Talks resume with no end in sight
Spring training should be approximately one month away, but Major League Baseball’s owners don’t appear to be feeling any sense of urgency about making sure everything starts on time.
That was the big takeaway from the latest bargaining session between the league and representatives from the MLB Players’ Association. After waiting six weeks to respond to the players’ last proposal for a new collective agreement, the owners offered up little more than cosmetic changes to what had been previously discussed.
According to multiple reports, commissioner Rob Manfred’s negotiating team declined to make any concessions on the big-ticket items. Their offer for the competitive tax balance threshold, which most teams treat as a salary cap, held steady at $214 million (U.S.). They also ignored requests for players to reach free agency before six years’ service.
Per ESPN’s Jeff Passan, the core of MLB’s proposal instead centred on funneling additional money to players with two years’ experience, awarding draft picks to some teams for not manipulating the service time of their top prospects, and making minor tweaks to a previously suggested draft lottery system.
Those changes accompanied a modest increase of about $25,000 to the minimum salary and the adoption of a universal designated hitter. MLB also renewed its efforts to introduce a 14-team post-season format, while backtracking on a
previous proposal to eliminate salary arbitration for players with four to six years of service in favour of a bonus pool system.
It shouldn’t be too difficult for the sides to find common ground on some of the secondary issues. The players are in favour of a draft lottery, but would prefer to see it involve more than the bottom three teams to further discourage tanking. They appear to like the idea of taking the bat away from pitchers, and they undoubtedly support the removal of penalties for teams signing free agents.
That’s all fine and good, but the minor tweaks do little to address the game’s bigger problems, the ones that could put the start of the regular season in jeopardy.
A source told The Associated Press that the players feel like they deserve a bigger piece of the pie and want the tax threshold raised to $245 million. To date, the owners’ proposal has only been a $4-million increase over the $210 million from 2021. Service time also remains a contentious issue.
In other words, nothing changed in the 42 days between talks except the weather, and the number of days remaining before spring games must be cancelled or postponed. Cooler heads might prevail before opening day scheduled for late March, but with negotiations showing little progress and the league’s off-season business not yet complete, camps opening in midFebruary is starting to look increasingly less likely.
The MLBPA reportedly informed the league that it would respond to the latest proposal without committing to a specific date. Whenever that day comes, the offer almost assuredly will include an earlier free agency window, which is as big a sticking point to the owners as the tax threshold is to the players.
If the league’s only purpose Thursday was to jump-start negotiations and get the ball rolling, it might have been mission accomplished. If the goal was to move this process forward, that clearly failed, with one union source telling MLB Network’s Jon Heyman that it was “disappointed” by the latest proposal.
The lack of movement between bargaining sessions seems to suggest the owners are intent on testing players’ resolve, to see how much they’ll be willing to concede the closer they get to missing paycheques.
They’d like to add some teams to the post-season, but are otherwise content with the status quo. It’s the players who are seeking more fundamental changes.
Perhaps MLB hopes that making enough adjustments in other areas will distract from the tax issue. After all, the strategy has worked before. The tax threshold barely moved over the course of the last contract despite record revenues, starting with a $6-million increase in Year 1, and later a bump of just $2 million prior to 2021.
A similar approach might not be as easy this time around. Some agents and players seemed to regret the last deal almost from the minute it was signed, and they want to see owners give up more this time around.
“There’s a lot of frustration from players, and I think there’s a willingness to ride this out as long as it takes to get a fair agreement,” Giants player representative Austin Slater told the San Francisco Chronicle.
The unfortunate reality is that the owners and players still have a lot of work to do before they will be able to finalize a new deal. Both sides are digging in their heels and not giving more than an inch. It’s why both parties find themselves in the same situation as in early December.
None of this bodes well for the health of the sport. This should be the time fans begin counting down the days to spring training and speculating about their team’s ability to remain competitive. Instead, all anyone is talking about is taxes, revenue sharing and draft lotteries, issues most fans won’t care about until it directly impacts the club they root for.
These are dark days and while there is still plenty of time for the skies to lift with a new contract before spring, the owners’ latest proposal is proof they aren’t in any rush to end the stalemate.