MLB, players in tense negotiations
As the days peel off the calendar toward an unofficial but implied deadline to salvage a 2020 season, the gulf between Major League Baseball and the Players' Association appears as many as 74 games wide.
Tuesday morning, some two days after its offer of a 114-game season, the union had yet received a counter-proposal from MLB in the wake of a tense conference call Sunday during which the league threatened to cut the season as short as 40 games, according to a person with direct knowledge of the negotiations.
The issue of pro-rated salary remains the largest sticking point, even as owners floated the concept of a 50-game season with pro-rated salaries in an ESPN report. At the moment, owners are willing to offer players a more extended season on a sliding salary scale, or pro-rated salary within a very shortened season.
The issue of extended playoffs — which would enable owners to recoup significant revenue in the face of the shortened season and no fans in attendance at games — appears settled. Yet a shorter season that enhances the chances of a complete postseason in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic is appealing for a wider swath of owners, given the significant disparities in local broadcast revenue during the regular season.
There is no hard deadline to reach an agreement, though the calendar provides a de facto timeline. Ideally, players would report to training camps around June 10 in hopes of starting the season around July 3, which makes the next three days particularly crucial.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred estimated in a CNN interview losses of $4 billion if games are played without fans. Players also have plenty at stake.
New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole, for example, was slated to make $36 million in the first year of a $324 million deal. That would be reduced to about $8 million in MLB's 82-game sliding scale proposal.
He'd make around $11 million, prorated, under MLB's reported 50-game concept, and about $16 million under the union's 114-game, pro-rated proposal.
Nationals to pay minor leaguers: The Nationals changed course and told their minor leaguers they will receive their full weekly stipends of $400 at least through June after Washington reliever Sean Doolittle tweeted that the team's major league players would cover a planned cut in those payments.
Doolittle wrote on Twitter that Nationals major leaguers held a video conference call after The Athletic reported Sunday the club would be releasing more than two dozen minor league players and reducing stipends for players in the minors from $400 to $300 per week.
A text message sent by the Nationals to players in the minors and forwarded Monday to The Associated Press reads: “Upon further internal discussion, you will receive your full stipend of $400 per week through the month of June. We will consider future payments on a month to month basis. Thank you!”
It's not unusual for big league teams to release minor leaguers at this time of year, although not normally this many. More than 400 young players have been cut with the minor league season in doubt amid the COVID-19 outbreak.
Minor league players not on 40-man rosters were promised $400 per week through Sunday by a policy drafted by MLB. Including Washington's switch, now at least 16 teams have promised to extend those allowances through the end of this month.
After the report about Washington's reduction in that stipend, Doolittle wrote Sunday night that Nationals major leaguers decided unanimously that they “will be coming together and committing funds to make whole the lost wages.”
“All of us were minor leaguers at one point in our careers and we know how important the weekly stipends are for them and their families during these uncertain times,” Doolittle wrote. “Minor leaguers are an essential part of our organization and they are bearing the heaviest burden of this situation as their season is likely to be cancelled.”