Orlando Ramirez-USA TODAY Sports
Representatives from Major League Baseball and the Players Association are meeting to discuss the owners’ first offer, which includes a 50-50 revenue split, toward getting a 2020 season underway.
That does not mean the players and owners are close and the regular season will materialize.
There is much bitterness between the two sides, especially with the players already believing they had struck a deal in late March that guaranteed their paydays in the year of the coronavirus. With so much being lost and with the prospect of an abbreviated season being lucrative, the owners would like the players to share the losses and thus offered the revenue split, which may be a non-starter.
Duane Kuiper has watched as the players have lost out in past negotiations that have resulted in careful service-time manipulation that delays free agency, then a free agency that includes qualifying offers, just a few complaints the players have about the current CBA. All of this is being brought to the virtual Zoom table.
“You’re a player and you’re in this union,” Kuiper said Tuesday on “Murph & Mac” on KNBR. “For the last four years, you’ve been reading about how all these last negotiations, you’ve gotten your ass kicked. You’ve given away stuff that now you regret doing. So what are you going to do the next time around?”
The players’ answer will be a complicated one. Will they allow a season to not be played to stand up for their labor principles? Doing so almost certainly would make them the public villain, as fans so often side with teams over players.
“Do you want to be the bad guy? That’s the thing. Because if the Players Association doesn’t bend a little bit and agree to something with the owners, they’re going to be the bad guy,” said Kuiper, who played from 1974-85. “I’ve been the bad guy three or four different times with strikes. It’s not fun being the bad guy. … What you have to hope is within these negotiations, you don’t try to take advantage of what’s going on. We see it on TV every day with Congress and with Senate, and they won’t pass these bills because one side thinks they’re being taken advantage of, the other side doesn’t want to budge. Well, I hope that doesn’t happen with this, but it could.”
Tuesday was set to be just the first negotiations a day after the owners formally sent over their proposal. Already, the union was bickering, executive director Tony Clark taking aim at the revenue split and telling The Athletic: “A system that restricts player pay based on revenues is a salary cap, period.”
He also said the league is “trying to take advantage of a global health crisis.” The fighting has begun. How long will it last?
“The more we get closer to June and they don’t have an agreement, the worse it’s going to get,” Kuiper predicted. “Because then the heat is going to be applied on whatever side you’re for. I don’t think the union’s going to budge a lot, I don’t. I think they’re bruised, they’re not used to getting their butt kicked. I think they’re going to play it hard and play it till the bitter end, and we’ll see what happens.”
