The CBA ABCs: Competitive Balance Tax (feat. Maury Brown and Lindsey Adler)

Now that Major League Baseball’s Collective Bargaining Agreement has expired, Alex and Bobby are taking some time to break down key concepts that will be on the table in the coming weeks and months and examine what’s at stake for each side.

This week, they do a deep dive on the competitive balance tax, looking at its initial aims to address parity and how its purpose has been twisted by both small and big market teams since its inception in 1997. First they talk with Maury Brown, senior contributor at Forbes, about how teams’ attitude towards the CBT has changed over the last two decades and what rising revenues across the league have done to undercut the measure. Then they bring on Lindsey Adler, Yankees beat writer for The Athletic, to talk about covering a team that has self-imposed-but-CBT-influenced limits on its spending and why they don’t exactly set baseball’s financial market anymore.

Follow Maury Brown on Twitter at @bizballmaury
Follow Lindsey Adler on Twitter at @lindseyadler

Links:
The CBA ABCs: Salary Arbitration (feat. Jerry Blevins & Kevin Goldstein)
Contextualize these discussions with our CBA crash course

Songs featured in this episode:
Paul McCartney and the Wings — "Let Me Roll It" • The Beatles — "One After 909" • Tommy Tucker — "Hi-Heel Sneakers" • The Strokes — "Modern Age" • Booker T & the M.G.’s — “Green Onions”