Remembering “The Highest-Paid Team In Baseball History”
Posted: 07 Oct 2025 10:20 am
“The Highest-Paid Team In Baseball History”
That tag and team graced the cover of Sports Illustrated for October 7, 1968, a fold-out showing the starting nine for the defending “World Champion St. Louis Cardinals” seated by their lockers with the “Manager of the Moneymen” and their salaries in order of appearance.
Maris $75,000
McCarver $60,000
Gibson $85,000
Shannon $40,000
Brock $70,000
Cepeda $80,000
Flood $72,500
Javier $45,000
Maxvill $37,500
Schoendienst $42,000
(Total) $607,000
Most contributed to two world championships and nearly a third for the Cardinals, but that talented, tight-knit and winsome clan has become ancient history, now more than ever, along with their proud and generous patriarch, Gussie Busch, and their legendary voice of 25 years, native St. Louisan Harry Caray, the subject of an 11-page feature in that same SI issue. “Harry Has His Own Ways” detailed his frolics and many near-firings, realized a year later, but when Harry was booming into 48 states over KMOX for baseball’s farthest west and farthest south and second-most trophied franchise, Cardinal Nation was born and St. Louis became a fixture among baseball’s annual attendance leaders.
Now, instead, the DimWitt regime has cut costs, featured farmhands and totally turned off the far-reaching fanbase, driving away a million in attendance in 2025 from 2023 for their lowest regular season total in 30 years. Meanwhile, a one-actor play off Broadway was making more than “The Highest-Paid Team” did together … and doing so every two games. That one mere Met nets $51,000,000 per year. That’s $110,000 per at-bat for Soto solo, the One-Ring Juan-der whose foul balls skip Cooperstown and go straight to Fort Knox.
Money can’t buy love, or even postseason, but the Mets at least bought some wins while the DimWitts just bought the farm.
https://vault.si.com/vault/1968/10/07/40890-toc
That tag and team graced the cover of Sports Illustrated for October 7, 1968, a fold-out showing the starting nine for the defending “World Champion St. Louis Cardinals” seated by their lockers with the “Manager of the Moneymen” and their salaries in order of appearance.
Maris $75,000
McCarver $60,000
Gibson $85,000
Shannon $40,000
Brock $70,000
Cepeda $80,000
Flood $72,500
Javier $45,000
Maxvill $37,500
Schoendienst $42,000
(Total) $607,000
Most contributed to two world championships and nearly a third for the Cardinals, but that talented, tight-knit and winsome clan has become ancient history, now more than ever, along with their proud and generous patriarch, Gussie Busch, and their legendary voice of 25 years, native St. Louisan Harry Caray, the subject of an 11-page feature in that same SI issue. “Harry Has His Own Ways” detailed his frolics and many near-firings, realized a year later, but when Harry was booming into 48 states over KMOX for baseball’s farthest west and farthest south and second-most trophied franchise, Cardinal Nation was born and St. Louis became a fixture among baseball’s annual attendance leaders.
Now, instead, the DimWitt regime has cut costs, featured farmhands and totally turned off the far-reaching fanbase, driving away a million in attendance in 2025 from 2023 for their lowest regular season total in 30 years. Meanwhile, a one-actor play off Broadway was making more than “The Highest-Paid Team” did together … and doing so every two games. That one mere Met nets $51,000,000 per year. That’s $110,000 per at-bat for Soto solo, the One-Ring Juan-der whose foul balls skip Cooperstown and go straight to Fort Knox.
Money can’t buy love, or even postseason, but the Mets at least bought some wins while the DimWitts just bought the farm.
https://vault.si.com/vault/1968/10/07/40890-toc
