While the baseball union is polling its players on whether to strike, owners are surveying fans on the popularity of a salary cap.
About three-quarters of fans support a salary cap, according to a Gallup poll commissioned by owners and released Thursday by the commissioner's office.Seventy-two percent of the 1,000 fans surveyed from June 22-28 say salaries are too high and salary caps in sports are necessary. Fifty percent say they strongly favor a salary cap in baseball and 26 percent say they're somewhat in favor.
The survey, which has an error margin of three percent, was limited to people who said they attended three or more games last season, said they tuned in to at least one game per week or said they were "close observers" of baseball.
Owners are demanding a salary cap, and the Major League Baseball Players Association is considering a strike in order to prevent owners from unilaterally implementing their plan after the season. The union immediately dismissed the results of the survey.
"This does not represent an informed judgment, and they don't want an informed judgment," union head Donald Fehr said. "Do they say the owners' income is close to $2 billion a year? Do they say that a salary cap means restrictions where players can work? Do they say that in the NBA no small-market team has won since the salary cap began?"
The key question in the survey was phrased: "A salary cap would limit the total amount of money each club can spend on the combined salaries of its team's players. Based on what you know, do you favor or oppose a salary cap for major league baseball?"
"I'm not really surprised by results of the poll," executive council chairman Bud Selig said. "The results are interesting. It's done by an organization that obviously used all the scientific mechanisms available to them."
Owners have offered to split revenue 50-50 with the players in exchange for a salary cap agreement. Of those surveyed, 18 percent said the offer was very reasonable and 47 percent said it was somewhat reasonable.
"If you want to spend a lot of money on public relations for its own sake, this is one of the things you do," Fehr said. "Unless you give people a lot of information, it doesn't mean anything. I hope they consider it money well spent, God bless them. It's not relevant."