Minor league antitrust examined

Leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee have asked baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred to explain the impact of potential legislation stripping the sport's antitrust exemption from covering the sport's relationship with minor league players.

Sen. Richard Durbin, an Illinois Democrat who chairs the committee, and Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican who is the ranking minority member, sent the letter Monday and asked Manfred to respond by July 26 to a series of questions that could be a prelude to proposed legislation further limiting an exemption created by a 1922 Supreme Court decision.

The letter is the next step after a similar request for information the four senators sent last month to an advocacy group for minor leaguers. The executive director of the nonprofit Advocates for Minor Leaguers has recommended Congress enact legislation nullifying the application of the exemption to minor leaguers.

Senators asked about the potential impact of repealing 2018 legislation exempting minor league players from federal minimum wage and overtime laws — the Save America's Pastime Act — and whether the antitrust exemption played a role in MLB's decision in 2020 to cut minor league affiliations from a minimum of 160 to 120. They also asked whether MLB would commit to maintaining 120 affiliates when current 10year player development license agreements expire after the 2030 season.

Draft Day 2

Mason McGwire, son of 12-time All-Star slugger Mark, was selected in the eighth round of baseball's amateur draft by the Chicago Cubs on Monday.

Mason is a right-handed pitcher out of Capistrano Valley High. The 18-year-old is committed to the University of Oklahoma, where his 19-year-old brother Max is an infielder. There's no indication yet if Mason plans to turn pro, but teams seldom use picks in the top 10 rounds on players who they think are unsingable.

Mark was also drafted in the eighth round out of high school in 1981 by the Montreal Expos as a first baseman and right-handed pitcher. He opted to attend college at Southern California, where he led college baseball in home runs in 1984 before being chosen 10th overall by Oakland. Mason is one of several sons of big leaguers taken in this year's draft, including the top two picks — Jackson Holliday, son of Matt, went first overall to Baltimore while Druw Jones, son of Andruw, went second to Arizona. Justin Crawford, whose dad was All-Star Carl Crawford, was selected 17th overall by the Philadelphia Phillies.

Mets broadcaster Alicea dies at 85

Longtime New York Mets Spanish broadcaster Juan Alicea died Monday, the team said. He was 85.

The Mets said Alicea died in his sleep in Florida.

Alicea joined the Mets in April 1969, the season they won their first World Series championship, and worked in the scouting and community relations departments. Alicea started doing Spanish broadcasts for the Mets in 1982 and called more than 4,000 games through 2019.

Boston's Sale has surgery on pinkie

Red Sox left-hander Chris Sale had surgery on his broken left pinkie finger on Monday, a day after it was hit by a line drive in a game against the New York Yankees. The team called the surgery successful but did not give a timetable for his return.

It couldn't have been more than a decade ago that Chip Ganassi hosted a dinner at his usual window table in his favorite downtown Indianapolis steakhouse. The movers and shakers of the local IndyCar scene were present, including Zak Brown, and the group played credit card roulette to determine who would cover the bill.

There's been some sort of falling out between Ganassi and Brown since that dinner — a business agreement gone bad? Brown's failed attempt to lure away Ganassi star driver Scott Dixon? — and the acrimony between the two team owners is common knowledge in the IndyCar paddock.

Now, they legitimately have a beef. Chip Ganassi Racing and

McLaren Racing both believe they have reigning IndyCar champion Alex Palou signed for next season in a messy contract dispute that will likely be resolved by lawyers.

Rumors swirled at the Indianapolis 500 that Brown was attempting to poach Palou, but the Spaniard last month insisted he was happy in the No. 10 car with Ganassi and not looking to leave.

Palou's denials shifted speculation toward another run at Dixon, but the six-time IndyCar champion and Ganassi's longest-tenured driver said he'd had no conversations about moving to Arrow McLaren SP. Ganassi heard the same gossip, rolled his eyes, huffed and puffed, and insisted his four-driver lineup next year would be status quo.

Brown, meanwhile, continued signing drivers to McLaren's expanding roster.

It all erupted last week when Ganassi called The Associated Press and said he'd picked up the option year on Palou's contract. A few hours later, the team made it official with a news release announcing Palou would be back for a third season.

Palou hit back in a series of tweets that claimed he'd not authorized any news release, the quote attributed to him in the news release was fake, and that he'd informed CGR he was not returning in 2023. Minutes later, McLaren said it had signed Palou in an announcement made after midnight in England.

So what happens next? Grab some popcorn for what looks to be an extracted battle for the 25-year-old in one of the juiciest IndyCar dramas in years.

Ganassi remained fairly silent on the issue all weekend in Toronto, where Dixon earned his 52nd career victory to tie Mario Andretti for second on the all-time wins list. He maintains he exclusively held an option on Palou, exercised it for 2023, and the contract he holds is valid.

Brown has never seen Palou's contract and has operated under the assumption that Palou was a free agent. And as personal as it may appear in luring the reigning series champion away from his rival, Brown insisted all his driver signings are business moves only.

“Our mission is to try and build the most competitive and exciting racing team in the world for our fans, sponsors and employees,” Brown told AP, “and you need the best talent in order to achieve that.”

Brown's recent moves back up his claim. Arrow McLaren, the IndyCar branch of the larger McLaren Racing organization, signed 2016 Indianapolis 500 winner Alexander Rossi for next season and Colton Herta has a testing contract with the F1 team. Both drivers are currently under contract to Michael Andretti, and Brown and Andretti are actual friends.

Brown stopped Pato O'Ward from slipping away from his IndyCar team when the Mexican expressed early season disappointment with his contract by giving O'Ward an extension from Arrow McLaren. And McLaren Racing extended Felix Rosenqvist's contract with the caveat he could be used in either IndyCar or the new Formula E team McLaren plans to launch next year.

That's five current IndyCar drivers — counting Palou — with contracts to drive for Brown. And he signed Lando Norris to an F1 extension at the start of the year in what's been a head-spinning flurry of roster padding.

Notably, Brown is undecided on who will drive what next season. He knows Rossi will be in IndyCar and Norris in F1, but everything else depends on resolving the Palou saga and the F1 future of Daniel Ricciardo.

Brown has said there are “mechanisms” in which Ricciardo and McLaren can split at the end of this season, but it is believed Ricciardo is the one who holds the option and the

Australian has insisted he'll be back in 2023. In fact, after the Palou debacle, Ricciardo took to social media to reiterate his future.

“I am committed to McLaren until the end of next year and am not walking away from the sport,” wrote the 33-year-old.

In reality, he has until September and after F1's summer break to formally inform McLaren he's returning — something Ricciardo has not done yet. Should he return to F1, then Brown is likely looking at a three-car IndyCar lineup of Rossi, O'Ward and Palou if he's actually available.

Rosenqvist would shift to Formula E, even as the Swede publicly lobbied Sunday to keep his IndyCar seat following his third-place finish.

“I want to be where I'm at right now. It's up to Zak, he's the man who is making the moves,” Rosenqvist said. He also added it could take weeks to unravel Palou's situation, and speculated Palou could even be benched for all of 2023.

“At the moment it doesn't sound like he's going to race at all. It's up to lawyers and stuff,” Rosenqvist said. “This whole deal went down months ago. I think if Zak was sure I was going to FE, he would have already said it. I'm going to take that chance.”

All bets are off if Ricciardo does indeed leave McLaren.

Then Brown has an open F1 seat — the carrot that likely wooed Palou away from Ganassi — and unlike Herta and O'Ward, Palou holds the FIA super license required to compete in the series.

Herta had an outstanding test in Portugal but remains under contract with Andretti until the end of the 2023 season. Andretti has said he would let the American move to F1 if he has the opportunity, but Andretti wants Herta in his own long-term plans and is hoping to land his own F1 team by 2024.

Herta and O'Ward both still need super licenses to compete in F1, a hurdle Brown will address once he knows if he actually has Palou and what Ricciardo has planned. He's determined for McLaren to become a consistent winner in F1 again and for its IndyCar team to challenge heavyweights Ganassi, Team Penske and Andretti Autosport.

It's all just business to Brown. Making his nemesis Ganassi squirm is simply the cherry on top of his ambitious plans.