Major League Baseball’s lockout is entering its fourth month, and the first two regular-season series of the 2022 schedule have already been lost. Most fans have grown weary of the back-and-forth, the finger-pointing and name-calling, instead merely wanting to know when they can expect MLB to again be a part of their daily routines. The unfortunate reality is that there’s no firm answer to that question, as we can’t know firmly when an agreement will be reached — or even when talks will resume.
As Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic outlines, local television contracts don’t call for rebates from teams until roughly 25 games are lost. Jeff Passan of ESPN adds some specifics, writing that avoiding rebates requires broadcasting between 138 and 150 games (with slight team-to-team variation). That plays into the owners’ ability to hold out, as does the general fact that their wealth considerably outpaces that of the players. In cold-weather states, April is a relatively poorly attended month anyhow — at least after the early rush of the opening series.
On the players’ side of the equation, MLBPA executive subcommittee member Andrew Miller told reporters last night that union solidarity is stronger than he’s ever seen (link via Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch).
“We’re prepared,” said Miller. “We’ve seen this coming in a sense. It’s unfortunate. This isn’t new to us. This is not shocking. Our communication, our willingness to see each other’s point of views and find solutions and fight for what’s right is not like I’ve seen before. I can tell you that.”
Both Miller and fellow subcommittee member Max Scherzer broadcast strength and a desire to improve conditions for future generations. Scherzer candidly said he was more than willing to “sacrifice part of [his] career,” noting that he would not be in position to have signed the contract he did without previous generations of players sacrificing portions of their career for him. At the very least, the MLBPA is putting up a strong front.
It’s easier for players like Scherzer, who have amassed hundreds of millions in career earnings, to sit out than it is for players with little to no MLB experience. However, as noted here at MLBTR this week, the union has been preparing for this worst-case scenario for some time, spinning off their licensing revenues into a separate company that allows them to take equity stakes in third parties.
The MLBPA offered $5,000 stipends to members for both February and March and, per Rosenthal and colleague Evan Drellich, will begin offering $15,000 monthly stipends on April 1. Most veterans won’t be applying for those checks, but for those playing closer to the league minimum — or, particularly, those expected to be collecting minor league salaries — it’s a reasonably notable sum. The union has the funds to last the entire season paying out those stipends, although the obvious hope is that a resolution will arrive far sooner.
Everything now depends on how quickly the two parties return to the table and whether one or both will blink in the face of historic levels of tension and public pressure. Clark’s suggestion that ownership cares more about “breaking the union” than about getting players back on the field speaks volumes about the rift that remains, and now on top of everything else, they’ll quarrel over potentially prorated salaries and service time.
Do not play for pro-rated salaries. ALL or nothing!
The players cannot be forced to play for prorated salaries. If the previous CBA is reinstituted for this season, then the owners must pay them 100% of their contracted salaries regardless of season length. There also would not be a CBT threshold at all since that sunsetted at the end of the 2021 season.
While that is very interesting and informative as I did not know that, I don’t see owners doing that for fear of a late season strike.
I’m still here in Jupiter. We are waiting to see if anything happens tomorrow. There are a lot of people talking about how the deal was close until Scott Boras showed up. Everyone is saying “Scott Boras blew up the deal” because all he is concerned about is the CBT threshold going up. Everyone is saying that he has all the big name clients and he personally benefits from the CBT number going up and nothing Bill Madden talking about it if you guys want to check it out. The feeling is that the whole thing fell apart after Boras showed up and talked to “his people.”: youtube.com/watch?v=lUSY-hLjzBM
Apparently Max Scherzer “went crazy” after Boras showed up. I saw Scherzer here, too.
Bill Madden is horrible; has always been anti-player and pro owner. Steinbrenner the Father would always use him to leak stories against his own players. Trying to shift blame toward the players using Boras is exactly what management would do.
@RobM: I don’t know much about Bill Madden but he is in the hall of fame, right? I listened to the video and he did seem pretty pro-owner but everything he said made some sense. It would also explain why everyone was so excited about a deal and then it just fell apart out of nowhere.
That makes perfect sense. They were really close to a deal early Tuesday morning. Everything changed when they resumed negotiations at 11 am on Tuesday.
@Hammer, Madden is a Spinks Award winner. He’s not really a member of the MLB HOF, but he is in the writers version of the HOF. They honored him with the Spinks award, which is presented during HOF weekend, but they don’t go into the HOF. Regardless, many bad people have been honored with the Spinks Award, including a convicted pedophile. It’s no longer even known as the Spinks Award as J.G. Taylor Spink was discovered to be a racist. Well, he wasn’t discovered. It was known for some time, but it became more of a problem in these days.
Anyway, back to the issue at hand. All the positive expectations on Monday night only came from one side: the owners. The players were the cautious ones, saying all along they still had issues. The belief that the two sides were heading toward an agreement, and the “Boras killed the agreement” are all being leaked by ownership. SOP. I mean, it’s pretty good tactics on their part, but it’s not too hard to see through them.
It’s all about greed on both sides depriving hard working struggling baseball fans from enjoying the game they live. I don’t think agents should be involved in this mess, nor do I think free agent Andrew Miller should be involved since he is unable to be signed and is without a team since the lock out prevented him from signing with anyone.
I don’t know how much of what Madden said is true but I can tell you this. The negotiations were looking better than ever until Scott Boras pulled up. Once he got there, everything went to sht very quickly. I wasn’t even expecting him to come. He wasn’t part of the negotiations. I can only assume he showed up to talk to his employees and clients. His employees are part of the negotiating team and Max Scherzer is his client. After Boras showed up those people went from being lukewarm to everything to against it. Scherzer was “downright livid.” How does that happen after they talk to someone who they weren’t even negotiating against? It looks like Boras came to convince them it was a terrible deal if the tax threshold didn’t increase to a lot more than $220-230 million. The sketchy part about that is as the biggest rep of top free agents, Boras has more to gain by the increase in the threshold than anyone in the world. I can’t vouch for this myself but people inside were saying Boras didn’t care about anything but the threshold. He didn’t care about minimum salary. He didn’t care about pre-arbitration bonus pool money. All of that could go out the window as far as he was concerned unless he got the highest CBT threshold possible. It looks like a conflict of interest to me because he makes money off that and he is the boss of a lot of people who were negotiating on the players behalf. Boras doesn’t have incentive to make sure the poorest players get more. He can’t make any money off that. Boras’s biggest incentive is to make sure the richest players get more. Everyone is saying that was his goal when he came in and a lot of people are saying that’s why it fell apart. I didn’t see his conversations myself but the timing makes perfect sense. It would be a big coincidence if the negotiations just happened to fall apart when he got there. You all should see the influence Boras has around these people. When he shows up half the people act like Elvis Presley just walked in the room. The other half roll their eyes. Then there’s little people like me who just watch and think wtf is going on?
Steve, if Boras benefits, then the players benefit, as do all agents.
The players got their collective butts kicked in previous CBAs. Maybe this time they decided to engage their agents for input. It does seem that way. That would make sense. My main push back on this story (beyond it smelling like a plant from the owners) is the belief they would have needed Boras to show up and tell them the CBT offer was bad. Look at the numbers the union was submitting and how far off MLB is off from them. The CBT has always been one of the most important items to the players. They finally realized it’s suppressing salaries because it’s being treated increasingly as a cap, so they’re fighting it. The owners on the other side are fighting to tighten it to strangle player salary growth. This has been their plan going back since the CBT was implemented. They smartly took a long-term view. The fans may not realize this, but the CBT is the most critical item in these negotiations. I’m sure Boras has had a lot on input to players leading in. I’m simply saying he didn’t kill it at the last hour. This has been known.
Beyond that, I want to go back to being the positve guy here on a deal is right around the corner!
Hammer: I read what you wrote, but honestly, you’re very inconsistent in your application of when you take for granted what “makes sense” (only when it favors the owners’), and when you assign blame (only when it favors the owners). For any other instance you seem to be a contrarian without proof. At least I’d suggest being consistent. If you want to look at what “makes sense” do it for both sides. That way your points are more….credible on this issue.
“little people”?
Screw that. You’re MF Steve Nebraska.
Mad Dog said the same thing yesterday, that they were very close and Boras said not to sign. Russo did say one thing that made sense, though. Manfred is the owner’s point person. We all know that. But, who is that person for the players? And, why is Scott Boras even involved like that? He’s an agent, not a union rep. He collects fees, not union dues. Dude makes plenty of money. Until his job changes, stay the hell out of the way!
All about Boras. Owns the MLBPA Exec. HIs Useful Idiots online in writing in the media. This was ALWAYS about busting the CBT and returning to Steinbrenner era of no penalties. Was NEVER about young players.
Lies and deceit. That’s all we’ve had from the Boras crew.
Bust the MLBPA.
Okay i see what u r saying and it makes sense, up to a certain point, but if this was actually true, dont u think in all the social media posts at least 1 of those rolling their eyes players u were mentioning would hv come out and said something about that? They, not being Boras clients, hv nothing to lose by outing Boras and his clients and imho everything to gain!! And im only suggesting it takes 1 outlier nothing more….seems unlikely there wouldnt be something mentioned tbh
The only ones saying that the negotiations were looking better or close was the owners. None of the players interviewed said that. In fact, they said it was a contentious session.
Then the owners came back with a take it or leave it proposal that included things they had never mentioned before about the CBT and rules. The players on he executive committee unanimously voted no.
Don’t buy the owners PR.
Boras didn’t change anything about the negotiations. The owners did that.
Boras cannot even enter the room during negotiations. Only Hazlem, Manfred, and the people on their negotiating team and Meyer, Clark, and the players on the executive committee can get in.
Don’t buy the owners PR.
Five of the eight payers are Boros clients!
What on Earth are you talking about? Players play for whatever the collective agreement says.
Since you don’t seem to understand worstthinkingposterever, CBA means collective bargaining agreement.
That was the old CBA. Which has expired
You missed where he said that the players have to agree to anything other than getting paid 100% of their contract?
The owners cannot impose prorated salaries on players without it being in the CBA. The players have to agree to it and they are not going to do that after the way the owners have treated them in this negotiation. They certainly are not going to allow language that allows the owners to impose prorated salaries to be added to a new CBA and it was not in the last one.
Is that really so hard to understand?
Don’t have to worry, owner’s will never do that, working off of Old CBA would allow players to strike again
“He” is you pretending to be someone else.
Exactly as I predicted. The first week we’ll hear “Solidarity Forever” from the players.
Hopefully the clubs stick to their guns. MLBPA is now nothing more than a Boras vehicle to end the CBT and revenue sharing, So bust ’em. I hope the union holds out for ALL as you say, because that will galvanize the clubs.
Let them sit the entire year. Let them sit until they decertify the union. And when the Boras stooges on the internet whine about MLB busting the union, my answer is ‘good’.
You do realize that in the other sports where they lost a season to a labor stoppage that the players got everything they were asking for, right?
FTR, the NHL won the 04 lockout after losing a full season.
Apples and oranges. Heck virtually no one in America cared or was even paying any attention.
Other pro sports don’t have 100% guaranteed contracts like MLB players do. Let the players give that up at the bargaining table. Until they do… I hope they all sit for a year with no pay.
That’s a fair point to add to all this.
Harold reynolds 2.0, I can’t believe Reynolds was a player.
Wrong again. If everything the hockey players wanted in 2004 was to be humiliated when they crawled back for less than they had been offered after a year lockout, then they got everything they wanted. They must have been masochists.
The hockey players were locked out in 2004 because they wouldn’t accept a salary cap. They crawled back a year later when they not only accepted. a salary cap, but also a lower salary cap than they were offered before the lockout. The players talked about decertifying and the head of the union resigned right after they crawled back in defeat.
The difference here is that Manfred probably won’t let the clubs that want to go for the jugular and instead he’ll allow the MLBPA to save face when they are beaten
After the NHL labor stoppage, the hockey players got guaranteed percentage of revenue, something they never had before.
They also got a huge increase in minimum salaries with increases that are tied to increases in NHL revenue.
Not sure you can say that the NHL won unless you are talking about the sport as a whole and not the team owners or league.
Anyone for busting up unions is not pro-worker in any sense. Even Donald Trump understood that.
So you are rooting for the teachers union?
I support their union above all others. And just so you know: there isn’t just ONE teacher’s union. Some are rather milquetoast and others are more activist in nature. The fact that I have to point this out to people is telling.
I would hate to not have baseball all year, but to break the union, it is worth it. The owners should cancel games for the rest of April. Give the union an ultimatum, take the deal by April 30th, or the deal is rescinded.
Of course the owners r willing to give up a month lol…..they start losing their tv contract revenues after missing that many games….just wait and see they will cave before they give up their huge tv money…..if the lockout goes beyond Apr 1st(still need a month for spring training!) u can say goodbye to the season
The teams don’t start losing TV revenue after 25 games. They have to start paying back the RSN’s for anything they have been paid up to that point.
If the season is lost or the lockout goes beyond 25 games, the owners will lose 100% of TV revenue..
The TV deals give MLB a cushion in time, not money. The teams still need to get the season started within 25 games or they have to pay back the money the RSN’s fronted them and then reschedule the lost games.
Why not break the owners? Why the union? Get some self esteem..
Your name is “baseball history” yet you do NOT have any sense of the role the union played within baseball history. Without the union, players would essentially still be serfs. Why do people not understand this?
I fail to understand the ideology that busting the union is “good.” What’s more ironic is that you’re preference is that the game and those who you presumably support in this endeavor (owners) would be damaged beyond recovery because of a full lost season of MLB. Unless you completely dislike baseball, I don’t see the advantage of that. Or, unless you think it’ll reduce prices when players make less? It won’t do that either.
Unions serve a purpose. When management gets too strong, problems arise, people are hurt, careers are ruined, many times unlawfully. When unions are too strong, the inverse happens (see NYC public schools). I am not for completely breaking unions. That’s a terrible price to pay for your goal to be achieved.
No play no pay
It has to be negotiated.
It will be nothing!! The owners won’t and shouldn’t pay for games not played.
I’m not smart enough to know. I can guess, if it’s a quick lockout they’ll get paid. If they don’t get paid, it’s going to be a long war.
They aren’t getting paid, and it will be very long, and possibly the whole year.
The owners have to pay the players contracts in full if there is a season. They cannot unilaterally impose prorated salaries. The players have to agree to any cuts in salary.
After the way the owners have been acting with the lockout there is no way the players would say yes to that in a new CBA and they didn’t agree to it in the old CBA.
Remember, the owners locked out the players and the owners are the ones that cancelled games. That is 100% on the owners.
This would be so like the Mets to finally get their act together and put the pieces in place for a potential 2022 run only to have the best year of Scherzer’s contract go void.
Yeah, no. Nice dream though. Mets fans been saying this since day 1 of the lockout
The Mets were far from looking the way they do now on Dec 2. It’s not just Scherzer, it’s all of the players, Buck, etc. Whatever the results, the decision making has been little or none to criticize.
It’s like I don’t even know who the Mets are anymore. And the circus show they ran for years and all that entertainment value has evaporated.
@FSF
Is that you @MetsFan22?
No
@Marlins. Haha, LOL. Was thinking the same thing.
Marlins: It can’t be, he didn’t mention how many more injuries the Mets already have than everybody else.
You’re right.
We do know one thing. Now that games are being canceled, @MetsFan22 will let us know that these canceled games adversely affected Mets players more than any other team’s players.
The Mets will finish 3-93 in 2022.
93 straight losses.
If we get 140ish games I’ll be okay with that. Anything less is a waste of time.
Just for fun the 4 worst teams 2AL 2NL. Will make the LCS this year.
Pirates vs D’Backs
Orioles vs Rangers.
D’Backs win in 5 games. Don’t know any of their players. Their best player. Walks off into the world series with an inside the park homerun.
Adley Rutschman not only hits .450 in the Orioles playoff run sweeping everyone including sweeping the Tigers with 112 wins in the regular season. Including 30 in a row.
Adley also will have 2 walk off hits and 1 more go ahead RBI Hbp in the 13th inning.
If only Grey’s Sports Almanac doesn’t exist. If it did and I had it. I’d share with everyone hear. I can’t be.greedy.
Sorry for ranting lol.
Those Orioles won’t stand a chance against Cabrera & Company after he wins his second Triple Crown & hits the playoffs in excellent Health for once.
Tigers Sweep The Cardinals in the World Series.
You guys are crazy. Marlins are going to become MLB’s first undefeated team when the go 14-0 during the regular season, and then sweeping every postseason series with their pitching staff. Miami becomes the first city to have two teams go undefeated from two different leagues of the four major sports.
I wouldn’t be mad at the Tigers winning. Baez WS MVP
How would Baez become the WS MVP when he’ll lead the series with the most strikeouts…even outdoing the pitchers?
Ah.
I see mets fans are preparing their mWar (“missed war”) argument for ’22 already.
I’d say the same for the Mariners… just as it looked like they were going to snap the longest playoff drought it looked like this year they were going to go for it.
@Rumors2godsears
The Mets play in the biggest market in their division. The Mariners play in (probably) the second smallest market in their division. There is a huge difference.
If I was a Mariners fan, I would be devastated right now. They had a good shot at competing in the AL West
Mariners fan…can confirm. Most disappointing to me is for guys like Brash and Julio, who were 40-man roster additions and now cannot go play minor league spring training and get the continuous reps. And then the sophomore seasons for Gilbert and Kelenic to take a step forward. Not to mention the first season of Robbie Ray. It hurts.
But they will save $24m on the Cano contract so there’s that.
Mets still had a few holes, but they have a very good team. I would have liked to see what happened and if the Wilpon curse could be lifted with Bucky at the helm.
I don’t think it’s a Wilpon curse. I think that the Mets, their PR team, the NY media and the Mets fan base have poor courier service. Every year they talk about how great the team is, but clearly their division rivals aren’t getting those memos.
The owners have the leverage. I bet they would be willing to cancel the entire season and lose the revenue because they can afford to while a majority of the players wouldn’t have the same financial security. Some do, some don’t. MLB will play on that to break the union.
I have no idea where you think these owners have $70-100 million lying around to fund a canceled season. A couple do. The rest will be mad scrambling to put financing in place to get through the season. Just because their club is worth $2 billion or whatever doesn’t mean they have any cash. And all the while, their families will have their hands out (which will go empty). I have little doubt that if the players can suck it up, this will be disastrous for the owners.
The owners as a whole will lose $60-70 million per DAY once the regular season games are lost. IF this report is correct, and I have reason to believe that its only true for the few that are part owners in their RSN, then the owners would only be losing $40-50 million per day once regular season games start being lost. That is a heaping lot of revenue going in the toilet.
Just to be clear, that number was per owner and I’m looking at it from a net basis. While a lot more revenue is lost, there would have been additional expenses beyond the $70-100 million in fixed costs that they would have to pay to get that revenue, most notably the players’ comp.
I believe you can’t lose something if you don’t already have it . You may never get it , but it is not something you lost because you never had it
Per owner on average it is over $2 million per day of lost revenue and for an entire season it is about $400 million per team in lost revenue on average. Take out the $139 million in player salaries and benefits on average and the teams would lose $261 million each on average. Since the teams would still have all the other costs outside of the $1 million or so they spend a year on in-park personnel like ushers and ticket takers and accountants, etc…, the losses would be pretty close to that $260 million per team. Teams like the Yankees and Dodgers would lose much more in total dollars and teams like the the Rays would lose less in total dollars.
I just read an article that said that each Owner is guaranteed atleast $100,000,000 and some more from both Local & National TV Deals. If these Owners loose the whole season, that is a Major Hit they would have to pay back. Plus they have to pay back this year for all the lost TV games from 2020. WoW, Huge Losses.
And thats not counting everything else.
All teams would have received $70.83 million in 2022 from the new National TV deals. Possibly more if the Apple and NBC deals are signed.
How much they get for local broadcasts varies from $40 million to $334 million. The least amount of revenue a team was scheduled to receive from combined local and national TV deals in 2022 was $110.83 million.
Many writers and sports radio personalities are saying that one of the reasons the owners are trying so hard to maintain the inequity in share of revenue with the players is they want the billions they have to pay back to the RSNs for the 2020 season being shortened as much as it was to come out of the players pockets.
You are on point. The owners have a major loss of revenue coming.
I look at it like this.. unloading a few teams by a prolonged strike wouldn’t be that bad, but that would be the only positive result can see from a strike which lasts.. Getting rid of half a dozen teams/owners which IMO are the hardline/cheap ones being so insistent on some of the policies that are holding a deal up to begin with.
I also posted in another thread here that they should dissolve 6 teams & restructure each league. This would increase the competitive structure of each team. Look at rosters now. There are lots of players on the 25 man roster that don’t deserve to be there. That is because there are just to many teams.
No. The owners don’t. IF they did, they would not have felt it necessary to lock out the players. The owners are about to start losing $60-70 million per day overall when games start being lost. These owners didn’t buy these teams with cash, they financed the purchase. So other than the couple that have been owned for decades, debt comes due every month and they will not have any revenue coming in soon. Add to that leases and all the other expenses, and unless the union caves quickly, the owners are going to be in a heap of trouble. There is no reason for the union to cave at all since they were smart and started putting a couple hundred million a year away into a rainy day fund for just this very negotiations starting in 2018.
The owners didn’t want the players to strike during the summer, which they have done two of the last three strikes.
Up until now, the player strikes have cost baseball about 1700 games.
The owner lockouts have cost baseball zero games.
That’s why the owners locked out. It was the right call.
Didn’t the owners just cancel a bunch of games??? smh
Thus the phrase, “Up until now.”
Was that dumas comment directed at me?
In 1972 the players went on strike during the end of spring training. As soon as they moved out of Florida, Arizona and Palm Springs, they went out on strike and the exhibition games in the big stadiums were cancelled.
It was a big deal to me because they cancelled the Freeway Series (Angel/Dodgers)
So they CAN and HAVE striked during spring training.
Shhhhhh Halo doesn’t like inconvenient facts.
If the shoe fits. The players cannot strike during the offseason. Period. Read the CBA.
The CBA? There is no CBA…
Has there ever been a players strike during an active CBA?
And since there is no CBA, they can do whatever they like. I’m no expert, but it’s logical that the owners can’t lock out during an active CBA either.
Want to call me another name now?
It’s a good thing I’m more mature than Stripling else I’d get upset.
Darn.. I was really hoping you could tell how the players had to obey an expired CBA. And then of course followed your usual ad hominem attack.
Federal labor law. Players can only strike during a time when they could be working. They cannot strike during the off season.
Stop arguing. That guy obviously understands labor law and collective bargaining agreements better than you do.
The union will crash and then Boros will try and start new league . Good luck with that
“That guy” is you!
If losing the whole season busts the union, it is worth it.
To what advantage?
As well they should.
The owners have their own fund, the Central Fund, and that fund is loaded with cash for “rainy days” such as this.
You do realize that the Central Fund is just revenue from national TV rights, national sponsorships, and merchandizing that is distributed equally to all the teams annually? There is no money just stays sitting in that fund. It goes to the owners of the teams. If you are talking about the Commissioners Discretionary Fund, a totally different pool of money, there is only $10 million in it, $333,333.33 from each club.
There is a small amount of money from CBT fines, etc… that stays in the MLB central fund until the following season.
MLB has attempted to break the union multiple times in the past. They’ve failed every time.
Boros knows the Owners are split , there are about. 15 or so teams that doesn’t want the CBT to go up and he is trying to break some owners , Rays #1 because they have broke his system . This is the owners versus Boros
I don’t know how you included Boras since he only represents a small percentage of players and isn’t involved in the negotiations.
Tell us about the multiple times in the past clubs tried to break the union. They’ve had 30 years of labor peace because Manfred is too much of a deal guy.
No, because union busting isn’t legal, and because when MLB tries it, they get proverbially spanked in court and lose, so it isn’t very advisable. Which brings me to my question, Screenname, why would they want to do this? It’s a terrible idea. They risk MLB locking in & going to mediation/arbitration, whereby the mediator will review if MLB negotiated in good faith. If the mediator sees this as an attempt to break the union, pressure the union through an unnecessary lockout, or any other ‘unfair labor practice’ the court will hammer MLB. The players will win and the owners will be up a creek without a paddle – have no teeth – bark without a bite, or whatever other metaphor you would like to insert. It’s simply not a wise risk.
I don’t understand why a cap with a floor is a non-starter. That way they can divvy up the total revenues by percentage like the other leagues.
Also not sure why they can’t tie the yearly increase of the CBT, minimum salary, and bonus pool to the percentage of revenue growth each year (if there is any) instead of trying to agree to it all up front.
One, because the ceiling is a joke at 180 million or whatever. As for revenue sharing of the overall pie, the owners have never allowed and will apparently not allow access to the books. How would you feel about getting your “percentage” when you don’t even really know what the gross is?
The 180 you refer to was the owners offer using the current CBT model. My understanding is it’s the players that are against the cap, so if they agree to negotiate a cap it will force the owners to open up their books to set the cap and floor based on the percentage of the revenue pie they agree on.
You clearly have a vendetta against the owners, which you’re entitled to. Just keep in mind that the MLBPA turned down the opportunity to do a rev share. I hope the players prevail. However as the article mentions, the nonstop finger pointing is past tiresome. Both sides are at fault.
I spent 1995-2020 fervently defending the owners and thought I did a pretty reasonable job. But what I’ve seen over the last couple of years has had me do a complete 180 on this matter.
No. The union did not turn down an opportunity to do revenue sharing because the owners have never offered to open their books. You can’t share revenue when you don’t know exactly what it is.
Why?
Why?
The owners will never allow a floor with no cap. The MLBPA will never allow a cap, period.
“Most fans have grown weary of the back-and-forth, the finger-pointing and name-calling, ”
If only that were true.
For me, it is true. And I love baseball and miss it. But I’ll be getting my fix with MiLB and college ball..
Key point! Those of us who have had the MiLB package for years will point this out as well. It’s well worth the 50. stand alone price and forget.. But like 30. tagged onto MLB package for us all.
It’s got every AAA team, most AA, many A ball games and a blast for u youngster fans. Highly recomend!
Andrew Miller to replace Tony Clark one day? Seems like a likely enough candidate.
Seems like a reasonable choice though this earth has probably 7+ billion people who could do a much better job than Tony Clark.
I believe the selection of Clark was a signal originally that the players were fine with the status quo. They went with a player with a friendly reputation as opposed to a tough union negotiator/lawyer type. In retrospect, that might have been a mistake. My guess when Clark steps down they may head back toward having a Marvin Miller type take over again.
Thats bs the rangers owner can’t tell me losing first series didn’t cost him any money.the Yankees were playing a 4 game series to open season in texas.the Yankees only damn trip to Arlington this season.
Don’t freakin remind me. That stupid Globe field (because those Texans had to build a new stadium) is the last stadium I have yet to see the Yankees play in (and win also fortunately). Now I’ll have to wait at least another year to check that final box.
FU you scum sucking sycophant (Manfred) and FU you f’n greedy owners!
FU you scum sucking sycophant (Manfred) and FU you f’n greedy owners!
“Most fans have grown weary of the back-and-forth, the finger-pointing and name-calling, ”
If only that were true.
Well, it’s the only baseball entertainment left at all if they’re not going to…ya know…play baseball.
I “grew weary” of it…well, pretty much immediately.
I rarely even read the articles in re the lockout. I hardly ever post anymore. I have no “side” in this. The MLBPA are hardly oppressed workers or whatever. Nor are the owners savvy businessmen. They are part of a monopoly ffs. & the never ending argumentation oftentimes disregarding Robert’s Rules is not appealing to me whatsoever.
“…instead wanting to know when they can expect MLB…”
Now that’s me! I could care less how the ducats are divvied up.
What I *do* care about is the fact that it’s snow goose season right now. From early Feb through early May I take a weekly trip following their migration – all the way to the Canadian border. For a bit they’ll be about 100 miles from me. Typically, however, I will have to drive quite a bit further (200-400 miles).
Know what I like to listen to while I’m doing all that driving, @Halo? You guessed it: MLB. Both spring training & regular season games.
Call me shallow. But that is what I “care” about.
The problem I have with people defending owners is that they make it sound like everyone is Scherzer or Trout or Harper or even some 3rd rotation pitcher making 15 mil a year. The vast majority are not in that boat and have only a very few years to maximize their worth, which in the vast majority of cases probably caps out at less than $1 mil per year.
Ducky, I have sides. Right is right, wrong is wrong and accuracy is important.
Right now I like to listen to fantasy draft pods. But they are so one sided even they are hard to listen to.
I’m going to say this until I’m blue in the face. Good young players deserve more money, the luxury tax should be a speed bump and not a barrier.
Everything else is noise that does no one any good.
The final offer from the owners raised the minimum salary from $570,000 to $700,000. That was addressing the supposedly biggest concern for ” low wage” players. This shutdown is on the union.
Time to re-read some baseball books. Split Season and a great book about the 1981 Columbus Clippers that I’m drawing a blank on it’s name right now. U get my sports fix and my labor fix simultaneously.
I’ve only been to 5 stadiums. Can I have some money?
I’ve only been to 1 NHL stadium so can you give me some money?
Is that how these negotiations work? …we may be at an impasse as long as MLB and the union are unfortunately. *sigh*
A Braves/Rangers World Series is happening soon.
Theeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee Yankeees WON’T win!!!!!!!!!!
Sounds like you’re terrified because you know they WILL WIN!
Yeah – GO YANKEES!!!!
#28 Coming soon! (But sooner if Hal sells the team to someone that cares to win – Yes, Derek, I’m talking to you!)
But Derek’s just a player, how could he afford to be an owner? Oh the implications come the next owners vs players spat.
April has higher attendance than May, June, and September overall. That can be attributed to the fact that for every team the opening series is the highest attendance of the year. Local TV deals are a little more than half the TV revenue and ALL national TV revenue will be lost from game one not played. Actually, MLB owners are already losing money from the loss of national TV games that were to start on February 26th in spring training. The players have a pool of money to draw from that is 20-25% of their total annual salaries. They can weather the lockout just fine.
On point. And while local media deals may have the “25 game” exemption that Rosenthall wrote about, teams that own their own Regional Sports Networks suffer from every game not played; and they don’t suffer small dollars.
Many writers also are confused; it’s the small market teams that are less likely to approve a deal, especially if they just dent the Union, never mind break it. So the season gets cancelled; how much will the Rays, with their 260M in revenue, MOST of which they share with landlords, vendors, etc lose., vs. what the Red Sox will lose, with 600M in revenue, MOST of which they keep a large chunk of. The Rays are more likely to like the promise of a steak tomorrow; the Red Sox want a hamburger TODAY (it’s a much bigger and better hamburger). And the larger the team (a lot of times), the larger the debt service.
I’ve said before, the MLBPA really didn’t ask for any significant concessions; indeed, most were inane. That the owners are more than willing to dig in their heels against those paltry Union gains doesn’t bode well for a quick resolution.
Just because you said it before, doesn’t make it any more correct. That’s your opinion, there are plenty that disagree with you.
You have not come up with anything to show that he was wrong about any point. So I am going to say your opinion fits with your name. A flamingbagofpoop.
Finally, a logical person post. Thank you.
And the fans will save lots of money. It works out well for everyone.
Let’s see how well they “weather the storm” by around June 1st.
No play=no pay
If there is a season I bet it’ll be similar in length to 2020. Not a big deal though. At least we have MILB this year. I won’t watch the shortened season but I do look forward to 2023.
I only hope that someone is figuring out a completely new realignment of players and teams that will put current MLB ownership entirely out of business.
Most businesses have finally begun to realize that if they don’t have the employees (players), they don’t have a business.
Get back to me when that happens. Then you might realize why the owners do what they do.
And the players can play in a meadow before 84 fans, and pass the hat!!
And do you think people will still give their money to the owners without players? Or, maybe the players in the fields. I can guess which one…
Maybe some of the players should take a mental health day as it seems like maybe this is getting to them. Hell they take enough mental health days during the season. It’s funny seeing many players talk about the owners lying yet they have no trouble doing it either. For the young guys? Sure thing.
Yes. The “doing it for the future players” makes me laugh too. It’s suddenly the 1970’s. Just like every professional athlete in every major sporting competition in the world, the future MLB player should be ok.
They are doing it because MLB players have a long held resentment for owners and this is an opportunity to stick it to them. That’s fair enough, they are aggressive, competitive beasts, but spare me the sanctimonious cover.
They’re doing it because Boras wants to bust the CBT and revenue sharing. Bust Boras. Bust the MLBPA.
Breaking the union is in baseball’s best interest.
The biggest points the MLBPA has asked for all put more money in the young payers pockets. But you would rather hate then pay attention to facts. Typical troll.
I don’t hate them, I love them. I just respect honesty. It’s obvious this is personal for the players. It’s more ego than altruism.
Hilarious. I point out where you are totally wrong and that is what you come back with? The fact is most of the things the players are asking for puts more money in young players pockets. The raise in the minimum, the Super Two expansion, the pool for pre-arbitration players. ALL are more money for the younger players. That you don’t get that is more than a little sad since you keep posting the same hateful, dishonest stuff. You can try to spin it any way you want, it won’t make your posts any more honest.
So I’m lying to you all about my opinion in regards to their motivation ???
I think you are confusing being right with being honest. I may well be wrong with my opinion, but it’s absolutely honest.
Yes mate. They have been and they got gains in all of it. My opinion is that ego and resentment has them wanting more.
Let you in a little secret, dude…
Here in the United States of America….we really don’t put too much credence in anything anybody says who uses the word “mate” in a sentence naturally.
Its our tradition.
We do the same with “dude”.
Why pour the waters of reality on his Boras conspiracy theory? It seems to comfort him.
Finally, a logical person post. Thank you.
The owners should just set the competitive balance tax at 2 Billion Gazillion so the players can cream themselves. Then the owners should all direct their GM’s to not spend over 210 Million.
Clark and Manfred should trade in their suits and ties for boxing glove and shorts and get in a ring to settle this thing man to man
OOOOOOOOO That would be fun. The 6’8″ Clark pounding Manfred into dust would be so fun to watch.
That’s called. Assault. And Battery
Not if it’s a previously agreed upon boxing match and both participants follow the rules. Although I doubt whether Manfred and Clark are in the same weight class.
One additional item for the financial ledger not mentioned, but it’s potentially a negative one of note for the owners. It’s been reported that the national TV contracts were paid out in full to MLB in 2020, even though only 60 games were played. MLB basically arranged to take full payments in 2020 when finances were more pressing and passed the obligations forward to 2022. That means the owners are already facing reduced revenue for the year as payment to the TV networks comes due. They planned to rob Peter to pay Paul. They hoped to offset that obligation with higher TV revenue they negotiated beginning this year, plus new TV contracts (Apple, NBC) and of course expanded postseason money to help offset their obligations.
They’ve obviously factored all this in, but it will increase pressure on MLB every week that’s delayed. It’s likely there’s only so far they can push out their obligations. Management has no doubt factored all this in, but they also know that any final deal with the MLBPA in this CBA will include missed pay. It always does, especially as they’ve locked out the players.
I remain optimistic a deal will arrive soon. Ownership, get back to the table and negotiating!
It is the players turn to counter the last offer from owners
Sure. Have they agreed to meet?
There is no chance the owners will pay for games not played. I sure wish I could bet on this!!
You also state that it’s a good idea to bust the union when that’s the least favorable route for the owners because of the potential legal consequences. You may not want to engage in betting anytime soon.
Sure, take your time guys. I’m glad you’re prepared for the worst. Do your thing. Get yours.
Hugest eye roll ever.
Here’s what I find “confusing” (amusing) is that when Covid hit, the bootlickers talked about how the owners couldn’t possibly afford the expense of paying the players without fans in the stands. And no, they couldn’t be asked to make less money in the short term for the good of the game (and business) in the long run.
Now, the same bootlickers say the owners have the resources to lose money for as long as they need to to make more in the long run.
Cuz logic isn’t as fun as licking boots, evidently.
Do the players have hundreds of employees to pay? Do they have the overhead of a pro sports team?
Most players probably paid cash for their cars. The ones who have families are likely further in their career and have made money.
So, basically, you are talking about some low level young players who might need some rent money. And the union has stockpiled that money for just this occasion.
Sounds like the players only need to hold out 6 weeks and the owners have to start writing checks back to the RSN’s.
Which check will be bigger? The players condo or repaying the teams TV deal?
The owners will cave. Both sides are full of crap, but the players believe the crap they are shoveling and the owners dont.
and you are omniscient! you know what? bull!
It’s a guess. I don’t know why you like to being a jerk so I’m definitely not omniscient.
I hate this. It’s such a shame. But, I get it.
We can’t agree as fans, so why should anyone else? The collective narrative is disappointing.
Our game is broken, both on and off the field.
Will I come back when all this is settled? Of course. I’m a lifer. I don’t count. It’s all the fringe fans and kids that will find something else to do. This is where the danger lies.
I fell in love with this sport as a little boy. The joy of my first pack of baseball cards in 1981, featuring the immortal Jim Beattie, Rick Porcello and Ruppert Jones. I never did pull that Willie Randolph or Ron Guidry as an eight year old.
There was a filthy kind of magic to baseball in those days. It just seemed…important.
Baseball was a sport I could play with my friends. Not well, mind you, but we could all just find a field and start a game. If we didn’t have a field, we’d play in the street. If we didn’t have enough kids, we’d make up rules so we did. We’d argue over safe or out, fair or foul. We’d stop what we were doing because Dwight Gooden was pitching tonight. Argue Mattingly vs. Hernandez. Go to the drug store and buy packs of cards and pour through them like lottery tickets. Sure, we played and liked other sports, but baseball season was special.
Then, WFAN radio started. I no longer had to wait until nighttime for Art Russ, Jr. to get my fix. In between library books about Henry Aaron or Willie Mays I could listen to stuff about yesterday, today and tonight all day. All the sports I could ever want!
Today now just feels kinda empty. Yes, I am a grown man with his own life and little family, but this is still a big part of me that dies a little more with each passing business disagreement.
Football is my mistress. Baseball is my wife. Today, I feel like I got divorce papers served to me.
Jeff Passan is a hack.