For World Series teams, how much do payrolls matter?
The World Series began Tuesday night, and the story going in is the revival of the Kansas City Royals. A franchise that聽had not been to baseball鈥檚 postseason for 29 years swept through the first two rounds, and are just four wins away from ending a long drought. Meanwhile, their opponents, the San Francisco Giants, are going for their third championship in six years.
The Royals are here聽for several reasons: They developed young talent through their minor league system, made a few shrewd personnel moves and have a bullpen that can effectively end games after six innings. They also started spending more.
For most of the 1990s and 2000s the Royals were one of the most miserly franchises in major league baseball, ranking near or at the bottom of the league in total payroll. They were also one of the worst. But聽the past few seasons have seen owner David Glass聽be more generous with his cash, and that has coincided with more success on the field.
The Giants, on the other hand, are a big-market team with a big-market payroll. This season, the Giants鈥� number is $145.1 million, sixth highest in baseball, and some 63% more than the Royals鈥� $89.3 million. So, Giants in five, right? Not necessarily. Since 2000, five of the 13 World Series winners had the lower payroll among the two teams.
So while it certainly helps to have money, it鈥檚 not the only thing. Three of the five teams that spent the most in 2014 didn鈥檛 even make the playoffs this year. And the 10 teams that did (highlighted in blue ) were聽somewhat聽evenly distributed across the payroll rankings.
Of course, baseball is contested not on the balance sheet but rather on the field.聽
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