You won't be hearing Tom Hicks grumble this week about all the money he's losing. You won't be hearing Drayton McLane, Larry Dolan or John Moores sing those "We're Going Broke Blues," either.

There are two good reasons for that:

The only way to make it work is to require those bottom teams to spend their money on players -- by keeping their current players, by adding new players. And requiring that means the next labor deal has to include a significant minimum payroll.

1. Bud Selig has dropped the veil of silence on his owners' chorus again, meaning any owner or management person who talks about labor issues gets to contribute a million bucks to Bud's Christmas Party fund.

2. And much more significantly, nobody wants to hear it.

That's a fact. And Bud knows it, too. From the moment the commissioner visited his favorite elected representatives in Washington last fall and brought that doomsday note from his accountant, one thing has been abundantly clear:

NO ONE CARES.

Whether one club or 24 is losing money, NO ONE CARES.

Whether the Devil Rays are closing in on Chapter 11 or an attendance of 11, NO ONE CARES.

Whether the industry is being swallowed by bank debt or Forbes Magazine subscription cancellations, ABSOLUTELY NO ONE CARES.

Don't take our word for that. The owners' own research -- through polls and focus groups -- has shown it: Fans from sea to shining sea have told them over and over they're not interested in the problems of Carl Pohlad, Tom Hicks, AOL Time-Warner or any of the richest men and corporations in America.

Instead, here's what fans have told these people: "We don't care about your problems. What are you going to do about our problems?"

In other words, if Bud's side -- and the players, for that matter -- want to talk about competitive balance, the customers will listen. But as soon as the conversation shifts to bank accounts, they'll turn the page, hit the clicker or study those Tour de France results.

	The owners won't be opening their mouths on the issues -- unless they want to be fined by Bud Selig.

So here's the question: If the commish has been told that by his own people, why did he wake up on the morning after the All-Star Game and drop that bomb about teams not making payroll? And why did he temporarily drop his gag order this month to allow his owners to bemoan their team's sorry financial states?

Pick your favorite answer:

A. From Selig's supporters: He needed to convince the union, once and for all, that teams really are in trouble.

B. From some of Selig's detractors: After the All-Star debacle, Selig felt a pressing need to change the subject.

C. From Selig's biggest detractors: It's an obvious sign this whole labor fight isn't about competitive balance at all. It's about making these owners more money.

Well, we're not here to psychoanalyze the commissioner or his motives. We're not here to back or dispute any of his financial claims.

We're here for one reason -- to re-emphasize that the only meaningful issue in this labor tug of war is competitive balance. And any attempt to harp on anything else is, at best, irrelevant and, at worst, an indication that the competitive-balance talk is nothing but a smokescreen.

"What you're seeing," says one longtime baseball man, "is inconsistent messages. On the one hand, Bud's saying, 'We need more revenue sharing so we can have competitive balance.' On the other hand, you're hearing him talk about all this debt.

"But if these clubs are going to spend that revenue-sharing money on their debt, how does it allow them to spend money on players? If it's about competitive balance, the money has to be spent on the players. And if it's not, what this really is all about is increasing franchise value."

If the industry as a whole is losing money, says another baseball person with no ties to the union, then more revenue sharing doesn't solve that problem. It only changes the problem -- because it doesn't bring any more money in. It just redistributes the money that has already come in.

But the owners' lead negotiator, MLB C.O.O. Bob DuPuy, disputes both of those notions. It's his contention -- and, of course, Selig's -- that more revenue sharing promotes more competitive balance and helps the overall health of the industry. It's all part of a massive "food chain," DuPuy says.

Revenue sharing, DuPuy said, is "designed to push the bottom toward the top and the top toward the bottom, make more teams competitive, give more teams a chance and, as a result, drive more revenues. Our history ... and the NFL history almost every year, is that competition breeds interest, interest breeds attendance, attendance breeds revenues ... and revenues breed less dependence on others. That is the 'food chain' we are trying to achieve."

It's a reasonable goal, but the question remains: How do they make that competitive-balance food chain work if the money being shared by the top teams isn't used by the bottom teams to get more competitive?

The only way to make it work is to require those bottom teams to spend their money on players -- by keeping their current players, by adding new players. And requiring that means the next labor deal has to include a significant minimum payroll.

At the moment, though, neither side is proposing one.

Fans have every right to be upset if these two sides strike a deal with significantly more revenue sharing in the name of competitive balance, only to find out down the road that teams are using those revenue-sharing bucks for any purposes other than payroll.

The players, because they're lobbying for the perpetuation of a "free market," have philosophical problems with asking for a minimum payroll if they're opposed to a maximum payroll.

The owners, on the other hand, have proposed a $45-million minimum payroll. But that's a virtually meaningless proposition that would affect, essentially, nobody. Why? Because it includes not just money spent to pay salaries of players on the active roster, but also benefits to those players plus minor leaguers on the 40-man roster.

Both sides agree there is another complication with a minimum payroll -- that every once in a while, a team needs to move from one generation of players to the next generation. And when that next generation arrives, it arrives in the form of a lot of young players who may not make enough money initially to get a team up to the minimum.

There are easy ways around that hitch, though. Allow a one-year exception. Compute the minimum as a three-year average. Charge a tax on teams that go below the minimum just as you would on teams that go above some agreed-upon threshold.

The fact is, though, that the current system proves you have to force teams to spend their revenue-sharing money on players -- or many of them simply won't.

DuPuy disputes that notion, too, saying flatly that owners "are not pocketing their revenue-sharing money." But just this month, that big three-way deal made by the Expos, Marlins and Reds almost collapsed at the last minute -- over a miniscule amount of money.

The Reds -- a team that has gotten close to $20 million in revenue-sharing money over the last two years -- were forbidden by owner Carl Lindner to add another $400,000 to their payroll. Not $4 million. We're talking about $400,000.

So the only way they were allowed to complete that trade -- which brought them the Marlins' opening-day starter, Ryan Dempster -- was to throw in Wilton Guerrero and float rehabbing pitcher Seth Etherton on waivers so he could be claimed (which he eventually was, by the Yankees).

Of course, if the Reds make the playoffs because of that deal, they could make up that $400,000 in one weekend. Apparently, we're not supposed to notice that.

This, remember, is what the owners' "food chain" is supposed to be all about. If a team gets more competitive, it makes more money. In DuPuy's own words: "competition breeds interest, interest breeds attendance, attendance breeds revenues."

That ought to make the pursuit of winning a worthwhile investment in and of itself. If it's not, then feel free, as a fan observing this great philosophical debate, to ask why the Reds are getting any revenue-sharing money if the owner won't use 400 grand of it to take a shot at winning.

But it's not just them. You should also ask why a team like the Royals has taken in tens of millions of dollars in revenue-sharing grants over the last half-dozen years, yet continues to cut the payroll -- and is often used by the commissioner as the No. 1 example of why the system needs to be fixed.

If this is how revenue sharing works when owners are given complete freedom to spend it however they choose, then you -- the fan -- should feel free to question the whole concept. You should also demand some kind of meaningful minimum payroll.

Remember, this labor fight isn't really about the owners and their problems. And it isn't really about the players and their problems. It's about fans and their problems.

So fans have every right to be upset if these two sides strike a deal with significantly more revenue sharing in the name of competitive balance, only to find out down the road that teams are using those revenue-sharing bucks for any purposes other than payroll.

Whatever happens at that bargaining table in the months to come, every fan should have reason to believe the result will have a direct impact on improving competitive balance.

You can decide for yourself what other teams are currently spending their revenue-sharing money on. But remember, there is already more money being shared by the top teams with the bottom teams than there has ever been in baseball history.

And if it's not going to be spent on players, then it isn't about competitive balance at all. It's just a case of some of the wealthiest men in America deciding that welfare isn't such a bad idea after all.

Jayson Stark is a senior writer for ESPN.com.