MLB and MLBPA 2022 Master Agreement Negotiations

Considering the Owners want to lower the luxury tax threshold to 180 million, that all but kills free agency for half the league.

 

Hopefully they put a limit on contract length

10 year contracts have never worked out for any team and it’s ridiculous.

 

It has ramifications across the entire league though. Some team like the angels will always be dumb enough to overpay for a 10 year contract so other teams lose their guy by choosing to not match stupidity with stupidity.

Your idea just means let every player go to teams with the most lucrative tv deals. I care about parity. NFL clearly has the best system in place for parity... hard cap, franchise tags, revenue sharing etc.

Although interesting enough... i don't think the nfl has a limit on how long player contracts can be.

 

Parity in the NFL is a myth. All but two super bowls in the 21st century starred Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, or Ben Rothisberger.

 

Except that neither the owners or players want that so it would make no one at all happy.

 

Parity isn't about winning the superbowl - its about being able to build a competitive team if you have good management. Good players and good management will still win out.

But in MLB, that's not the case - money changes the equation. The Royals or Pirates could build an elite squad, but will have to disassemble it within a few years due to payroll issues, while the Dodgers would not. Money doesn't rule all, but it makes it way easier to cover up bad decision making - that's not the case in the NFL since everyone works with the same pot. In MLB, if the Dodgers had all the Astros' players, they would not have to worry about losing Verlander or Springer or Correa or Cole. That's where parity fails in MLB.

 

Yet Baseball hasn’t had a repeat champion since 2000. Franchises aren’t cheap because they can’t afford to pay, they’re cheap to maximize profit regardless of winning (A’s, Rays) or they’re cheap because you can’t build a winning team solely though free agency like you can in basketball.

The bloated free agent market comes from how exclusive it is. A players best years are behind him 6 years into his major league career. This concentrates the best talent into getting all the money, often to fall off in their early 30s. Free agency is built to benefit the owners and the best players, while screwing over the rank and file.

 

Again - completely irrelevant. Baseball also has the biggest "luck" factor of all the major sports in that the best teams regularly lose 3-4 games in a row to crappy teams and vise-versa. The best team almost always wins in the NBA (barring injury). A top 3 or 4 team almost always win in the NFL. Wild Card teams routinely win in MLB.

This isn't true. Both the NFL and NBA get the vast majority of their resources from national TV deals, which is what makes their caps viable. MLB is almost entirely local TV deals: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/lets-update-the-estimated-local-tv-revenue-for-mlb-teams/

The Dodgers get $239MM / yr from their TV deal. The Marlins get $20MM. So even if they manage to have equal revenues from attendance/merchandise/etc, the Dodgers have $219MM extra dollars per year to spend on payroll than the Marlins to maintain the same topline numbers. For that matter, the Dodgers have $100MM more than any other team in baseball.

Teams are cheap because they don't have the money that other teams have.

 

Considering the owner's demands are a 14/16 team postseason and lowing the luxury tax by 30 million dollars, which puts 7 teams over the limit with their current payrolls. On top of that, the average salary is declining as we speak, 4 million to 3.5 million in the last 3 years. For all the whining about "losing money in 2020", I doubt the owners back down, if the players don't give in, this will go into the season.

The longest work stoppage in american pro sports history wasn't a player strike, It was an owner lockout. The NHL was spending on average 75% of its expenses on player salary in 2003-04, so the owners demanded a salary cap. The players refused, and the owners locked them out. The result? The entire 2004-05 season was cancelled, not a single game played. The players eventually submitted to all the owners demands, and by the very next year, less than half of NHL team expenses went to player contracts thanks to a hard salary cap.

Not only in sports, but as the labor market becomes endlessly saturated thanks to non-stop immigration and the shattering of small businesses, I expect employer lockouts to become more common, especially as unions weaken and decline further.

 

Lockouts only work in privately held monopolies. Pro sports are a legal Monopoly which is why Congress has some oversight and why the is a CBA. Doesn't work when there are public stock holder and competitors.

 

The MLBPA continues to be the strongest union. Even with the mini-stalemate during the pandemic, you saw their resolve when it came to unilaterally willing to take only the pro-rated share of current salaries, rather than accept possibly more money overall for the year... but setting a precedent whereby they conceded to the owners wishes.

Is it due to more players/team? Is it do to historical factors? Is it because baseball owners are more diverse in terms of some willing to withstand losses, some not?

Its fascinating... but ultimately the players are unlikely to give in on every single issue, and they still remain ultimately concerned that the average salaries continue to go down while MLB overall revenue continues to rise (thanks to internet deals) despite overall attendance and ratings not necessarily rising.

 

Dodger fans really hoping for a shortened season because they don't have the durability to survive 162 games and remain functional.

 

Will be interesting to see the ramifications of the bargaining. I think both sides are headed with a full steam ahead, to get the max for their party. I think both see what the other side has, and they covet that enclave.

I fully expect a drawn out no hold barred fight between the owners and the players Union.