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Representatives from Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association met for about an hour and a half in New York Sunday, and afterwards there were some formal proposals revealed that had been made by the MLBPA during the meeting.
Evan Drellich of The Athletic has the details:
MLBPA proposal per source:
— Evan Drellich (@EvanDrellich) March 6, 2022
• Would grant MLB ability to implement 3 specific on-field changes w/45-day notice, starting w/2023 season: pitch clock, larger bases, shift restriction. MLB also wants robo umps w/45-day, players didn’t offer
• Prearb pool starting at $80m, down $5m
More union proposal today:
— Evan Drellich (@EvanDrellich) March 6, 2022
• No change on CBT or minimums.
• If direct draft pick comp (qualifying offer) goes away, MLBPA now OK w/other CBT-related penalties (sometimes called non-monetary penalties)
• Some revenue sharing changes still on table for PA
• MLBPA is still at 6 picks for amateur draft lottery, MLB Is at 5 (and there’s other disagreements)
— Evan Drellich (@EvanDrellich) March 6, 2022
Dan Halem and Bruce Meyer had a one on one today after the group meeting. TBD when next meeting will be.
The key words in all of that, to me, are:
No change on CBT or minimums.
I’d say that pretty much ensures the parties remain at deadlock, because it was the CBT and the minimums that had four small market owners (Diamondbacks, Angels, Tigers, Reds) apparently dead-set against any sort of deal last week. It’s unknown how many other owners went along with those four; it would take eight “no” votes from owners to nix any possible deal.
There was also no mention by Evan Drellich of any discussion of how many teams would be in the postseason or what the format would be, and based on what I mentioned in this article earlier today, that seemed important to both sides.
With no meeting scheduled at this time, I would expect more games to be cancelled sometime later this week. We’re starting to possibly look at losing all of April 2022.
As always, we await developments.