Deal not done yet
Union not happy with MLB plan
Breaking down the MLB’s proposal to delay season and why it failed.
On Sunday afternoon, at 1:14 p.m. and via the Twitter account of Yahoo national baseball writer Tim Brown, the term “pro rata” officially re-entered our consciousness. Grateful aren’t we all. To think, it hasn’t even been a year, although it feels like 15 or 20.
Brown’s tweet revealed that, two days prior, Major League Baseball had approached the MLB Players Association with an offer, one that would potentially delay the 2021 season by about a month.
Predictably, given these two sides could seemingly argue over the color of ketchup, it touched off an interesting debate, one filled with plenty of questions. As a way to sift through the entire idea, let’s look at some of the biggest ones.
• What were the details? The proposal, which the MLBPA rejected Monday night, went like this: If the union said yes, spring training would begin March 22, and the season April 29.
To accommodate a 154game schedule, MLB offered to extend the season by a week, and players would be paid for a 162-game schedule. It would also include a previously proposed swap of expanded playoffs (14 teams) for the designated hitter in both leagues.
Alas, the union rejected the proposal, MLB issued a subsequent statement that said it believed in what it offered, and both sides professed to prepare for an on -time start to the 2021 season.
• What were the problems? There are several. For one, the union previously rejected the DH-for-expanded playoffs swap, believing a larger postseason is worth more than extricating bats from pitchers’ hands. The union also worries that it will tamp down spending if there’s an easier path to the playoffs.
Secondarily, the timing of the entire ordeal seemingly became an issue for players. By pushing games back a month and only extending the season a week on the other side, MLB would be taking away off-days — and any sort of safety net if there are issues.
There was also the possibility for things to get messy, and the union worried about ceding more power to commissioner Rob Manfred when determining how many games would be played.
Lastly, the union believed delaying the season would present an injury risk for players, especially pitchers. The 2020 season saw a record number of arm injuries, with many ascribing them to the period of in-between time and a shortened ramp-up during spring training 2.0.
That was largely unavoidable because of the pandemic. This time, the union seemingly sought to avoid similar issues.
• Should something happen? Delaying the season was, and remains, hardly a stupid idea. Though it’s not as if the coronavirus will be gone in a month, recent trends in Arizona and Florida depict a downward trend in infection rates, plus an increase in vaccine distribution.
Nevertheless, Arizona still has the highest infection rate in the country. Plus, there’s no way MLB can or will delay the Cactus League (Arizona) while allowing the Grapefruit League (Florida) to play on.
The move here was to stage serious talks in November or December. For whatever reason, that didn’t really happen until now — when pitchers have targeted Feb. 17 as a ready-by date, when players have secured housing and MLB has talked about anticipating an on-time arrival for spring training.
This late in the game, it’s simply hard to change the rules, especially when the NFL, NBA, NHL and NCAA are all staging seasons.
• Are there other concerns? Absolutely, yes. For while the biggest should always be safety, there were other ramifications to consider.
Because teams will need to follow specific protocols this spring, it’s expected that minor-league spring training will occur after the major leaguers are done. Delay a month, and MLB could see even shorter seasons for its teams. It was not yet known how many younger players would train after the major league season started, but it’s hard to imagine it’s safe for four affiliates — Class AAA, Class A, High-A and Low-A — to safely gather at once, meaning the lower levels, where development is often most important, would have seen an even lengthier delay.
The failure to find common ground here also complicates 2021 rules. Is there a DH or not? The uncertainty has kept sluggers such as Marcell Ozuna and Nelson Cruz on the free agent market. Any rule changes represent a tweak to the collective bargaining agreement, which means they further fall under this umbrella of distrust and could serve as pawns in the ongoing game of chess between the two sides.
• What’s the result? The status quo remains, and both sides are preparing for spring training.
The MLBPA did not offer a counterproposal Monday, and the two sides have little history finding common ground on anything, a trend that could complicate negotiations of the next Collective Bargaining Agreement. Rewind to the start of the 2020 season. Manfred had to implement a 60-game season because nobody could agree.
To change something here, his only recourse would be to invoke a national-emergency clause in the CBA and suspend the uniform player contract, which would take this entire argument to court.
Barring some sort of out-of-the-blue compromise, the most optimistic outcome seems to be what happened after a bit of a bumpy start in 2020, with players adhering to a strict set of protocols and the sport continuing to do its best playing through a pandemic.