Does MLB have a salary cap?

Player salaries in the MLB often draw criticism for their gargantuan size. Indeed, other North American sports leagues do not see their athletes paid that much. Today, we ask; does baseball have a salary cap?

The salary cap is a pre-determined amount that a team can spend on their players. Salary caps can be a limit on spending per player, a limit on the aggregate amount of money a team can spend, or a combination of the two.

"Steve Cohen's bid to buy the Mets has been approved by MLB's Ownership Committee, per @soshnick. Cohen's net worth ($14.6B) makes him wealthier than the next three richest MLB owners combined. In a league with no salary cap, that's significant." - Kendall Baker

Salary caps are implemented in sports leagues across the world to level the skill invested in teams across an array of wealth. Salary caps can often be arcane arrangements that fans do not always understand.

For example, the NFL has enacted a rule that no team can pay their players a total sum exceeding $182.5 million. Likewise, the NHL has a hard-cap of $82.5 million. This means that teams are not allowed to exceed this amount in their total payroll per season.

In contrast, baseball works slightly differently. The league has a luxury tax, which charges teams based on how much money they spend over a certain threshold. This, in theory, discourages teams like the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox from spending ungodly sums on their players.

In any five-year period, any team whose payroll exceeds the threshold pays 22.5% of the sum in fees to the league. If a team exceeds the threshold for a second time, the rate jumps to 30%, and 50% if they exceed the limit three or more times.

"They might as well remove half of the MLB teams if there isn’t going to be a salary cap" - Dylan

Some say that the luxury tax does little to discourage teams. Since 2003, the Yankees, Red Sox, and LA Dodgers have paid nearly half a billion dollars in luxury tax fees.

So no, the MLB does not have a salary cap. Some say that this provides an unfair advantage to rich teams, while others claim that an egalitarian measure like a salary cap would invalidate wealth and punish success.

MLB salary cap unlikely to come in soon

Some small-market teams like the Milwaukee Brewers have called for the introduction of a salary cap. However, staunch opposition from the players' union as well as rich teams make this hard to imagine. For now, poorer teams will just have to search for their own Billy Beane to lead them to glory.