How MLB, MLBPA must get their priorities straight as lockout looms over their sport
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Hours before the negotiation teams of the players and owners met Thursday, one industry source lamented the state of the game. Each side is entrenched and angry, the source noted. “I don’t even know where we go from here,” he said. “I really don’t. Everybody is painted into a corner.”
With the sport seemingly headed for at least some downtime, there’s plenty of room for reflection — and now is a great opportunity for everyone involved to ask themselves hard questions about how they contributed to a completely toxic working relationship, and what they can do (and must do) to effect change.
The owners
1. Why can’t we focus on the bigger picture? The owners need to free themselves from the cancerous incrementalism that has infected their sport, something their extraordinary collective wealth should allow them to do. It’s not evident that some of the owners are capable of this, though, given the small-minded decisions over the past couple of years, such as when the Oakland Athletics proposed to cut the salaries of their minor leaguers from $400 to $300 a week during the COVID-19 shutdown, or the league’s choice to cut about a quarter of the minor league clubs despite an annual savings of less than $2 million per team.
But the owners need to recognize that even if they prevail in a long-term standoff with the players and end up with a slightly bigger pile of money, their product would be damaged, perhaps irreparably. Some fans would stay away forever, and the players’ anger would persist. The owners need the players to be on board to build the sport, through on-field changes and promotion.
Whatever revenue the owners might sacrifice with a major, decisive concession in the competitive balance tax would be more than offset in the years ahead through MLB growth.
2. Why are we working to protect a system that incentivizes losing? Think about that: The Baltimore Orioles (among others, following the example set by yet more teams) have determined it’s better to cut their…
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Source : espn
