MLB: Rob Manfred Threatens 48 Game Season Without Resolution
Yes, the MLBPA issued a 89-game proposal to the MLB owners. And yes, the owners will of course shoot that down quite possibly faster than any other proposal thus far. But progress is being made, and the hopes of a decent season are still very much alive.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred made an appearance on MLB Network ahead of the draft on Wednesday night to talk about negotiations. While Manfred essentially guaranteed that a season would happen, it did come with stipulations.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred on ESPN: The league will make a new proposal to the MLBPA after receiving the union's 89-game proposal last night. He said it will be a "significant move in the players' direction" but "if we have to we'll exercise that right" to set a 48-game season.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) June 10, 2020
Manfred essentially guaranteed without saying as much that the league would pivot to a 48-game season if the two sides cannot come together on a financial agreement. The MLB commissioner has it within his power to dictate the number of games played under the condition that the owners offer a fully prorated salary.
The good news is that it’s looking increasingly likely that an MLB season will indeed be happening. The bad news is that the length of the season is probably going to be very short, and tensions between the two sides are going to carry into the next season.
MLB will need to renegotiate a new collective bargaining agreement with players following the 2021 season. As of now, it does not seem likely that the two sides are going to work with each other and make sacrifices, based on how the last couple of weeks have gone. We’ll have to wait and see.
Dodgers: Justin Turner Goes OFF on Cardinals’ Owners Financial Claims
48 games?? Depth wouldn’t matter too much. Even the Padres could win the division with that short of a season…
Aren’t these owners supposed to be smart businesspeople?Why can’t they figure out another way to recoup some of the lost ticket sales? Like pay per view or 3 yrs of expanded playoffs? If they mixed that with an offer of maybe 85% of prorated salaries we might see some games!
Well daniel they are smart business people. That’s why there are no baseball games. Few of us have the qualifications to tell the owners how to run their business. They lose more money playing then not playing. The only reason we will see a few games is because they worry about the long term impact on their business investments. Grab a beer and stop trying to figure out a solution without any real knowledge.
A long term impact on the owner business investments in the past was because of a Baseball strike, not a universal virus. Fans were hesitant to get back into baseball because of the strike. I think, for what it is worth, that the fans will be so happy to get back to “our favorite pastime”,”next year”, that the money will be flowing in ticket sales, concession sales, internet sales, etc. 48 games is not worth the possibilities of injury to the players.
Well Beth that is an original thought I havent heard before. Fans deserted baseball because of a strike but won’t because of the pandemic. That’s the one fear the owners had and the only reason I could see that they would even want to play this year. Hope you are right.
Daniel doesn’t handle reality real well. This isn’t his first time
Opening correction: MLBPA offered 89 games, not 76….
So it looks like we have a standoff here. Owners aren’t losing anything, players are, The union is beothing about monies for this and that. Nobody is winning and everybody is losing including the fans, well maybe not the owners like you say. Well let the season go, forget it. Start from scratch next year. We’ll lose players we should have had and salaries that could have been. We’ll start off next season with everyone beothing again but maybe we’ll get to play some kind of games. I’m fed up and so are many other fans. Almost no one will be buying Memorabilia or anything relating to Baseball. Let Football and Basketball take all the hoopla and monies that Baseball would have had. Good riddance.
Maybe the Dodgers can share some of their eight-thousand-millions they have from Time Warner.