then coronavirus happened, 2020 baseball

Hearing that six owners that don't want a season. @Ken_Rosenthal reports 8 or more. Urgency for Manfred to corral his group before that number grows.

— Andy Martino (@martinonyc) June 16, 2020

pirates, a's, mets, cubs(?) . . .

wonder what the repercussions are gonna be in 2022 when the CBA has to be negotiated again. this seems pretty bad.

All the other sports leagues are paying their players in full, right? Korean Baseball, Japanese Baseball, German Soccer, English Soccer, the NBA, the NFL? Why can't MLB?

What even is the logic for the owners in not playing a season?! This is baffling to me

via gothamist of all places; links in original stub:

"The LA Times reported that the commissioner's office told the players' association that it would not honor the players’ demand to announce a schedule "unless the union waives legal claims against the league." And to top it off, MLB also informed the players union this week that several major league players and coaches have tested positive for COVID-19."

^duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuude

did the MLB spokesman then twirl his mustache and cackle??? fuck’s sake

at the risk of aimlessing this (and correct me if i'm wrong anywhere):

can't speak to european soccer (do they have a union? or just rely on EU rules in general?)

NBA and NHL played almost all of their regular seasons, meaning the players got paid. NFL is run by even bigger assholes (maybe?) than MLB, but has not yet been truly affected.

the structure of MLB payouts is skewed -- the players get paid for playing 182 regular season games, and agreed in march to accept a pro-rated salary based on regular-season games played.

the owners pay the players for all these regular-season games, but then get a huge bonus from the playoffs. also they claim that they're losing shitloads with every regular-season game played without fans. so they have an obvious incentive to minimize the regular season and expand the playoffs.

estimates range on how much (if any) the owners might lose this year by playing without fans (A, B) but given that in good seasons -- of which there have been . . . all -- the players get no extra money, it is perhaps fucked up to ask them to take on the risk of bad years. for what do the owners deserve money, apart from taking a minuscule risk?

the march agreement imposed 'good-faith' negotiations toward a regular season that would be as long as feasibly possible while paying the players a 100% pro-rated salary. it also allowed the commissioner to set a regular-season schedule.

the commissioner, who is the figurehead of ownership, has over the past three months offered a series of deals that amount to 'we will pay you for roughly 48 games at your 100% pro-rated salaries and no more.' some of them tried to split the union by screwing high-paid players; the others offered levels of pay depending on whether the playoffs -- which pay the owners -- are completed. meaning that the players assume the risk of not only getting sick, but the financial risk that the playoffs are shut down.

recognizing that negotiations are useless, the players have said fine, give us the fucking schedule -- you set it, we'll play (for 100% pro-rated). but manfred can't do that right now 'in good faith'; his owners need to wait until there's only time enough left to play 50 games. thus the leaks of infections.

latest is that no season will happen unless the players waive all legal claims against the league, which means not just 'you cannot file a grievance regarding our obvious unwillingness to abide by the terms of the march deal' but also 'you cannot sue us if any of our half-assed safety measures gets you or a loved one killed by covid-19'

so. congrats to ownership for utterly uniting the players and dividing the owners! there's a group of owners that will not accept losing any money this season and there's a group of owners that either won't lose money or are rich enough not to care, and now manfred has to bridge the gap. lol!

this air traffic controller union lawyer who occasionally writes for baseball prospectus apparently has been indispensable in all of this

This article is a series of management falsehoods, presenting itself as a path forward. It's scary how a reporter would have missed everything that has gone on over the past few months, but apparently this one has. Let me hit the high notes in a thread 1/ https://t.co/Gbc6obQ6Fi

— (((EugeneFreedman))) (@EugeneFreedman) June 16, 2020

So Baseball Twitter is saying that the owners never wanted a season. Is this right?

And I think I asked this before but I still don’t understand. What do players get paid if there is no season? More than they would get for 50 prorated games?

players get nothing if there's no season

ken rosenthal is saying that he knows of 8 owners who don't want a season, probably owners of teams with some big contracts to burn

booming analysis mookie

https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/dr-anthony-fauci-says-mlb-should-try-to-play-in-the-core-summer-months-and-avoid-october/

apparently an agreement might be on the way

i am really dreading the precedent set by expanded playoffs. if 14 or 16 teams becomes standard...

https://tosabarbell.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/tball2.jpg?w=520

i'd get used to expanded playoffs if it was the top x teams regardless of league so we don't have any sub-.500 in playoffs nonsense. this is true of every sport

at least in the nba shitty 8 seeds generally don't make it to the finals. baseball is a complete crapshoot.

yeah i know. but if it's 8 teams/league say, then last season the rangers would have been the 8 seed with 78-84 and that's... just so wack.

^^^knows about shitty 8 seeds making it to the finals

ITS TRUE

Just spoke with @MLB Commissioner

America really needs some unifying common experiences right now,not to distract us from our challenges,but to remind us of the things we have in common

Baseball can help fill that void & I am cautiously optimistic we will #playball very soon

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) June 17, 2020

The president we might have had *wipes a tear*

According to Jon Heyman, the players and owners have an agreement in principle that will give players pro-rated pay while providing expanded playoffs and a waiver of a potential player grievance for failing to live up to the March 26 agreement. Heyman was also the first to report that Rob Manfred and Tony Clark had an in-person meeting yesterday, as Manfred flew to Arizona in an attempt to restart talks.

As Heyman was reporting the deal, multiple reporters confirmed that MLB had made an offer, but indicated a deal had not yet been made.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/instagraphs/mlb-owners-make-new-offer-for-60-games-but-no-deal-yet/

a waiver of a potential player grievance for failing to live up to the March 26 agreement

So now the owners can keep trying to run out the clock on the number of regular season games? hmmm

A driving force in this resumption of the baseball talks:

I've been hearing it wasn't so much that a group of owners didn't want to play. They just didn't want to play and face a $1 billion grievance.

You know what would make that grievance go away? Making a deal.

— Jayson Stark (@jaysonst) June 17, 2020

everyone saying they'll settle around 65-66 games, which is still a complete joke of a season

I’ll take it.

So will I. It was weird seeing Fauci being comfortable with people in stadiums this summer, as long as they were at 1/2 or 1/3 capacity. Dude must be really jonesing for some baseball too

MLB offer includes universal DH for not just 2020, but 2021 too. It also includes on top of 100 pct prorated salary for 60 games, a $25M postseason pool.

— Joel Sherman (@Joelsherman1) June 17, 2020

NL fans aren't even gonna have a chance to say goodbye to pitchers hitting, it's already dead

while i think pitchers hitting is extremely stupid it's basically the last of the leagues being distinct in the only sport where the leagues are still distinct and i will hate to see it go

arbitrary leagues, 16 team postseasons.... we're NBA now

*last remnant of

https://twitter.com/trevorplouffe/status/127341783497918873

oops

One thing that “the purists” are gonna hate:

The owners have proposed being able to sell commercial advertisements on uniforms for 2020 and 2021.

Again, it’s in the proposal, which as many have reported is not a done deal.

— Trevor Plouffe (@trevorplouffe) June 18, 2020

Gross

sucks cuz the Brewers consistently have decent hitting pitchers

Wow, Fauci is a huge baseball fan! Could this guy be any cooler? Shame about the Yankees though.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/sports/baseball/coronavirus-fauci-baseball-running.html

Teams don't have to use the DH, the option to let the pitcher hit has always been there!

I personally don't like the idea of advertising on uniforms, but I can bite my tongue and accept it. It's the norm in other sports and baseball has far more important problems to deal with.

I hate it so much

other sports?

ESPN is now paying Mark Teixeira for "analysis," and he's very amped for a fluke world champion.

The advertising's been creeping in for as long as I can remember. It seems to come in waves. Here's the Green Monster in the 1940s:

https://coololdphotos.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2015/05/2560947551_4f0c88c5a2_o-945x1024.jpg

In the 70s:
http://collectiblestadiumseats.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/oldmonster.jpg

And recently:
https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7136/7617019132_3590bc2640_b.jpg

once it starts on the uniforms it's never coming off :(

yeah unis are sacred compared to signage

at least it'll sully Stankee pinstripes

do you have a shortcut key for these

boo to ads on uniforms

guys, the industry isn't very profitable -- they need the ads

I keep forgetting

maybe the players could do a gofundme for the owners so they can meet ends meet?

I don’t mind the logos on basketball uniform, but I hate their existence because I know they’re just leading the way towards full on fucking McDonalds costumes or something

BREAKING: Coronavirus outbreak at Phillies camp -- 8 positive tests. Story herehttps://t.co/YhBRXdgksX

— Jim Salisbury (@JSalisburyNBCS) June 19, 2020

welp

yeah that'll do it