[ESPN] MLB suspends spring training, delays Opening Day at least two weeks

Their back and forth during the current financial state of our nation sure does give them an even worse look though, and baseball needs good PR, not bad

And while I hope you are right that at least it could lead to not having a work stoppage either next year or in 2022, I’m not so sure that will be true. The distrust between Mlb owners and players runs deep.

If they didn’t play this year because of heath reasons, the people would understand. If they don’t play because of money, the harm they do to the game will be enormous

 

Not sure they’ve ever given in to fan sentiment, optics, or PR... its always been about the money each and every step of the way.

This just magnifies it... and there’s likely a time in the future where things are good again and this is forgotten... but the relationship between the two sides has never been harmonious. All the recent contract stifling, whispers of collusion, and service time manipulations have always been grinding at the MLBPA... while some owners struggle to compete as well as make payroll in an uncapped league, and require subsidization from richer teams just to break even.

The more layers that get peeled back the more fractured/broken the game is (financially). Manfred’s bungling of the cheating scandal inspires no confidence that he is going to be able to go toe-to-toe with the players union... and that’s after they’re already sour on him because of his bad handling and his impetus to enforce significant rule changes.

 

We'll see how many games, but this seems like the owners conceding that a loss, or small profit is a lot f**king better than the long term damage multiple work stoppages will do.

 

Sounds like owners see regular season as worthless to them without fans in stadiums. 50 games would be the third offer of $1.5B to the players...just rearranged meeting players concerns about not tied to revenue and then pro-rated salaries. Owners are basically saying we will give the players $1.5 Billion for enough regular season games to make it look legitimate such that owners get playoff gravy.

Players basically are saying owners are lying about regular season games being a loss without fans in stadiums.

 

Agree

I think the world is a different place than the last work stoppage though. Social media has drastically changed everything. Now everyone will discuss it more which leads for more and more anger.

I hope they figure it out and have a season, and if they don’t I hope I’m wrong about the damage it will do, but I think it will set the game back for years

 

I think this is a good place to start an actual negotiation. Players asked for 100+ games, owners offer 50...will likely settle in middle around the 80 mark they originally wanted.

 

Owners offered 1.5B on first offer. This is same offer, repackaged, again. Games, salary cap, prorated salaries are distractions over root disagreement.

 

Yep, but it’s an offer with full pro rated salaries. It’s the first offer that has a potential place to start true negotiations. Both sides initial offers were non starters, and both sides knew that when they made them

 

50 games is ridiculously short. It’s acceptable for the NBA, where great teams are obvious from the get go... but baseball?

Astros were 33-17 after 50 games last season, which was on May 22... and up 7.5 games on the Rangers. 50 games normally doesn’t even get you to Memorial Day which has long been claimed the unofficial “start” to the season.

I don’t think the players go for this anyways. The owners are going to have to end up conceding an 82-100 game season with higher percentage of revenue salaries to strike an agreement. There’s also growing evidence that fans likely could be allowed back in, in reduced but room for expansion capacity as the summer goes on... which would make gate revenue a variable that likely improves. Could have possibly more fans for playoff games.

Players/owners have to consider that probability/finances in these talks... but the months aren’t getting any shorter the more this drags out, and they’ll still need 2-3 weeks to train prior to starting a season.

And with all the restructuring of finances... how come nobody has brought up that if these games actually go on the air, networks are going to get ad money through the roof, and yet teams haven’t discussed a possible adjustment in the rights fees they’re being paid? That’s where the true money is right now, and ratings projections for any live sport is quite optimistic.

 

Im sure the players have brought up the ad money because of better ratings, but with the owners refusing to open their books, how could you possibly get an honest answer as to how much that would be

 

Would have to pressure the networks and see if deals are actually being reworked on the DL with anticipation of huge ratings surges and the resultant increase in ad revenue.

National deals tend to be public information... haven't seen anything from any of the leagues thus far discussed... but they're all standing to see ratings increases if there are any games on period.

In the end, these fluctuations likely merely impact future rights deals negotiations... which is sort of the situation the owners/players are in now with the current deal. If networks are paying the same rates despite bigger ratings due to a pandemic, and don't get to change the stipulations on the fly, do owners get a pass for trying to do just that?

 

No chance there's a 50 game season. I think the owners see it as a negotiation tactic but that's starting from a completely unrealistic point. 50 games from July only gets you barely into September. It's too asinine to use in these negotiations. It's not going to work towards a middle ground. It's just going to be laughed at.

 

It is meant to be a slap in the face. Players said owners lied that they would lose money on regular season games. Owners responded by saying they would give players everything they wanted except shrink the number of games to make money the same as their previous offers. The players want more money except they keep talking about other things as a means to get more money. Though, if this drags on, there may be only enough time for 50 games at some point. When that time is reached, it will be on the players and players alone that baseball wouldn't be played.

I expect owners are willing to concede every non-money issue and contort deal any way imaginable to meet players non-money concerns. On money, I expect the majority of the owners are willing to concede a little such that the players get around 57% of baseball revenue which is on the high end of what the players normally receive. Assuming owners expect the revenues to be about 3 Billion (*), this would be about 1.7-1.8B. Owners have offered 1.5B three different ways. Players counter offer was about 3B to them...though their plan would increase total revenue, while their share of total revenue increased.

*Whatever this number is, all other numbers should be scaled to this number except the 57%.

 

Teams don't get the ad money, though - networks do. They pay flat rates and take on risk in exchange for upside if ad revenues goes up. Unless MLB can renegotiate contracts upward with networks, they don't benefit, and it seems unlikely any networks would have any incentive to renegotiate anything.

 

I think this is spot-on. Players want owners to take all the pain; owners are proposing both sides split the pain. All the other leagues have that mechanism built into their systems with salary caps tied to revenue, which is why all the other leagues are operating so much more smoothly. If this season gets scrapped, I can see the owners pushing much harder in the next CBA for a system that ensures mutual damage in downturns.

 

But the other leagues’ cap system merely dictates what kind of contracts are handed out per team. It has nothing to do with mitigating the lost revenues during a pandemic.

The reason why the NBA is in a better place is because they’ve already collected 80% of revenues for the season. The reason why the NFL is in a better place is that they already expect to collect 100% of the TV money if all games are played.

But on paper, both leagues face the same crisis of no fan attendance... which both leagues also attribute to about 40% of overall revenues.

If the NBA season were yet to start now... or if football has to potentially only play a half season... they’d both be discussing the same things as baseball in terms of lowering players salaries.

In the end, the baseball financial system is broken from a standpoint that lower revenue/payroll teams need subsidizing beyond what they can get from gate revenue or TV money. Beyond the truly big market teams (of which the Astros, payroll wise, are one of), they don’t really have an issue with the lack of a salary cap. They have more of an issue to get small market teams to raise payroll to the median level.

 

Much like the players don’t have an overwhelming incentive to renegotiate anything...

If the owners feel just to try and renegotiate that agreement with the players mid-stream, not sure why they don’t also force such tactics with the networks that stand to be the real winners in this debacle, regardless (if there’s no season, they get to pocket the rights fees... if there is a season, they get to up sell ad money).