MLB Lockout: Hope on the Horizon as Players and Owners Will Meet Again Tuesday
Could an end be in site for the seven week-long lockout that has frozen Major League Baseball’s offseason? While nothing is certain, there appears to some thawing of the ice…
HOUSTON, TEXAS – OCTOBER 07: Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred talks with Manager Tony La Russa #22 of the Chicago White Sox prior to Game 1 of the American League Division Series at Minute Maid Park on October 07, 2021 in Houston, Texas. (Photo by Bob Levey/Getty Images)
Could an end be in site for the seven week-long lockout that has frozen Major League Baseball's offseason?
While nothing is certain, there appears to some thawing of the ice as both the players and owners met for more than two hours to hash out proposals on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. Reports are the sides are going to meet again on Tuesday.
According to reports, the players rescinded their request to have free agency tied to a players age in addition to service time in the League. The players are prioritizing the luxury tax threshold, draft order, and pay for younger players with less service time.
The union is also revising its proposals regarding revenue sharing among the 30 MLB clubs, and players remain firm on their proposal to reduce the timeline for arbitration eligibility from three-years to two years.
According to CBS Sports, issues that the players union is wholly against include:
- Raising the minimum salary and making more money available to Super Two players, a subset of players who quality for arbitration four times rather than the usual three based on their service time. (per MLB Network's Jon Heyman).
- Draft pick bonuses for teams that do not manipulate the service time of top prospects. (per Sportsnet's Ben Nicholson-Smith)
- Adjustments to the league's previously proposed draft lottery. (per ESPN's Jeff Passan)
The focus for the players is strictly an economic one. They want to get young players paid more up front sooner. In the union's estimation the players are grossly underpaid in their pre-arbitration and pre-free agency years. That is why the union wants a significant increase in minimum salary while "angling to lower the bar for arbitration eligibility to two years."
"[D]iscussions have taken place on how to address the "tanking" phenomenon among teams and the status of the luxury tax on payrolls moving forward -- i.e., whether the tax threshold will be raised and by how much. As for the revenue sharing issue, it's a source of concern because the transfer of such a large percentage of local revenues from large-market teams to small-market clubs has in essence guaranteed the latter profitability regardless of what kind of team they put on the field," CBS Sports.
Time is of the essence for both sides. Spring Training is scheduled to begin in three weeks, and the regular season starts on March 31. The longer both sides remain apart in negotiations, the likelihood that spring training games and regular season games could be lost only increases.
