SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Major League Baseball officially gets underway tonight with a game between the San Francisco Giants and the New York Yankees. Opening day for most teams is tomorrow, and plenty of attention is focused on the Los Angeles Dodgers, who have won the past two World Series. They and their big payroll are already planning for a three-peat which could fan the flames of a possible labor battle looming on the horizon. NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan is on the line to talk baseball. Hey, Becky.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: Hey, Scott.
DETROW: Look, I painfully concede the Yankees are so last century. These days, the question is, are the Dodgers going to be winning the World Series again?
SULLIVAN: Ay-ay-ay (ph), Scott. I mean, it's definitely a possibility. And if you believe the stats website FanGraphs, they give it a 1 in 4 chance, by far the highest of any team.
DETROW: Wow.
SULLIVAN: Which is absolutely wild. So yeah, your New York Yankees were long the evil empire, but...
DETROW: To some.
SULLIVAN: I think the Dodgers have claimed that title now. Obviously, yeah, they won the last two World Series in a row, including the amazing seven-game thriller we had last October against - with the Dodgers playing the Toronto Blue Jays. And then, you know, they went out and made some of the biggest moves this off-season. They added outfielder Kyle Tucker. They added the closer Edwin Diaz. Yeah, it's stacked. They definitely could do it again. Would be the first three-peat title in baseball since the Yankees pulled it off in 2000.
DETROW: Look, there is so much parity in pro sports right now, and then you've got the Dodgers doing this. How - I'll put it this way. How do they keep getting away with this?
SULLIVAN: Well, yeah. I mean, there's so many elements here, but they can just afford it, basically. So according to Spotrac - this is a service that sort of tracks sports financials - the Dodgers' payroll, you know, for the purposes of baseball's luxury tax, is just shy of $400 million. The luxury tax, of course, in baseball, it's what they have instead of a salary cap. So if a team goes over that threshold, they pay the tax. And so $400 million is way over the threshold. So the Dodgers also have to pay 142 more million dollars just in the luxury tax. In total, their bill is more than half a billion dollars this season. It's easily the most in the major leagues.
Meanwhile, you've got a ton of teams in baseball that have a payroll more like $100 million. So the Dodgers are spending five times a team like the Cleveland Guardians or the Washington Nationals. And structurally, there's just not really any way for a team like Cleveland to catch up. You know, the Dodgers just rake in tons more revenue. And so all of this is providing a lot of fuel for these talks about a salary cap. As you alluded to, the players union contract is up at the end of this season, and the negotiations are expected to be really difficult 'cause this is going to be the biggest issue. The players have always opposed a cap to their compensation, so it could get ugly.
DETROW: I mean, this is such a downer question on opening day where everybody's feeling...
SULLIVAN: Yeah.
DETROW: ...Optimistic, even non-Dodgers fans, but, like, are we thinking there could be a lockout or a strike at the end of the season?
SULLIVAN: I mean, it's obviously way too early to say, but I think there is a lot of anxiety already in the baseball world that that is on the table 'cause the sport is in a really good place right now, actually. There's been some rule changes over the past few years that have sped up the pace of games. That's been really popular. Attendance has risen three years running. TV ratings are up. The momentum is just amazing, and so a lockout that would disrupt the 2027 season, that would bring all of that to a screeching halt, I think, and nobody wants that.
DETROW: So we'll just ignore that for now, and we'll talk about the baseball that's about to happen. We've got 162 games to play. Walk me through some of the biggest things you'll be looking for.
SULLIVAN: Yeah, I mean, well, this is the first season with ABS - that's the automated ball-strike challenge system - in the regular season. So players at the plate will be able to challenge an umpire's call of ball or strike, so, you know, like the batter or the catcher. I think it's going to be really interesting to see how that plays out over the course of a whole season. It's, like, going to be this new stat, basically. Something we evaluate players with - how good they are making these kinds of challenges.
Another possibility that could be fun for you, if not for those of us from the Midwest, but the AL East could become the first division ever to send four teams to the postseason. Yet the Blue Jays, the Yankees, the Boston Red Sox, Baltimore Orioles are both supposed to be better. That could make those division games very interesting, very tense all season long.
DETROW: That's what the AL East is made for, to send all its teams.
SULLIVAN: (Laughter).
DETROW: That's NPR's Becky Sullivan. Thank you so much.
SULLIVAN: You're welcome.
(SOUNDBITE OF NANCY BEA HEFLEY'S PERFORMANCE OF NORWORTH AND VON TILZER'S "TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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