Why would a Japanese millionaire want to buy the Seattle Mariners baseball team, when he has admitted that he has never played in or even seen a baseball game? Cash is the answer: major league baseball, like professional football, basketball, and hockey, is now big business with the potential to bring millions of dollars in profits to owners. Not very long ago, however, buying a sports franchise was a hazardous investment risked only by die-hard fans wealthy enough to lose parts of fortunes made in other businesses. What forces have changed team ownership from sports-fan folly to big-business savvy? Why has The Wall Street Journal become popular reading in pro sports locker rooms? And why are sports pages now dominated by economic clashes between owners and players, cities with franchises and cities without them, leagues and players' unions, and team lawyers and players' lawyers? In answering these questions, James Quirk and Rodney Fort have written the most complete book on the business and economics of professional sports, past and present. Pay Dirt offers a wealth of information and analysis on the reserve clause, salary determination, competitive balance in sports leagues, the market for franchises, tax sheltering, arenas and stadiums, and rival leagues. The authors present an abundance of historical material, much of it new, including team ownership histories and data on attendance, TV revenue, stadium and arena contracts, and revenues and costs. League histories, team statistics, stories about players and owners, and sports lore of all kinds embellish the work. Quirk and Fort are writing for anyone interested in sports in the 1990s: players, players' agents, general managers, sportswriters, and, most of all, sports fans.

Examines the future of professional sports as a business. Presents testimony & prepared statements by several members of the Senate Committee, the commissioner of the Nat. Football League, the owner of the Carolina Panthers Football Club, firms that manage professional athletes (Falk & Assoc., Advantage International, & Sportscorps Ltd.), & Prof. Kenneth Shropshire, Univ. of PA, & Prof. Andrew Zimbalist, Smith College. Also, submissions from the Nat. Football League, Nat. Hockey League, mayor of Houston, assistant to the Mayor of Cleveland, & a prepared statement on procedures for proposed franchise relocations.

Public Policy and Professional Sports is a comprehensive analysis of public policy aspects of the economics of professional sports, supported by in-depth international case studies. It covers regulation and competition in the sports industry and its labour markets, public spending on stadiums and mega-events, and governance issues including unethical behaviour (corruption, doping, etc). The innovative feature of the work is the combination of economic analysis and well-known international examples with detailed case studies of public policy as it relates to sport in Australia. Australia is an excellent case study due to the high profile of sport in the national psyche and the range of popular professional sports.

Longlisted for the 2016 PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing presented by PEN American Center Are today's professional athletes nothing more than selfish, greedy millionaires with no idea how ordinary people live? The common perception of today's professional baseball, basketball, football, and hockey players is of individuals always wanting more money and better working conditions. When it comes to labor issues in sports, the usual media spin portrays topics such as strikes by players and lockouts by owners as millionaires in dispute with billionaires; each group as self-interested as the other. However, as is often the case, the truth is vastly different. Sports and Labor in the United States demonstrates that players are often exploited by ownership and fight for matters of principle, not simply material gain. In accessible, nontechnical language, Michael Schiavone presents a comprehensive examination of labor relations in American professional sports and how they have evolved over time. Separate chapters on MLB, the NFL, the NBA, and the NHL provide an overview and analysis of each sport from their organized beginnings up to the present day. Like no other work before it, Sports and Labor in the United States provides a comprehensive and detailed understanding of labor relations in American sports for scholars, those interested in labor issues, and sports fans.

The risk of athletes sustaining concussion while participating in professional team sports raises two serious concerns both nationally and internationally. First, concussion in sport carries a public health risk, given that injured athletes may have to deal with significant long-term medical complications, with some of the worst cases resulting in Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). Secondly, sports governing bodies are now exposed to the risk of financial and reputational damage as a consequence of legal proceedings being filed against them. A good example of this, among many other recent examples, is the case of the United States of America’s National Football League (NFL), the governing body for American football, which, in 2015, committed to pay US$ 1 billion to settle the class action filed by its former professional players. This book examines how to most efficiently reduce these public health and legal risks, and proposes a harmonised solution across sports and legal systems.

Clayton Trutor examines how Atlanta’s pursuit of the big leagues invented business-as-usual in the business of professional sports.