market teams from outspending and crushing small-market ones.

Except, it won’t. The NFL is used as a model for salary caps, but it hasn’t had any more success at achieving parity among the teams. The league is divided between consistently successful teams (like the Chiefs, Eagles, and Bills) and consistently awful ones (like the Browns, Jets, and Jaguars).

What’s actually ruining baseball is the same thing that’s ruining lots of other things in this economy, including restaurants.

Recently, my wife and I went to a well-known chain seafood restaurant for her birthday. It was a place famous for its decor, atmosphere, and large gift shop. But when I got my food, it was terrible. The salmon was fatty and rubbery. The jasmine rice had no flavor. And the way it was plated, it looked like something I’d get at a hospital. I instantly lost my appetite. Not only did I send my dish back, I didn’t ask for anything else. I went away from that restaurant without eating.

This restaurant forgot the most important part of the business—making quality food. Since this company filed for bankruptcy a few years ago, they were probably focused on cutting costs on the ingredients and kitchen staff and hoped the decor and atmosphere would make up for it. This wasn’t the case for us. We’ll never go back there again.

It seems a lot of sport teams owners act the same way (especially our local team). They make enough money from TV deals, real estate, merchandise, and other investments that it doesn’t matter whether the team wins or loses. And if you still make money even if your team never breaks .500 or hasn’t been to the postseason since Obama was president, why spend money to win? And if you don’t? Just move to another city like the Athletics did so you can extract money from those fans.

However, cutting corners to maximize profits is like killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. You can make your P&L statement look better by laying off a bunch of employees, but the quality of your product and services suffers. Closing a bunch of stores can boost your stock price, but it makes it easier for your customers to go to your competitors. Short-sighted policies lead to long-term disasters.

When the Dodgers were bought by the Guggenheim Group after the disastrous ownership stint by the McCourts, they put in the investments to improve the team and the fan experience. They built their ball club and made improvements to Dodger Stadium. The success the team experiences today is the result of years of focusing on quality on and off the field. When you offer a great product, you build and expand customer loyalty, gain more media attention, attract investment and talent, and become much more profitable than if you tried to squeeze every last penny out of your customers and employees.

If the Dodgers stand out, it’s sadly because too many conglomerates and the billionaires who own them are focused on revenue extraction and speculation. They charge more and offer less. For them, employees and customers only exist to be exploited. They forget that they’re the ones who buy their products. Once they’ve rung them dry, their revenue will dry out too. (And they’ll take to the streets like 7 million Americans did on Saturday.)

Investing doesn’t guarantee winning. The Blue Jays could be taking home the championship for the first time in 32 years. But the Dodgers have achieved success over the long run and are primed for more success in the future. The Dodgers aren’t the villains here. A system that is willing to sacrifice quality, decent pay and conditions for employees, and customer satisfaction is what’s really ruining baseball and everything else. We should all be demanding better. 

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Dodgers versus Angels I’m not surrendering the Dodgers to MAGA When winning means more My team lost, but baseball won

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