glory

Yup. Unless they come up with an agreement tomorrow out of the blue, this lockout is going to last longer now. Even if they somehow agreed on all the topics (CBT, pre arb, etc), soon they'll have to figure out how 2022 salaries and service time will be distributed for less than 162 games. Hint: owners will want prorated salaries, players will want full salaries, and more s*** to have to work out. Losing games because of the QO is insane to me. I can't even wrap my head around that.

MLBPA wants $65 million with $5m increases every year, so it will be $85m by year 5. The owners want $40m flat. Over a five year span that's a difference of $200m (owners) versus $375m (players). So gap is still pretty significant. CBT is close enough to where that shouldn't be an issue. I have no idea why the players care about the international draft at all. Those prospects are not part of the union. It's the reason why you can tell Tony Clark that minor league players are getting paid with peanut butter sandwiches as currency and he wouldn't flinch because it has no impact on the union. Seems like an odd thing to be a non starter.

Apparently the NBC/Peacock deal is simply taking the games that ESPN used to have, which were non exclusive games on Monday and Wednesday. If that's the case, then the NBC games are likely to be on the local cable channels and MLBtv as well, as opposed to Apple games which will be exclusively on Apple TV. Given the disparity in the amount of money MLB is getting from NBC ($30m/yr) versus what they're getting from Apple ($85m/yr), I can't imagine NBC is getting exclusive games, so it shouldn't impact how fans view it. Instead of airing on ESPN it will be on Peacock or NBC Sports. That's the way I am interpreting it at least, could be wrong.

Yeah if there's no deal today/this morning, then I don't think there will be one any time soon. If no deal this week, then you can add salary/service time during shortened season to the list of things they'd have to bargain/agree to. It's only going to get worse if they can't agree today.

If the players don't accept this, then I really won't fault the owners at all. Nothing seems unreasonable, and some of it looks really good for the players compared to the last CBA and/or previous proposals.

Not surprised MLB has gone to streaming services for weekly games. It's inevitable for all sports, but specifically those that rely on local/regional cable. The RSN model is going to change significantly over the next few years, and MLB will need to find a way to recoup some of that money. We will probably see more of these types of deals in the next few years. Exclusive games without any blackout restrictions is valuable, especially for Apple that doesn't have any sports content yet, so I'm sure MLB is getting a nice chunk of change on this one. Whether it's the best timing to announce this just as they are crying poor in labor negotiations is another story.

The Rays trade players the moment they make more than the league minimum, but sure, they made a play for Freeman.

If they end up missing a huge chunk or even all of the season, then I don't think baseball recovers from this. They'll still have fans and loyal local followings, but they'll inch closer to being the NHL in terms of having no national footprint and being strictly a regional/niche sport. If they only miss April, then we'll probably see no significant change since no one cares about baseball in April anyway, but this definitely seems like the type of lockout that will last most of the season, if not all of it. Baseball recovered in the 90s because of the home run chase, but also keep in mind that baseball was a lot more culturally relevant back then so it was easier for something big to bring fans back. In 2021, we saw the modern day Babe Ruth and it barely made a ripple outside of baseball circles. If Ohtani was around in the 90's he would have probably been one of the biggest athletes in America. Baseball over the last 10 or so years has really fallen off the national map, and even if someone were chasing Bonds' single season home run record in a few years (spoiler: no one will), I don't think it would bring the level of attention that the home run chase of 98 did.

Yeah April is horrendous for attendance and weather, so I could see the logic from the owners. If the season starts May 1, then they'll be fine with that. Unfortunately I think this lasts a lot longer than that.

James Harden in his next contract is going to make $60m in the final year of his deal, and that's in a salary cap league. While MLB players wear the "free market" like a badge of honor when players didn't even break $40m AAV until last year. A salary cap tied to league revenue solves pretty much all of the PA's issues but it will never happen.

Apparently MLB's offer is: 12 team playoffs (instead of 14) $675k min salary $25m pre arb pool $220m luxury tax ($220m for first 3 years then $224m in 2025 and $230m in 2026) CBT penalties same as last CBA Draft lottery for top 5 picks No draft pick compensation on free agents They still seem to be apart in all of the financial areas, but at least there was enough movement to extend the deadline. Just have to hope they find a compromise in the $$ today. According to Evan Drellich, the owners are asking for an international draft in these talks, so my guess is the players concede on that and some of the numbers (pre arb bonus, CBT, etc) increase.

If it ends up being 12 playoff teams then it means the players would have caved in other areas, so I’m actually surprised the players value 12 more than 14 so much that they’d potentially sacrifice other things. Either way, 12 would be better than 14 from a fan standpoint. If expansion happens again in the future, with 2 more franchises added, then 14 might be more desirable but with 30 teams, 12 is a nice compromise. Hope this gets done today and we can finally talk baseball again.

More logical would be if top team only has to win 1 game to advance while wild card team has to win 2, but I guess the league wants to ensure a 3 game series for financial reasons, and in that format the max a series would go is 2 games. I understand why they want to do something like that but I don’t think it would work.

The players want 12 teams while the owners want 14, so the players are ok with expanded playoffs, just not 14 teams. Which is kind of stupid because we are talking one extra team in each league making it so it's hardly a huge difference. My guess is they are holding out on that because it's the one piece of legitimate leverage they have on the owners so they are using it as their biggest/only bargaining chip. Based on what I've read, the owners have been consistent in that they won't budge on 1) revenue sharing and 2) the super 2 percentage. The players keep trying to make changes to this, but it seems futile since the owners don't even consider it something to be bargained. My guess is if there's any chance for movement in the next 2 days it will be if the players concede on those two issues. They'd get their increased minimum, and the owners might marginally increase the pre arb bonus if the players back off the super 2 stuff. The draft lottery seems like a minor/petty argument to begin with so I don't think that means much in the long run. It's the CBT that is going to be make or break this, and it sounds like "break" is more realistic at this rate.

Agreed, I'd just keep Vlad at 1B and get a short term 3B to bridge to Martinez/Groshans/whoever (barring a trade for someone like Ramirez), but the Jays seem legitimately interested in Freeman, so it's possible they have already considered the option of moving Vlad back there. If the other option is to sign Freeman and put Vlad at DH (or vice versa), then that seems like a bad use of resources/money, but I trust the front office in their decision making.

If slim Vlad is an average 3B, then moving him back there is a no brainer. My guess is he'd still be below average there, but no where near as bad as pre-2020, so might still be worth it if the upgrade at 1B (Freeman or otherwise) was big enough to justify it.

Based on today's results, seems like the only way baseball will begin (either March 31 or any time after that) is if the players cave. I don't think the owners care if they miss games or even a season. They'll survive. It's the players who lose guaranteed money, lose a year of their careers, etc. I don't think we see a resolution to this any time soon. I hope I'm wrong and they figure something out by Monday, but that's looking like a pipe dream. Last year the Jays missed the playoffs by 1 game in large part due to not being allowed to play home games for 4 months, and now have a roster that on paper looks like it could contend for the playoffs even if they are not expanded and we don't even know when or if the season will begin. Having to sit through the 2017-19 seasons only to get completely screwed when the competitive window begins. Frustrating. I could stomach a 60 game season during the pandemic due to the circumstances, but a shortened season because the two sides couldn't figure out how to split $10b is ridiculous.

Vlad is competent enough at 1B to be there long term so if the team is seriously interested in Freeman, then it would have to mean Vlad to 3B. Moving him to a DH role at age 23 when he's legitimately in the best shape of his life probably wouldn't go over well with him. His IG bio still has "3B" on it, so he probably still wants to be there (or he's too lazy to change his bio, I guess). I'll trust the front office on this one if it actually happens. Freeman is probably going to the first team to give him a 6 year deal, so curious to see if the Jays would actually do it given all their other FA contracts added recently.

The 3B free agent market stinks and Jose Ramirez may not even be available in a trade (especially if expanded playoffs becomes a thing). Moving Vlad back to 3B and either trying to sign Freeman or trade for Olson might be superior options at this point, although that means competing with the Yankees, Dodgers, and Braves for those two players so it won't be cheap.

Yeah, I don't think what the players are asking for is unreasonable, but the entire structure is so different from previous CBA's that it's clearly an attempt to make up for getting screwed in the last one (or last couple). Arb after year 2 + $100-115m pre arb pool + 36% increase in league minimum + 15% increase in CBT (from 2021 to 2022). Again, can the owners afford to make these changes, or at least meet somewhere in the middle on them? Sure, but you can't correct the structure in one CBA. Lay the ground work and then build from there seems like a more realistic way to implement these things. If they agree to a pre arb bonus, even if it's $20-30 million this time around, it's still a new structure built into the CBA that didn't exist before and it can grow over time. You can't make all the money back in one negotiation. If the owners agreed with the $775k minimum, raised the pre arb bonus to say $50m, and did the lottery for the top 7 teams, then maybe the players back off on the CBT increase. If they do all that while getting the 14 team playoff format and advertising on the uniforms, they'd still come out way ahead in the end, but the players would get a win as well. There has to be a middle ground when it's just money, but I don't think either side wants to go there.

Yeah there's no chance any minor leaguer with even a small chance of making the Majors would ever be a scab. They'd be blackballed by the PA. If it wasn't for the stupid antitrust exemption, I'd be rooting for a bored billionaire to create the baseball version of the XFL so that baseball fans could watch nationally televised baseball that hasn't been touched by Manfred or Clark, but unfortunately we are stuck waiting for the two sides to agree, whether that happens in 4 days or 4 months. I'm not a big fan of college baseball, and minor league baseball without 40 man roster players is going to be messy.

Seems like the owners thought the players would fold with the lockout, or at least concede on some important issues because Tony Clark always concedes, but the PA is taking a hard stance this time and I think the owners genuinely have no clue how to proceed from here. They are so used to throwing the PA a crumb and having the PA act like it was a steak dinner. The biggest issue was the lockout beginning on December 1-2 and the owners not coming up with a proposal until 6 weeks later. It was clear from that point that they were just waiting for the players to bend rather than actually wanting to negotiate. At this point I don't care which side "wins", just give me baseball on the regular schedule, but if there is a delay then it's 100% on the owners. They should have been having these types of meetings in Dec-Jan, not just on the final week of a self imposed deadline a few weeks before the regular season.

Starting ST on March 5-6 would make sense with a 2/28 deadline to get a CBA done. Of course, this assumes a CBA will get done by 2/28, and I'm not as confident about that.

I find it very hard to believe that the Jays as is have a top 5 farm system. I think most publications would agree with Kiley/BA's ranking. Although obviously I hope Law ends up being right.