In light of current economic conditions, you might be worried about your situation: your job security, your home's value, your 401(k), and how you're going to pay for your kid's college.

But hey: quit being so selfish, and have a little sympathy for the real victims of this mess. That's right: professional athletes. MLB.com's Hal Bodley reports that "Economic uncertainties facing virtually every professional sports team, every player and, of course, each and every fan undoubtedly will have a trickle-down effect during baseball's offseason."

He goes on to say that teams are expected to be "more cautious, if not conservative, in locking up those not considered superstars," as they cut spending in anticipation of depressed attendance and advertising revenue.

But 2008 revenue hit a record high and some commentators, including agent Scott Boras, who is of course biased, say that baseball may well prove to be recession-proof. But I'm not so sure. It may be that attendance and consumer interest in the game will remain robust, but leading sponsors, especially in the financial industry, may be less aggressive with their marketing dollars. The PGA Tour is certainly seeing that effect already.

It looks like it could be a blue Christmas for Manny Ramirez.

The Boston Red Sox can take comfort in knowing that media tycoon Rupert Murdoch is in their corner tonight as they face potential elimination from the American League Championship Series at the hands of the Tampa Bay Rays. Whether that will help the Sox overcome a 3 games to 1 deficit is doubtful.

Murdoch, who probably prefers rugby or soccer to America's past time, is in a pickle with the World Series that will be broadcast over his Fox network. News Corp. (NYSE: NWS) shareholders, whose holdings plunged more than 60 percent this year, are probably gritting their teeth that the Philadelphia Phillies (my team) defeated ex-Red Sox slugger Manny Ramirez and the Los Angeles Dodgers to capture the National League championship. Ramirez is one of the game's best known and controversial personalities. Moreover, the Dodgers attract fans from all over the country including older folks who remember them when they were in Brooklyn.

The Red Sox nation are among the most passionate fans in baseball. I bet they are miffed that the ALCS has been relegated to TBS while the much inferior National League basked in the glow of network television. Furthermore. the Red Sox , one of the most storied franchises in sports, are on the verge of being eliminated by a team from Tampa Bay, which gave the world Hooters. Okay, that was Clearwater, but it's close enough.

Are your stocks and other investments underperforming? Well, consider buying a piece of Yankee Stadium as an investment.

Yankee Stadium, the cathedral of baseball, and "The House That Ruth Built," closes today.

In 2009, the City of New York will auction-off seats, signs, lockers, and other valuable parts of Yankee Stadium and Shea Stadium, both of which are owned by the city and which will be replaced in April 2009 by two new stadiums, a new Yankee Stadium in The Bronx for the New York Yankees, and CitiField in Queens for the New York Mets.

Artifacts from both ballparks will have value, but Yankee Stadium's will far exceed most items from Shea Stadium, collectors say.

That's because, among sports venues, in human history Yankee Stadium ranks second only to the Roman Coliseum in cultural and social significance.

We know what occurred in the Coliseum: its activities symbolized life during humanity's descent. We also know what has taken place in Yankee Stadium, and the games played and events held there help tell the story of humanity's ascent.

A new feature on Forbes.com looks at the big business of minor league baseball, and has a ranking of the 20 most valuable minor league baseball teams in America.

The Oakland Athletics AAA affiliate, the Sacramento River Cats, is the most valuable team, with a price tag of $29.8 million. To put that in perspective, George Steinbrenner paid about one-third that amount for the New York Yankees in 1973 -- talk about inflation!

Here's the really cool part: If you don't have $30 million to blow on the River Cats, assuming Art Savage would sell them, you can buy a share of the #5-ranked Indianapolis Indians (PINK SHEETS: INDN) for about $23,000. The team paid $350 per share in dividends in 2007.

But the company does not file regular reports with the SEC and the shares are extremely thinly-traded and illiquid -- there have been no trades in the stock in the past ten days.

According to Forbes, the economics of minor league teams are very compelling because all of the baseball operations salaries -- players, coaches, scouts, etc. -- are paid by the parent club, leaving the owner in charge of operating expenses. Draw big enough crowds to attract considerable sponsorship dollars, and you have a veritable cash cow.

The downside is that you don't have any control over the rosters -- if you're looking for the ultimate fantasy baseball experience, you'll have to pony up the hundreds of millions for a big league team. Or consider an independent league.

Sam Zell is looking to unload the Chicago Cubs baseball franchise that came with his ill-timed $8.2 billion acquisition of Tribune Media Co., and the most aggressive suitor appears to be dot-com billionaire Mark Cuban. The New York Times reports that he offered $1.3 billion for the the team, Wrigley Field, and the team's stake in Comcast SportsNet Chicago.

But of course, Cuban, who has accumulated $1.7 million in fines during his tenure as owner of the Dallas Mavericks, is not without his critics, to say the least. He's too arrogant, too brash, and not gentlemanly enough, they say. He had trouble cracking into the old boy's network of the NBA, and Major League Baseball is said to be even more reluctant to change.

But if Cuban is the high bidder -- and the league will let him in -- it'll be a great day for the Cubs and for baseball. The team hasn't won a World Series since 1908 but, given Cuban's deep pockets and superhuman competitive drive, the Cubs would likely get the extra boost they need to finally win one. Plus, Cubs and Cuban have the same first three letters, so it's pretty much meant to be.

Baseball has dealt with a lot of scandal lately involving performance-enhancing drugs, and it's about time we added a passionate renegade to the current regime of old bureaucrats. And yes, I'm talking to you Ted Lerner.

The Sam Zell-owned Tribune Co. is selling its prized baseball team, the Chicago Cubs, and opening bids are due today.

Reuters reports that 10 parties have been approved by Major League Baseball to make bids, and the team could fetch over $1 billion. Potential bidders include a group led by taxi tycoon Andew Murstein, including Hank Aaron and Jack Kemp, and the usual band of moguls. But if you want to see some passion restored to baseball, you have to be routing for internet billionaire Mark Cuban, the flamboyant owner of the Dallas Mavericks.

Cuban has the cash and he's the one guy who would probably be willing to commit the resources to make the company a champion for the first time since 1909.

Murstein's, who is vice chairman of Sports Properties Acquisition Corp. (AMEX: HMR) told Reuters that "We're not going to chase the deal. With us, it's not going to be an ego buy."

For disenchatned Cubs fans, a billionaire on an ego trip would be the best buyer.

There are many ironies in the fact that President George W. Bush will throw the first pitch at Major League Baseball's All-Star Game in New York. For one, President Bush is the first managing general partner of a Major League team (the Texas Rangers) to become President of the United States.

President Franklin Roosevelt was the first to attend an All-Star Game and throw out the first pitch, starting the tradition. He too had to deal with a poor economy and by the time he threw out that first ball the groundwork was being laid for World War II. President Bush has had to contend with his own war.

While there are differing views as to whether we should have gone into Iraq and whether we should stay or get out, this will always be viewed as George's war, fair or not. And the state of our economy in 2008 will also be viewed as George's economy, fair or not.

The ultimate irony for me is that Yankee Stadium is scheduled to be torn apart at the end of the season. This is YANKEE Stadium and the last president to set foot in it will be George W. Bush. The stadium with the greatest heritage in baseball, the 'House That Ruth Built', is going to be torn apart while our economy is also being torn apart. It is being torn out at its roots.

Back in June, Georges Yared blogged about one of the silliest lawsuits in sports history: Major League Baseball decided that it would take on fantasy baseball leagues, battling for a licensing fee for the use of statistics, such as batting averages, home runs and earned run averages. Major League Baseball sought to limit the number of companies that could use its data for operating fantasy baseball websites in exchange for a fee, and CDM Fantasy Sports Corp sued, essentially arguing that data about a factual event such as the outcome of a baseball game was not proprietary because it could be garnered from various sources other than the league itself.

CDM won in federal court and baseball appealed to the Supreme Court, which declined to hear the case. According to the Wall Street Journal, "In taking on the fantasy-baseball operators, and losing, MLB has likely cost every pro sports league millions of dollars. All the leagues had been getting fees from fantasy operators."

It's good to see Major League Baseball lose here: after failing miserably to protect the game's integrity from the threat of illegal drugs, gouging fantasy players for fees should have been the last thing on the league's mind. MLB doesn't need any more controversy right now, and should never have waded into this battle in the first place.

Baseball is not always a perfect metaphor for life, but it is a good one for investing.

Good teams know how to find value where others may not see it. Spending gobs of money on expensive players does not always pan out and successful companies do the little things well. There is no better illustration of this than the current sad state of the New York Mets and New York Yankees.

Despite investing more money than the GDP of some small, developing countries on high-priced talent, the New York Mets and New York Yankees are being outperformed by teams from the vast baseball wasteland known as Florida. The pain being felt by New York sports fans pales in comparison to the anguish in the executive offices of Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS)'s ESPN and News Corp. (NYSE: NWS)'s Fox Sports, which spent big bucks tor the rights to broadcast baseball games. I bet ESPN and Fox ad sales representatives would break out in a cold sweat at the thought of an all-Florida World Series.

What's ironic is that the people in Florida don't seem to like baseball. More than 80,000 people showed up to watch the football games of powerhouses University of Florida and Florida State in 2006. Last year, the American League Rays attracted an average of 17,148 fans to their games and the NL Marlins drew 16,919, according to the Baseball Almanac. That's roughly a third of the 52,739 who went to see the Yankees or the 47,579 who went to watch the Mets.

Porkbelly futures and plain-vanilla interest rate swaps not exciting enough?

Well now you can invest in a pitcher! For $50,000, you can buy 4% of 25-year-old minor league relief pitcher Randy Newsom's future Major League earnings. That means that he'll need to earn $1.25 million in the majors before you start raking it in.

Newsom has set up Real Sports Investments LLC to broker the deal, and he describes it this way:

Investing in a player is similar to investing in a company. If the company makes money, the investors get paid in the form of a dividend. If an athlete you own shares in makes it to the big leagues, then you will be paid a percentage of his contract .... Investors can also trade their shares to other willing buyers and sellers via this website. Shares will increase or decrease in value based on the athlete's future earning potential and supply and demand.

It's certainly an interesting idea, and Newsom is hoping to get other players to sign up to offer a portion of their future earnings.

One concern is that at 25, Newsom has never pitched past Double-A, although he did notch 18 saves there last year. But the idea certainly makes sense and Newsom definitely has a future in business, if not in pitching.

Ready to start your due diligence? Watch this YouTube video of him pitching and decide whether you think he has a future.

Yesterday, I praised Adam Piatt for his admission of steroid use and efforts to assist former Senator George Mitchell in his efforts to investigate performance enhancing drug use in professional baseball. I wrote that "Hopefully the media will treat him well in light of his revelations as a sign to people in all industries that, no matter how badly you screw up, there is redemption to be found if you do what you can to fix it."

Now, free agent catcher Gary Bennett, who played for the St. Louis Cardinals in 2007, admitted in a phone interview with the Washington Post that he used human growth hormone: "As far as the report is concerned to me, it's accurate... Obviously, it was a stupid decision. It was a mistake. It was something that quite obviously, you regret now. And beyond that, I just don't know."

I would congratulate Bennett for his honesty -- more than a few players are insisting on their complete innocence in spite of strong evidence to the contrary. How are the fans reacting? This is just a small sample, but most of the comments left on the Washington Post blog post were very positive:

Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig needs to discipline the players named in the Mitchell Report on steroid use that's set to be released today. It's not only the right thing to do for the game's future but it's the best way to safeguard the game's bottom line.

Some players named by former Sen. George Mitchell reportedly include some of the most popular players in the game including future Hall of Fame pitcher Roger Clemens, Los Angeles Dodgers slugger Nomar Garciaparra, Texas Rangers star Milton Bradley and Detroit Tigers catcher Pudge Rodriguez. All of these players need to explain what they did and when they did it, or face immediate suspensions or fines. Click here for a list of the players as reported by WNBC TV.

Baseball survived the Black Sox scandal, free agency and those godawful uniforms from the 1970s. It will survive steroids as well but it needs to rip off the scab immediately. For too long, the game took a speak no evil, hear no evil approach to the performance-enhancing drugs. Doing nothing, though, isn't an option for Selig any longer because too much money is at stake.

Seeking advice on his contract negotiation with the New York Yankees, Alex Rodriguez went to the number one source for business wisdom, Warren Buffett, and a pair of Goldman Sachs executives.

After opting out of his contract at the urging of super-agent Scott Boras, Rodriguez found limited interest in his services at the price he was seeking. Now, he's back negotiating with the Yankees, after alienating the team badly by refusing to meet with them.

Buffett's advice to Rodriguez was this: If you want to stay in New York, go talk to the Yankees yourself and leave Boras out of it -- there's too much bad blood between him and the Yankees.

There are lot of athletes who could use Buffett's wisdom: Mike Lowell has professed his desire to stay in Boston, but may leave the team if he can secure a four-year deal from another team -- Boston is only offering him three. Buffett would probably tell him that it's silly to leave a great situation for more money when you're already rich. Mr. Lowell: Please stay in Boston. You had the best year of your career and the fans love you.

Buffett would probably tell Barry Bonds ... Well, Buffett would actually probably beat the crap out of Barry Bonds, because Warren Buffett is a person of integrity -- he doesn't like people who cheat and lie.

Full Disclosure: Zac Bissonnette is long the Boston Red Sox and has a large naked short position in the New York Yankees.

It was less than 3 weeks ago when Alex Rodriguez decided that the middle of World Series Game 4 was the opportune time to announce he was ditching the Yankees through a clause in his contract. At the time, Howard Stern sidekick (and lifelong Yankees fanatic) Artie Lange quipped: "Don't let the free-agency door hit you on the way out" (I'm paraphrasing to keep it clean, folks).

In the wake of this stunt, our own Georges Yared referred to A-Rod as a "crybaby extraordinaire" and a "selfish, self-centered you-know-what." Georges also noted that, "The attempt to upstage the Red Sox and Rockies should not be forgiven nor forgotten by the baseball brethren." Indeed, it was a classless move, one likely perpetrated by A-Rod's agent, but certainly given the green light by the third baseman himself.

And yet, here it is mid-November, and hijo pródigo A-Rod and the Yanks are back at the table. It's all sorts of amusing, really. This morning, it hit newswires that negotiations mediated by Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) officials have resulted in a new contract for the clutch player who isn't. Reportedly, A-Rod wanted to restart negotiations with the team, but chose to use a third party (Goldman representatives) instead of his agent, Scott Boras.

Shortly after the market closed today, I got one of my familiar MarketWatch.com bulletins in my in-box. But it wasn't concerning after-hours earnings or the Dow's (latest) triple-digit drop. Rather, it simply stated: "Home-run king Barry Bonds indicted on perjury, obstruction of justice charges."

Yowsa. While everyone always just assumed Bonds used the juice at some point in his career, I think this comes as a surprise to many sports fans. A federal grand jury has accused Bonds of lying under oath when he said he was unaware that substances handed out by personal trainer Greg Anderson were steroids. Bonds has also maintained that he did not use steroids in 2001, as he chased the single-season home-run record, then held by Mark McGwire.

According to MarketWatch, John Burris, "one of" Bonds' lawyers, told San Francisco radio station KCBS the Bonds would plead "not guilty." Burris also asserted that Bonds "will be found not guilty." Burris says the indictment was a shock, as the government doesn't have proper evidence to bring such a claim.