Andrew Zimbalist

Fenway Park
The activity of rooting for baseball and other sports teams is one of the strongest expressions of community remaining in our society.

Andrew S. Zimbalist (born October 16, 1947) is an American economist. He is currently the Robert A. Woods Professor of Economics at Smith College. Zimbalist received his B.A. from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, in 1969 and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1972 and 1974 respectively. He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Sports Economics.

Quotes

Baseball And Billions - Updated edition - (1992)

• It is true that I described antisocial, parsimonious, sanctimonious, and wasteful behavior by the owners over the years, but baseball's problem is structural, not individual. Put any individual into a position of power with an opportunity to make tens of millions of dollars in an industry that is on a cultural pedestal and protected from all forms of competition, and the odds are against the second coming of Lee Iacocca or Ralph Nader.
  • Preface to The Updated Edition, p. xiii-xiv

Babe Ruth
While Babe Ruth's $80,000 in 1930 was eighty times the average U.S. income, Don Mattingly's $3.4 million in 1991 was 160 times the average.

• Baseballs exemption from antitrust statutes, based on the notion that it was not involved in interstate commerce, erroneous back in 1922 and more so in the 1950s, became even more anomalous in 1957, when the Supreme Court declared football to be subject to the antitrust statutes and stated that baseball's exemption was "unreasonable, illogical and inconsistent."
  • Chapter 1, Monte Ward To Marvin Miller, p. 15.

• With today's high salaries, long term contracts, and corporate penetration of the ownership ranks, it is commonplace to hear commentators rue baseball's growing commercialization, claiming it is undermining the aesthetics and competitive spirit of the game. In fact baseball's growing commercialism has been a constant since the 1860s.
  • Chapter 2, Baseballs Barons, p. 30.

• Perhaps if movie theaters also played the national anthem before their main attractions, the Internal Revenue Service would allow Hollywood studios to depreciate their actors.
  • Chapter 2, Baseballs Barons, p. 35.

• Baseball's owners must be the only U.S. citizens whose parents never told them the story of the boy who cried wolf. Their perennial cry of evaporating profits and imminent catastrophe in the presence of of rapidly growing revenues and escalating franchise values is hard to take seriously.
  • Chapter 3, Franchise Finances, p. 47.

• Between 1903 and 1991 the value of the Yankees appreciated at a compound annual rate of 11.4 percent.
  • Chapter 3, Franchise Finances, p. 68.

• Nobody ever said that capitalism guarantees profit.
  • Chapter 3, Franchise Finances, p. 69.

• It is well to recall that in 112 years of major league baseball, there has been only one bankruptcy filing.
  • Chapter 3, Franchise Finances, p. 72.

• While Babe Ruth's $80,000 in 1930 was eighty times the average U.S. income, Don Mattingly's $3.4 million in 1991 was 160 times the average.
  • Chapter 4, Player Performance And Salaries, p. 77.

• How is it that the average CEO in Japan receives an annual income of $300,000 while the average CEO in the United States earns $2.8 million?
  • Chapter 4, Player Performance And Salaries, p. 78.

• Consider for instance, the facts that Jose Canseco was picked in the fifteenth round of the amateur draft, Roger Clemens the twelfth, Ryne Sandberg the twentieth, and Nolan Ryan the tenth.
  • Chapter 5, The Minors, p. 111.

• Before becoming governor, Nelson Rockefeller offered to buy the Dodgers to keep them in New York.
  • Chapter 6, The Metropoli, p. 126.

• Baseball performance is an outcome of opposing forces.
  • Chapter 6, The Metropoli, p. 142

Between 1903 and 1991 the value of the Yankees appreciated at a compound annual rate of 11.4 percent.

• The first baseball game ever televised was a battle for fourth place in the Ivy League between Columbia and Princeton on May 17, 1939.
  • Chapter 7, The Media, p. 149.

• Baseball's popularity and, more so, it's revenues continue to increase.
  • Chapter 8, The Future, p. 168.

• Some owners are competent, effective business people who care about the game. Many others do not share these attributes.
  • Chapter 8, The Future, p. 186.

• The activity of rooting for baseball and other sports teams is one of the strongest expressions of community remaining in our society.
  • Chapter 8, The Future, p. 186.