As the 1879 season drew to a close, The Chicago Inter Ocean lamented that the fourth place White Stockings, despite “the receipts of the year,” would only “have between $2,000 and $3,000 on the right side of the balance-sheet.”
According to the paper, the Cincinnati Reds would lose at least 8,000; the Boston Red Sox and Troy Trojans were both $4,000 in the red, the Cleveland Blues and Buffalo Bisons lost “a little,” while the National League Champion Providence Grays made “a little.” The Syracuse Stars were “completely wiped out;” the franchise would be replaced by Worcester in 1880.
What was the reason for the lack of profits? The Inter Ocean said it was those over paid players,:
“The folly of paying men from $1,000 to $1,800 for six months work. It is not as though they were men of high order, who had spent large sums of money in training for a high profession…On the contrary, the best of them are nominally farmers or mechanics, who at their legitimate business are worth from $30 to $40 a month, and that is all they worth at baseball.”
Hall of Famer Jim O’Rourke hit .348 in 1879, “worth from $30 to $40 a month.”
After all, The Inter Ocean said, “a majority of them are simply ‘hoodlums.’”’
“There is no league player who is a good investment, simply as player at over $2 a day and expenses…For a captain, a man of good executive ability, more might reasonably be paid. The executive capacity should demand an extra remuneration above the manual labor supplied by the ordinary player.
“Players are now so plenty that there is no need of the usual insane rush for engagements. This season has shown that cheap men can do no more nor no less than high-priced men—that is, fall all to pieces and lose everything.”
1879 National League Champion Providence Grays
Baseball History Daily 
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