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On the 595th Sporticast episode, hosts Scott Soshnick and Eben Novy-Williams discuss some of the biggest sports business stories of the week, including the latest in the baseball playoffs, where the Milwaukee Brewers have an early NLCS lead over the Los Angeles Dodgers. They also consider a ticketing thought experience.
The hosts discuss Brewers ace Jacob Misiorowski, who is a poster child for the type of young star that the Major League Baseball Players Association might point to as being short-changed by the sport’s current pay structure. Misiorowski throws harder than anyone in the sport’s modern history and may win the NL Cy Young Award, but he’s only in his second MLB season, which means he’s one year away from being arbitration eligible and four years from free agency. Given the taxing nature of hard-throwing pitching, he’s potentially at risk of being underpaid through the most effective and healthiest years of his career.
The hosts talk about how some teams are choosing to lock up young talent earlier than ever, including some instances of contracts signed before the player even reaches the major leagues. That’s yet to happen for Misiorowski. Is that because of the Brewers’ approach? The injury risk? Or does the looming labor battle play some role?
Next the hosts talk about baseball attendance. In the ALCS, the Tampa Bay Rays had thousands of empty seats during Game 2 of their showdown with the Cleveland Guardians. The hosts debate whether every team in baseball would play at capacity if they gave tickets away for free.
They close by talking about the WNBA Finals, which will be played between the Atlanta Dream and Golden State Valkyries. The league just solved a logistical problem when it was able to relocate some Dream home games from the team’s roughly 3,500-seat traditional home venue to State Farm Arena, home of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks.
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