How does a baseball team become the envy of sports? Turn to the NFL for an example because that sport has a hard salary cap, and Tom Brady‘s New England Patriots were the envy of sports. Washington Nationals’ President of Baseball Operations, Paul Toboni, didn’t mince words in an MLB Network interview yesterday. He said what he said and meant what he said. Getting there in a sport that doesn’t have hard cap spending is an issue. Is Toboni naïve -or- is he of the belief that spending isn’t everything?

The Los Angeles Dodgers have been dominating baseball for over a decade with 13 consecutive playoff appearances and 12 NL West crowns in that timeframe. Since 2017, they have been to five World Series and won three of those. If not for the Washington Nationals in 2019, they might have won another. In their storied history, they set a franchise record in 2019 with 106 wins. They would top that in 2022 with 111. Are they the current envy of sports? That is up for debate.

The Dodgers are a destination spot not only for fans to attend games, but also for free agents — and especially for top Japanese talent. They have built an excellent farm system, analytics model, and player development system.

A team becomes the envy of sports by achieving a combination of on-field success, such as consistent winning and championships, and off-the-field excellence, that includes building a strong and positive team identity, creating a winning culture, and fostering deep community connections. This blend of performance, reputation, and fan engagement leads to an envy from rivals and admiration from across the sports universe.

You have to give it to the brain-trust of the Dodgers because they have captured the hearts of fans on both sides of the Pacific and are cashing in financially. While they spent more than every team not named the New York Mets, the difference is the Dodgers might still be making money. Reports hit this week that claim the Mets lost $350 million this year.

Can you envy a team if they won, yet lost over one-third of a billion to get there? That’s the difference with the Dodgers. Forbes believes the Dodgers made $21 million last year in operating income. You have to figure the postseason money put them in the black. They aren’t spending money beyond their means. And this offseason, they are in great financial shape as they had nearly $60 million of payroll come off the books. Of course they will be spending most of that back to try to win another World Series.

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The key for Toboni is to build his team from a strong foundation, and he sees that in his vision to start with building a “scouting and player development monster.” Actions speak louder than words. But to Toboni’s credit, he comes from a Red Sox system where they put that in-place. If you build a system that is consistent in the production of young and team-controllable talent, you can compete at the highest level without necessarily breaking the bank in terms of total payroll because young controllable homegrown talent is usually much less expensive than aging free agent signings.

On-field success:

• Consistent winning: Consistently making the playoffs and winning championships is the most direct path to becoming an object of envy.
• Team spending: A team that performs at an elite level over a sustained period, sometimes despite financial disadvantages, is particularly impressive to rivals.
• Strategic innovation: A team that is at the forefront of developing new strategies, player roles, and/or analytics can create a blueprint that others try to follow. 
• Team chemistry: A strong, positive team chemistry where players support each other is a key component of success. This fosters a comfortable and safe environment where players can thrive emotionally and focus on the game.

Off-field excellence:

• Strong front office leadership: Effective leadership from management and coaches, combined with a clear team identity, is crucial for building a winning culture.
• Player development: A team that consistently develops its own talent from the minor leagues into successful major leaguers is highly respected.
• Business and stadium: A team can also become the envy of others due to its business operations and facilities. This can include a modern stadium, strong revenue streams, and a positive public image. 

Community and fan engagement:

• Media positivity: The best run teams also have an overall positive image in the local media. Many times that comes from great team marketing and public relations.
• Community connection: A strong bond with the local community and fan base that creates a sense of pride and loyalty that transcends wins and losses, and also shows up in attendance.
• Fan experience: Creating a great in-stadium experience for fans who can turn a stadium into a sought-after destination where demand exceeds the supply of tickets.
• Global brand: The most successful teams build a brand that resonates far beyond their local market, creating a massive and devoted global following. 

The 2011 to the 2019 Washington Nationals had a magical run of nearly a full decade that should have lasted longer than it did. But even when the team was making the postseason and had eight consecutive winning seasons, the Nats never achieved all of the elements of a team of envy because even when they were winning, their attendance never reached anything close to even Top-5. Part of the reason was even when the team was winning they never won over their fan base until they won the World Series. But unfortunately, that was short-lived. The team tumbled off their peak like a vehicle taking a nose-dive off a cliff.

For Toboni to achieve his goal, he will need some serious help. The team will have to change perceptions that have dogged this team since the Montreal Expos relocated to Washington, D.C. The media thrives on needing villains — and the Nats play that part so well. Negativity sells better than positivity.

You can change perceptions from negative to positive. That takes a concerted effort. Madison Avenue marketing and public relations firms do this for a living. This starts at the top with the Lerner ownership group. They have the targets squarely on their backs. When the Nats were doing deferrals, the media made it into a negative as if they were stealing money out of players’ pockets. Yet, the Dodgers did the deepest deferral deal in baseball history with Shohei Ohtani, and the Dodgers were applauded in the Los Angeles media. Trust me, Bryce Harper was never going to starve if he accepted the $300 million 10 year deal the Nats proposed to him — and by the way, that deal was never countered by Harper’s agent per reports.

We could go through all of the scandals of the ‘toxic clubhouse’ of 2015 and 2018 to the perception that the Nats don’t keep their homegrown players. The latter is an MLB problem that most teams go through yet the Nats kept Ryan Zimmerman and Stephen Strasburg for their entire careers. They tried to keep others — but you cannot force players to stay. There is no CBA provision to retain players like the NBA and NFL have. Speaking of Strasburg, his retirement was another black eye on ownership. While most of the swirling stories were not accurate, there was enough there to make it into a major debacle.

Maybe Toboni will navigate the D.C. potholes better than his predecessor. The first one will be offseason spending, and the fact that the team hasn’t been successful in signing a player to a long-term deal since Strasburg exactly six years ago. Toboni spoke a few times at the GM Meetings this week and gave some direction that starting pitchers will be his offseason priority.

“There’s a huge piece of it, like, ‘Hey, we’re trying to create a culture that will really develop a foundation, especially our younger [players] going forward.’ We want folks that are not just going to tolerate the culture but rather drive it, and be leaders in the building.”

— Toboni said in his media session at the GM Meetings

The biggest negative with the fan base is the perception that the team doesn’t spend enough money on payroll — and the issue there as most intelligent people know — the Nats are in a revenue crisis as was reported by both Forbes and CNBC. The hopes are they can raise revenues to allow them to spend more on player payroll which principal owner Mark Lerner stated as a goal. But this team has a long way to go to be a middle tier revenue team. Of course MLB and the CBA look at DC’s market size and categorize the Nats as a large market team at No. 10 per the current CBA’s market score. Any team over 100 in that score is not eligible to receive revenue sharing.

The Nats are in the Bottom-4 of all teams in terms of revenue. Part of that is self-inflicted — but much of it was the MASN TV deal that tied the team up in a decade of court battles, never allowed the team to negotiate a third-party deal because the original agreement gave the Orioles control of the Nats TV rights. A situation not seen in any other sport, and probably not in any successful business.

The Nationals could climb rapidly in revenue if they could hit on the four pillars that teams rely on: attendance driven revenue, local TV rights (RSN), stadium naming rights, and lucrative corporate sponsorships.

While the Nats’ TV money saw a nearly $15 million decline from 2023, the entire regional sports network landscape is not what it was 10-years ago. On top of that, the Nationals did not take advantage of offers for stadium naming rights in the past when they first publicly announced their intentions in 2016. Per sources, the Nats had offers for stadium naming rights that would have netted them around $15 million in new revenue per year. Multiply that by 9 and that is $135 million of money that was never captured — water under the bridge now. On top of that, where was/is the push to market the team better? The Nationals are in the bottom half of attendance once again in MLB. The total marketing effort is not producing enough results.

All of this goes hand-in-hand with being the envy of sports. Yes, everything starts with winning, but like we saw from the Nats when they were winning is that they didn’t have enough going right behind the scenes. Does Toboni understand this? He needs to grasp all of this because winning by itself is just winning on the field. To sustain this, you have to win off-the-field too.