Yankees slapped with 11.8 million $$ luxury ta

[Velcro]

NEW YORK (AP) -- Happy Holidays, George Steinbrenner! Your New York Yankees are the only baseball team to be slapped with a luxury tax bill.

The Yankees were told by the baseball commissioner's office that they owe $11.82 million, a baseball official told The Associated Press on Wednesday under the condition of anonymity.

New York's payment is due by Jan. 31.

A tax rate of 17.5 percent this year means the Yankees' final payroll, for tax purposes, was $184.5 million. The other 29 teams all stayed under the tax threshold of $117 million established by baseball's new collective bargaining agreement.

Commissioner Bud Selig pushed for the tax to discourage high-revenue teams from far outspending their rivals. The Yankees were told of the amount late Tuesday.

"One year's experience is not sufficient to make a judgment, but we are pleased with the increase in competitive balance on the field," said Bob DuPuy, baseball's chief operating officer.

Steinbrenner served in ticket probe

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) -- George Steinbrenner and other top Yankees' executives were subpoened by a New York state commission investigating the team's distribution of free tickets to public officials. Subpoenas were issued Tuesday to the Yankees president Randy Levine and chief operating officer Lonn Trost, according to documents reviewed Wednesday by The Associated Press under a Freedom of Information Act request.

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Yankees president Randy Levine declined comment.

New York, which won the AL pennant but lost to Florida in the World Series, had estimated its tax would be between $11 million and $12 million.

Unlike regular payroll figures, the luxury tax is based on payrolls for 40-man rosters and includes about $8 million per team for benefits.

In 2004, the threshold increases to $120.5 million and the tax rate goes up to 22.5 percent. New York's projected luxury tax payroll for next season is between $175 million and $180 million.

The luxury tax in the new agreement, which runs through 2006, is much steeper than the one baseball had from 1997 to 1999.

A total of eight teams paid tax in those three years, topped by Baltimore, which had a 1997-99 total tax of $10.6 million. The Yankees paid $9.9 million in that period and no other team paid more than $2.8 million.

In addition to the tax, the Yankees project they will pay $50 million for 2003 toward baseball's revenue-sharing plan, up from $32 million the previous year.

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george's fainting spell gave yankees something to think about