If the idea was to hold down the Yankees' spending or slow down the power of the big-market clubs, I don't see that going on.

If you're a big-market club, you care about how many people come to your stadium.

The big-market clubs, he said, will give some of their revenue to the small-market clubs.

Or how big-market clubs are ready to abandon the smaller markets in the most literal sense by forming a league of their own.

Ravitch picked up the theme of the have-nots and did so with such fervor that he brought the big-market clubs into a new revenue-sharing agreement earlier this summer.

Referring to negotiators for owners and for management, he said: "They've had no qualms about not just saying 'big-market clubs' but saying 'the Yankees.'

There is much debate about what compelled the Mets to start acting like a big-market club.

Owners of small-market teams wonder how devastating a winter it will be if big-market clubs boost the market once more with $6 million and $7 million player contracts.

"A new stadium won't make a small-market club a big-market club," he said.

It's more difficult, but a big-market club like ours, there will be some guys who are going to clear because of their dollars.