I think it will be a long time before major league baseball will go to Mexico city. One of the biggest factors rarely mentioned is players safety, I'm not so sure the players association would be willing to okay a team in Mexico City.

Hey, if they put a team in Detroit... :-)

Put a Carlos Delgado in a normal-sized ballpark in Mexico City and he might hit 70 home runs.

In home games.

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Put a Carlos Delgado in a normal-sized ballpark in Mexico City and he might hit 70 home runs.

In home games.

Off Tanyon Sturtze.

10 of the 16 teams in the Mexican Baseball League have stadiums with fewer than 10,000 seats. Mexico City's stadium (which doubles as a race track) has the largest capacity, by far, with 26,000. Of course, one can't directly compare the drawing power of Mexican Baseball with MLB, but the preponderance of small-capacity parks underscores baseball's lack of popularity relative to soccer.

Post-NAFTA, Mexico's economy has been an exaggerated version of the US in terms of GDP growth. Mexico grew at 5+ percent during much of the late 1990s but has experienced negative or negligible growth in the new millennium. Surprisingly, its currency exchange rate hasn't been that much more unstable than Canada's during the last few years. Inflation is still a problem. A Mexican team could face the same problem as Toronto and Montreal, paying out (essentially) fixed, stable US Dollars while taking in increasingly less valuable pesos. Rapidly fluctuating interest rates are also a problem. I think a Mexican team would have to be very, very well capitalized to hedge against the more erratic local economy.

Mexico's political system is improving, slowly, but is still extremely corrupt. As mentioned above, player safety is an issue.

I think the risks are too high to place a team in Mexico now. Maybe in ten years as the political and economic climate stabilizes.

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I think the risks are too high to place a team in Mexico now. Maybe in ten years as the political and economic climate stabilizes.

What would help a lot is a unified currency block of the Americas containing the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Chile, etc. However absolutely nobody seems to want that other than Tom Courchene so I don't see that becoming a reality anytime soon. The Americans wouldn't benefit a great deal from it, and most Canadians are scared senseless for "sovereignty" reasons.

Mike

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Here's what I meant by the Courchene reference.

Maybe in ten years as the political and economic climate stabilizes.

Washington DC has the same problems and probably won't get a team before Mexico City. And talk about *crime* ...

Scott Lucas post is perfect, tells everything you need to know about Mexico and pro-baseball.
Major Lopez Obrador is a NDP type guy that has a press conference every morning ( very, very early ) and he just bring up just about everything comes to his mind, which is bright and well informed. No way he was mistaken, he would be for a winning team all the time. Somehow the jays are more popular than the spos around here.
The bottom line is that there is no money here to bring a whole season from MLB or NBA or NFL. But a couple of games a year will be sure sellouts ( the record for more people at a NFL game is Mexico city with 122,000 fans in a stadium ).Mexico's
baseball golden era was in the 50's and 60's , then we were rich, outgoing and cute. And now we are ages away to feed our poor...

The Americans wouldn't benefit a great deal from it, and most Canadians are scared senseless for "sovereignty" reasons.

Given that the money men in the current U.S. Administration (for example) couldn't find their asses with both hands and a map ("Aw shit, did the Secretary of Doofus just _guarantee_ higher interest rates!?"), I'd be leery of letting them set monetary policy for us. Once the U.S. electorate has shown that they have stopped electing empty suits to high office - or at least are electing people who give a shit - I'm totally down with the idea.

The EU can sensibly form a monetary union because no one power dominates the group, and the presence of continually countervailing forces means that (1) monetary policy will be inherently conservative (a Very Good Thing) and (2) no one idiot can sink the ship for everyone. That is obviously not the case in North America.

Now if the Pacific Rim countries (Commies excluded) were to think about a monetary union, *that* would make more sense to me. Since the Japanese are more likely to land a spacecraft on the freakin' *Sun* than to agree to even the slightest loss of control over monetary policy, this is what we call a Long Term Project.

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Given that the money men in the current U.S. Administration (for example) couldn't find their asses with both hands and a map ("Aw shit, did the Secretary of Doofus just _guarantee_ higher interest rates!?")

While I have absolutely no faith in the current U.S. administration, I think the Fed does a pretty good job. I suppose that might change when Greenspan's term is up.. I'm not sure I want to know who W would pick if given the chance.

I have to admit I'm biased as I know about two dozen people who work in Fed banks (mainly Richmond and Minny) and they're for the most part really bright people.

In a sense, though, the U.S. already does dictate monetary policy to us. It's really difficult to sustain an interest rate level which is significantly different than the U.S. one, and whenever we do (1991-1996 and 2003) we get wild swings in exchange rates which needlessly harm the economy through transition costs.

An asian currency would make more sense for Canada, as it would reduce our dependency on U.S.-Canadian trade. But you're right.. the Japanese are never going to agree to that. You'd need both the Japanese and the South Koreans involved, and when is the last time those two countries agreed on anything?

Mike

Craig B,

It must be rough on W at cabinet meetings, distinguishing one Secretary of Doofus from another. Maybe they wear different coloured hats to help him.

You used the phrase "I'm totally down with the idea". A Tim Horton's commercial indicates, and my teenaged son confirms, that this phrase currently means in slang that you support it.

Now, back to baseball everyone.

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You used the phrase "I'm totally down with the idea". A Tim Horton's commercial indicates, and my teenaged son confirms, that this phrase currently means in slang that you support it.

You don't have to be a teenager to understand that phrase!

I have the brain of a 6 year old and I know what it means. :)

Mike

(I guess I really should give the 6 year old his brain back. He needs it for school.)

I'm not sure I want to know who W would pick if given the chance.

Look no further: here's the next Chairman of the Fed.

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Look no further: here's the next Chairman of the Fed

Oh Dear. You know the first thing he'd try to do is contract the Cleveland Fed.

No, the Fed needs a real chariman:

The EU can sensibly form a monetary union because no one power dominates the group

Hahaha. Our plan is working!

If there is any interest left about the original post:
In Mexico city news there were a litle more detail. It is a plan for 2012, promoters are Peralta ( the Puebla tigers owner an a bidder for the Anahaim Angels last year ) and an undisclosed group from Chicago.
Peralta is trying to do something about a new stadium in Mexico city.
We used to have the Social Security Stadium (sic) a neutral, natural grass, cozy stadium for 25,000 fans, around 12,000 very confortable with shade.
Then both the then Mexico city Tigers and the Red Devils decided they needed a new stadium, they came with the foro Sol with artificial grass ( like the Tampa one) no shades ( plenty of either sun or rain ) and resulted in a hitters band wagon where people are not going and where the game they play there is more pinball than baseball. The tigers moved to Puebla, the Red Devil have won three championships in the last five years. But losing money like crazy...
Then somebody had the bright idea to bring MLB, a new superstadium, etc. in an unrelated effort to the one that Monterrey is doing to get the Spos to play over there.

Interesting stuff ... it looks like the Great New Ballpark Ladder-to- Success Theory has spread southward from the US and Canada. Here's hoping the Mexican equivalents of Carl Pohlad get stonewalled. Thanks for the update, Jabonso!

Social Security Stadium

Suddenly, "Skydome" doesn't seem quite so bad.... :-)

Oh Dear. You know the first thing he'd try to do is contract the Cleveland Fed.

True, but first, Selig would add Expansion Banks in Denver, Miami, Seattle and Houston.

A "Social Security Stadium" in Mexico? Memories of Neruda and thoughts about the perilous financial state of the American social security system go swirling through my head, and the result is completely horrifying.

It's probably just a bad translation though.

No Mike, its name was Estadio del Seguro Social and the owner was the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social an institution that handles medical services for 40 million people plus(40 % of our population ) retirement plans for around 20 million ( they are privatizing this plans in a hurry due to a suspect bankruptcy )and runs a massive sport program but no longer professional ( they use to own the Potros del Atlante a Mexico city soccer team ).

One at a time...

(1) I would be "totally down" with that idea, i.e. support it. Provided my precondition was met.

(2) Mike, seconded.... KAGA FOR FED CHAIR!!!!! ("If my memory serves me correctly...")

(3) Calling "France & Germany" one power is like calling Coke & Pepsi one soft drink brand or Cats & Dogs one pet.

(4) Mike, it's true that it's hard to maintain a *significantly* different interest rate from the U.S. one, under the current conditions, but there is considerable freedom to differ.

(5) The "Secretary of Doofus" crack was related to the U.S. Treasury Secretary, who recently *guaranteed* higher interest rates in the coming year, in an interview in the Times of London.

(6) Back to baseball... Garry Maddox serves on the board of the Philadelphia Fed. When news of this came out this year, it allowed Dan Werr to write the greatest tagline in the history of Baseball Primer:

"Two thirds of interest rate policy, open market operations, and banking industry regulation are covered by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. The rest is covered by Garry Maddox."

Sheer genius.

Maddox should have Rumsfeld's job.