(FORTUNE Magazine) – Dear Mr. Statistics: As every guy who has to work for a living keeps reading bitterly, baseball salaries continue to arch heavenward like Ruthian homers. In the late 1970s, player salaries represented about 25% of team revenues. In 1984 that ratio was 42%. In 1993 overpaid Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants is expected to earn about $10,000 per plate appearance, and the ratio will almost certainly be over 50% (as it was in 1992). My semisarcastic question is, When will player salaries exceed total major league revenues, forcing the owners to sell hot dogs for a living? -- UNDERPAID BLEACHERITE Dear Underbleach: Since 1975, when twirler Andy Messersmith of the Los Angeles Dodgers won the arbitration case that brought free markets to the national pastime, player salaries have risen at a sensational average rate of 17.4%, while owner revenues have risen at a merely terrific rate of 15%. If these rates continue unabated, salaries will outstrip revenues in 2023. Bleacher bums are not alone in positing that the free market is ruining baseball, that the players are greedy, that the owners are insane. Our own analysis is more upbeat about market forces. It suggests that the horsehide business is still in the process of a healthy adjustment in pay, reflecting the sudden end in 1975 of monopsony in the baseball labor market. When the adjustment ends, and the owners can no longer increase salaries faster than revenues, they will doubtless negotiate a salary cap, just like their counterparts in pro football (who have capped salaries at 67% of revenues). It is true that many owners are fretting over signs of weakness at the box office (attendance was down 1.7% last year) and in network TV (whose payments have generally accounted for about one-quarter of team revenues). But it is also true that many owners are even now sniffing out new sources of dough, including the super-duper possibilities built into pay-cable deals, which could triple the owners' take, according to University of Texas economist Gerald Scully. And hey, nobody was pointing a howitzer at the Giants when they signed Bonds for six years at $43.75 million.