Baseball battle on restart continues to heat up
Owners, players are firing their parting shots
Brewers
Negotiations to return Major League Baseball to the field during a pandemic broke off Saturday night, which was no small trick considering true negotiations never actually began.
The players union turned down the latest offer from ownership for a shortened season, which it believed was a charade from the beginning. Once again, the proposal did not include paying players at full pro rata, a non-starter from the outset for the union.
These sides don’t like each other or trust each other, which was evident in statements issued accusing both of failing to negotiate in good faith. Forget the good faith. There was no real negotiation to begin with. Just dueling emails in which players and their bosses continued to disagree on what they supposedly agreed upon in a March 26 document.
Players said they were guaranteed full prorated pay in that document (it cannot be called an agreement) and refused to budge off that stance. Owners say it allowed them to re-visit player pay if games were played without fans, which is how they are slated to begin.
With owners continuing to offer the same-sized pizza, only sliced differently, players pushed themselves away from the table and said “no thanks” one last time. Players director Tony Clark issued a statement in which he said, “It unfortunately appears that further dialogue with the league would be futile. It’s time to get back to work. Tell us when and where.”
In other words, the union told commissioner Rob Manfred to do what it believed was intended all along: implementation of a season with as few games as possible with pro-rated salaries. Owners have insisted they will suffer unacceptable financial losses the more games they play at full pay rates.
As might be expected in what quickly
became an acrimonious exercise, both sides fired warning shots that could lead to dueling grievances being filed.
MLB issued a statement that said: “We are disappointed that the MLBPA has chosen not to negotiate in good faith over resumption of play after MLB has made three successive proposals that would provide players, clubs and our fans with an amicable resolution to a very difficult situation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic… The MLBPA's position that players are entitled to virtually all the revenue generated by a 2020 season played without fans is not fair to the thousands of other baseball employees that clubs and our office are supporting financially during this very difficult 2020 season.”
In essence, that statement said, “You greedy players refuse to make financial concessions while others in the game are suffering, so shame on you.”
Beyond Clark's grim statement, union lawyer Bruce Meyer sent an email to MLB deputy commissioner Dan Halem, saying, “Players remain united in their stance that a day's work is worth a day's pay, particularly in a situation where players and their families are being asked to take on additional burdens and risks. Given your continued insistence on hundreds of millions of dollars of additional pay reductions, we assume these negotiations are at an end… We demand that you inform us of your plans by close of business on Monday, June 15.”
So, with the death toll from COVID-19 approaching 120,000 in the U.S. and millions of Americans out of work as an added consequence, not to mention massive protests from coast to coast over racial injustice, baseball players and their bosses remain at odds over money. Those who thought they wouldn't have the hubris to keep the game shutdown over financial disagreements were oh so wrong.
MLB's latest offer to the union, delivered Friday, included a 72-game season during which players would have received 70% of their prorated pay, boosted to 80% if an expanded postseason was concluded. Both sides were in favor of including more teams in the playoffs but players would only agree to do so if paid on a full pro rata basis.
As for MLB's insistence in not playing beyond October, Meyer accused owners of using fear of a second wave of COVID-19 to force players to accept pay cuts without providing requested information to warrant that stance.
“Other leagues are planning on playing in October and November, and we have proposed having the flexibility to play games at neutral sites if necessary to address any safety concerns,” Meyer wrote to Halem. “We believe your position is part and parcel of your general bad-faith determination to play as few games as possible to punish players for refusing to capitulate to MLB's demands for massive pay cuts.”
In other words, “You guys are running a con game here solely to make players look bad if they don't agree to play for less money.” Players have continued to point out they will be the ones taking the risks in playing during a pandemic, not the owners, who have built fabulous wealth while running clubs.
What is expected to happen now is a mandate from Manfred for a "regular" season of about 50 games, to stretch no longer than the end of September. Players originally offered to play more than 100 games with the playoffs stretching into November but owners have not wanted to do so, citing a possible second wave of COVID-19 as well as conflicts in postseason scheduling with their TV partners, which remains their primary source of revenue.
It's true that even 50 games are better than none but the players certainly won't be excited about it. And perhaps it's best not to play with fans in the stands anyway because so many of them have been turned off by this disgusting process.
Rather than seeing this as a one-off negotiation during an unprecedented time in the country's history, owners and players have drawn lines in the sand that could lead to an ugly labor war when the current Collective Bargaining Agreement expires after the 2021 season. There has been labor peace since the disastrous shutdown in 1994-95 but if the sides can't find a middle ground during a pandemic, good luck next year when financial consequences to the game still will be reverberating.
Since 2016, all Clark has heard is the union "lost" the last CBA negotiation, and he is determined never to hear that again, especially after average salaries did not reflect the game's revenue boosts in recent seasons. But it never should have been about "winning" this negotiation, for either side. This should have been about doing whatever it took to get through a horrible 2020 and move forward.
In an industry that generated well over $10 billion last year, owners and players couldn't find a way to share the losses that will come from playing in these extraordinary circumstances. The New York Post reported Saturday that MLB had reached an agreement in excess of $3 billion with Turner Sports to televise postseason games after the current deal expires following the 2021 season.
That news came just days after St. Louis Cardinals owner Bill DeWitt Jr. said on a radio show, “The industry isn't very profitable, to be honest.” And it further galvanized the players' belief that owners will be just fine in the long run and shouldn't be squeezing them further this year, pandemic or not.
Reaching an agreement would have set a cooperative tone at a time when so many people are suffering. It also would have resulted in expanded playoffs, which would have benefited both sides with many more millions in revenue.
But these parties were never going to agree about the finances because their level of distrust exceeds what should have been common sense with the country in crisis. For those of you who wanted baseball back in the worse way, that's how you're going to get it.