9:25 pm: Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports that the league is willing to increase the first CBT threshold if the union makes concessions in other areas. The most recent negotiations have had the owners unwilling to raise the threshold beyond $220MM with the players trying to push it to $238MM. Even that $220MM has been difficult for the owners, as four of them voted against that offer.
In order to bridge that gap, Rosenthal says the owners would want “a variety of adjustments,” which would include the players lowering their ask on the bonus pool for pre-arbitration players. The players did indeed drop their ask on the pool in their proposal today, from $85MM to $80MM, but a further reduction would apparently be necessary in order to get the league to budge on the CBT issue. Furthermore, Rosenthal adds that the league “would want the union to accept a streamlined process for implementing rules changes beyond the 2023 season.” This would apparently go beyond what the union already agreed to earlier today, as Rosenthal writes that “The league wants the ability to make other changes for subsequent years within 45 days of the end of a season. Such changes would be implemented upon the recommendations of a competition committee composed of more league than union representatives, effectively giving commissioner Rob Manfred the power to act as he chooses.”
3:59 pm: Bob Nightengale tweets that the union disputes MLB’s characterization of the situation, listing several concessions they have made.
3:40 pm: Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports that the sides could meet again as soon as Monday, with the league expected to announce further game cancellations.
3:28 pm: MLB spokesperson Glen Caplin responded to today’s meeting, with James Wagner of the New York Times providing the full quote on Twitter:
“We were hoping to see movement in our direction to give us additional flexibility and get a deal done quickly. The Players Association chose to come back to us with a proposal that was worse than Monday night and was not designed to move the process forward. On some issues, they even went backwards. Simply put, we are deadlocked. We will try to figure out how to respond, but nothing in this proposal makes it easy.”
The use of the word “backwards” is a bit confusing on its face, given that the union made notable concessions on some of the issues detailed below. However, Wagner elaborates in another tweet that “MLB felt that things were suggested verbally in Florida on Monday, such as the size of the pre-arbitration bonus pool being smaller than $80M, that weren’t reflected in today’s offer,” and that is why they characterized today’s written proposal as going “backwards.” The MLBPA denies moving backward from any verbal offer.
1:20 pm: Representatives from the league and the MLB Players Association met today in New York, with the union bringing both some written responses and counter-proposals to the owner’s most recent collective bargaining agreement offer. Today’s negotiating session lasted around an hour and 40 minutes, and details have begun to emerge (from The Athletic’s Evan Drellich and The Washington Post’s Chelsea Janes) about the union’s latest proposal.
Perhaps the most notable difference is that the players agreed to give the league the authority to make on-field changes within a 45-day window of initial proposal, in regards to three specific rules — a pitch clock, restrictions on the use of defensive shifts, and the size of the bases. The last CBA gave the league the ability to implement rule changes a full year after an initial proposal to the union, and reports recently emerged that the owners were looking to drastically shorten that period of time in this latest agreement.
Any of the proposed rule changes would be explored via a committee that would have player representation. The three proposed rule changes would begin in the 2023 season. One other rule change that the MLBPA did decline was in regards to the “robo-ump,” or an automated system for calling balls and strikes.
The players had been seeking an $85MM bonus pool for pre-arbitration players, though that number has now been dropped slightly to $80MM. It should be noted that this would be the starting price for a pool that would be expected to gradually increase over the five-year span of the CBA, and presumably those increases are still part of the latest proposal. The drop to $80MM probably isn’t too likely to get the league’s attention, as the owners have been open to the idea of a bonus pool, though at the much lower price of a flat $30MM pool for each of the next five seasons.
Should teams surpass the various tiered thresholds of the luxury tax, the league had been proposing methods of punishment beyond just a financial penalty, such as the last CBA’s penalties of moving a team’s top draft pick back 10 slots if they exceeded the tax threshold by more than $40MM. The MLBPA had been resistant to such “non-monetary penalties” as Drellich called them, but the union has now okayed some similar type of punishment in exchange for the elimination of the qualifying offer. The league had previously floated the idea of eliminating the QO, so teams who sign particular free agents would no longer have to give up draft picks as compensation, though the teams that lost said free agents would still get a pick.
In regards to the larger and more thorny issues of the luxury tax thresholds themselves, the union made no changes to their past proposal. As well, the MLBPA stood by their previous demands for an increased minimum salary. The concept of an expanded postseason continues to factor into negotiations, yet while the union had been open to a 14-team playoff with a particular format, the players today opted to just stick with a 12-team format. The MLBPA also continued to decline the league’s overtures for an amateur draft for international players, and in regards to the domestic draft, the union still wants a proposed draft lottery to cover the top six picks in the draft (while the league wants only the top five picks impacted).
While the owners are sure to reject this proposal on the whole, some small positives could be taken from today’s news, even if the bigger obstacles holding up a new CBA remain in place. The union’s previous issue with the league’s rule-change proposals had more to do with the introduction of the topic at what seemed to be a pretty late stage in CBA talks, rather than an objection to the content of the rule changes themselves. Given how the three rules in question have already been being tested at the minor league level, it was no surprise that the league was seeking implementation eventually, though commissioner Rob Manfred said back in December that the owners would likely hold off discussion of any alteration of on-field rules in order to focus on the big-picture financial concerns.
Limiting the 45-day implementation to just these three rules represents a seemingly acceptable compromise for both sides, and such, it now seems like a fairly safe bet that for the 2023 season, fans will see a pitch clock, larger bases, and some changes to how teams deploy defensive shifting. Any of all of these concepts can be argued as ways to improve the on-field product, with the larger bases and the limited shifts in particular intended to promote more offense and action on balls hit into play.
A clock could also potentially lead to more action, should a pitcher (perhaps feeling the pressure of a ticking countdown) rushes a mistake pitch that the batter knocks for a hit. But in general, the pitch clock is intended to address the longstanding concern over the time and pace of games. The exact mechanics of the rules are still to be worked out and quite possibly determined by committee, and The Score’s Travis Sawchik also notes that the clock could be a way of enforcing rules already on the books about keeping batters in the box during plate appearances.
ESPN’s Jesse Rogers reported earlier today that the league was aiming for a 14-second pitch clock with the bases empty, and a 19-second clock with runners on base. This represents a change from the times tested in low-A ball last season, as pitchers had 15 seconds to throw with the bases empty and 17 seconds when a runner was on base. Looking at the numbers from 2021, the clock seemed to indeed result in shorter games, as the low-A games saw a reduction of about 21 minutes in the average game time.
So in other words, nothings really changed.
Just the date and Manfred’s socks.
The scumbag probably went and bought new golf clubs after laughing off the players’ proposal.
Fsf, speaking of scumbags…
Rob, don’t don’t take it so personally.
You can see it on his face; it’s so personal for him. His ego is way in the way.
The “scumbag” here is not Manfred. It is Boras. He is responsible for killing the deal that was close to being made last Tuesday. Until the players wake up, and exclude Boras from any imput into the negotiations, there will be no agreement. Boras only cares about his high – level clients, and his commission. The low salaried players are being hurt the most by far. The longer this laats ( it could be a lost year), some of those players will be replaced by rookies next year.
I agree. There are a ton of players out there, Valdez, Rios, Davis, Brice, etc., that are probably their major league career in service days. They lose $100k in lifetime earnings if they miss one month. If Scherzer or Harper miss a month, they go from incredibly wealthy to incredibly wealthy. For some of the others, and they represent a huge amount of players, missing a month of work means driving a truck for an extra year or two.
Manfred is being attacked, personally by the sports media ( unfairly), because they are all in the players pocket ( except, Chris “Mad Dog” Russo. The fans that are capable of thinking, all know this.
I hate Manfred because it’s obvious to me that the guy doesn’t care about baseball at all. I’m not talking from generalities; I just am absolutely convinced that the game completely bores him and that he literally couldn’t give one crap about whether the games are played or not as long as he gets his money.
Now if this was pro golf that we were talking about, I have little doubt that he would take a much more positive, enthusiastic and proactive role in getting the game back on track. This is the SCUMBAG who called a championship a mere piece of metal that doesn’t mean anything. If that doesn’t infuriate all of you, I’m not sure what will.
FSF
I hate Manfred because it’s obvious to me that the guy doesn’t care about baseball at all.
==================================
I don’t have the foggiest idea what the rant is about.
Do you even know what Manfred gets paid to do? It’s to grow the game. Otherwise, he wouldn’t get paid one thin dime. Do you think the owners, 30 of the richest people in the world, got together ans said “let’s hire someone to destroy the game”?
This is like the RS idiots screaming about starting times, Do you know what determines starting times? It is the time that will get the most fans to tune in and attend, for the longest period of time. Y’all think that decisions are made haphazardly, with no concern for the fans.
Every decision is made to accommodate as many customers as possible. Same as in the real world.
The “rant” speaks for itself. Do you think his behavior thru all of this has “grown the game”? Do you honestly think the owners leave anything material up to a commissioner, let alone this clown, to make any true financial decisions? I expect him to play a more engaging role in this process but it’s clear that he doesn’t care. You think he REALLY cares whether baseball grows or not. He’s only got a few years left before he’s put out to pasture and I’m sure his retirement balance is all he’s focused on.
We could all go on with the examples but this is the tool (along with the owners) that locked out the players to “kickstart” negotiations and went radio silent for well over a month. If that doesn’t tell you everything you need to know, well then you’re just a Manfred/owners’ apologist as far as I’m concerned.
Do you honestly think the owners leave anything material up to a commissioner, let alone this clown, to make any true financial decisions?
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You have to use your common sense on this one. They pay the dude $11M a year. Is that just a charitable act on their part?
“you’re just a Manfred/owners’ apologist as far as I’m concerned.”
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That’s absurd. To the best of my knowledge, I’ve never commented on Manfred before. Nor am I really commenting on Manfred now. I am just letting you know the reality of the situation.
Y’all are acting like he hates the game. His job is to grow the game. If he wasn’t doing a good job, he wouldn’t get paid $11M a year. To think anything else is detached from reality.
They pay commissioners a lot to take the bullets for the owners. Who else is going to do their bidding? You think Hal Steinbrenner or Liberty Media want to come out and address the media on this kind of stuff. They pay him to be their stooge. But even stooges can contribute. With Manfred, there’s not even an inkling of desire to try as far as I can see. Let’s look at the three most challenging situations that have come up for him:
Astros cheating scandal (debacle the way it was handled)
COVID-19 season (debacle the way it was handled)
Lockout (games already canceled so debacle yet again)
His name shouldn’t be Rob Manfred. It should be Rob Debacle.
I never said he “hates” the game, I said he doesn’t care about it except as a source of income and would gladly bet tons of money on it if I actually could.
JoeBrady.
In this polarizing environment, it’s good to be in the middle. It probably means your emotions are not overruling your brain.
Young “good” players deserve more money. Teams that want to spend need a way to compete with teams that have a much greater profit margin. Teams should not take the revenue sharing money and simply pocket it.
Fans are too emotionally invested and let their feelings get in the way. I guess that’s why Fans is short for Fanatics.
FSF
They pay commissioners a lot to take the bullets for the owners. Who else is going to do their bidding?
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You can’t seriously believe that. You think they are paying Manfred $11M a year to take bullets for the owners. They wouldn’t pay that much to take real bullets,
Baseball revenues continue to rise, and that’s what the owners are concerned about, and that’s why Manfred gets paid.
Baseball revenues are rising as a mere byproduct of all entertainment revenues rising, and it’s falling behind on relative “growth” compared to many other options, including other sporting leagues. I agree that growing the game is a part of the commissioner’s responsibility and the owners would undoubtedly want him to do that but what has he done in 8 years exactly that tells you he’s even remotely working on that? For whatever criticisms people want to lay at Roger Goodell or Adam Silver, those guys do seem to have actually taken more proactive roles.
The owners have already given the players big raises, listen to Manfreds press conference after the first games were cancelled.
“Big raises” relative to what? What you or I make? The bottom line is, that salaries have not kept up with overall revenue growth. That would be perfectly fine if the teams were indeed hurting and not making much. But then, why is it that they categorically refuse to open their books???
For whatever criticisms people want to lay at Roger Goodell or Adam Silver, those guys do seem to have actually taken more proactive roles.
====================================
I didn’t bother to look at all the ratings, but the NBA final ratings have tanked in recent years. Over the past 11 years, the NBA finals have not had a game with a rating of less than 8.5 until 2018, and the average was probably > 10.0.
In 2020, they averaged about 4.0. In 2021, they averaged about 5.2. FWIW, the NBA might be ruined forever.
All ratings are down relative to what they have been. It’s a sign of the times. The Cosby Show use to get a 35 rating as the number one show and today, a rating of 5 can win the week. The bottom line is, those players and the overall revenues, are much higher than they use to be and growing.
What’s more puzzling is that you want to bring up something like TV ratings in response to a much broader comment that I made. This isn’t the 1950s-1970s.
If you think revenue rise is just a byproduct of something you made up (do you really think all entertainment revenue comes from similar sources?), you should spend more time educating yourself and less time displaying your ignorance.
Then please enlighten us with your genius and explain the reasons for MLB revenue growth?
That is just false. There was no agreement last week, nor were they close to an agreement.
As long as the owners insist on a CBT threshold that makes a harder de facto salary cap than it was last year, there will be no deal, and the players are absolutely unanimous in that objective.
And if players are obsessed with inflation and revenue there is never going to be an agreement.
It’s just noise.
Just like 40% of the players only get paid 350,000 is noise. Virtually every single one of those players cost the owners money.
Bottom line, the players want to get paid what they are worth, which is fine, but the rhetoric about paying players more than they are worth is bogus.
Inflation has nothing to do with paying a player what he is worth. And the value of that player varies from team to team.
That player generates more revenue for the Yankees than he does for the A’s. The players want the Yankees value to be the global value.
Patrick OKennedy
As long as the owners insist on a CBT threshold that makes a harder de facto salary cap than it was last year
===========================
Care to explain that with numbers? Last I looked, the owners were offering a 10% increase over five years, and dropped the draft pick penalty. Absolutely no one is changing their mind over a 2% increase per year.
But, since I am open-minded, maybe explain it.
baseballhistory Exactly Dude you are spot on!!
Its all BoreAss and the rest of the agents who want a higher CBT because it gives them a higher commission. Only a few teams now are playing near the CBT so the big increase will go to BoreAss and the rest of his agent clan!
I mean, I”m not exactly a fan of Manfred, but you have to realize and understand (which I don’t think you do) he’s like Goodell in the NFL, he’s simply the microphone for the owners.
The CBA has to benefit both parties, not just one. Each party feels like they need to win more, but in reality, they need to equally win at the CBA. Of course, MLBPA feels like they’ve been burned by a few recent ones and want to make up for that. Can’t do that.
Some of the players demands are a bit much. They took the whole “shoot high, settle a little” to heart.
Yes, but in regard to Goodell and Silver, they both constantly have an enthusiasm that comes thru when discussing league matters (other than when suspensions and things like that are involved). Manfred looks like he’s being held a prisoner every time he has to talk about baseball. The only time he seems happy is when he’s announcing lockouts or canceling games. Then he seems to get a serious crap eating grin on his face.
I agree with the rest of your comments, the CBT does need to be fair. But how fair is it that one side has access to all of the information regarding industry revenue and the other does not?
Inflation reflects the value of money directly.
Do you compare a salary in 1967 to a salary today? Of course not. The value of money was very different back then.
$210,000 in 2021 is equal to $224,700 in 2022, due to inflation. What economists call REAL dollars.
The minimum salary for the past two years has increased with inflation, in a cost of living increase. Players and owners both understand this.
@JoeBrady As far as the numbers go, the first year increase is less than 5 percent. The second and third year don’t increase at all. The third year increases $4 million, or under 2 percent, and then a $6 million increase in the last year.
But it’s more than just numbers to the players. It’s like the holy grail. They called a strike in 1994 over the issue of salary cap. They went to the NLRB and got a finding of bad faith bargaining against the owners. They took a law suit to federal court and won an injunction when the owners unilaterally imposed a salary cap.
The players have been willing to die on that hill, over that issue, and they’re simply not going to give the owners an even harder salary cap this year.
Up to now, they are equally to blame, along with owners who tread the tax threshold like a cap. But in this round of talks, the owners know damn well that their offer is a non starter just because of their tax threshold. It’s the third rail issue.
And I believe that owners are trying to take full advantage by exchanging a modest bump in the CBT threshold for things like dictatorial power for the commissioner to change rules, and a huge drop in the pre arbitration bonus pool, and an international draft- as much as they can get. Same way they’re using lost games of the season. It’s all about leverage.
Not unlike what the players tried with the 12 to 14 team playoffs.
This is another link about what I was talking about when I was in Jupiter for the players meetings. I know this is floating around more on the internet now and some people think it’s just made up internet garbage. I can tell you it’s not. I was telling you guys this is what was going on in person when the meetings were happening. Everyone who was there saw a lot of it and I personally saw a deal look like it was going to get done until Boras showed up. Then he left and the deal was over. The crazy thing about it is that Boras is not part of either negotiating side and it looked as if the 2 sides were really close to a deal before he walked in the door. It seems to be all about how much money Scott Boras wants for himself because he doesn’t consider raising the league minimum anything since he can’t make money off it. I was telling everyone this when it happened and now it’s all over the internet. Boras (who isn’t a CBA or union representative) blew up the entire deal because he didn’t like it. I’m bringing it up because I was commenting about it live while it was happening and some people didn’t buy in. It’s everywhere now. youtube.com/watch?v=ubLMKvjooYY
Several things in that video are factually incorrect.
– The minimum salary was $570,500, not 550,000
– The parties never agreed on a bonus pool of $30,000
– Players were never, ever, ever going to agree to a CBT threshold of $220 million Period. Ever.
So the rumor is false.
F the players
Steve Nebraska: Bill Madden had multiple sources who said Boras blew up the deal. How were you in a position where you “personally saw a deal look like it was going to get done until Boras showed up”? Please explain. Thanks.
Up to now, they are equally to blame, along with owners who tread the tax threshold like a cap.
==============================
They treat it as a soft cap. So what? That’s what it is intended to do, They wouldn’t even have a cap if they didn’t want to discourage teams from going over.
“Up to now, they are equally to blame”
==========================================
Assuming that you mean both sides are at fault for unrealistic starting points, I agree. I think the union started high because they did a crap job last time, and got hammered for it. Now they are gun-shy. Pure guess here, but on the owners side, I think they wanted to weaponize April.
Patrick OKennedy2 hours ago
So the rumor is false.
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1-Maddon and Maddog are legitimate and unlikely to make stuff up. Further, Maddon says he heard from 7 guys that were in the room. I assume that a lot of writers make up trade deadline rumors, and signing rumors, etc. That’s just part of the game. No harm and it makes stuff more interesting,’
But this is completely different. I’d bet real money that Maddon isn’t lying.
2-And, just as importantly, if this was just a rumor, then MLB-R, and the 1000 other outlets that have gone radio silent, would be publicizing it. It’s just common sense.
There is no way the players would ever agree to a CBT threshold of 220M, and they are still $50 M apart on the bonus pool and 25K on the minimum salary. They were not that close to a deal, so it wasn’t there to be blown up.
1-So then you think Maddon and Maddog, after long & distinguished careers, decided to start lying about something like this?
2-And why would MLB-R, and most other sports media, be ignoring this? They are desperate for news, and this is huge news.
Maybe…but probably not his underwear. Pathetic bunch of fools.
Craven, is this the Llano flash?
Yeah. This offer is literally the exact same offer the union made before sans the meaningless on field rule changes. The league offered them $30 million pre-arb pool for 12 playoff teams and $40 million pre-arb pool for 14 playoff teams. The players are asking for double what the leagues top offer is but won’t even have the decency to give the owners the playoff package they want for the largest offer. The players are never getting an $80 million pre-arb pool. They definitely aren’t even getting close to that if they keep trying to make the league stay at 12 playoff teams. It looks like the league is finally trying to actually negotiate. Going from zero pre-arb pool to offering $40 million a year is a much bigger concession than the union “lowering” their ask to $80 million while still only allowing 12 playoff teams. The league got their offer up from zero to $40 million pretty quickly and all the union has done in that time is get down to $80 million. The last deal the league offered looked pretty reasonable. So reasonable 3 owners hated it. The union is still making offers they know will never be accepted. There is no way 23 owners would ever agree to even close what the union just offered and they know it. The fact that they wasted all this time coming up with such a pointless offer is starting to make me believe the players actually don’t want to play. They keep wasting more time that no one has. The owners did it first but now it looks like it’s the players who are wasting time to me. The owners should have never tried to put this rule change thing in the contract in the first place. It was stupid and pointless. Now the players are taking more time and including it in the contract as some sort of trade off for the owners like it actually has some kind of monetary value. Either get it with no trade off or just scrap it all together. This rule change thing is far less valuable to the owners than the universal DH is to the players. The players aren’t giving up anything to get the universal DH. The owners giving up anything for this rule change thing would just be stupid on their part. The rule change concepts suck anyway. Paying to get them would be even worse.
By and large I agree with most of your posts these last weeks Hammer. I really don’t see why granting the player’s ask on the minimum is a big deal and I think the owners will grant it. Baby steps. I also think they’ll move a bit closer to the players on tiering the luxury tax.
Baby steps lead to future leaps. The owners need to stand hard and fast. The players need to play or find other professions if this one doesn’t suit them.
THE PLAYERS NEED TO PLAY lol stfu dude
The Major league players Maybe they should go to Japan If they don’t wanna play here
The owners need to find new players I guess then since they locked out the best 1,200 players in the world
Four owners voted against the raise from 210m to 220m. The players ask of 238m, and the gigantic future increases are not in any way realistic. Unless the union drops this demand, there will be no baseball. Despite the rantings of Tony Clark, some individual players, and ” the sportswriters”, this impasse is completely on the players union.
The problem with a high cap is teams that want to spend, and have spent, but don’t have the revenue stream of huge market teams, are now competing for free agents against the big guys who can get anyone they want.
What do the Angels, Tigers, Diamondbacks and Reds all have in common? They have shown a willingness to spend but are not part of the big boy table.
The owners and players need to work that out. As far as “good” young players getting paid, I’,m 95 percent behind the players. Make the pool 50 and move on.
Merely adjusting for inflation would put the CBT at $225 million. The players want $238 million. If the CBT had kept pace with revenues, it would be near $300 million. Their request is far, far more reasonable than the owners demand to lower the CBT in real dollars, adjusted for inflation.
$ 80 million is just $2.67 million per team. They will get more than twice that much for patches on uniforms. As a replacement for adjusting the super two cutoff, it’s a small price for owners to pay. In any case, they will settle in the middle once the owners decide it’s profitable to play games again.
This is not an impasse. The stalemate is 99% on the owners. The players would play ball today.
Patrick OKennedy
If the CBT had kept pace with revenues, it would be near $300 million.
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I repeat this over and over. If you want a percentage of the revenue, all you have to do is to say “yes”. Otherwise, you get salaries. You won’t get both.
“This is not an impasse. The stalemate is 99% on the owners. The players would play ball today.”
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More nonsense. The differences to make everything equal is almost right in the middle. Again, just post a few lines.
CBT-% ask and % offered over 5 years
Minimum wage-% ask and % offered over 5 years
Pre-arb pool-ask and offer
Expanded play-offs
Patches
Then add up the numbers. If you add in the middle number of each item, they are close to zero. But put the numbers down rather than just continually repeating “owners bad/players good”.
There are so many issues with revenue.
If you have a company in KC, you don’t have to pay New York City prices to keep that employee.
The players want Kansas City to pay New York prices for ballplayers. How can you make that work?
Inflation? Give me a break. It’s noise.
Or maybe the players think that the owners want New York to pay KC prices for ballplayers.
FSF,
Solve that problem to New Yorks and KC satisfaction, and then you are left with how much should be in the “good” young player bonus pool.
I have nothing against Boras, but Boras wants KC to pay New York prices and that’s a dog that just isn’t going to hunt.
Both NY & KC want to spend as little on players so your comment is not at all rooted in reality. The only thing that could resolve this to any satisfaction for you, me, the players, etc. is if we knew what the real revenues were. Funny how the side that your defending is the one absolutely refusing to do the ONE thing that would clear all of this up nicely for ALL of us. I don’t know, make’s me sorta think they got something to hide.
New York has a much higher revenue stream than KC, so adding high price talent doesn’t hurt nearly as much.
And of course, that high price talent is worth more to New York than KC.
It’s irrelevant if they want to pay the money or not.
But there is a soft cap so your comment doesn’t make much sense. There will always be teams that are going to spend well under it. What is your point? Your comment would make a whole lot of sense if the cap represented the floor as well.
If the CBT gets raised and certain teams spend a bit more, I would think the value of 2 additional playoff teams is worth much more from a purely competitive standpoint to a KC than the fact that NY can spend $10 million more. This is baseball, any mediocre team can go on a run. Just ask the reigning champions.
But this is NOT about competition for the owners. It’s about how much money they can keep from players.
My point, which is simple, how do establish “fair market value” for a player that has different values in different markets?
Just like we do in the rest of American society, the highest bidder wins. That’s the way it’s always been done in the era of MLB free agency. I don’t even see who’s even trying to change that aspect and reality.
For the longest time, the Padres cried “small market” and didn’t spend squat, and now they’re spending a fortune every year and have gone out of their way to completely realign pre-ARB extensions all the way into the stratosphere. As if the players’ greed had anything to do with them enthusiastically busting down that door over the last few years.
The McDonalds worker in KC has a different fair market value than the McDonalds in New York City.
This isn’t rocket science.
If you want the New York Yankees to establish the value of every major league player… good luck having a league.
But I’m sure the players agree with you, which is why it’s so hard to have a CBA.
That’s the way it’s been done ever since free agency started and EVERYONE here seems to agree that MLB revenues have increased nicely so I’m not sure what that Commie talk is all about.
Also, there is a CBT which is a HUGE part if not the focus of these discussions, which addresses NY only being able to spend so much no matter how much they may want to spend.
Not since the CBT has been introduced. That’s why it was introduced.
I don’t know where you live, but if you want to pay New York City prices for things. Go right ahead, but if your shops charged New York prices, they’d be out of buisness. If they paid New York City wages, they’d be out of buisness.
Thank God I don’t live in NYC.
But the players and Boras certainly like your position.
Who knows why the CBT was introduced. I don’t ever see a big market owner ever bad mouth it. You’re operating under the assumption that these owners are looking to win. WAKE UP! That isn’t at all their goal and NEVER has been. Sure it would be a nice by product and they’ll try to extent it doesn’t cost too much. But this for the owners is ENTIRELY a financial game.
Now if the The Boss were still alive, then the players might have an owner advocate. God, I miss him. Rest in peace George!
Who knows why the CBT was introduced? OK. Sure.
Hey Boros seems to agree with you.
Ken Rosenthal has an article about why it was introduced at the Athletic, pub’d this morning, with quotes from Gene Orza and Manfred.
I wrote an article in June 2020 about why the players might want to accept a salary cap- and floor.
blessyouboys.com/2020/7/20/21328610/is-it-time-for…
Well, please elaborate. Heck, your premise seems to be that it was for the sake of competition. OK. Sure.
Thanks for the link!
I don’t even know how to respond to why CBT was put into place.
Very few players seem to disagree with it, the question is about penalties. The only question taht remains is how much to you slow down the big market teams.
I don’t know what that threshold is. It doesn’t seem anyone knows.
So now you’re just echoing the same thing I did, who know why it started. The article, and certainly my position, seems to be that once again, it was about money and the owners wanting more of it.
The player obviously would rather not have it. That they don’t “disagree” with it is entirely because they know its a waste of time to. It’s there, and the owners are not going to let it go unless a gun is held to their heads (metaphorically).
What do you mean you don’t what the threshold is and that no one knows? It’s a number everyone knows, once it is set???
Arbitration?
The players actually proposed it after the 1996 season, when they had been playing without a CBA for two seasons following the strikeout, and court injunction.
The first CBT was a tax on the five biggest payrolls, regardless of amount. Since the turn of the century, it’s been a tax- starting at 17 percent in the first two CBA’s then never more than 20 percent on the lowest tier.
Do you think they would want that they today seeing what it has evolved into?
That’s a good question. I suppose the teams with the 3, 4, 5 highest payrolls wouldn’t like it, and probably the Padres because the tax is probably higher.
After the 94 strike and a court injunction stopping owners from implementing their own terms and using replacement players, they played for two seasons in 1995 and 1996 without a CBA, playing under the previous CBA.
After the 1996 season, the two sides came to an agreement, but a group of owners blocked approval because some of them were still stuck on a salary cap. So the players proposed a tax on the five highest payrolls (or that’s what they settled on anyway). The players got a big boost in their pension fund.
There needs to be average players in these negotiations right now it is only the top tiered players involved. They are the ones worried about the luxury tax average players are concerned with salaries
Who do you think is getting the benefits of the minimum wage, arbitration eligibility and the arbitration pool? How would you address getting the average player paid?
The bottom line is, unlike decades past, teams are not going to pay $5-10 million per year for every mediocre free agents because they have prospects that they fell will do a good enough job and sometimes, getting paid only the minimum.
Noone confuses Ross Stripling with “top tiered” players. Or Alex Wood. Etc.
This isn’t really accurate.
Generally speaking, cap or no cap, the highest tiered players will get paid. It is actually your post-arb non-stars that are most impacted by a cap on spending.
If you are a star, they will pay you. If you are not, then they would rather fill your role with a pre-arb guy that may not be as good but will be a fraction of the cost.
This has been the direction that free agency has moved in recent years — think of it as the “studs and duds” roster construction model.
However, my take is that the best way to counter that is not to increase the CBT but instead to increase early career earnings, which the owners are even more against
another one…..too long…NExT!
At this point the whole back and forth so called negotiating is a complete turn off. Whenever a new CBA is finalized I hope egos are burst and they have a wake up call … “NON-TENDER”
This will be rejected by the owners in less time that it took for you to read this.
who reads dumb rolls’ posts?
Let’s all bombard Manfred’s office and Twitter account and tell him exactly what we think of him. I just did
Let’s all bombard Players union office and Twitter account and tell them exactly what we think of them
tell them to stay strong? or that you lick boots?
You do realize the owners are the ones who initiated the work stoppage right? Spring training could be in full swing and there would no cancelled games if it wasn’t for the owners locking the players out
@aragon
LOL god the midwits are out tonight.
OWNERS RICH AND BAD PLAYERS POOR AND GOOD I SMART
@TMQ
That is utter nonsense. If the owners hadn’t locked the players out, they would have gone on strike in August, September, October. Just like 94.
Stop following the popular crowd and bashing Manfred.
Exactly, he’s nothing more than a mouthpiece for a useless group of blood suckers who contribute nothing to baseball except having a pile of money they used to buy the ip of a team that they then decide to milk for every dollar they can.
I know you can’t see it, but Manfred is in no way the problem. Boras is far and away the biggest problem.
MLBPA still asking for the moon. Until the players get realistic there’s not going to be any baseball anytime soon.
Absolutely correct. Until Boras is bounced out of the decision making process, there is no chance of an agreement.
They should just take a couple of months off and come back with clear minds in June.
I hope that was sarcasm, Atomic. They’ve already wasted 3 months just to FINALLY make offers that each side knows won’t be accepted. This is ridiculous.
Yep, I can’t stand it. I’m really starting to lean towards “all I need is baseball games” (will be happy with ootp 2021 instead of going to mlb games in person or watching on television. Just isn’t worth it if they think so little of us as fans like these players are showing. These players are stacked, they need to grow up. If you get 5mi wtf are you crying about not getting sIx mIlLiOn *literal-facepalm lmao even 1st year players are more stacked then the average person that works their tail off every day!
According to Heyman the shift is now banned
I’d like to hear some predictions on when we might see first pitch, anyway. Maybe a motivational speaker? I think I saw one the other day living in a van down by the river
With the absurd back and forth rhetoric. I’m no longer optimistic.
Player continue to negotiate from their initial ambitious “ask’ rather than from the parameters set by the previous labor agreement like most negotiations are conducted.. That’s why the players refuse to accept a federal mediator. It’s a little like me asking my boss for a million dollar raise and then ‘negotiating” from there rather than asking for a percentage raise off my existing salary.
While your company is annually making profits hand over fist, you’re an indispensable component of it and perhaps deserve closer to a million dollars plus stock options over your existing salary. Without you, your company suffers and will take a long time to recover to present day status. Both sides are negotiating daily so there’s no point in having a mediator relaying messages.
I agree with Devlsh. What he is talking about is how everyone else gets paid under contracts. As long as the players don’t want to be paid based on revenue (which they are open about not wanting) the revenue is irrelevant. Once they start asking to be paid based on a percentage of revenue they can start considering what the revenue is. Until then it doesn’t matter.
Revenue is not irrelevant and is the entire of premise of this all. If baseball has had declining/stagnant revenues, the new CBA would;ve been signed the minute after the old one expired.
Revenue is irrelevant. Profits are relevant.
Revenue is largely beyond a team’s control. Profit isn’t. The owners can always generate a large profit for themselves by not spending (on players). That’s what this whole thing is about.
And if the players don’t like it, they can change professions. Or start there own league if they chose. But holding up the game over there over inflated egos and greed is getting old
@FSF
Teams spending on payroll until they are unprofitable won’t be good for the players either. Thinking any business should not be allowed a profit is rather Un-American. As to teams not being able to control revenue, that’s entirely false. That’s the incentive to pay players. Improving the team will improve ticket sales, improve concessions, improve ratings and TV contracts. If this wasn’t true, there would be no reason to pay anyone over minimum.
@stymeedone,
In a bubble what you say is true, but the more teams that do all that, the more wind up right back in mediocrity. Baseball is a zero sum game. If they all spent $1 billion on payroll, there still will be the same amount of losers there are today (barring a 30 team playoffs). So while you may pass an MBA class, your comments are not rooted in any reality for the baseball owners of the MLB. That’s just a fact.
The Owners Locked Out the players!
Some really ignorant comments posted!
The player strike has cost 1700 games and three perverted seasons. Some ignorant comments on this board
If you can’t get revenue data from the league, what you certainly won’t ever see profits.
Hammer the players are not against being paid based off of league revenues. They are against being paid based on league revenues while having to take the leagues word for it as to what those are.
If the players want salaries based off of revenue or even profit, guaranteed contracts will be a thing of the past. Do you think the union will go for that?
You are correct 100%, and those comments started with you.
Player strike? It’s 2022!
quickest way to have your comment disregarded: refer to mlb as “the mlb”
You do realize the owners are the ones who initiated the work stoppage right? Spring training could be in full swing and there would no cancelled games if it wasn’t for the owners locking the players out
TMQ.. do you really believe that if MLB had not locked the players out that the MLBPA would have started the regular season. Hardly. They would have struck. Both sides are using US to become richer and richer and until we all realize that it will continue for as long as there is Major League baseball. Wake up everybody Wake up
Revenue is relevant. Owners can take salary, pay friends and families as advisors, and do lots of other things to hide money that I don’t know about since I’m not a billionaire. Profits can be manipulated more easily than the bottom line.
That is correct. It is in baseball’s long term best interest, to break the union. It would take sacrificing the season, but it might be worth it.
If you’re going to push for breaking the union then you’re for breaking up the government sanctioned monopoly the owners have then, right?
and if owners don’t like it they can try to sign a bunch of b-level players that will be cast out from the players union and try to push a sub par product down our throats
But if youre so indispensable, go try performing your indispensable labor on your own and see how much money you make.
All of these asks by the mlbpa are based on the assumption cable revenues will continue to accelerate at a time when cable is collapsing. People are not going to pay these cable sports fees forever and these 100+million a year tv deals are going to be defaulted on eventually.
A mediator does far more than just “relay messages.” A neutral mediator removes the animosity and can talk face-to-face with each side to get a true measure of what they’re willing to accept and what is in fact unacceptable. He/she also provides an outside unbiased perspective.
The only reason to refuse a mediator is if you’re insisting on more than is reasonable.
Agree 100%. Eventually they won’t be able to use the BS excuse of a mediator being a stall tactic. They’re already stalled get a mediator already!
This sounds good, but why would that be so? why is impartiality just assumed? One could have valid reason to assume bias. Not saying there is, but I shouldn’t be able to come up with a plausible reason that easily, if unreasonable intent was the only viable reason.
YBCreature, MLB teams are not making money hand over fist. The Braves made $20 mill. on hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue and $2 billion enterprise value. Those are pretty low margins.
you believe the financial statement from a large corporation as it is presented? pity you!
Do you have access to more accurate figures, Visionless?
@Visionaire
If you are not believing the financial statement, which is a legal document reported to the govt., what are you basing your opinion on? Twitter?
@For Love of the Game that’s the trouble with fans on here backing the players. They seem to think that operating costs end once the players are paid. They act like it costs nothing to host a baseball game to tens of thousands of fans. I said it before, most owners are either billionaires looking to make extra money in a side business or they are fans of the sport. There is no billions of dollars of profit. It’s like people who think mma fighters should make more money. Where’s the money come from? And I agree with the guy stating that TV deals will soon be a thing of the past. Who needs cable these days? Hell things are so desperate for cable companies that most now are forcing their customers to get basic cable along with internet access. How long before other companies come in and end that nonsense? Less fans buy game packages as well. They’re fine with the highlights they can watch for free on YouTube. Players would be wise to come back down to Earth.
You might want to take a look at those numbers again.
Better yet, read the breakdown from Travis Sawchik. It was a heck of a lot more than 20m.
Right because legal documents reported to the government are always 100% true & accurate. Just like Trumps tax records for the past…30 years? Haha
Maybe you ciuld try looking at the right numbers…
mobile.twitter.com/Travis_Sawchik/status/149721526…
It was 104m and was with limited first-half attendance.
I Chief Wahoo also have Vizions. They tell me players greedy.
TV contracts will never be a thing of the past. And the evidence doesn’t support your claims as TV contracts continue to get larger and larger with each one signed. Even if cable companies go under their replacements will then be the ones paying to broadcast the games.
This is from the Braves 2020 Financial Statement:
Following a review of the above, our compensation committee determined to pay each participant the following
portion of his or her LMC Maximum Individual Bonus:
Gregory B. Maffei: $7,854,000
Brian J. Wendling $ 332,536
Albert E. Rosenthaler $ 748,421
Renee L. Wilm $ 690,795
That equals $9,625,752
These are expenses that are taken off the total proffit of the Corporation even though it is paid to Part Owners.
This is just the beginning of how they siphon money out of the business & into their pockets.
Sorry, disregard the above message. That is from Liberty Media Corporation, not just the Braves. I will keep looking for just the Braves Financial Statements.
The braves hid multiple times that in accounting tricks.
They might be. Look at what happened with european soccer- MediaPro promised 3.25 billion over 4 seasons for TV rights to Ligue 1 teams. They were using the same live sports programming fees our companies use here. Customers complained and demanded the fees be dropped (approx 25 euros a month).
Mediapro was forced to default on their deal and has just about killed the ligue 1 franchises.
Less and less people are subscribing to TV plans. Counting on that TV money always being there is foolish.
Apparently the owners need to unionize so they can have a 650k/yr base salary.
it just…doesnt work that way, plain and simple. maybe it should, but it doesn’t.
You guys don’t get the concept of the best in the world at a job. Look around the world at private businesses and see what the best performers, with the best & most desirable, unique skill sets, within those professions make. Then, consider it’s a unique industry, so compare apples to almost apples and look at what the top1% of other entertainers make (musicians/ actors, etc).
Then, in that appropriate context, without comparing them to you, who are average and replaceable tomorrow at work, think about what they would/should/could negotiate for, given these experts with unique desirable skills are the reason the businesses are doing as well as they are.
@Yankee Clipper Expect MLB is the only option. Actors have tons and tons of studios and media companies. Tons of record labels and streaming services.
GM: Yes, sir, that is true; but those industries also don’t have monopolies for their ownership conglomerates either. Different side of the same coin, if you will.
@yankeeclipper
The best performers do make the most money in any industry. MLB players are the best in the world, and they are paid better than any ballplayers in any other league throughout the world. Since that’s already the case, can we start the season now? You don’t see the Top stock broker asking for a percentage of the stock market, just that they are paid like the top broker. The Best chef doesn’t ask to get a percentage of the restaurants revenue. To do that, he has to own the restuarant, and take the risk and bear the costs. In those other industries, if that top performer stops performing, they will no longer be compensated as the top performer. You’re right in that its not apples to apples. There is nothing to compare to the asks of the MLBPA.
Stymeedone: So, the best actors merely ask for more than the other actors? Nope. The MLB players have lost salary in terms of ratio. That’s why they bargain every few years. They never signed anything stating they would never ask for more money. I’m truly confounded that so many people are down on the players in this multi-billion dollar entertainment industry, where the entertainers are asking for money and you’re saying it should stay with the people that manage them. It’s like saying Col. Parker should’ve made more than Elvis Presley.
Random incorrect poster: And please stop saying the Braves only made $20M profit. That’s so untrue. Gosh, man. Nowhere, anywhere does it say that.
@yankeeclipper
You are the one acting like they are not already paid at the very top of the spectrum. The owners are offering raises on top of that. No one said they were expected to stay at status quo. Asking for a percentage of the industry is a ludicrous demand. No other job provides that.
Max S. gets paid 40 f’ing million dollars to throw a baseball every 5th day for 7 months.
Okay, so you “feel” (subjectively) that it’s too much. Again irrespective of the volume of business the entertainment industry does, including people that make a two-hour movie fake acting, that don’t have to do anything real and have made just as much as Max.
It’s a subjective standard. A personal issue you have about his job. Not an objective measure based on his job skill & the industry value. And you’re okay with the people who own these people who throw baseballs every fifth day making hundreds of millions per year to simply…..own the rights to that throw? Seems a bit misdirected.
I don’t fall in either side but I see the people on the owners’ side raking the most extreme and illogical stances like this. It’s a paradoxically flawed blend, with the main ingredient being subjective feeling about what a worker gets paid to do, absent any other relative measure. It’s like saying $1.50 is paying too much for gas without knowing the economy, the geographic location, or the year to which one is referring.
@yankeeclipper
That’s the whole thing. No one, especially not you or me, knows the final numbers. Looking at revenue only is like looking at ABs only. It does not give a whole picture. You have decided, without access to facts, that every MLB team is making ungodly profit, and that they are hiding it. I am assuming that the last couple of years have not been their best, but overall they are profitable. That there are differences in market sizes helps explain the different payroll levels. That’s one of the ways they keep profitable. When the pandemic hit, and the large markets needed to stop the revenue sharing, that did give some indications that margins may not be as large as you think they are.
But isn’t it a reasonably obvious conclusion to draw if the owners won’t open up the books? I mean if they are constantly crying about how poor they are, it would be VERY easy for them to prove. Yet they make ZERO effort to do so. You don’t find that the least bit suspicious?
There are other ways besides a full revenue work up. They could create an index with certain agreed sources of revenue. MLB is getting into a few lucrative revenue sources such as gambling and a nice $1 billion deal with Nike that started in 2020. What gets included could be another big debate. With new national TV contracts, those are set for another seven years without an increase.
Literally every single business/profession/career you are talking about almost always starts out as an internship. So the players should not have a league minimum if we base it off your statement. They should start as an internship. School/college doesn’t count as intern because you have to intern for the business i.e. mlb. Do you really think musicians wake up making millions of dollars?;they usually start in a garage than get found and signed by a small name. After 5-8 years at minimum, they get lucky and sign a contract with a big name business. And on top of that, most people like musicians make almost all their money through concerts, sponsors and so forth. Actors usually start in low budget P films and work there way up to M F D B and some get lucky and become A-list celebrities. It’s all about skills. And you need to be honest to yourself, more than half of MLB players are teaching themselves/honing their skills each and everyday at the expense of ownership. Players are welcome. I’m just praying lindor gets better. He was a beast, signed like 10 years and all of a sudden his honed skills have just went away. Oh my oh my.
That’s just not true about how most labor negotiations work or why they rejected a federal mediator. No union would ever have added a pension or made significant changes to benefits to members of the bargaining if they simply stuck to the parameters of the previous agreement. And, federal mediators are a useless in a situation like this, where there are many minute details on which they would never get up to speed enough to help. It was a slimy move by the owners for PR purposes only. They make what looks like to the uninformed to be a reasonable suggestion and attack the union for not accepting something that would delay a resolution and only work for the owners.
Dervish, it’s like asking your employer for a wage increase when what you really want is a wage increase, paid sick leave, and a pension.
Not only that, but then why is it okay for MLB to ask for expanded playoffs & a salary cap when none ever existed? If that one-way street is permissible, then by that logic, only the owners could ever change anything in favor of ownership and the players would have zero benefits & only what little pay the owners felt they deserved.
It’s so incredibly naive I can’t believe it’s being discussed at this level, unless most people are simply being contrarians.
Good point
Only 2 hours
$80 million is not a starting point, it is an ending point. you can say $30-$80, or maybe something more like $40-$70, but starting with $80 million in a completely new program isn’t happening.
They started at over $100MM
@Schmoopkins
A pre-arbitration bonus pool has never existed before. It started at ZERO.
I never said either number was reasonable as a starting point. Just stating the gd facts.
This needs to be put in perspective. It’s a bonus. The base salary is going up 26% according to reports. The bonus equates to an additional 40% raise. So, the ask is actually a 66% increase to prearb players. Obviously, this is not distributed equally but the net ask is an additional 66%.. This is on top of eliminating draft pick compensation, the universal , and a hefty increase in the CBT threshold,
Given the free agent contracts that were flying around before this started, and a climate so phenomenal that players turn down $300M, it’s not like they were downtrodden. The last offer should have put them back to work.
when your worth is $600 million why accept $300 mil? it’s a lot of money either way. sure.! but, why would he sell himself cheap?
because that’s not how union negotiations work
When you think you’re worth $600mm and no one is offering $600mm, maybe you’re not worth $600mm. Kinda like Cousin Eddie holding out for a management position. Have fun waiting.
ther is only one team that can offer. when he has 30 teams…… you know the answer
I agree with you guys. The pre-arb bonus pool has always been zero. Let’s be honest. Once it starts we all know it’s only going to go up. It never even had to be considered as something to start by owners in the first place. When you start something new you do it in baby steps to make sure it was the best decision and make sure you do it the right way. I thought the owners offering to do it at all was a very good faith gesture. If I were an owner I would have just said absolutely not. It’s never happened before. It doesn’t have to happen now. So to me even agreeing to it is a good faith gesture. I thought offering $40 million a year for a 14 team playoff package TO START the program was extremely generous. Demanding $80 million TO START the program and still only expecting a 12 team playoff package is absurd to me. Get your foot in the door first before you start demanding what your foot should be allowed to do if it gets in there.
Dan Halem and Scott Boras will overthrow Rob Manfred and Tony Clark, so Dan will take over as the commissioner and Scott will take over as the union chief.
skip it…. 30 words or less!
next
There has never been a 14 team playoff for a normal baseball season. Offering 12 team expanded playoffs TO START expanding the program was extremely generous. Demand 14 teams and only offering 40 million is absurd. Get your foot in the door first before you start demanding what your foot should be allowed to do if it gets in there. Circular logic
There is no rationality involved on the union side whatsoever. That is why we are where we are.
The average player salary has dropped over the past two years. Looking at the top contracts doesn’t show the whole picture of free agent contracts
If you view it as a replacement for making more players eligible for arbitration, then it costs teams much less to pay out $2- 3 million per team than to add a couple of players to their arbitration list.
it is, but 2 year arb or even a solid expansion of the super two system was never reasonable because the players bargained these things away in the past and hadn’t offered a real concession worth that much to the owners this time.
The ultimate concession is who gets what share of the revenue generated by the game.
They started asking for $115 million, actually.
I am 100% in support of the players but even $80 million is unrealistic for a rookie bonus pool
it is just $2 mil plus a team!
Nice use of the word “just.” I still remember my daughter telling me she had just been accepted at her college and it was “only” $36,000 per year. I’m sure these businesses had $2MM laying around, like I had $36k laying around.
What’s unrealistic is paying players far below their actual value for years. The bonus pool is for the top performing athletes who are being taken advantage of.
Value is relative to what someone is willing to pay. The players could always try the NPB and see how much they make.
Sure, and the owners can try selling a product with minor leaguers and see how that pans out. Comments like that go both ways.
‘Value’. LOL! Let them put an ad up on Craigslist and we’ll see their ‘value’. The ‘value’ is Major League Baseball which has little to nothing to do with anyone presently playing it. These guys are Uber drivers waiting for their next career.
I have a bad feeling that we’ll be extremely lucky to have a season over 130 games at this point.
More like a good feeling.
Lolol voice of reason indeed:)
A 130 games, regular season games, and no playoffs sounds about right. Maybe we get lucky.
I think I’d put a couple hundred on under 130 games at this point.
Ya…gunna be another “pandemic” type season
More great writing- thanks Mark- appreciate it. Owners: Please just cancel the season and shove it right in the players’ ungrateful, selfish, greedy faces. Thanks.
“Shillin for a quarter, shillin for a quarter.”
– The_Voice_Of_REASON
MLBPA. A Clown Show that’s over but no one told the clowns.
It looks like the MLBPA has become the new Insane Clown Posse…a “band” that shouldn’t exist. So, let’s disband the MLBPA and their insane demands.
LOL @ you worrying about the $$$ owners make. GTFO
Oh jesus….my nephew lived with me for a few years and played the ICP constantly….and did not like headphones/earbuds……I was heading toward ptsd I think…..
He even saved his $ to go to a few of their “events”……
cpdpoet: did he refer to himself as a “juggalo?” I’m not sure if that even exists anymore but all the die hard ICP fans used to walk around with face paint and call themselves juggalos and say stupid crap all the time like “I’m always down with the clown” and “Juggalo for life!” That band is definitely a stain on American culture. It sometimes shocks me how things that are so worthless can get so many fans here in America.
@Hammer
I used to know someone from work a long time ago who would go to the “Gathering of the Juggalos” every August. I THINK it was in Illinois…
@Hammer
Also, Super Humman gives a shout out to the Juggalos in every stunt video. youtube.com/watch?v=GCp3Udupr1s
Because of the population explosion. More weirdos than ever. The movie “Idiocracy” is becoming a documentary.
same troll with multiple tags!
They should just rename it to MLBScottBoras. Boras and his associates are the ones who blew up the last deal because of a few rules the players wanted anyway in the past.
How about a $60MM bonus pool, $2MM per team? Issue solved! Increase w inflation each year.
Boros and his ilk have ruined this. We’ll be lucky to have games on July 4th. These idiots are shooting themselves in the foot.
Castellini and his ilk have ruined this. We’ll be lucky to have games on July 4th. These idiots are shooting themselves in the foot.
If you think you’re pissing me off by getting on Castellini you’re wrong. His cheap butt is part of the problem, and I wish he’d sell the Reds. However, the players starting points and refusal to budge is asinine. That’s because of Boros and his ilk.
@Reds Fan:
Incorrect. The owners refusal to budge is asinine.
Castellini represents not just a problem for you as a Reds fan, he’s a greater problem for MLB. The ownership committee requires 75% approval which means small-market clubs can block solid proposals, which gives them significant power over the greater game. The tremendous increase in TV contract money, which is shared equally, along with 52/48 split on local revenue means smaller markets have experienced tremendous revenue increases over the recent CBAs. Is Castellini spending it? You better than anyone knows the answer to that. No. All the changes MLB wants to make will simply encourage Castellni and Nutting and others to pocket the revenue from big markets while they do nothing to expand their home markets and the game in general. At least the Rays are putting out a quality product.
So, yeah, you may not like seeing his name, but he’s a significant problem for MLB, and he is one of the key reasons there’s a lockout and fans aren’t seeing Spring Training games and multiple regular season games have already been canceled, with more cancelations coming tomorrow.
Rob, I would contend owners have ‘budged’ a fair amount, especially on salaries for young players, which disproportionately affects small market teams who’ve historically based their operating model on those players.
In other words, proportionally, its the small market teams that are “giving” ground already in MLB’s proposal, raising the floor if you will. By fighting a large increase in the Competitive Balance Tax, they’re trying to minimize the disparity in spending between the deep pocket teams and themselves, which is why it’s called the Competitive Balance Tax..
The owners could increase revenue sharing to make up for the difference in “giving” each team has done.
@Rob M
The players union is aware of the position of the small markets, yet provides proposals that they know the small markets will never approve. Guess they really don’t want the season to start. That seems like the problem.
Rob….then the owners should come up with a pool of money for the “poor owners” lol
You do realize your support of the owners’ plight while hating on Boras for being an independent businessman making profit is paradoxical right, Reds?
I’m not just hating on the players. I’m hating on both. I’m just pointing out that all things went to hell last Tuesday after Boros got involved. There has to be a middle ground. Both the players and owners like Big Bob aren’t negotiating in good faith. Cooler heads have to prevail or the NLRB has to get involved. The players are angry from 2016, and the owners don’t want to budge from their 2016 victory. This pissing match is going nowhere.
Historically, Boras success in getting paid top dollars for his players is predicated on getting ONE owner to blink, cave and sometimes negotiate against themselves.
Using him as your strategist when you need more than 2/3 of the owners to agree may not work as well.
Sippi, it’s Boras with an “a”. And I think his reported influence is being overstated.
My issue with the players is that they appear to be outraged that fans would dare to criticize them. “It’s the owners’ faults”, they say and point fingers at the billionaires. They’re mostly right, but they need to understand that Average Joe Fan doesn’t care about the details of these labor meetings. Nobody’s a fan of baseball because they love to follow league negotiations. The bottom line is THERE IS NO BASEBALL. And they shoulder a portion of the blame. Baseball fans hate what’s going on right now, we despise everyone involved. The players should at least pretend to empathize.
What was the point of meeting if they aren’t willing to compromise?
If the non-roster players are going to have their season, then I think the major leaguers can really go screw, because playing the game is what real baseball is all about – gotta check out the NH Fisher Cats, Vermont Lake Monsters or Lowell Spinners this year
I haven’t seen them but the Savannah Banana’s are the ones i would like to see. Entertainment, affordable by all. Forget these guys that want more than $200,000 A GAME
Unfortunately, the Lowell Spinners no longer exist. They were one of the Short-Season A ball teams that were eliminated last year. You can still see the Portland Red Sox (wish they were still called the Seadogs), or take a trip to Worcester and check out the awesome new stadium they built. It is a launching pad for HRs.
I really hope local networks decide to televise AA & AAA games this year while the lockout is in place. I just want to watch some professional baseball; it doesn’t need to be MLB baseball per se.
Can’t wait to have both parties sit around for a week before holding their next unproductive meeting
They’re all still dancing around the flame. We’ll have little movement until there is progress on the CBT from ownership.
By that time there will be a small chance that players will be getting drafted.
The players have seemingly already decided to sacrifice the season (they’re funded for it) since they view the CBT as effectively becoming a salary cap. They’re correct. Last season, basically 1/3rd of MLB teams were constrained by the CBT based on their CBT payroll and their actions. My point is this is a battle they are going to fight to the end.
The reason I remain optimistic is the owners are not prepared to fight this to the end. They can afford it near term, but they love their money, and they stand to lose an enormous amount this year, not to mention the long-term damage they’ll face. The players, however, view this as a forced salary cap, so they’ll fight it to the end. The owners will recognize the CBT gap likely can be bridged with an increase of $10MM in year one, with moderate increases throughout the five years, so it doesn’t take a genius to see eventually ownership will cave. They are ego-driven enough though to have this drag on another month.
I agree with you 100%, which is why I’m baffled as to the constant defensive posturing of the players. If they aren’t just blowing smoke and genuinely believe that they have grievances, and further claim that they are financially prepared to weather the storm, why don’t they grow a pair, state their bottom line demands and walk away from the table. I think a big part of that, to put pressure on the owners is stating that they will not play for prorated salaries.
FSF: You make a very good point but I think I know the answer. If the owners decide to cancel the season & this goes to impasse, the players want to demonstrate that they continued negotiating, & did it in good faith (ie, not with a hard line “take it or leave it” stance). I think it’s a wise, long-term outlook. I also think the owners are trying to push precisely that outcome to argue a lack of good faith.
Hopefully, through this they can find some common ground and come to terms though.
If the players don’t want a “forced salary cap” then let them give up guaranteed contracts like in other sports.
They’re really good at asking for the moon in this fight but they don’t want to give anything of real essence up.
The things they’ve “caved on” were idiotic asks in the first place.
Until the players give up guaranteed contracts or something similar in substance…. I hope the owners give one last proposal and tell them to take it or leave it. And then they cancel the season if the union rejects.
The owners are having to think about the entire 5 year deal as it pertains to profit. Even by cancelling the season to force a fair agreement, they probably make it up in the totality of the agreement.
Let the players get real jobs that aren’t guaranteed contracts and raises are based on performance and are not 40% just because they demand it.
College football spring camps start soon any way
That’s a fair point. The PR optics are worthwhile.
Rob- I posted below the idea that the players being willing to give on penalties for the highest tier could serve as a deterrent to “runaway spending” without hardening the de facto salary cap on the lowest tier CBT threshold.
At the same time, we didn’t read it today, but expanding playoffs to 14 teams would be aimed at those same owners who are driving the opposition to raising the CBT to any reasonable level, by giving them more playoff spots to shoot for and increasing their revenue even if they only make a run at late season relevance.
The players are looking for another way around the remaining obstacles.
Why should players give up guaranteed contracts? And what owner has ever been forced to give one?
@bigjonliljon Every sport has guaranteed contracts. They are called signing bonuses and guaranteed money.
MLB is the only major sport with 100% gully guaranteed contracts. There are partially guaranteed contracts in other sports but not 100%
@RobM, yes. This battle is a continuation of the 1994/5 strike, which was about MLB trying to implement a salary cap. Owners smartly slow walked a salary cap into the game under a different name, and either the players only just noticed it, or only just decided to fight it. Regardless, fight it they will. For both sides, this isn’t about the dollars in the CBT, which seem bridgeable, but about holding current and future ground in a salary cap.
Yes, and a salary cap has never been part of the game. So while you criticize the players for asking for more money because they’ve had a raise in the last CBA, you cite things they shouldn’t be entitled to on the very premise they’ve never had it. Meanwhile, on the flip side, you say the owners should have a cap because other sports have it? Talk about hypocritical….
bigjon,
What’s your point? Why not have fully guaranteed contracts? Maybe the other leagues should have them.
@Rob M
It was actually 5 teams. Only 6 teams have ever gone over the cap, so 24 of the 30 aren’t setting their payroll based on the CBT. Raising the CBT does damage to competition. How much more than their competition do the Yankees, Mets and Dodgers really need? Want to see players salaries go down? Let two or three teams constantly win it all. The other teams will learn its not worth paying out for that one big contract that can destroy their franchise if it goes bad, when the Yankees can sign 4 of them and be fine if two go south. Then who will Correa sign with?
And the players don’t seem to understand the PR optics, IMO.
@stymeedone, Eno Sarris over at The Athletic had a nice chart and breakdown on CBT payrolls last year. (I pasted the chart at the bottom of this post). It can get very confusing for fans when looking at opening day payrolls, season-ending payrolls and CBT payrolls. People will use different ones depending on the argument they’re trying to make.
When discussing the CBT, it’s obvious that the only payroll that matters is CBT. So in 2021, seven teams were at or exceeded $200MM. Two other teams — one being the Cardinals — sat fractionally below at $199 and change. Sarris outlined the various moves teams made and didn’t make to correctly conclude that those nine teams at minimum were CBT constrained. They weren’t trying to win; they were trying to stay under the salary cap by a different name.
We’re at a point now where the Padres had a higher payroll than the Yankees. The Yankees traded multiple prospects so they could add a MLB player at zero cost so they wouldn’t go over the CBT threshold. They gave Adam Ottavino and a prospect to one one of their main division rivals, the Red Sox, simply to constrain their payroll. They ended up in a tie with the Red Sox, who beat them in a one-game playoff. The Rangers paid Odor’s entire salary so the Yankees could add him, and in return the Yankees traded prospects. The Padres wanted to add Joey Gallo, but didn’t want to make the trade unless they could move Hosmer. The Cardinals did not make moves so they would not approach the CBT. And don’t forget, the Red Sox traded away their home-grown, generational talent in Mookie Betts, who was beloved in Boston, so they could manage to the CBT.
The fact that only two teams exceeded the CBT is not argument teams aren’t constrained, it’s an argument that teams are constrained.
Dodgers — 285.6
Padres –216.5
Phillies –209.4
Yankees –208.4
Mets –207.7
Red Sox –207.6
Astros –206.6
Angels –199.0
Cardinals –198.4
“progress”.
Baseball writer Travis Sawchik was asked who the most influential voice was on the players’ side. His answer: Scott Boras.
I find that disturbing, since this agreement is supposed to be between the players and the owners. It’s a little like the owners strongest voice being Merrill Lynch.
Doesn’t that count as outside interference?
I have already said that Boras should receive a lifetime ban.
Bill Madden also reported Boras being the most influential on the players side. Both sides can consult whoever they want.
I’d hire Boras as my agent, and if was part of the MLBPA, I’d want Boras as one of the chief advisors. They likely realized their mistake by not listening to his warnings on the prior CBAs.
Outside advisors are used on both sides, and frankly, I have a difficult time viewing Boras and the other agents involved here as “outside advisors.” They are very much part of the game when it comes to players and their compensation. They have to be approved by the MLBPA. They are part of the game, so anyone presenting them as being outside are being misleading, if not purposely disingenuous. As I stated prior, MLB knows Boras is not popular among a certain set of fans, so they’re trying to play him up to counter fans dislike of Manfred.
Sometimes outside advisors can be quite damaging though. During the ’94-’95 strike, MLB used an outside advisor, who is generally credited with throwing fuel on that fire that pushed the players toward the strike. That outside advisor? Rob Manfred. It’s funny (in an unfunny way) when Manfred claimed there had never been a labor stoppage and lost games on his watch. He conveniently ignored his role in 1994/95.
You have no idea RobM whether “outside advisers are used on both sides”. It doesn’t help the discussion when you just fabricate like that. l
Boras doesnt have a single other persons interest at hand other than lining his own businesses pockets. His business. That HE OWNS. he is a business owner. Open his books
@days – Hmm, sounds familiar…. kind of like, I dunno, an MLB owner?
Didnt catch the meaning of the statement, no surprise there
OK
A Lifetime Baseball Fan hear, but I don’t think either side has “The FANs” interest in heart here. I have been through every Strike, lockout, work stoppage, NO World Series from MLB and I always came back! I am getting sick of Millionaires fighting over a Game! Either play or don’t play or the MLB Players start their own league or something!
When does Soccer or World Cup Seasons start, you are on the verge of getting a new FAN!
The best soccer leagues in the world (in England, Spain, Germany, Italy) started in September and are in the middle of their seasons. Here in the US the MLS started last week. The World Cup is only played every 4 years (there is no “season”) and it will be held this year in November./December. If you really had even the slightest intent of being a fan you would have known at least some of that.
It seems to me the question was likely asked rhetorically. No need for the self-righteous response.
I feel like a deal could be reached if the player’s union would back off on the luxury tax. Should be more concerned about incentives for younger players than making sure mad max gets his 40 million/year on a WS contender.
If the top salaries go up, the expect all salaries to go up. It’s much more than the players at the top of the food chain.
In principle maybe. In reality the 1% stars like Mad Max will just get larger contracts and the average guys will get the squeeze. The stars will just want more of the cap space
The number of total players in baseball has declined due to the shrinking minor league systems, so these numbers the players are tossing out are more Outrageous. If you are major league talented you will eventually get paid, many times, see Verlander,even if you haven’t done squat in two years and are coming off a blown arm. Mlb players are mostly overpaid in my opinion.
There will be floor without a cap. Since there will be no cap, there will be no floor. I’d be shocked if there was a floor.
If the owners are going to stick at a $220M CBT initial threshold then the players should demand a minimum salary floor of $110M. The Pirates and Orioles both had payrolls ~ $60M and neither of these teams were competitive. So maybe t the players should turn the screws a bit and say OK we don’t need the big market teams spending big bucks but we need every team to at least spend. Those owners who don’t want to spend should pack their bags, sell their team and get the F out of the way
A win through free agency cost $8M. Small and mid-market teams trying to win through free agency are going to fail. Sure, they might go from 60 to 66 wins but it’s not going to make them contenders. It’s a strategy for the truly incompetent. Don’t blame teams for not being incredibly stupid. Also, don’t blame teams for trying to keep the level of financial disparity in check. I understand why fans of big market teams want the CBT to increase significantly but it’s unfair to most fans and bad for the game.
Your argument would be stronger except the Rays and A’s have shown you don’t have to spend $110 million to ‘be competitive”. If you raised the floor to that level, you’d still have teams that are poorly run AND heavily outspent…unless you constrict the top ceiling as well. The only way teams will be judged on their merits is if all the teams worked from the same payroll levels. That’s not going to happen, but fans in small markets who want to be competitive should recognize that raising the floor won’t increase their chances if the top teams can just spend more.
Whoa! Here you go with the “money can’t buy championships”. So why then should there be a cap? If teams can win so well on cheaper roster payrolls, why cap them? Who cares if Yankees spend $300M?
You just contradicted yourself within two sentences.
Maybe if the Rays and A’s had spent $100 million, they’d have won a championship or two. (Talking about moneyball era A’s here)
Your conclusion seems to be twisted to support your narrative. The entire point is that the top teams can spend literally twice as much. Therefore, it is an absolute certainty the lower revenue teams MUST produce more wins per dollar spent. Pursuing a strategy that requires produces and extremely low win to $ spent ratio is truly incompetent. The merit of free agency decreases proportionate to the revenue advantage held by top teams.
@YankeeClipper, money alone can’t buy championships. but lots and lots of money can. Let’s Play Ball is correct in pointing out that a small market team adding an expensive free agent will not make them competitive unless they are doing other things right. However, a team with lots of money could spend their way to a championship or at least contention by signing several expansive free agents and spending to keep home grown talent. After a certain level of spending, more money covers failures, incompetencies, etc.
Wait, so can money buy championships then? You cannot have it both ways. Either it can or it can’t. And, I think you seriously overvalue the addition of one or two contracts by inserting some convenient hyperbole where it suits your needs and say they would get all the top FAs. No, they couldn’t. They never did, never would. Look at history as an example.
And, it’s hard to say those other teams need to be more intuitive, inventive, or anything else when they don’t even spend 50% the free money given to them specifically for payroll. Why should teams be limited in spending because other teams refuse to spend? There’s no such thing as an endless budget, btw. Any rudimentary education in economics would teach one the self-limiting effects of reckless spending in FA.
Maybe if the Rays and A’s had spent $100 million, they’d have won a championship or two. (Talking about moneyball era A’s here)
Vtbaseball: Excellent point.
Vtbaseball- The Rays almost won it in 2020. A call here. A call there.
Winslow- “almost”. Maybe had they spent a little more it would have pushed them beyond “almost”. A couple of close calls don’t make or break a game, there’s a lot more to it than that.
Yes a floor won’t do anything. The small market teams would just spend the 100 million floor every year. Where as now they may spend 60 70 when rebuilding but will spend 130 140 when contending. They will just do team friendly contracts and buy out arbitration years they would have paid anyways.
LOL! The only ‘screws’ the players turn are on themselves. All of the owners will be fine without Major League Baseball. Players can take up their natural careers with Grubhub, Ubereats and driving for Amazon. The best off will make it to Sales Mgr at the car dealership. Turn the screws! LOL!
And owners can scramble to find a $100 million dollars of financing to keep their teams afloat.
FSF: Very true, and the great thing about the small-market-centered baseball we currently have is that they receive $118M already in just shared revenue (ie, free money), so they should have a bare naked minimum roster payroll of $100M.
Again, both sides are at fault. There are no good guys or bad guys, just two sides looking out for their own self interests.
One thing is clear, there was going to be a work stoppage, I’m glad it’s now rather than this Summer.
This is almost embarrassing. Wait, no. It IS embarrassing.
When baseball starts, the fans won’t be there. At least the good fans.
All I wanted to see was a Mets season, win or lose. Just baseball. No fluff.
These comments about “good fans,” “real fans,” “smart fans” are absurd and self-serving. It’s saying, “If you agree with me, you’re right. If you don’t, you’re foolish.” Gimme a break.
They are going to ruin the 75th anniversary of Jackie Robinson at this pace…and we are back to 90 minute meetings again. These “negotiators” are SOOOOO BAD at their jobs. Time to compromise and get back on the dang field! Do your freaking job!!!!!!
How many uniquely different things are being negotiated for at the same time here? Pitch clocks, playoff teams, super 2, minimum salary, bonus pool, the size of baseballs, defensive shifts, luxury tax…
My goodness… why not move the mound and add a safety bag at first while we’re at it…
A five-year agreement for an $11B/yr industry makes things complicated.
MLB should fire Rob Manfred and promote deputy commissioner Dan Halem to interim commissioner and the MLBPA should fire Tony Clark and promote Daniel Murphy to interim executive director, so both sides will get the deal done and end the lockout.
That would me make way too much sense for this group of clowns.
What are you going to do with Scott Boras ? He is the one ruining it for everyone,if you look at a picture of him it reminds me of Putin
Jimbob,
Now that’s a really useful, apt, and timely comparison. /s
People are throwing around the word ruin like it has meaning. Baseball will survive and might even be better.. I’m looking forward to anti-shift rules.
Give us Robo umps and kick those tainted blue bums to the curb.
…or a system that sends garbage umps down to a level where they belong.
Also, MLB better be careful and not assume the fans will just show up. Last time games were lost, there was a 20 percent decline in attendance upon returning to the field for play. That was during a time of increasing attendance.
This will be the first time during a period of declining attendance. The impact could be far greater than 20 percent with all the other options fans have to spend their entertainment dollars on. That 20 percent loss in gate revenue would be far worse than giving an additional $20 million or so to close the pre-arb pool gap or the increase from $220 million to $230 million on CBT levels.
That is not what their after ,they want all the big market teams to spend more , they could care less about small market teams. They want all big market teams to spend more of their profits so that there are more 30 -40 -50 millionaires players so agents like Scott Boras can rule Scherzer is nothing but a mouth piece for Boras
Teams like the marlins who rather be cheap than win are the reason we are in a lockout rn.
@MetsFan22
Say what you will…and I agree that the Marlins suck…but the Mets have consistently locked themselves out of the playoffs.
This is true, 48team. But with new ownership I do see a change. How much change? Who the fudge knows?
the Marlins have been to the playoffs…THREE TIMES. sure they won it all two of those times, but havent for years now.
Man.
I know some of you guys are pretty into debating players vs owners. Which is fine. Ya know? You do you or whatever.
But as a baseball “topic” I – personally – can’t think of a more boring one. Mercy. Reminds me of our quarterly meeting with the accountant. Where I mutter, “sounds good” or “OK” at what I hope are appropriate intervals.
Also: I still contend the Circle Change is just a screwball with a new name. So. Anyone who wants to argue about *that*, well here I am.
I agree. Screwball with a slightly different grip. Like the sinker v 2-seamer, right?
Ducky, Robbie, LordD99, and I all ruminated on which three or four guys the Yankees would acquire in trade or via FA on another thread. Care to opine?
Got a bite!
I think it’s the same grip. Enrique Romo showed he used the same grip as – for example – Felix Hernandez does for his “change up”. Felix even uses it like a breaking ball.
The classic internet debate centers around the supination. Does the forearm rotate or not. Now I always point out Hernandez’s pitch & you can see he rolls his forearm a little. Kind of like a milder, inverted twist like on your slider.
I tried to throw one when I was a kid. Used a curve grip & tried to roll my forearm like I was throwing my curve – except 180° difference. I couldn’t get it anywhere near the plate & – obviously – it made my forearm sore as heck.
I did the same thing as you and could actually get the ball to fade. I met a guy in college who did the same thing with his tennis serve. And there was always golf where sometimes you intentionally slice the ball. Even when you shoot a basketball you can do it a little. The problem I had was maintaining decent velocity on the pitch and getting it to fade and drop. The circle change happened for me around age 40 and I threw one whole good one out of a dozen tries. Leave it up and ouch. I think of them as different. Never got to a splitter, that could have been interesting. I have pretty big hands, heck I play double bass, but control was always an issue. Sound familiar? Oh well.
Ya know, I probably threw about 100 of them. I abandoned the effort because none of them even came close to the plate. It was also slow as hell & made my forearm feel weird.
Yes.
Sounds very familiar. I threw a no-mo in High School once. & lost. Do you have any idea how many BB’s, HBP’s, & WP’s it takes to give up 8 earned through 6? Well: I sure do.
I had pin point control and a fast ball that could be ticketed for loitering.
I remember the other team cheering on their hitters suggesting they pick a color of the rainbow. Because that’s what my pitches looked like.
Thank God I didn’t have ten more miles on my fastball, I would have signed any contract they would have given me and spent my 20s languishing in the minor leagues.
Or: via a combination of filling out, getting stronger, & good coaching you add 10 *more* mph. You make over 400 starts in the Bigs & retire at 39 a millionaire several times over, & the favorite player of a bunch of kids. Several of whom shed tears when you hang up the spikes.
@Yankee Clipper, I do reserve the right to change my trade/FA proposals, but I’ll hold with my suggestions for now.
@Ducky, I think the circle change is a cousin of a screwball. Very closely related…but what do I know?
I used to go to fangraphs a lot. Was even a member. They had a lot of great stuff about pitch development & mechanics. @Rangers29 is so lucky. In the Olden Dayes we had to talk to guys or get books from the library to learn how to throw different pitches. Now these young pitchers have all this great stuff. Right on their phones! Man.
Anyway, it comes down to wether the pitcher rotates his arm or not. To me the best analogy is slider vs cut fb. I never threw a cut, but my understanding is that it’s just a fb with your slider grip. So: no supination. If the circle change was thrown just like a fb then it would be different. When I’ve tried throwing one with a pair of rolled up socks or whatever, my wrist just seems to naturally roll over. Which is why I contend it’s just rebranding.
Another one: how is that Zach Greinke will actually throw change ups with a higher velo than some of his fastballs.
Would get or guys I want?
For me it’s been Rizzo, Story, Chirinos for awhile now. I’m pro Voit for a salary dump Lorenzo Cain too. Until our offense, defense, & bench are dealt with I am not thinking much about the rotation. Which is interesting as the only offer we know Cash made was to Verlander.
But we need to somehow find at least 100 runs laying around somewhere between now & Opening Day, Clip.
Tell ya. Two *more* available playoff spots is probably good news for a lot of fans. As Yankee fans? Not so much. Bro. I am admittedly a terrible GM. This has been known since 2015 at the old RAB. That being acknowledged, even I could probably get us into a Wild Card with $200MM with the new spots, serious. What’s that? 84-85 wins?
Good excuse for Hal & Cash though; “Well we made the playoffs. Which are a crapshoot blahfeckingblahblahblah”.
@duckybuckinfent
How dare you come in here and change the topic to actual baseball!
I miss the Yanks. I miss Spring Training. I miss baseball, man.
I go to YouTube and watch games.
Stymeedone: Hey man, just want to make sure you understand, Stymeedone, you’re a frequent commenter on here & I respect you. I differ with a lot of those taking the more extreme positions, but I still look forward to talking actual baseball with you and the other board guys.
DBF, Glad to.
The Circle Change is where the Thumb and Forefinger form a Circle on the side of the Ball and the ScewBall is basically a FB with the hand turned inward at Release giving it a opposite fade to the Hitter. A Lefty screw ball will fade away from a Righty and a righty fades away from a Lefty.
Extremely hard on the Elbow
Ya know @Byron, I used to think the same thing. But back when fangraphs wrote about baseball as opposed to personal morality I read an article about Felix Hernandez. & the grip on his change up is exactly how you described & behaves exactly like you described a screwball does. Someone in the comments posted how they are the same pitch.
Since, I’ve looked into it quite a bit. I remain convinced it’s the same pitch different name.
Amen, amen, Fent I don’t get the allure, lotta grasping at straws and some folk could probably use a little more fresh air outside the house in here
But on the bright side all humans repress pain quickly , this thing will lift soon and we will be treated to a buncha real BASEBALL action here which will drive some real discussions
I understand that it’s not simple.
& as building contractor I realize that the bigger the contract the greater chance of contentiousness when dividing the spoils. I think it’s something inherent in our nature.
But.
I could care less who “wins.” I can’t relate to either side. & I have little patience for the rhetoric issued from both parties.
What I care about is that it’s snow goose season. From early Feb-April I take a weekly trip & follow the migration from Northern Mo/Southern IA all the way to the Canadian border. Lotta driving. At points it’ll be over 400 miles each way. But normally I can catch the Yanks (both spring & regular season games).
Listening to those games is a piece of the Whole Deal. It’s a part of the backdrop. I also realize May is around the corner along with the building season & my life gets swallowed up by work.
I know Messrs Manfred & Clark could give a rat’s about me & what I want. But if I said I wasn’t disappointed in all this, I would be lying, Cap.
Just wanted to tip my cap to all the fellas who took a few minutes to humor me. You guys are awesome, man.
Have great nights.
Catch you guys next time.
What we need is someone like Joe D. Someone almost bigger than the game itself. Willie Mays (?), or someone else, that has pure love for the game from an epoch that precedes the “ money “ generations. Someone to harmonize the three-headed unit of baseball and bring it back into perspective.
Remember when Joe D said the best moment of his life was “putting on the pinstripes?” And when he couldn’t wait just for Opening Day to go to Yankees Stadium? I still loathe Hal for tearing that down. They should’ve stayed in that ballpark. It was a shrine, a living monument.
Sorry, @Halo11.
But: Mike Trout should have been a Yankee.
Don’t pull my Yankee fan card, Clip.
I have never been to the new ballpark. Now, my grandfather was a season ticket holder for the Yanks & Giants. As such, I was going to The Stadium since before I can remember. Saw a lot of ballgames there, man. Some pretty big one’s too. However – to me – the new park has just never looked “right”.
To be completely honest – I have no desire to actually see YSIII. Ever.
Yankee Clipper
I still loathe Hal for tearing that down.
=========================================
I absolutely loved the pageantry of Opening Day at Yankee Stadium. For one of the few times during the year, I’d leave the pub a little early just to stare at the field and imagine Ruth, Joe D., Gherig, Mattingly out there.
But the old Yankee Stadium was a dive. If you wanted a beer, you’d be on a line that started on the outside wall of the stadium. Popcorn meant you were missing at least a half-inning. No elevator meant at least a 15-minute wait to exit. You had two choices to eat. A nice hot dog and a cold hot dog.
The new stadium meant a 5-minute wait for a beer, with a huge choice. Had I asked for a Guinness in the old joint, they’d have laughed. 10 different food choices within a 3-minute walk. More bathrooms. Walking in from 161st & River Avenue is something that every BB fan in the world should do once. It is literally a ‘holy cr*p’ moment.
And, yes, the old stadium was hallowed ground, but they also put it to pretty good use. The BB field is always in use, and the field on top of the parking garage allows for both FB and soccer.
Limiting the shift is a great step towards improving the game as far as action is concerned. Thank goodness for that. Not sure what to think about the bigger bases and the pitch clock, tho. I’m thinking the pitch clock would definitely create more flow to the game.
I assume that increased base size does not include home plate?
Ghost home plate, ump makes strike zone based on much he is being nagged by wife.
Enjoy watching the infielders stand in chalk circles before every pitch and extra umps on the field to police violators.. I guess they will be using “ghost” balls as a penalty for violating the shift.
The concession in allowing some “non monetary” penalties in the CBT could be significant, as it has previously applied only to the third tier penalties, which currently are on payrolls above $250 million, of $40 million above the lowest threshold.
In that case, the penalties would serve as a deterrent to “runaway spending”, applying to only the Dodgers in 2021 and only the Mets so far in 2022, but not to teams contemplating any moves who are nearing the lowest threshold.
The fact remains that the players are not going to agree to harden the de facto salary cap that the CBT has become on the lowest threshold, and the owners know this.
We didn’t read about the 14 team playoff, but it’s the same owners driving the bus on CBT penalties that would benefit from expanded playoffs, so that’s a trade that might actually happen.
Just please keep the stupid notion of “ghost wins” out of it.
@Patrick O’Kennedy
The “non-monetary penalties” idea would actually make sense. Make a team forfeit a draft pick for going over the CBT and then forfeit another draft pick for every $5 million after that.
A reduction of 21 minutes? Now add the DH and add another 45 minutes to the game just in offense. Idiots running and ruining the show!
It’s not the length of the game. It’s the pace of play within the game. More hitting and more SBs is what they’re shooting for.
Spring training games go quickly. Far fewer commercial breaks.
You do realize the the American league uses the DH right? The average AL game is just 5 mintues longer than the average NL game. Not 45 minutes.
Who do Yankees give up to get Jason Giambi back?
Jeter isn’t doing anything at the moment
They are so far away from each other and 2022 season is long gone.
So basically we are back to the tactics of January. Move the ball 2 centimeters, wait a week for a response when the ball will be moved 3 centimeters for one issue and 2 centimeters back the other way for another issue.
I’m on the fence with this impasse. No I mean literally on the fence, at Petco Park actually. Above the 400 ft sign. I’ve boobytrapped the scoreboard and spiked the punch in the locker room. I’m chained to the flagpole and laden with nitro. Bumperstickers will be issued if there’s not an agreement by next Wednesday.
Enjoy your last three dats!
you could go to jail for that statement. be careful joking around terrorist actions.
Yes the threat of bumperstickers carries 20 years without parole
At this point, I am amazed that there ever was baseball. Unions destroy everything they touch.
@ players – unions gave you a 40 hour work week, the weekend, the end of child labor, 8 hour work day, Unemployment Benefits,Workers Compensation Laws, Employer-Based Health Coverage, and the Family and Medical Leave Act. You’re welcome.
He’d prefer to die in a sweat shop or a ditch next to it and leave his fingerless children an orphan because whatever his boss gives him is more than good enough for him.
Medical care is for commies!!! Vacation is for the weak!!!!
Nonsense! Unions lobbied for some of those things. Honestly, what good have unions done for employees in the last twenty to thirty years. I worked for one of the worst, the teachers union. How are your kids doing after that union refused to teach for well over a year?
Dave, your point is valid, and I always assert, that’s the problem. One side with too much control leads to a response, usually too far the other way, and they both do damage because of human nature. That’s why neither side can have absolute control. I use the NYC teachers union as a prime example on the union side.
Many on this board who want to destroy unions don’t understand the inherent danger in that action, that it is that very response that created these types of powerful unions in the first place because of the natural pendulum shift – the equal and opposite force, if you will. It’s why a lack of objectivity in this scenario will backfire on either side, but especially on the owners, because they’re the ones with the power, thus the ones with the responsibility.
THE EVEN YEAR THING IS HAPPENING AGAIN. Last decade it was the Giants winning championships in 2010, 2012 and 2014. This decade it’s just going to be shortened seasons in 2020 (COVID), 2022 (lockout) and 2024 (aliens will finally attack).
Could we ask the aliens to expedite their timetable?
This isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. The head of the players union is leading them down the wrong path.
Spring training in June, in Arizona should be fun.
Daily high temperatures for Phoenix from 99°F to 106°F, rarely falling below 91°F or exceeding 112°F in June.
The MLPA may find there’s a faction of players who train in AZ who want to come to an agreement sooner than the players who train in Florida.
I have to laugh when I see players complaining about a pitch clock. Since 1888, the following has been in effect for MLB. Based on the rule book of the past.
12 seconds from when the pitcher receives the ball back from the catcher and the batter is in the box and alert to the pitcher – with no runners on. It rises to 30 seconds with runners on base..
It is rarely enforced because:
The rule book makes clear that the intent is to avoid unnecessary delays to the game… even though there is no time limit to the game.
If the batter feels the pitcher is taking too long he can ask for “time.” So instead of penalties we most often get a cat-and-mouse game between pitcher and batter.
It is a pure judgment call on the part of the plate umpire, based primarily on body language, and the penalty is a ball being called. Nobody wants an ump penalizing a team because their pitcher has a bad attitude.
It starts getting called when both teams are complaining about delays.
I don’t understand why they don’t make a list of the things they can agree on and then whittle it down from there. Stop going back and forth on 20 things when you can probably agree on 14 of them without a ton of arguing.
1) Sky is sometimes blue.
2) The baseball is sometimes round.
3) We don’t like each other.
And that’s about where one side would start arguing that #3 should be listed #1, and the whole process breaks down.
They should at least be able to agree on which wing sauce to get for the next “meeting.”
I don’t see how the players offer was worse. I agree it wasn’t much better but no way it was worse as MLB is claiming.
It was said the players verbally offered more concessions. That is why it was worse.
Concessions in exchange for what? Everything is a give and take, and we haven’t had a session yet that the owners didn’t come out an spin out of context. I’d take comments like that with a grain of salt
A concession in exchange for getting a CBA agreed to, and future paychecks.
Honest question: why are larger bases needed?
some level of frustration with calls being overturned on replay when a player slightly comes off the bag- or so at least one report said
Manny, I heard this believe it or not: to encourage more small ball–less distance to run. More stealing, bunting, etc. Like I said, believe it or not but I heard a baseball talking head say it. Another thought I had was first basemen and secondbasemen would be further in the hole to avoid shift need. Owners want to eliminate shifts to get more offense. BUT, I can only guess cuz my thoughts are pretty lame…as is this lockout. So anyone??? any ideas ???
The only idea I could come up with is 1st base (I believe what softball and little league already use..?) to avoid collisions and feet getting tangled on bad throws.
I think it will only cause more issues at 2B and 3B, particularly on steal attempts, giving the runner more real estate to reach safely, and more potential area for the defender to catch and apply the tag.
I suppose it depends on how much bigger we’re talking about..which I fully admit I have not yet seen.
@Manny, I believe it’s all part of a variety of changes MLB wants to make to get more action back in the game. Here’s what I found on MLB.com when they experimented with larger bases in the low minors last year:
“The subtle increase in size provides more room for players to operate around the bases, reducing the odds of the kinds of collisions that have caused foot and ankle injuries in the past. And the more grippy surface could potentially prevent injuries such as the knee issue Bryce Harper suffered in 2017, when he slipped on a wet first-base bag in rainy conditions.
This change also slightly decreases the distance between bases. While the impact is likely modest, the three inches would theoretically lead to more ground balls and bunts getting beat out at first base and, perhaps, more successful stolen-base attempts, thereby increasing both base traffic and action.”
——–
I’m not sure I fully buy the first part of the article. Wouldn’t an increased grippy bag perhaps lead to more injuries? I feel the second part of the statement is more correct. I also know they were also experimenting with either changing and/or limiting pick-off moves as part of an effort to increase action and SBs. My thought on this is the same as limiting shifts: Let’s give it a try if it will increase action and limit some part of three-true-outcome baseball.
@Rob- so are we talking an inch and a half on each side, or 3? 3 seems like we wouldn’t be far from being able to lay out a picnic lunch on them..
Beats me! I will say though that an additional three inches could lead to extra satisfaction for some.
Only if they know how to use it.
SOME Rob??? Any attempts to enlarge the fan base by getting more women excited about baseball are strokes of genius imo. I believe there have been many in depth studies. BIGGER bases! Great idea!
It’s hard to get women excited about baseball when the closest a woman has gotten to The Show is Erin the umpire from the Enbrel commercial.
What’s Enbrel?
Claude- I believe it’s for rheumatoid arthritis. Works best on C-lister actresses portraying actual arthritis sufferers.
Holy crap, Manny, I laughed my ass off. I need to remember you and Rob. My humor ain’t great but it’s good to know I have at least a few accomplices. There’re so many depressing things going on.
Manny, the foul line is against one edge, so it’s an extra 3 inches. 6 after adding second base. So Rob, 6 extra inches towards that satisfaction issue. Could come in handy when the bags are loaded after the 5th
To reduce the need for oven mittens.♂️
YES!!! Awesome response by owners. Stay patient. Players are losing by the day and will cave. Was so worried they were losing their backbone, but this latest answer is perfect.
Looks like we’re now back at the owner-obstructionist phase where every MLBPA offer is ridiculed, and then MLB will respond with their own offer showing little movement. Manfred will continue to cancel more games and eventually he’ll create another fake deadline declaring the season will be cancelled unless an agreement is made by xx date, trying to force another frenzied negotiation.
I’ll check back tomorrow. Nothing new today!
The players give, the Billionaires take. That’s it in a nutshell!
Love the use of the word “billionaire” like the players aren’t doing just fine! You realize the evil empire you describe is willing to pay EVERY player a minimum of $700,000 a year. Every one of them. The worst person in their industry will make that. Pretty damn good. The owners continue to negotiate from a position of power, just like you would if you had their leverage. It’s just smart. Sorry.
Aptly named, wacky macky.
The MLB doesn’t want a deal they want full capitulation. The current owner group led by their gap-toothed Napoleon seems hellbent on destroying MLB as a major sport.
Silly take.
“the mlb”
pipe down dummy
Just had a wild idea. Stop worrying about salary caps for teams. Institute salary caps for players. A team cannot pay any player more than a reasonable percentage of the entire payroll. Example: $100 million payroll, highest paid player can be paid 20% ($20 million annual salary).
The nba had the right idea with salary and contracts.
Cap the maximum amount (20-25 mill a year max would be good) raise the minimum.
Make service time 40-50 man roster dependent 5 years after being placed on 40 man roster for first time. Id increase roster size.
Get rid of draft pick attachment. Let teams get draft pick compensations for free agents they lose. Similar to nfl formula.
Limit how many years other teams can offer. If someone holds their bird rights, think thats the name in nba, home team can offer 5 years. 0thers can offer 4. Id say cap it at 8 years from rival teams and 10 years from home team if they hold the rights. Give players incentive for staying with an organization. 10 years 250 mill or 8 years 200 mill. More than enough money.
The NBA has ELEVEN exceptions to their salary cap. Most are to allow teams to retain their current players.
Bird rule, non Bird rule, Early bird rule, mid level exception, rookie exception, etc, etc.
More NBA teams were over the “cap” than MLB teams.
But they also have five year MAX contracts for players, who can make no more than 30 percent of the team payroll, (with much smaller rosters)
Max contracts is a great idea. These decade long contracts are poison and ownership knows it. If the players were serious about getting the league minimum raised, faster arbitration eligibility etc they would give the owners 5 year max contracts. That would be huge negotiating leverage
I think the players ought to offer a salary cap too. The owners cap their spending anyway. Fighting a cap tooth and nail is REALLY stupid
Well. Least we will get a good look at minor leaguers this year.
Empires spokesperson Darth Vader stated, “Alderaan had it coming. Peaceful? Yeah, right. How peaceful is a planet that’s getting blown up? Know what I’m saying?”
Of course the owners are not going to agree to anything the players put forth. Their desire is to get the players to knuckle under and take whatever deal they want to shove down their throats. This may not be settled……..ever.
Nonsense.
I don’t care anymore.
I no longer care about the actual season. I just want to see where everyone signs and which trades are made.
RIP Baseball. I consider myself fortunate to have followed the Red Sox from 1970 listening on a transistor radio that faded in and out to present day, listening on crystal clear XM..
Good job union, you destroyed another industry. Enjoy that golden goose Trout, Betts, Cole and all you other “slaves”. You have plucked it to the bone.
I followed the Reds from 1970, and listened on a transistor radio, when living in Colorado Springs.
The owners do not want April BB.
Once they lose 75 games or so, they start losing TV revenue.
The players, need to walk away for a bit, and put the screws to the cheap owners.
At least your owner wants to win.
Robo umps are the one good thing baseball might actually have in it’s future.
All I hear from both sides is blame and “blah blah blah blah”
MLB owners have no shame. Zip, zero, none. They think they can just lie, lie, lie, and it has no consequences. I can’t imagine where they got that idea.
Nonsense.
@eddie Could be they got the idea from turning on the tv and listening to any major news channel the past two years?
A lot of comments here, so someone may have already mentioned this, however, why are they only talking pitch counts? To me, most pitchers throw the ball faster than most hitters get ready in the box. To me, I’d prefer to see the hitters have to stay in the batter’s box or given a small window in which to do so. Look, all that adjusting the hitting gloves, and scratching and all that adds time when added up. If you view old footage, guys would step right back in and hit.
Time to talk about Median Mean or Average Salary, Total Salary.
Simple Stats OK. Now if Ohtani’s next contract is 50 million the Mean or average , and Total Salary goes way up but the Medium which is more important stays the same.
The Medium is the number where half the players make more and half the players make less. This deadlock is all about the rich players…
.The situation is hopeless…
It is median not medium.
I think there is a point in May where the league will lose some of the guaranteed TV money if there are no games. This may be a date that will get both sides to step back from the cliff.
Anyone seen the Penguin?
You mean Ron Cey?
Salary floor seems like a clear concession for the CBT
Apparently, the players have resisted an actual floor for fear it would eventually lead to a ceiling.
why so dramatic? there will not be a floor. if any, lower threshold is the way to go.
Famous Bill Parcells quote: “Don’t tell me about the labor. Just show me the baby.”
Forget Baseball, more time to fish
Nightengale, that shining example of reliability. He had the White Sox tied to Escobar last summer, then Verlander this winter, and then Semien and Robbie Ray. Then most recently last month, to Castellanos (post lockout speculation). I would put his comments in the category of meaningless, probably all for purposes of deception. He is a stooge of Reinsdorf if not other owners as well.
In the 60’s my dad was offered a contract to play with the Reds… He turned it down because welding paid more money. He was the best father!!! Wish he could’ve played pro ..
THE GAME I LOVED IS NO MORE. I HAVE BEEN A BASEBALL SUPER FAN SINCE 1961. THE GAME IS NOW OFFICIALLY GONE. I WILL WATCH THIS NEW SPORT AND HOPE TO SEE THINGS THAT MAKE ME LIKE IT, BUT IT NOT THE SAME GAME. PITCH CLOCKS ? UPSET WITH 3 HOUR GAMES ? WITH THE PRICE OF TICKETS FOOD AND PARKING THEY SHOULD PLAY 6 HOURS AND GIVE US THE ENTERTAINMENT WE DESERVE. JUST PENCIL PUSHERS TELLING US OUR GAME IS NOT GOOD AND THEY ARE FIXING IT, WELL THEY ARE NOT, IT IS RUINED. NO STATEGY, NO BUNTS, NO STEALS, MOVING MEN OVER, THE ART OF THE GAME IS GONE. THROW HARD AND HOPE, FOLLOWED BY SWING HARDER AND HOPE. NO SKILLS. SAD SAD TIMES FOR REAL BASEBALL FANS
OMG did my 13 year old daughter write this? All caps and all dramatic. RE-LAX!!!
i have crippled hands i cannot hit the buttons well. i am sorry the caps bothered you. i was not trying to be over dramitic, i just like the game the way it was, i will re-lax as you ask
Mike Paul-We don’t know who you are from a hole in the ground. Anyone that makes statements like that on a webpage carries no weight.
Winslow – that is only your opinion and he is entitled to his. Next time speak only for yourself. I do not hold your “we” opinion !!!
MIKE PAUL
THE GAME I LOVED IS NO MORE. I HAVE BEEN A BASEBALL SUPER FAN SINCE 1961. THE GAME IS NOW OFFICIALLY GONE. …GAME. PITCH CLOCKS ? UPSET WITH 3 HOUR GAMES ? WITH THE PRICE OF TICKETS FOOD AND PARKING THEY SHOULD PLAY 6 HOURS AND GIVE US THE ENTERTAINMENT WE DESERVE. JUST PENCIL PUSHERS TELLING US OUR GAME IS NOT GOOD AND THEY ARE FIXING IT, WELL THEY ARE NOT, IT IS RUINED. NO STATEGY, NO BUNTS, NO STEALS, MOVING MEN OVER, THE ART OF THE GAME IS GONE. THROW HARD AND HOPE, FOLLOWED BY SWING HARDER AND HOPE.
===================================
Not for nothing, but you sound like an old guy that has become inflexible,
I’ve been a fanatic since 1967, so we aren’t that far apart.
Pitch clocks? I am 100% in favor of. I’m a RS fanatic, but watching Buchholz shake off the catcher 5x on every pitch is insane. Watching Pedroia adjust his batting gloves for 5-10 seconds on every pitch, is insane.
SBs? I love a SB, but if you aren’t successful at least 70% of the time, don’t even bother. I don’t root for stupid BB even if it is what I grew up with.
Bunts (assuming you mean a sacrifice) and moving guys over, are usually negative plays. I think teaching guys to bunt for a hit, especially lefty batters, is crucial. But it’s usually a negative-value play.
I’m not telling people what to enjoy, but between 2004 (when Tito effectively eliminated the CS) and 2021, the AL has had 105 less SBs, but also 224 less CS. If you’re rooting for a SB, okay I guess, but if you are rooting to win, then you have to root for more selective SBs.
I think analytics, shifts and three true outcomes have changed the game for the worse, but what are you going to do.?
How about let the owners, whose job it is to make baseball appealing, be allowed to make rules to adapt to analytics? Football does this all the time.
How about rules, like robo umps, to circumvent the issue that men who throw the baseball have surpassed the ability of men to call judge where that baseball crosses home plate?
Less games Cubs pay Heyward . Life is good
it’s owners’ lockout. they will have to pay for games not played.
Players will not be compensated for games that are canceled due to the owner-imposed lockout, which creates a powerful tactic by which MLB owners can force the MLBPA into accepting a subpar deal. With every day that goes by, multi-millionaire players can lose out on hundreds of thousands of dollars per missed game.
so, the owners who have so much fixed cost won’t lose out millions? think!
Hayward has never lived up to the $$$ he has been paid. Outfield defense is his best quality. And, never a real offensive threat.
As for the defense shifts teams are deploying…to eliminate them altogether all at once is foolhardy at best. Teams are effectively using data to give themselves the best chance to get batters out. I have NO problem with that. Now if you want to make a new rule that says ALL INFIELDERS MUST PLAY ON THE INFIELD DIRT (OR CLOSER) THAT WOULD ELIMINATE THE EXTRA OUTFIELDER TEAMS ARE DEPLOYING
I already cancelled my MLBTV subscription and I’m quickly approaching the “it’s dead to me” level
Why is MLB Network doing local blackouts of college baseball games? In the DFW area other programming been on in its p
Just cancel the season.
I’m 100% with the owners.
How is it the players don’t make enough? Dude, they are complaining too much. It’s such a turn off to the fans. In the old days, players got paid so little they needed side jobs in the offseason. Players making $10 mil, $20 mil, $30 mil a year. Even $1 mil is too much to play children’s game, you don’t see me earning millions because I’m good at Monopoly. The players are too gready and it’s ruining the sport. I personally don’t care for the post season, it’s over saturated and having tons of teams in is stupid.
I love the season, 162 games, being able to compare stats and seasons from yesterday to today. Opening day is like Christmas. I’ll tell you, not getting 162 games pisses me off, it wrecked the season for me. And if games start again I have to pay a ton of money, I’ll never take my family to a game. And I’m not poor or a commie, I’m very well but even if I was a millionaire I’d never spend $12 on a hot dog. The prices are so extreme it’s going to collapse the sport, people don’t care about baseball, new generations think it’s boring (which it is, I love anyhow). Owners should cancel the entire season. Owners taking the risk in having all this money/contacts tied up is a dying sport, if there’s a pandemic or fans think the sport is stupid the owners still got to pay. The owners have too much risk, the players priced themselves out of the sport.
Cancel the season or do replacement players. The season is already ruined for me (no 162). Nobody would care. Baseball is woke anyway. They moved the all star game out of Atlanta for political bogus reasons. The sport is dumb now.
Excellent post Watchclark
Owners refused to make any offer in December unless players took free agency, arbitration and revenue sharing off the table
Owners implemented a lockout
Owners unilaterally implemented a freeze on all player transactions
Owners proposed eliminating six year free agency, replacing it with age 29-1/2 leaving some players under team control for 10 years
Owners proposed abolishing arbitration completely, in favor of an algorithm
Owners then proposed eliminating super twos in favor of an algorithm
Owners refused to negotiate for six weeks after implementing a lockout
Owners promised to present a counter offer to players on Feb 1, then made no offer, just federal mediation.
Owners proposed more than double the CBT tax rates
Owners proposed no increase in minimum salaries over a five year deal
Owners proposed converting minimum salaries to maximum
Owners demand advertising patches on uniforms
Owners demand 14 teams in the playoffs
Owners offer $15 million to make the arbitration deadline issue go away
Owners are STILL proposing only five percent increase in CBT thresholds, then NO increase for another two years- an even harder de facto salary cap
THAT is why they don’t have an agreement
Players are responsible for every dime of the $10.7 billion plus that MLB generates in annual revenues. The players are entitled to bargain for their fair share, without the de facto salary cap, called a competitive balance tax that was specifically ended in the last agreement.
You didn’t need 30 lines, Al you need is:
CBT-What increase over five years was asked and offered
Minimum wage-Same thing
How much revenue will the owners get for expanded playoffs + patches
How much do the players want for the arbitration pool.
Keeping it simple will engage more discussion.
Remember, it’s the owners that agreed to pay the players $10 million, $20 million, $30 million a year. To the extent that you think player salaries are over-inflated, the owners are the direct cause of that.
As for me, I was pro-owner at the beginning of this process, but am now pro-players. The owners are the cause of this lockout and, clearly, they had no intention of entering into a new CBA before regular season games had to be cancelled. And now the shenanigans of wanting to allow Manfred to be able to make unilateral rule changes is just laughable. If I were the players, I’d take any expanded playoffs off the table if any more games are cancelled.
If millions of people paid to watch Monopoly, the best players might earn millions of dollars. MLB is an $11B industry. Describing it as a children’s game is naive.
Don’t the owners make enough? Oh I forgot. They won’t open their books.
I am not on either side but it does amaze me how folks can be upset with players playing a kids game but not owners and other associated front office types (and the commissioner) making even bigger bucks from a kids game.
This counter was a joke. The Union took ten million off the pool and said no to everything else but agreed to graciously allow rule changes that they could only prevent by adding yet another demand.
Neither side seems to want to get serious.
Players playing a game for a living, earning millions and living a 1% life whining for more. Meanwhile hard working American citizens are lying more for milk, gas, food, everything, but these whiny players have a chef prepare them Waygu ribeyes in the “crib”. This is absolutely horrible optics, but the players do not care.
twitter.com/str0/status/1500622592478117893?s=21
They need to have a settlement in place in the next 10 days! At that point owners will start to loose their TV money, they won’t like that.
There are 30 individual contracts with regional sports networks, each with their own terms. Maybe some of the language was copied from some of the former Fox Sports agreements to others. We don’t know.
RSN”s make 90% of their revenue from subscriber fees, and only 10 percent from advertising, so they’re not losing money until they have to give rebates to subscribers, or they’re hit with cancellations. They don’t have big losses to pass on to teams.
The other National TV contracts are heavily focused on the post season with Fox, Turner, and now the new ESPN deal, assuming they have expanded playoffs.
In the meantime, MLB probably thinks they can continue to lock out the players and not pay them, which isn’t necessarily the case. But if so, they actually save that money while still getting the bulk of their television revenue. They’ve done all this math and have decided to cancel games because their salary cap is more important to them than the game.
Someone help me with why bigger bases are needed. Only thing i can think of is advertising..
It’s to prevent collisions.
This sounds good, but why would that be so? why is impartiality just assumed? One could have valid reason to assume bias. Not saying there is, but I shouldn’t be able to come up with a plausible reason that easily, if unreasonable intent was the only viable reason.
I wondered if maybe it was something to make it easier for sliding runners to keep from sliding off the base. It has seemed to me from watching a lot of MLB games over the last few years that there are tons of close tag-plays on the bases (and challenges) and it’s usually NOT a question of whether the throw arrived first or it the tag was applied. It’s usually if the runner momentarily lost contact with the base after sliding in. (By the way, I think the umps are remarkable in how often they get these things correct.)
Frankly, if making the bases slightly larger kept that inch-or-less for a fraction of a second from being such a big issue, that would be a good thing.
Bigger bases would lead to more close plays going to the offense – more singles, more stolen bases, more action.
the bases would be twice as large. Best example is first base. Half would be orange and be in foul territory. The other half is where it is now. The runner must touch the orange part so no collisions at first… Same at second and third. Avoid collisions.
Softball has been doing this at first base for 40 years..
This isn’t softball.
The bases that have been tested in AAA are 18 inches squared instead of 15 inches squared.
From what I read; they will still be placed entirely in fair territory. The corner bags will still be 90 feet from home plate. Second base is still going to be placed 90 feet from first and third, but unlike the 1st and 3rd base bags, second base is measured by the middle of the bag to the inside corner of the first and third base bags.
That will make it roughly 4 1/2 closes to second base with a sliding area of 99 inches greater. Which means a player is less likely to come off the bag.
I think it’s a good idea.
If you have read something differently, or seen these bases in AAA, please let me know.
Fire Tony Clark!
It’s ironic that two destructive forces can have such different meanings.
FIRE Tony Clark!
Or…
HAIL Tony Clark!
Tbh imho if the union is truly serious about standing up to the owners this time, they should walk away from negotiations at this point and tell MLB that until they r ready to make concessions towards the unions most recent proposal there is no need for further discussion……that would put the owners on notice that the players r more than willing to push MLB’s owners beyond their current comfort zone and into loss of tv revenue territory
For those who are dogging on the players think about this. The amount that the players make doesn’t get higher, unless the CBT is raised. All that has happened so far is moving the money around within the cap. They allocated some of the money to the younger players under the same cap. So really the owners aren’t spending any more money. The system is broke. Insert Pirates here.
The two sides cannot be further from each other – it is just ridiculous. 2022 season is gone. Peace out.
Bye.
No more free pop in the pop machine for these overpaid ingrates.
“Even that $220MM has been difficult for the owners, as four of them voted against that offer.”
——
Most likely a strategic vote, down to the names against being pre-orchestrated to be leaked. I suspect MLB knows they’ll meet the MLBPA at around $230MM on the CBT with some regular and moderate yearly increases, but they will extract as much as they can from the union to get there. We know that’s where it’s going, yet we will probably have to go through weeks more to arrive at the mostly known destination.
It would really be helpful if the most recent comments were at the top when I hit view comments instead of having to scroll to the bottom when an update in the struggle is provided.
I agree. Or if I get to be the MLB-commissioner-equivalent (“dictator”), I recommend the cite start with the “most popular” comments (say, 3-5 or so, determined by the number of replies or up-votes), and the have the most recent first.
But I’m not the MLB-commissioner-equivalent, so I’ll graciously let MLBTR approve and implement any such changes, at least for the time being.
In reality though it is not MLBTR’s who control the comment section but the company they have contracted for the service. Different sites use the services of different company’s to run their comment sections. SportsNet.ca uses Viafora, MLB had previously used Livfrye (then they eliminated the comments section altogether), others used Discus, each company had their issues.
After all that, the owners are only willing to agree to a reasonable increase in the lowest CBT threshold if
– They can turn the commissioner into a dictator who can change the rules of the game
– They get a salary cap at the higher thresholds
– They bring back the stupid effing ghost runner
– They get robo umps to call balls and strikes
– They can go back to higher penalties that they already agreed to drop on the CBT
They can go F#$@K themselves
Players should schedule their next meeting with MLB in November. See if the owners budge a little more then.
or they could get replacement players. The average player makes almost 800X the average American paying their salary. Let them go work for a living if they are unwilling to work under the horrible conditions of the latest offer.
Get a mediator and get this crap over with. STOP acting like you’re doing everyone that loves baseball a favor.
People in other parts of the world are having their lives ruined by a communist *-hole.
And you wonder why other countries HATE America so much.
Inflation in this country is out of control among other things
And you guys are arguing how to divi up millions of $$$$ for a sport that either that you own a team of. Or you’re paid to play.
You want to give Manfred carte blanche to change rules.Leave the game alone.
If some people don’t like the game as it is. And they think it’s too slow. to hell with them. The games was great the first 150 years.
Now it tooo slow.
Stay home.
Most of those same people who feel that way have their face buried in their cell phone while sitting at the ball park.
You guys need a reality check. Seriously. Did you guys every think about asking a true baseball fan what they think is wrong with the game?
No there is a winning business. Tell your customers the hell with what you want and what you are willing to pay for. It always works out so well for companies or industries that don’t adapt.
The discussion about ‘no one cares for the customers” is just one more incredibly stupid discussion. Virtually 100% of all companies operate the same.
1-They want you as a customer.
2-They want the cheapest cost of goods sold, and service, while still retaining you as a customer.
3-They want to charge you as much as possible, while still retaining you as a customer.
Furthermore, all of us are the same. All of us want top prices for our house, our car trade-in, our Ruth rookie cards. The idea that “but it’s baseball” is something I have trouble even processing.
If you think this is a one-sided problem, read this…
cascadereview.net/3-things/r5yw75n7jepcatr-w4e6l-4…
The offer is Manfred Kills Baseball and Americans accept it so he and owners make more money.
Actually, The offer is ….
1) A very substantial raise to prearb players
2) Elimination of draft pick compensation
3) The universal DH. Like it or not it’s good for players.
4) A draft lottery system
5) Expanded playoffs. Players make approximately $25K and let’s keep in mind that increases in revenue likely result in a significant portion of that added revenue will be spent on players.
6) Rule changes to promote more running game and faster pace of play.
7) International Draft Lottery W
8) The CBT threshold goes to $220M in 2022 going up to $230M.
Let’s look at the last two. Why wouldn’t this be better for the parity and therefor the game and would any fan of a team that is not in the top 6-7 in terms of revenue want this increase? Why should we support their desire to make the gap in parity wider given the other conditions listed above?
BLAH, BLAH,BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH !
I’m dusting off the “Honey Do” list. Whenever they settle, they have lost me.
Despite the abilities of pro athletes they’re compensation is ludicrous.
THEY PLAY A GAME – FOR HEAVEN”S SAKE !!
Their performance doesn’t save lives, instill values, or put their own lives in jeopardy.
What about our firemen, police, nurses, the military, teachers, child care workers, etc.
What about the level of compensation you receive for what you do to earn a living?
Think the pro athletes are worried about: gas prices, food prices, vehicle prices, energy costs? When was the last time YOU priced a Ferrari? Bought a $5,000,000.00 House?
THINK about that next time you read about a pro athlete moaning about wanting to be paid $50 Million a year or those who are bought out or released who get paid MILLIONS for NOT playing for a team. They have jobs because of us. Find another way to occupy your time and amuse yourself. Both owners and players will regret their selfish behavior..
I don’t think there’s anything scarier for the future of baseball than Manfred having the ability to change whatever he wants with no one checking his power. Of all the changes suggested, this is BY FAR the worst one.
Not faulting you guys but these articles are useless. Both MLB and the players are trying to curry favor with the fans by making worthless statements about each other. Who cares about this stuff until they come to an agreement? I don’t care who “wins” or “loses.” I have no idea what’s really going on at these meetings. The media is only told what one side or the other wants us to hear. Somewhere in a back room there are probably four lawyers who are doing the actual negotiating anyway.
I appreciate the comment. No one should care who “wins” or “loses”. Once you buy your ticket, the money isn’t yours any more. Why anyone cares whether Trout get 49% of my money and Cohen 51%, or vice versa, is beyond me.
The fact is, both sides are going to “win”, and win huge. The only issue is who is going to win bigger.
Agreed. 2 months after resumption, no one will remember what the min salary is.
It’s always this way. People pick a side and stick with it. They often won’t even know the exact details of what they are rooting for. It’s kind of like the stock market in that manner.
Folks get apoplectic over market corrections. But often have no idea of how often corrections occur, and won’t remember a single one of them from as recently as 5 years back.
Baseball just needs to return to the days of 1903. Change all the rules back to then. Shouldn’t have the whole league making the playoffs. Only the best two teams make it. Pitchers should be hitting as well, otherwise, why are fielders expected to do two jobs when the pitcher only does one job? If you have a DH for the pitcher than you should have a DH for all the fielders as well.
Seriously? They want “concessions” just to keep the salary cap on par with inflation?
The concessions they want are concessions of new benefits the players are getting that weren’t in previous CBAs. That’s fair, in principle anyway: we’ll give you new goodies but only if we can suppress the luxury tax level, so if you want the tax level to stay as it is in real value you’ll have to give the goodies back.
One, it’s not a cap, I assume you mean the CBT threshold. It has no correlation to inflation. It’s relative measure would be revenue specific to smaller market teams as it is meant to suppress spending advantage. Increased inflation would increase other operating costs which would reduce spending capacity not increase it.
Since the owners already announced they’re happy to cancel the first month, there’s no real reason for the players to budge until then. Because they already know the owners aren’t going to be ready to compromise until a month has been lost, so there’s no sense weakening your position by making one sided concessions before then.
Which is why it was really quite foolish of the owners to leak their willingness to miss a month… unless they honestly just don’t think April is profitable.
it is known that after 25 games missed owner have to return the money to league tv provider. regional ones also will demand re-payments. all the leverage will go to the players if this impasse last into april.
actually it is the other way around… pressure on the players… They will know at that point there really is less money and any TV lost will be subtracted from the MLB offer for the irst year
it’s the owners’ lockout. they pay. of course players lose money, too but potential losses for the owners are much greater.
All window dressing. The sides are negotiating, both in person and through the press. The owners understand that many fans will support them because they think players get paid enough. The Owners threat to cancel a month is a de facto grab for the player’s money to subsidize any Owner’s concession. In the end, we all know that it will be back to business: Younger players will get paid a bit more, Owners will use CBT threshold as a hard cap, service time manipulation will remain, tanking will continue, and the Owners will still be coming to the taxpayers for more goodies. For all those fans who say they would play the game for nothing–no, if you could throw 99, you’d want to cash in. For all those who say bring in the “replacement” players, there’s no way they’d pay premium prices for AAAA talent, no way. And the Owners are not the type to cut ticket prices. For all those with access to Minor League games…hey, go, support the prospects.
I LOVE the idea of a pitch clock. When they implemented it in the minors a few years back you could see a big difference when young guys got called up. Great idea.
Every time I see this picture and just glance at it. I, for just a moment, wonder why a nun is negotiating anything with MLB.
“In the old days, players got paid so little they needed side jobs in the offseason. Players making $10 mil, $20 mil, $30 mil a year. Even $1 mil is too much to play children’s game, you don’t see me earning millions because I’m good at Monopoly. The players are too gready and it’s ruining the sport. I personally don’t care for the post season, it’s over saturated and having tons of teams in is stupid.
I love the season, 162 games, being able to compare stats and seasons from yesterday to today. Opening day is like Christmas.”
So…the players give him so much joy it’s like Christmas, but he misses the good old days of players making so little they have to have side jobs.
Jealousy and decades of trickle down have mind F’ed so many people into becoming pathetically eager little servants.
PS- No one enjoys watching you play Monopoly. FYI.
in old days people like you or me were paid a few cents. go back!.
The players don’t give me joy, the game of baseball does (that’s why I’d be fine with replacement players). Not saying the players can’t make money (maybe $1-5 million), but the absurd $30 million contracts are outrageous.
The players are pricing themselves out of the sport, people can’t afford $12 hotdogs, $30 parking and $9 cotton candy. I sneak candy into the theater for this very reason.
Well, I guess that’s why minor league baseball and college baseball and high school baseball was created, For folks like you.
Candidly, if I can’t watch the very best play, I don’t want to waste my time. This is why no one really watches the WNBA. It’s at a competive level where your average decent high school boys’ basketball team would run circles around these pro teams.
why do you care? you could go to a local baseball park and watch kids play. i have never liked tom brady or the patriots but enjoyed their great plays. i like to watch mike trout stretch out to grab a liner or his great hitting. you like scabs? and you think owners are charging those high prices mainly because what they are paying the players? dream on! they charge what market can absorb.
THIS is the single most absolute full of ..IT posturing in this whole thing.
“I don’t care about watching the best play the best, I’ll watch any random American Legion game I drive past…”
If true, you’d be watching said American Legion game and not worrying about what a league full of elite players are up to.”
The single most absurd smoke to blow up one’s own….
The players don’t give me joy, the game of baseball does (that’s why I’d be fine with replacement players). Not saying the players can’t make money (maybe $1-5 million), but the absurd $30 million contracts are outrageous. The players are pricing themselves out of the sport.
The players don’t give me joy, the game of baseball does (that’s why I’d be fine with replacement players). Not saying the players can’t make money (maybe $1-5 million), but the absurd $30 million contracts are outrageous. The players are pricing themselves out
an effing troll, as usual!
Just because you can’t afford it doesn’t mean others can’t. Obviously, there are still plenty of people who attend games and watch on TV such that they get billions in broadcast rights every year.
We’re living in a day an age where several people have become worth more than $100 billion individually and CEOs regularly get thousands of times the income of an average employee.
Don’t blame baseball. It’s merely a microcosm of the massively widening gap of the haves and have nots. And star players are and will continue to be a part of the “Haves” whether we like it or not. I’d rather see them getting the money then some old white guy sitting on a chair barking orders all day and running his company into the ground.
“running his company into the ground.”
=====================
That makes -0- sense. Revenues continue to increase. That’s why these guys are billionaires.
It’s a general comment on CEOs, not MLB owners, though I would clearly rather the players get paid than the owners.
We’ve had some reversals since the Putin War, but virtually all the stock markets seem to think that the CEOs are doing a good job. If they are running their companies into the ground, then the equity markets are reacting to that rather strangely.
A lot of this is starting to sound like an anti-capitalism screed.
You certainly have short-term syndrome. As if what is now or next week is the end all and be all. The fact is, that well over 95% of businesses since you’ve been alive have gone bankrupt or closed down. You want to live in your fantasy world and not deal with facts, then so be it, I look at what’s actually going on.
Short-term? I have always invested in a 40-year timeline. Give me almost any timeline in the past 40 years, and the equity markets will show that Corporate America is doing well.
I’m not sure what you point is. You seem to be vehemently anti-CEOs. Some of these people are recreating how the world does business.
That said, if you don’t want to be in the market, because you don’t believe in the US CEO’s, then by all means, keep your money in the bank.
Yes, because the best and brightest keep it going. Look at the S&P 500 today, 90% of the companies that were there when you were born are no longer there. Some went thru legitimate M&As but most either went bankrupt or took pennies on the dollar to sell to another company in lieu of getting nothing.
You want to ascribe the success of a few dozen companies as representing American business as a whole. I look at facts. You look at nothing and draw your own unsubstantiated conclusions.
There’s a work stoppage in baseball? Sorry, didn’t notice.