Baseball Isn’t All <i> That </i> Greedy : Little League: Story about charging $6-per-uniform fee appears to be untrue.

The story had people sizzling mad. And that sizzle spread across the country like a forest fire.

Major league baseball, its image already damaged by labor problems, was sinking to a new low by going after its youngest fans, cracking down on Little Leaguers by forcing them to pay an additional $6 per uniform.

It was outrageous. It was unconscionable.

It also appears to be untrue.

The story first appeared in the Florida Today newspaper and was picked up and run nationally by the Associated Press. The Times even ran an editorial, accusing baseball’s hierarchy of greed and insensitivity.

What in the world were those baseball people thinking?

Florida Today sticks by its story. Others, however, dispute it as follows:

STORY--Major League Baseball Properties, the licensing arm of the sport, is getting tough with Little Leaguers, amateur adult leagues and anybody else who wishes to purchase a uniform with a major league name or logo on it. Baseball will now require those teams or individuals to use only licensed equipment.

RESPONSE--Baseball has always enforced its licensing rules.

“We have licensed three major national companies and a couple of local companies in selective parts of the country,” said Ethan Orlinsky, a lawyer for Major League Baseball Properties, “to produce a variety of uniforms at price points that are affordable to the youth leagues, taking into consideration the quality of the products and the kind of products they could otherwise get if a counterfeiter were to produce those products.

“This is something we have been doing for many years. There is no news here because what we have done this year is the same as we did the year before and the year before that.”

STORY--The kids will now be paying an additional $6 a uniform by being forced to use only licensed equipment.

RESPONSE--At issue here are only jerseys and caps. The rest of the Little League uniform--consisting of pants, stirrups, socks, shoes--does not contain a major league logo, except in rare instances, and can therefore be purchased anywhere.

The three major licensed manufacturers of jerseys--Majestic Athletic, the Russell Corp. and Bike Athletics--all say they carry a line of jerseys that can range in retail price from the $20-$30 range down to $7-$10.

Asked about charges that Little Leaguers were going to be forced to pay an additional $6, Faust CapoBianco, national account manager for Majestic, said, “That’s erroneous. It’s not true at all. We carry a full line of youth equipment from exact-replica jerseys down to the cotton T-shirts.

“Are those expensive jerseys out there? Yes. But we also devise a product line for those teams that are on a tighter budget. We want to make sure that everybody can field a team. And if they can only afford a less expensive shirt, we still want to make it as authentic as possible.”

Bob Giese, a district manager for Russell, said he was surprised by the Florida Today story.

“I’m not aware of any changes,” he said. “I was shocked. It’s too bad it started, because major league baseball doesn’t need any more bad ink right now.”

Sporting goods stores around Southern California confirmed that they carry shirts and jerseys with the major league trademark starting at $7.

Cap prices also vary depending on quality.

Given the approximate prices relayed by the national manufacturers for jerseys, Tom Squires, sports editor of Florida Today, said that his paper’s story was based on what his reporters discovered in the southeastern part of the country.

“We have a problem here in Brevard County,” he said. “It’s the same in Atlanta or Shreveport. Six dollars more a uniform is actually conservative. They are paying seven or eight dollars more. If you don’t have a problem in Los Angeles, you should write that.”

STORY--”It’s a money issue with the majors,” said Tony Juarez, a Little League district administrator.

RESPONSE--Baseball receives a royalty fee of 9% of the wholesale price. If, for example, a shirt sells at retail for $10, it has been marked up about 30% from the wholesale price. That means the wholesale price is $7.70. Major league baseball’s share of that is 69 cents.

“The clubs own their names as well as their logos,” Orlinsky said. “So you have to license a company to use that name. This is a legal issue.

“As agents of the clubs . . . we need to be able to protect those trademarks so that they maintain their value and they maintain their goodwill. If we don’t do that, we risk losing those trademarks.”

STORY--Little League has been hit hard in the wallet.

RESPONSE--Said Dennis Sullivan, the national director of communications for Little League: “The only calls we’ve gotten are from people wondering about these media stories.

“Little League has enjoyed an excellent relationship with major league baseball throughout its 56-year history. Little Leaguers are proudly wearing the names of those teams. And Little League understands that major league baseball needs to control and protect its trademark. We understand it’s not the intent of individual teams to receive a fee as a result of the use (of trademarks).”

Sullivan said many Little League teams aren’t even affected by major league trademarks.

“Many teams wear the names of their sponsors,” he explained.

Others, he said, recycle the uniforms, handing them down from season to season for the younger kids coming up.

While taking its royalty fees for youngsters’ uniforms, major league baseball has also put money back into those programs. Baseball contributed $5.5 million to youth baseball organizations last year, according to a statement from Major League Baseball.

Orlinsky said: “There’s nothing we want more than to see every boy and girl in a uniform that features the name or logo of a club on it. . . . To the extent that a youth league will call us and tell us that they can’t afford to buy the officially licensed product, we’ll work with them.”

Orlinsky says the only people complaining about the licensing policy are those who are trying to get around it, those who produce and sell unlicensed products. It was their complaints, he insists, that generated the controversy.

“They take (major league) names, they put them on products, they sell them at retail and they sell them to youth leagues,” he said. “They sell them all over the place. It is illegal.

“I find it intriguing that somebody who is breaking the law is seen as the victim.”