What Kansas City Royals owner John Sherman said about MLB lockout, downtown ballpark
Kansas City Royals chairman and CEO John Sherman seemingly still likes to look at himself as another longtime Royals fan. He’s also abundantly aware that he’s a fan who currently has more say in the fate of the franchise than anyone else who’s ever sat in a seat at Kauffman Stadium with emotions riding on every pitch.
Sherman, who took over as principal owner in November 2019, spoke with reporters at the club’s spring training facility in Arizona for the first time since Major League Baseball and the Players Association butted heads in a labor dispute that rubbed many fans of the sport and the Royals the wrong way.
He answered questions on a range of topics ranging from recent Royals acquisitions and the outlook of the team to the recent labor strife, heading a small-market franchise, ownership’s involvement in big-ticket baseball decisions, the ongoing exploratory efforts to build a new ballpark and the efforts to make game broadcasts available via streaming platforms.
Here are some of the key issues Sherman addressed in a 20-minute session with reporters.
Lockout/new CBA
On his biggest concern during the lockout
“I’ll just tell you as a fan I was frustrated, probably like our fans. It’s part of the business. We got a deal done that I think is good for both parties. I’m just glad to kind of move on with that. But that uncertainty and that frustration and when we had to cancel some games, that was concerning. I’m glad we kind of figured it out when we did and we’re going to get the whole 162. I think that’s important for our fans, for our club and for the community.”
On whether the new CBA does enough to help small markets compete
“We got a fair deal for the league and for the players. We set out and our primary objectives were competitive balance, pay the players fairly and then, the best we could, align our interests to grow the game together.
“There’s some things I like better about it than other parts of it. But when you talk about competitive balance, the players respected some things that were important to us. They respected, ultimately, that the six-year path to free agency was important to us. It’s really important for a small-market team. The three years to arbitration was important. Revenue sharing. If you remember, initially, their request was to alter the revenue sharing. That wouldn’t have been good for competitive balance.
“So I look at those things as things that were important to us. The CBT (competitive balance tax) crept up on us a little bit, but there will be some sharing above that that I think will benefit teams like ours. There will be a fund with excess CBT proceeds that will be divided by the Players Association and the league. Some of that money will be available to small-market teams that perform well and off the field, investing in the team and then growing their revenue from a business perspective.”
On the inherent advantage of large markets in acquiring and retaining top players
“From time to time you want to compete, but I don’t think the Kansas City Royals want to make a habit of trying to compete for those most expensive free agents. I think we need to kind of do what we’ve been trying to do, evaluate well, select well, develop well and build a core nucleus. When the time’s right, we’ll certainly be willing to spend some money to make sure we can compete at a high level.”
On the new playoff system
“I would’ve liked to see 14 [teams make the postseason]. For a market like ours, it would have you invest more. I think it’s more entertaining when more markets are engaged in August and September.”
On whether he’s worried about fans who became disillusioned
“We’re always concerned. We’re trying to reach out to our fans, stay connected. We tried to stay connected during that period of time. We’re always concerned about that. We’re doing a lot of things in baseball to try to attract a younger, more diverse audience. I think you’ll see some of those changes in the next couple of years. But certainly always concerned about fans, want to earn their trust and want them to come to the ballpark, but also watch us when they’re not at the ballpark as well.”
General observations as principal owner
On what stood out from what he’s learned about the Royals operations since taking over
“It’s interesting. Before I came here, I think the perception was that maybe the Royals were more of a traditional organization. Not making the changes to compete. I found something really quite different. J.J. [Picollo] had a big impact on that. I think the role he’s in is going to help us continue that.
“But what I like about this group is you have the traditional baseball guys and then you have the scientists, whether it’s data science, behavioral science, performance science — and they learn from each other. The scouts like to say, ‘What you have in the data, I see it with my eyes.’ But let’s confirm what you see with your eyes. Then there are things you don’t see with your eyes. What I like about this group is that it’s not parochial. They’re learning from each other. There’s a lot of different things we still want to do to make sure we help our players develop.”
On the return of former Cy Young Award winner Zack Greinke to the Royals
“It’s awesome. And the way the sequence went with [Mike] Minor and picking up Amir [Garrett], I just think that was brilliant. We were willing to kind of maybe wait. Somebody asked me this morning if you’d make an offer on a house when you already own one. But I think it’s great, with Zack and the history there. I think for the team, he’ll make us better. He’ll be an innings eater, in my view, but he’ll also help our young guys. We’ve got an army of young pitchers all showing some development. From what I hear, they’re pretty excited about having him around as well.”
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On the part he plays in deals like Greinke signing and Salvador Perez extension
“I have a great deal of confidence in our baseball people. But I’m certainly involved when it involves investing money, allocating resources. I certainly was involved in the Zack discussions. Certainly, last year (was involved) in the Salvy deal and some other things as well — signing Minor, signing Carlos [Santana], the [Andrew] Benintendi trade. Those are the kind of things that I think incrementally are going to make us better. All those things I just talked about and then the things we’ve done here and the development of our young players.”
On expectations for the club
“It’s spring training. Hope springs eternal. This is an optimistic time of year anyway. I feel like we’re making progress since we’ve came in here. I feel like we’re trying to get better every day. I think we got better last week, but we’ll see what we have. We’ve had two spring training games. We’re getting a little bit of feedback, but I think we’ve got a core group of veterans and we’ve got an army of young pitchers that are developing and we’ve got some new guys that are going to help us.”
On Kansas City fans
“We’ve got a great fan base. I have been a fan for a long time. I started watching the Royals when I came to Kansas City in the 70s. It was obviously a great time to be a Royals fan. When Ewing Kauffman (owned the team). You think about all Mr. Kauffman did to keep the team here. He tried to find a local buyer, couldn’t do it and he literally gave the team away and donated the team to the community to make sure that it stayed here.
“When Mr. Glass called us in the spirit of Ewing Kauffman, he was passing that one. So when I think about Mr. Kauffman and what he did, it was good that the team stayed here but it was kind of bad from a competitive standpoint because we didn’t have an engaged owner. We were run by a non-profit. There wasn’t any money, but then Mr. Glass got Dayton [Moore], brought him in, rebuilt the franchise, the farm system, the international business. I’m just excited as a fan and can’t wait for April 7th. I wish it was March 31st — we’re not going to get there — but certainly can’t wait for April 7th.”
Popular off-field topics
On exploring a downtown ballpark
“We’ve got a team working hard on that. We’re looking at multiple sites. We’ve engaged some really good firms to help us look at that, both in terms of architecture, economic impact studies and things like that. The way I look at it is we’re one of only 25 cities in the United States with a Major League Baseball franchise. Four cities have two and there’s one in Canada. So these are really valuable assets for a community. So why shouldn’t we want to optimize the value of this asset on behalf of our community. I’m kind of interested in how the community wants to [optimize it.] A lot of it’s engagement with different parts of the community. We’re doing the work around real estate, sites and architecture and financing and those types of things trying to understand. I look at this as it ultimately will be a public-private partnership. We’ll be big investors in that partnership.
“But we’ve got a really good team working on it. I’m excited to see how that comes out and also excited to see how the community [responds]. I get a lot of feedback that The K is great. Look, my first date with my wife was a Royals-Yankees game in the late 70s. I was out there in 1980, 1985, ‘14, ‘15, so I love Kauffman Stadium. It’s a great place to play baseball. If you think about when Ewing Kauffman and Lamar Hunt got together to do that, whenever it was 50 years ago, it was a really innovative concept. For most football teams 3 yards and a cloud of dust was when they were in the infield.
“But now with baseball, again it’s a great place to play, but we think we can do more. Baseball in higher density areas, if you look around the country in Chicago, Atlanta just did a great project. Atlanta won the World Series, that’s helpful. But in Atlanta I think they had 2.6 million in the ballpark and over 10 million visitors to The Battery. So you can do a lot for a community as far as economic impact. So that’s what we’re studying. We’re looking forward to getting the feedback that will drive those decisions.”
On making games widely available via streaming
“We’re working on some things. Sinclair is working on some things. Then long-term, I think there are some really exciting solutions. I don’t know how long it will take. The whole landscape is changing, streaming, the way young people consume the game and connect to teams and players. But there’s a lot of work being done at MLB right now with some really bright people on our media committee. And we’re monitoring Sinclair and that whole situation.
“When you think about that, reach is more important than revenue for us in baseball. I think a lot of what you heard during the CBA was all we cared about was revenue. But reach is more important than revenue. Revenue will come if we connect with more fans over time. That’s the strategy that we’re employing. How we get there, I think there’s some turbulence. But we want to make it easy for people to connect and see our games.”
This story was originally published March 21, 2022 at 3:46 PM with the headline "What Kansas City Royals owner John Sherman said about MLB lockout, downtown ballpark."
