Owners Will Reportedly TALK Tomorrow About WHETHER to RESTART Negotiations with Players
If it is possible to communicate everything – the substance, the reaction, and the tone – in a headline, that’s it up there. You could probably stop there unless you want to read a lot of anger the rest of the way.
Here’s the report:
BREAKING: @MLB sources tell @FoxBusiness there is an owners call being skedded to Monday to discuss talks w @MLB_PLAYERS and whether to restart negotiations for a 2020 baseball season. Story developing
— Charles Gasparino (@CGasparino) June 7, 2020
Given the report, you know that’s an owner source. And that owner wants the world to know that, yes, they are willing to TALK about the POSSIBILITY of RESTARTING negotiations with the players for the season.
ARE YOU F**KING KIDDING ME.
HOW IN THE SWEET F**K WERE YOU NOT F**KING NEGOTIATING ALL F**KING WEEKEND.
I guess now that the 4th of July has been blown – for no good reason – the owners have no reason not to just drag their feet until they “have to” impose the short, 48/50-game schedule? I guess none of them care about the extra month that they could have had the entire national sporting stage to themselves? These are businesspeople, right?
Anyway. So maybe they’ll talk tomorrow about maybe talking to the players. But, as you know by now, there has been absolutely no indication that there is genuine interest whatsoever in actually trying to put together a season of a reasonable length. The players’ best interests don’t matter. The fans’ best interests certainly don’t matter. Just that possible $11 million each team might save by engaging in this farce of a non-negotiation.
While they don’t love either option, many if not most players seem to prefer 50 game season mandated at prorated pay over 82 games at 40% pay cut on sliding scale. Feels like owners are willing to compromise further but the union is stuck on prorated pay for half season or more.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) June 8, 2020
The rhetoric hasn’t helped, the delays have helped less, and time is running short to reach an agreement. Commissioner Rob Manfred prefers to get a compromise done, but owners aren’t necessarily opposed to him mandating a short season. 50 seems to be the msgic number at moment.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) June 8, 2020
It’s really gonna be glorious when MLB returns late, has to compete with the NBA and then the NFL, has such a short season that no one takes it seriously, does not get the expanded postseason (because why would the players agree?), has to later fight through a public grievance with the players about the length of this season because they clearly did not actually try to have the longest season possible, and engenders as much bad will as possible with the players the year before the CBA expires. Truly, this has been art.
The only way to top the performance is to figure out a way to get the whole season shut down, rather than the mandated crap version. WE’LL SEE!
