MLB Offseason: Owners got a dinger of a CBA

Owners are, for sure, comfortable missing regular season games, especially early-season games. They know it hurts players more than them. This is why they did a lockout instead of waiting and letting players strike in August like ‘94. This is also why they dragged their feet during the pandemic negotiations in 2020.

Players get paid for the regular season but don't get regular paychecks during the postseason, and they get the same amount of money in April as in September. They don’t get paychecks in spring nor October. Owners make more money in September and the postseason.

I don't have the time to write a 2,000-word dissertation, but this is a purely ideologically driven lockout because Manfred was hired by the owners with the mission of breaking the union. If they can’t fully break the union, their ideal scenario is probably a 60-game season that starts in August followed by an expanded postseason. There is zero urgency on the ownership side.

Reading Lords of the Realm, by John Helyar, basically drove home the point that owners absolutely and in no way actually care about baseball as a concept. This shouldn't be surprising, because capitalism, but the amount of stupid, petty bullshit they did (and do) to the detriment of the actual product they purport to sell is mind-boggling.

This is a group of people that still has blackout restrictions that cover millions of square miles, even with fanbases that sell out their stadiums nearly every season. Honestly, if it weren't for Ted Turner, we'd probably still be lucky to get the damn games on terrestrial radio.

 

Some various news items:

"A surprise one-on-one meeting between commissioner Rob Manfred and union head Tony Clark" is a cursed fucking sentence. I want to know which MLBPA lawyer was tasked with writing "Do not trade a salary cap for bigger chairs in the clubhouse" on Clark's palm before sending him in there.

In other news:

- Josh Hamilton has received probation in a case in which he was accused of assaulting his teenage daughter.

- Spring training games have been canceled through March 7.

- Former Mariners and White Sox player Julio Cruz has passed away at 67; no cause was given.

Edit: I missed this:

Owners badly want expanded playoffs because players don't get regular game checks during the postseason, only (rapidly diminishing as MLB accounting gets more and more creative) revenue shares. So the owners get to soak up so much more of that sweet, sweet gate, concession, parking and media revenue the longer the postseason runs and the more games there are.

 

Jon Heyman, who has been in owners' pockets for years, tweeted that he was told by a source that a CBA is "within striking distance" and could be done by tomorrow night.

He immediately got dogpiled by a bunch of players and actual, legitimate journalists who basically said he was full of shit. One said that the very idea was "beyond absurd."

 

Per Evan Drellich from The Athletic, MLB has offered to eliminate draft-pick compensation for free agents. (So, getting rid of the qualifying offer.)

The catch?

They want to drastically increase the luxury tax penalties, in exchange. The owners aren't even bothering to try to hide how badly they want a salary cap.

 

Please, please, please bring the Dinger Machine back inside the park!

 

Charles Comiskey, Connie Mack and Branch Rickey turned out pretty well.

 

If you have to dig back that far to find the ones that didn't end in disaster...

 

Well, there just aren't particularly very many former players who became owners.