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MLB, MLBPA Reportedly Planning To Implement 12-Team Playoff In Next CBA

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Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association are apparently in agreement on a 12-team playoff in the upcoming collective bargaining agreement, reports Bob Nightengale of USA Today (Twitter link). As part of that deal, Nightengale adds that the league is likely to keep the penalties for exceeding the luxury tax in a similar level as they’d been under the previous CBA.

The league’s desire for an expanded postseason field has been evident throughout negotiations. MLB had pushed to expand from the previous 10-team field up to 14 clubs throughout discussions, but the union had resisted that possibility. It seems the league has agreed to settle for 12 during this round of negotiations, presumably via adding one more Wild Card team in each league.

Specific terms of the format being discussed are unclear. Hypothetically, it seems the likeliest scenario would see the top two teams in each league receive a bye through the first playoff round (similar to the format utilized in the NFL until that league expanded its own playoffs two years ago). That’d leave the division winner with the worst record and the three Wild Card teams in each league playing some kind of series to advance to the second round.

MLB reportedly offered more player-friendly terms on issues like the minimum salary and pre-arbitration bonus pool to try to get the union’s approval on a 14-team playoff. However, the PA continued to express concerns that broadening the field to that extent could reduce the incentive for teams to earnestly pursue upgrades to their rosters.

There’s a high degree of variability in the MLB postseason — just last year, the playoff team with the worst regular season record went on to win the World Series — and the union fears that under a 14-team system, front offices might be content to build marginally above-average rosters and let the chips fall where they may once the playoffs begin. That could have a trickle-down effect of diminishing free agency spending, one with which the MLBPA was surely uncomfortable.

In recent discussions on playoff expansion, the union has floated the concept of a “ghost win” in the first round for the division winner that doesn’t receive a bye. As Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic reported (on Twitter), that’d system involve the division winner playing the Wild Card team with what amounts to an automatic 1-0 lead in a five-game series. So under that setup, the division winner would only need to win twice in the remaining four games to advance. The Wild Card qualifier, on the other hand, would need to take three out of four.

It’s not clear whether that kind of format made it to the end of discussions on the issue. It also remains unclear how many games each first-round series would comprise. What is apparent is that the parties’ reported willingness to settle on a 12-team postseason marks a key step in their progress towards eventually hammering out a CBA. Postseason expansion has been one of the most important topics of these negotiations for years — with Commissioner Rob Manfred voicing support for a 14-team field as early as October 2020.

MLB, NBC Sports Have Discussed Potential Broadcasting Partnership

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Major League Baseball and NBC Sports have had discussions about a possible broadcasting agreement for the 2022 season, reports Andrew Marchand of the New York Post. No deal has been finalized. If an agreement were to get across the finish line, Marchand writes that most of the games would be streamed. NBC would handle a few network broadcasts — its first in more than two decades — but the majority of the coverage would run through Peacock, NBC’s streaming service.

It marks the second possible broadcasting agreement in as many months for MLB, which come on the heels of a reduction in the number of weeknight broadcasts on ESPN. Marchand reported in mid-January the league was also in discussions with Apple that would see some games broadcast on that company’s streaming service, Apple TV+.

The Apple contract has yet to be finalized, Marchand hears, although he writes that ultimately “the expectation is that Apple and NBC would both be involved this year.” The league is targeting a combined sum in the $100MM — $150MM range between those two potential arrangements, with Apple expected to foot the majority of that bill.

Those potential broadcasting agreements are obviously set against a backdrop of broad uncertainty about the 2022 season itself. The parties are amidst their eighth straight day of collective bargaining negotiations as the lockout drags on. Latest reports cast a glimmer of hope as the sides have made some progress on key issues, but there remains plenty of ground to cover for a deal to be reached. The league has maintained that a CBA must be in place by tonight to avoid cancelation of regular season games. It remains to be seen whether late-night progress would mollify MLB’s stance, but the league expressed a willingness to lose a month’s worth of regular season contests during talks this afternoon.

MLB Moves Closer Towards Union’s Asks On Minimum Salary, Pre-Arb Bonus Pool And CBT In Pursuit Of Expanded Playoffs

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With three hours remaining until Major League Baseball’s stated end of February deadline for a new collective bargaining agreement that avoids disruption to the start of the regular season, there seems to be some progress in negotiations. The parties continue to talk deep into the evening, and various reports suggest the league has moved in the Players Association’s direction on a few key areas.

Jeff Passan of ESPN reports (on Twitter) that the league has offered more player-favorable provisions than it had been in the past on issues like the league minimum salary, the bonus pool for pre-arbitration players and the competitive balance tax. Passan cautions that there hasn’t been enough movement for a deal to be imminent, but it’s possible the sides make enough progress tonight that the league pushes back its deadline to avoid game cancelations to tomorrow so they could continue to negotiate.

As has been the case throughout negotiations, a primary goal of the league’s is to expand the postseason field. MLB has sought a 14-team field; the MLBPA has agreed to go beyond the current-10 team playoff format but has drawn the line at 12 teams thus far. The league has put forth two concurrent proposals to the union on the league minimum and the bonus pool, reports Evan Drellich of the Athletic (Twitter link). In the event of a 12-team playoff, the league is offering an approximate $675K minimum salary and would agree to set aside around $20MM for the bonus pool; if the union agreed to a 14-team postseason, the league would agree to a minimum in the $700K range with approximately $40MM for the bonus pool.

Bob Nightengale of USA Today tweets that MLB has also lowered its desired penalties for clubs that exceed the luxury tax threshold. Specifics of MLB’s latest proposal aren’t clear, but the league has pursuit heightened penalties for tax payors in prior asks. The union has been vehemently opposed to that possibility, fearing stronger penalties would cause the CBT thresholds to function more akin to a salary cap. Andy Martino of SNY reports that the league is still seeking higher penalties than existed in the previous CBA but has apparently moved closer towards the status quo than it’d sought in prior offers.

It’s unquestionably a positive development for fans anxiously awaiting any meaningful progress in CBA talks. However, it’s important for fans not to put the cart before the horse. Drellich adds that a deal is still “not close,” and it’s certainly not a given that the momentum will continue to roll towards an agreement in the coming days. A union source tells reporters (including Chris Cotillo of MassLive) the parties are “still very far apart on key aspects” needed to reach an agreement.

Indeed, the league’s offers on the minimum and pre-arb bonus pool are more favorable to players than their prior offers (particularly those tied to a 14-team playoff), but they’re still shy of the players’ targets. The union has been seeking a $775K minimum next season that’d rise by $30K each year of the CBA term. The MLBPA has sought a $115MM pool for pre-arb players, $75MM more than the league’s offer tied to a 14-team postseason.

It’s also unclear where specifically the parties stand on the CBT. The union has been seeking a spike to $245MM for the base luxury tax threshold next season, while the league’s latest known offer was at $214MM. It’s possible MLB has expressed some willingness to raise the lowest CBT number, but it’s doubtful they’ve agreed to jump all the way to $245MM. The union has also sought a slight expansion in the number of players eligible for arbitration; the MLBPA is seeking Super Two eligibility for 35% of players with between two and three years of service time, while MLB has steadfastly refused to entertain any jump over the status quo of 22% in that bucket.

Where things go from here remain very much up in the air. It doesn’t seem likely a new CBA will be finalized tonight, but it does at least appear there’s a chance they’ll progress enough to avoid the league formally declaring the cancelation of regular season games. Martino tweets that the sides are preparing for the possibility of negotiations carrying on “deep into the night.”

Foreign Professional Leagues Could Offer Opportunities For Players During Lockout

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Major League Baseball’s imposed deadline for a collective bargaining agreement to be in place to avoid disruption to the regular season is tonight, and the league has already stated its willingness to cancel a month of regular season play. In response, a few players have taken to social media with seemingly tongue-in-cheek suggestions they could look into the possibility of playing in foreign leagues.

Reigning NL MVP Bryce Harper posted a picture of himself on Instagram donning a Yomiuri Giants uniform (h/t to Britt Ghiroli of the Athletic). The Giants, based in Tokyo, are a member of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball. Braves reliever Luke Jackson tagged the Mexican League’s Toros de Tijuana in a tweet implying he could be available to sign there. Yankees outfielder Joey Gallo joked about creating a self-deprecating profile on LinkedIn (on Twitter).

Pointed quips aside, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that some players could pursue opportunities in foreign leagues if the lockout lingers into the start of other countries’ seasons. As Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic points out (on Twitter), guidance provided by the MLB Players Association to players and their representatives last November stated the union would back any effort by a player who wanted to make the jump from an MLB 40-man roster to a foreign league. “The PA would challenge any attempts by MLB to interfere with Players who choose to participate in a foreign league during a lockout,” the union wrote, shortly before the league implemented the lockout. “During the 2004-05 work stoppage, a large number of NHL players chose to play internationally.”

How many players would have interest in exploring that possibility remains to be seen. It’d certainly register as a surprise if a star like Harper or Gallo — each of whom has already banked notable earnings in their careers, albeit to different extents — made that kind of move. However, players on the fringes of 40-man rosters could more earnestly pursue those opportunities if they present themselves. Even in offseasons unaffected by a work stoppage, it’s not uncommon to see players at the very back of rosters request their release to head to a foreign league like NPB or the Korea Baseball Organization. Those deals typically come with a guaranteed salary greater than what the player might’ve made shuttling between the majors and Triple-A (and sometimes even above the MLB minimum salary).

It doesn’t seem likely we’ll see an exodus of big leaguers heading to Asian leagues. NPB and Taiwan’s Chinese Professional Baseball League limit each team to carrying four foreign-born players on their active rosters at any given time. The KBO caps teams to three foreign players with salary maximums. All KBO foreign roster spots for 2022 are already accounted for, and NPB and CPBL teams would face similar challenges in accommodating multiple players.

That’s not to say players would be completely devoid of opportunities though. The Mexican League, in particular, could be a destination. While that league places a limit of seven foreign players per team, it exempts foreign-born players of Mexican descent from that list. As Joseph Bien-Kahn of GEN explored in 2019, that loophole has incentivized teams signing players born outside of the country to search for any semblance of Mexican heritage in the player’s genealogy.

Whether any players will choose that route remains to be seen. The lockout doesn’t seem to be on the verge of a resolution, and big league players are facing the possibility of lost game checks. The MLBPA has stockpiled a strike fund in recent years, from which union members will receive stipends for an indeterminate period of time if the lockout continues. (MLBTR’s Steve Adams broke down that system in greater detail this afternoon). The chance to play in a foreign league could allow some players to supplement their income, however. If MLB indeed follows through on its stated amenability to canceling games, it’s possible the union’s support for players pursuing foreign opportunities could spur some to explore that avenue.

Yankees Hire Hensley Meulens As Assistant Hitting Coach

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The Yankees are bringing a familiar face back to New York as the team’s new assistant hitting coach, as the club announced that Hensley Meulens has been hired for the job. (The Curacao Chronicle first reported Meulens’ appointment over the weekend). The position has been briefly filled by Eric Chavez earlier this winter, before Chavez left the Yankees to become the Mets’ chief hitting coach.

Meulens is no stranger to the Bronx, as he spent five of his seven MLB seasons playing with the Yankees (from 1989-93).  He was also one of the candidates interviewed for the last Yankees’ managerial vacancy, before the club hired Aaron Boone in December 2017.

After the Yankees parted ways with former hitting coaches Marcus Thames and P.J. Pilittere after the season, Yankees GM Brian Cashman said he planned to add a third hitting coach to the mix, a nod to the recent trend for larger and more specialized coaching staffs around baseball.  Dillon Lawson was promoted to the role of hitting coach and Casey Dykes was named assistant, and since neither Lawson or Dykes played pro ball, New York was reportedly focused on hiring a former Major League veteran to add some on-field experience to the staff.  Chavez fit the description, and Meulens brings both his playing experience as well as a lengthy coaching resume.

Meulens spent 10 seasons on the Giants’ coaching staff, serving as both the hitting coach and bench coach under Bruce Bochy.  Meulens also spent a single season as the Mets’ bench coach in 2020, and spent time as a coach in the minors in the Orioles and Pirates organizations from 2003-2008.

This resume has put Meulens on the radar for several managerial openings over the years, as he interviewed with not only the Yankees, but also the Twins, Reds, Mets, Red Sox and Giants over the years.  Given his long stint in San Francisco, there was some sense that Meulens could be Bochy’s heir apparent in the manager’s job, though he moved onto his bench coach role with the Mets after the Giants instead opted to hire Gabe Kapler as skipper.

MLBPA Organizes “Fully Staffed” Training Facility For Players

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The Major League Baseball Players Association has organized a “fully staffed” stadium and training facility in Arizona for players to work out during the course of the lockout, reports Robert Murray of FanSided (Twitter link). Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports (on Twitter) that the union has interest in arranging a similar facility in Florida.

That the MLBPA has set up alternative training options for players unable to access team facilities is the latest indication of what has become apparent — there’s little reason to believe a new collective bargaining agreement is imminent. The league’s imposed deadline for agreeing upon a new CBA without canceling regular season games is today, and MLB has informed the union of their willingness to scrap a month’s worth of regular season action.

So long as the lockout drags on, players on 40-man rosters will remain unable to have contact with team personnel or to access club facilities. Plenty of players work with independent trainers even during typical offseasons, and it seems likely many will continue to stay in shape on their own.

That said, the union’s arrangement of an operational stadium and facility (and apparent desire to create a second on the other coast of the country) provides players with another option. It’s the latest union effort to bolster solidarity and willingness to continue to wait out the work stoppage. Of greatest import as the threat of lost game checks looms larger by the day is a strike fund compiled by the MLBPA’s withholding of licensing revenue over the past few years in anticipation of a potential lockout.

MLB Reportedly Indicates Willingness To Miss A Month Of Regular Season Games

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MLB’s self-imposed deadline to reach an agreement with the Players Association is today, and Evan Drellich, Ken Rosenthal and Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic report that the league took a “more threatening” tone to the MLBPA today and voiced a willingness to miss a month’s worth of regular-season games (Twitter link). The first meeting between the two parties today lasted only 40 to 45 minutes, tweets Michael Silverman of the Boston Globe, though the expectation is that negotiations will continue throughout the day.

The players have, unsurprisingly, taken that as a clear threat, tweets ESPN’s Jeff Passan, although there’s been no indication to this point that the union’s solidarity has begun to wane. The players have generally taken an exceptionally united front, even in the wake of what was seen as a discouraging counterproposal from the league late last week. There’s been little expectation that the league and union would be able to avoid the “disastrous outcome” of canceled regular season games (as described by commissioner Rob Manfred himself), so the only notable component of that threat is the number of games the league is willing to miss.

The Associated Press estimates that each day of canceled games would result in a collective $20.5MM of missed salary for the players, although it’s worth emphasizing that the union has envisioned just such a hardline tactic from the league for years and has been stockpiling funds to weather this type of storm. MLBTR’s Tim Dierkes reported over the weekend that the league’s strike find is “exponentially” larger than it has ever been (Twitter thread). The MLBPA has been holding back full licensing revenues for years to safeguard against this type of scenario, and the players also spun their licensing department into a separate company, MLB Players Inc.

In doing so, the players afforded themselves the ability to take equity in other companies. Jared Diamond of the Wall Street Journal profiled MLB Players Inc.’s deal with Fanatics over the summer, and they’ve also taken an equity stake in OneTeam Partners. The result is a considerable increase in the union’s funds, and while an exact dollar amount isn’t known, there are a couple pieces of information that can provide relevant benchmarks. An Associated Press report earlier this month indicates the union had as much as $178.5MM at year-end in 2020. An LM-2 Form filed to the U.S. Department of Labor suggests the number was $171.4MM for the 2020 calendar year. Either figure is dated by now, and the size of the fund only figures to have grown.

Notably, players can apply for monthly stipends in the absence of collecting their salaries. The union had provided a pair of $5,000 stipends for February and March, and Drellich and Rosenthal report that the figure will jump to $15,000 beginning on April 1 (when the regular season would be underway). Not all players will apply for that stipend, of course, but in theory even if they did, the 1200 stipends would cost the union a total of $18MM. Add in a pair of (again, theoretical) $6MM payouts for February and March, and it still only taps into $30MM of the union’s funds. Realistically, even based on the 2020 numbers and not accounting for 2021 licensing revenues, the union likely has more than enough capital to make it through the whole season paying out those stipends.

While it’s true that the sport’s biggest stars won’t bat an eye at a $15,000 monthly stipend and may not even file to collect it, that figure is crucial for the union members on the lower rung of the pay scale. Consider players who were just added to 40-man rosters over the winter and those who’ve not yet solidified themselves as big league regulars. Those players could well be looking at spending much of the season in Triple-A, and the $15,000 stipend would largely account for that minor league salary — in some cases, with Double-A and Class-A players who’ve been added to the 40-man roster over the winter, the stipends may even exceed their would-be minor league salaries.

The prospect of lost salaries doesn’t sit well with the union, but the game’s star players who are on lengthy multi-year contracts can surely weather the loss, and those who are most vulnerable are generally taken care of via the monthly stipends. There’s an undeniable middle class who’d be getting squeezed — pre-arbitration players who are solidified on the MLB roster — but those players are among the ones the union is fighting for most ardently, insisting upon increases in minimum salary and pushing for earlier paths into arbitration. Broadly speaking, there’s good reason to believe that even amid the loss of salaries, MLBPA solidarity is likely to remain strong.

Derek Jeter Leaves Marlins Organization

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There’s been a seismic shift in Marlins leadership, as Derek Jeter announced today that he is leaving the organization and will no longer serve as an executive or a shareholder with the club. Jeter’s statement reads as follows:

“Today I am announcing that the Miami Marlins and I are officially ending our relationship and I will no longer serve as CEO nor as a shareholder in the Club. We had a vision five years ago to turn the Marlins franchise around, and as CEO, I have been proud to put my name and reputation on the line to make our plan a reality. Through hard work, trust and accountability, we transformed every aspect of the franchise, reshaping the workforce, and developing a long-term strategic plan for success.

That said, the vision for the future of the franchise is different than the one I signed up to lead. Now is the right time for me to step aside as a new season begins.

My family and I would like to thank our incredible staff, Marlins fans, Marlins players and the greater Miami community for welcoming us with open arms and making us feel at home. The organization is stronger today than it was five years ago, and I am thankful and grateful to have been a part of this team.”

Marlins chairman and principal owner Bruce Sherman issued his own statement on the severing of the relationship:

“The Miami Marlins and Derek Jeter announced today that they have agreed to officially end their relationship. The Marlins thank Derek for his many contributions and wish him luck in his future endeavors.

We have a deep bench of talent that will oversee both the business and baseball decisions while we work to identify a new CEO to lead our franchise. The ownership group is committed to keep investing in the future of the franchise — and we are determined to build a team that will return to the postseason and excite Marlins fans and the local community.”

Sherman and Jeter partnered as prospective buyers for the Marlins back in 2017 and eventually outbid multiple other groups to purchase the franchise from now-former owner Jeffrey Loria at a reported price of $1.2 billion. The bulk of that investment came from Sherman, though Jeter was said to have invested $25MM into the organization himself. Jeter later disputed that number, calling his stake a fair bit larger. Sports Illustrated’s Tom Verducci reported in February of 2018 that it was closer to $38MM in total.

The early stages of the Jeter and Sherman regime were historic for the Marlins, as the front office (then headed up by president of baseball operations Mike Hill) embarked on a dramatic reshaping of the roster and farm system that saw the Marlins’ former core of stars shipped out of town. While the return for eventual NL MVP Christian Yelich has been widely panned, that sell-off also saw the Marlins acquire Sandy Alcantara and Zac Gallen (among others) for Marcell Ozuna. Gallen was later traded to the D-backs for current second baseman Jazz Chisholm. The Giancarlo Stanton/Yankees trade also occurred that same winter, and a year later the Marlins traded J.T. Realmuto to the Phillies in a deal headlined by Sixto Sanchez.

The Marlins parted ways with Hill following the 2020 season, and Jeter played a significant role in bringing Kim Ng aboard as the sport’s first ever female general manager. The team’s first full offseason under Ng was relatively quiet, but she and the Marlins have been aggressive thus far in the 2021-22 offseason, signing Avisail Garcia (four years, $53MM), acquiring both Jacob Stallings and Joey Wendle, and signing both Alcantara (five years, $56MM) and shortstop/clubhouse leader Miguel Rojas (two years, $10MM) to contract extensions.

Even with that sequence of transactions, however, the Marlins are only projected to carry a $68.9MM payroll, per Jason Martinez of Roster Resource. They’re still expected to pursue an additional bat when the offseason lockout and accompanying transaction freeze are lifted, but it’s safe to say the Fish will remain near the bottom of the league in terms of overall payroll. It’s not clear whether Jeter’s departure is at all tied to the team’s payroll expectations moving forward, but it seems clear that a rift of some degree formed between Jeter and Sherman.

Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports that Jeter’s contract was set to expire later this year but was not immediately on the cusp of ending. Presumably, any potential talks about a new contract would’ve included discussions about the long-term vision for the organization, and it seems (based on Jeter’s own words) that he and Sherman no longer aligned.

Whether the reasons for Jeter’s departure eventually become clear or not, he’ll leave a lasting stamp on the organization. The handling of some early personnel changes (e.g. the Marlins’ dismissal of advisors Jeff Conine, Andre Dawson and Jack McKeon) was not without controversy, and the Marlins drew plenty of criticism after the Sherman/Jeter group immediately slashed payroll with the trades of Yelich, Stanton, Ozuna and Dee Gordon.

Five years later, however, it’s hard to argue that the Marlins aren’t in a better position. The position-player core of this roster isn’t as strong, but the Marlins now boast one of MLB’s best farm systems and perhaps the deepest collection of pitching any team has to offer. The long-term payroll has more flexibility — whether or not it’s used is another question — and the Marlins are more generally seen as a team on the rise. That surely isn’t due to Jeter alone, but beyond his hiring of Ng, Jeter also played a large role in bringing VP of scouting/player development Gary Denbo and assistant general manager Dan Greenlee over from the Yankees. Greenlee has helped to build out an analytics department that is lacking, and while Denbo has at times been a source of controversy himself, the improved farm system is a testament to his own work.

Time will tell whether additional departures are imminent, and it’s not clear what might be next for Jeter. The Hall of Famer made no indication that he plans to step away from baseball entirely, though, so it’s certainly plausible he’ll eventually take on a new challenge with another club.

Craig Mish of SportsGrid first reported the news shortly before Jeter issued his statement (Twitter link).

Latest On Clayton Kershaw

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The baseball world’s focus continues to fixate on the MLB lockout and today’s MLB-imposed deadline, but whenever the lockout lifts, the ensuing flurry of free-agent and trade activity has the potential to be historic. One of the most notable names among the yet-unsigned players on the market is three-time Cy Young winner and 2014 NL MVP Clayton Kershaw, who became a free agent for the first time at season’s end. The prevailing wisdom since he hit the market has been that Kershaw would either return to the Dodgers or sign with the Rangers, as Kershaw’s Dallas home is a short drive from Arlington’s Globe Life Field.

Bob Nightengale of USA Today touched on that fact in his latest MLB notebook over the weekend, writing that a former teammate of Kershaw’s expects him to either sign with the Rangers or retire. That’s just one third party’s opinion, of course, and that identifier itself is rather vague. (“Former teammate” could range from Corey Seager to Ted Lilly, after all.) It’s perhaps an anecdotal note, but any clues as to the eventual decision of a future Hall of Famer (and any shreds of offseason normalcy) are of particular intrigue.

It’s already been a huge offseason for the Rangers, who’ve signed Seager, Marcus Semien, Jon Gray and Kole Calhoun as they shift gears from an abbreviated rebuild to a clear win-now approach. Despite doling out a more than a half-billion dollars in free agent contracts, however, the Rangers still ought to have the financial wherewithal to add Kershaw.

The Rangers are projected for a payroll of roughly $127MM, per Roster Resource’s Jason Martinez, and they have only $80.25MM in guaranteed 2023 contracts to consider. Texas ran a $165MM payroll as recently as 2017 and, from 2014-18, averaged a $146.5MM Opening Day payroll. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News suggested multiple times in recent weeks that a Kershaw match could be in the cards, though the implication in Grant’s latest mailbag piece was that Kershaw would be their final major free-agent expenditure if he did sign (likely at an annual salary north of $20MM).

All that said, while the possibility of Kershaw changing teams is a fascinating one on which to speculate, there’s been no firm indicator that he won’t return to the Dodgers. Kershaw himself appeared on the Dan Patrick Show earlier this month and spoke broadly about the allure of playing on a perennial contender, even if it came with the difficulty of enduring repeated playoff exits (YouTube link).

Kershaw didn’t do much to tip his hand, but he did note that for the Dodgers, “the World Series is the expectation” every year. Dodger fans hoping for a reunion will surely point out the obvious: that has not been the case for the Rangers. Of course, there are broader factors at play. Kershaw noted in that interview with Patrick that he and his wife welcomed their fourth child over the winter, and proximity to his young family will naturally play a major role in Kershaw’s decision.

It’s worth noting, too, that Kershaw certainly didn’t sound like a player who had retirement on his mind.

“We have to continue to prepare like we’re going to play,” Kershaw said when asked how the lockout impacts his preparation for the season. “…I’m continuing to prepare like we’re going to start on time, but each day it just seems like we’re getting further and further from that.”

Owners, Players Meet For Extended Negotiating Session; More Talks Planned For Monday

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Representatives from the owners and the MLB Players Association met today for an extended series of talks, a day in advance of the league’s self-imposed deadline to avoid the cancellation of regular-season games.  More negotiations are scheduled for Monday at 9am CT, following multiple sessions today that took place over almost a six-hour time period.

This marks the seventh consecutive days of negotiations between the two sides, as the clock continues to tick towards both the owners’ February 28 deadline and the start of the regular season on March 31.  Some Spring Training games have already been canceled by the lockout, and if a new collective bargaining agreement was reached by tomorrow, teams would face a whirlwind of a month consisting of both an abbreviated Spring Training, and essentially three months of lost offseason business crammed into roughly a four-week window.

Given both the lack of progress and some open frustration emerging during yesterday’s talks, it seems like a longshot that a new CBA will actually be struck by tomorrow.  As Chelsea Janes of The Washington Post notes, the unofficial nature of the owners’ February 28 deadline means that it could be pushed back if there is actual movement towards an agreement, and the players are likely to make such a case if some noteworthy progress is made tomorrow.

A league official told multiple reporters (including The Boston Globe’s Michael Silverman) that today’s talks were “productive,” as the two sides discussed both core economic issues and other CBA items not directly related to economics.  However, the league and the MLBPA are still “far apart” on many of these issues, according to USA Today’s Bob Nightengale (Twitter links), and today’s talks included “a lot of hypotheticals” under discussion and no actual proposals from either side.

One detail from the league’s side relates to the luxury tax threshold, as The Athletic’s Evan Drellich and Ken Rosenthal report that the owners have “indicated willingness” to raise the levels of the Competitive Balance Tax thresholds beyond their past offers.  It wouldn’t be a big raise, however, past the $214MM that the league submitted yesterday as the initial tax threshold.

Past reports indicated that the owners’ offers to eliminate the qualifying offer (and thus eliminating the draft-pick penalty for teams who signed a QO-rejecting free agent) was linked to the CBT negotiations, specifically with the league looking for higher taxation rates for teams who exceed the CBT tiers, according to Drellich/Rosenthal.  Presumably, owners see the elimination of the qualifying offer as a significant enough concession to counter the MLBPA’s demands for much higher luxury tax thresholds, though the union clearly doesn’t see the two matters as a worthwhile trade-off.

The topic of an expanded postseason has also been a key part of CBA talks, as MLBTR’s Anthony Franco explored back in December.  With the owners eager for more teams (and thus more games and more TV revenue) in the playoffs, the MLBPA has been trying to leverage this desire into making gains on other economic issues.  Most recently, the expanded playoffs also factored into the February 28th deadline, as the union has said that they won’t agree to a larger postseason field whatsoever if the owners withhold pay due to canceled regular-season games.

Rosenthal (Twitter links) has some details on the MLBPA’s offer for a new playoff format, which includes an increase in the number of postseason teams from 10 to 12.  The owners have been pushing for a 14-team postseason, though in both 12-team and 14-team scenarios, the union’s offer includes the concept of a “ghost win” in the first playoff round as a reward to teams who win their division.  For example, a division-winning team would only have to win one of the first two games of a first-round series in order to advance, while the wild card opponent would have to win both contests.

In short, the idea would to incentivize winning a division title, which would theoretically entice teams to spend more on player salaries in order to be more competitive.  The MLBPA has seen the concept of a larger playoff field as a possible drag on spending, as teams have less urgency or a bigger margin for error in reaching the postseason.  The league’s 14-team offer did propose awarding a first-round bye to the teams with the best records in the AL and NL, and the other four division winners would have the benefits of both hosting the entire wild card series in their home ballpark, and also choosing which of the wild card teams they’d want to play.

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