The MLB lockout is lifted!

[Tnetennba]

17 minutes ago, bmags said:

Right, I guess that’s my overall point. I think players think “anti-tanking” wins the public over, but reality is they want Oakland, Pitt, Balt to spend more. 
 

I think those teams that have been competitive despite low payrolls should get windfalls. Competitive balance team tha makes playoffs? You get an additional $10 mill toward player salaries. Can only be used on payroll though.

Non competitive balance team in bottom 10 of payrolls? You lose 2nd round pick.

Do I think that would get sign off? Maybe not, but it’s more worth fighting for than a damn lottery, my god.

Oh I agree.  The lottery is a fine idea but its a bandaid fix for a much larger problem.  It might make bad teams try a little bit more knowing that completely bottoming out is no longer a guarantee of the top pick, but in no way forces low payroll teams to spend on talent.  A salary floor, or rules that function to require Oak, Pitt, Balt, Az, Denver, Miami, etc to all spend a certain threshold does much more to keep those teams competitive IMO.  Or at least keeps them from running out laughably low payrolls while banking free dollars - which is more of a perpetual issue for them as opposed to outright tanking for years on end.

[Tnetennba]

24 minutes ago, Bob Sacamano said:

Over/under 11 minutes?

Seven minutes in heaven.

[bmags]

On twitter I saw a writer post how after the first half of the free agency before the freeze, it was hard to see this as a league not working.

And I'd just restate my opinion that much of this animosity is for the 2017-2019 period of an unusually large number of teams being uncompetitive. That this was the result of a new competitive advantage in front offices around player development staffing and technology and analytics, and years of results for franchises like the white sox, reds that the old way of doing things wasn't going to work.

Now virtually every franchises save the Rockies has modernized and retooled, and we just finished a year of very good competition and it only getting better.

The players could do nothing to tip the balance against tanking and see greatly reduced tanking!

But the number of early retirements and poor FA spending laid the groundwork to fight the last battle. And the commissioner is an absolute ahole who wants to fight battles.

If the players had prioritized just getting rid of draft pick compensation, and raising limits, they'd likely be pretty pleased with their takeaways the next 5 years. But they are trying to recoup losses and win, and the owners are trying to always prove they are victims.

It sucks. 

Baseball is a good sport, it shouldn't be this hard.

[ptatc]

14 minutes ago, NWINFan said:

By now, rational people would have come up with some kind of deal. Each side would not like parts of it, but they would be able to live with it especially when the industry is doing well and most are making money.

But we're dealing with greed and short sightedness. Not to mention power plays. 

I don't agree with everything posted here, but I can see the rationale behind things I don't agree with. I probably could have a conversation with many people here. What is missing in these talks?

Unfortunately when you get to collective bargaining, rational people become irrational and it becomes only about getting something from the other side. Having been involved in a number of them on both sides, it's all about what you can get. It all depends on how long and how far the employees/players want to push it. This is why we all knew that with Boras and his players leading the union this time around it was going to last awhile.

[bmags]

One thing I wish the players did was remove the "player benefits and other comp" or whateer from the the Luxury Tax calculation merely to make it easier on all of us.

[bmags]

1 minute ago, ptatc said:

Unfortunately when you get to collective bargaining, rational people become irrational and it becomes only about getting something from the other side. Having been involved in a number of them on both sides, it's all about what you can get. It all depends on how long and how far the employees/players want to push it. This is why we all knew that with Boras and his players leading the union this time around it was going to last awhile.

I'll stand up for the players here. The league should have realized in 2020's season restart negotiations, where they tried to hold off on negotiating until last minute and it failed disastrously that players were united this time.

Manfred just went to the same playbook. Wait until there is a feasible deadline, push at last minute with bare minimum. It didn't work. This is absolutely rob manfreds doing, this isn't like boras players are striking and refusing to negotiate.

[SCCWS]

17 hours ago, caulfield12 said:

It's simply a matter of denying large numbers of part-time employees their benefits, leading to oftentimes single mothers working multiple jobs instead of being there for children after school and/or massive taxpayer funded government subsidies for Medicaid, WIC, AFDC, food stamps, etc.

Not overextended.

Deliberately adopting this hyper profitable business model until someone stops them...which is unlikely with all their PAC contributions to local and regional politicians.

Now they're expanding into senior care since so many greeters can't afford to retire, needing work part time to supplement Social Security.

Btw, his model is largely a failure in China, where volume and efficiency loses to even lower labor costs for local competitors...with with most workers paid roughly $2-3 USD/hour.

Walmart eliminated 'greeters" in 2019. They  retained some number of them as  receipt checkers as you exit and  in various miscellaneous roles in the express checkout area and covid related tasks.  

[ptatc]

13 minutes ago, bmags said:

I'll stand up for the players here. The league should have realized in 2020's season restart negotiations, where they tried to hold off on negotiating until last minute and it failed disastrously that players were united this time.

Manfred just went to the same playbook. Wait until there is a feasible deadline, push at last minute with bare minimum. It didn't work. This is absolutely rob manfreds doing, this isn't like boras players are striking and refusing to negotiate.

They never start early. It just the way it works. It's always the manufactured deadline to get people seriously negotiating. Nothing is seriously negotiated until the last minute. Again, the irrationality of negotiations.

[bmags]

1 minute ago, ptatc said:

They never start early. It just the way it works. It's always the manufactured deadline to get people seriously negotiating. Nothing is seriously negotiated until the last minute. Again, the irrationality of negotiations.

Maybe, but a big reason why this turned into games lost is because perceived lack of respect. You don't lean into that by doing what manfred did. He's truly, truly a moron.

Instead he should have tried to give so little in continuous negotiations the players walked away so he could say "See! The players walked away!"

[Balta1701]

32 minutes ago, bmags said:

One thing I wish the players did was remove the "player benefits and other comp" or whateer from the the Luxury Tax calculation merely to make it easier on all of us.

The players would be thrilled by this as it would be a $15 million boost in the luxury tax.

[Balta1701]

16 minutes ago, ptatc said:

They never start early. It just the way it works. It's always the manufactured deadline to get people seriously negotiating. Nothing is seriously negotiated until the last minute. Again, the irrationality of negotiations.

They might not have finished until a deadline, but had the owners side recognized that they were going to have to actually compromise, they could have gotten large portions of the work done previously.

Adding in text to the proposal overnight on Monday and hoping the players would agree without noticing on some minor issue is the kind of thing that should have been impossible even under a deadline, not just because it’s scummy, but because all those other issues could have been worked out with agreed upon text.

[ptatc]

14 minutes ago, bmags said:

Maybe, but a big reason why this turned into games lost is because perceived lack of respect. You don't lean into that by doing what manfred did. He's truly, truly a moron.

Instead he should have tried to give so little in continuous negotiations the players walked away so he could say "See! The players walked away!"

Again, I would like to say it's only him but in all of the negotiations I've been in, that's the playbook. For us, it always came down to voting to authorize a strike, force more negotiations, then settle for what we can get. Everytime. All 6 of them. 

[Balta1701]

41 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

Oh I agree.  The lottery is a fine idea but its a bandaid fix for a much larger problem.  It might make bad teams try a little bit more knowing that completely bottoming out is no longer a guarantee of the top pick, but in no way forces low payroll teams to spend on talent.  A salary floor, or rules that function to require Oak, Pitt, Balt, Az, Denver, Miami, etc to all spend a certain threshold does much more to keep those teams competitive IMO.  Or at least keeps them from running out laughably low payrolls while banking free dollars - which is more of a perpetual issue for them as opposed to outright tanking for years on end.

But you’ve just listed 6 teams where it obviously matters. If they have support of an extra owner like Reinsdorf who probably won’t vote for any agreement unless the union agrees to decertify, then they have sufficient votes to block any agreement. That gives those teams a ton of leverage.

[Tnetennba]

4 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

But you’ve just listed 6 teams where it obviously matters. If they have support of an extra owner like Reinsdorf who probably won’t vote for any agreement unless the union agrees to decertify, then they have sufficient votes to block any agreement. That gives those teams a ton of leverage.

Oh I am aware.  The lack of consensus amongst all 30 owners is a problem in its own right.

[bmags]

8 minutes ago, ptatc said:

Again, I would like to say it's only him but in all of the negotiations I've been in, that's the playbook. For us, it always came down to voting to authorize a strike, force more negotiations, then settle for what we can get. Everytime. All 6 of them. 

Well, we know that isn't the only playbook because we just had 25 years where there was no gap in the CBA. There are plenty of collective bargaining agreements that don't end in strikes.

[ptatc]

8 minutes ago, bmags said:

Well, we know that isn't the only playbook because we just had 25 years where there was no gap in the CBA. There are plenty of collective bargaining agreements that don't end in strikes.

Authorizing a strike is just that. It gives the union leaders the permission from the union to strike if they decide to. We've never actually gone on strike. It's just a bargaining tool for the union leaders.

The playbook is the same, just depends on how for each side decides to take it. If it goes long enough you'll hear about the union voting to authorize a strike, doesn't mean it will happen but it gives the union leaders more bargaining power.

[bmags]

2 minutes ago, ptatc said:

Authorizing a strike is just that. It gives the union leaders the permission from the union to strike if they decide to. We've never actually gone on strike. It's just a bargaining tool for the union leaders.

The playbook is the same, just depends on how for each side decides to take it. If it goes long enough you'll hear about the union voting to authorize a strike, doesn't mean it will happen but it gives the union leaders more bargaining power.

This doesn't make any sense as a response. Yes, labor has tools at their disposal to create leverage and urgency and aren't always on defense, but my point is not every CBA ends up in a strike or a lockout. As evidenced by the last 25 years.

Manfred was the one that decided he could create enough leverage through the lockout. He was wrong. Blaming the players because they could do the same thing and therefore Manfred isn't at fault is silly.

He's paid a lot to make decisions, he failed in 2020. He failed now. He is surrounded by leagues shoveling revenues into his mouth while he is watching his cash cow of RSNs fail and he ... fails in a labor agreement.

He fails and he fails and he fails. He fails at building baseballs. He fails at telling the truth about building baseballs. He fails at fixing baseballs. He fails at telling the truth about fixing baseballs. 

He's bad at everything except keeping his job. It's okay to acknowledge it.

[StrangeSox]

CBA's are negotiated for millions of workers in numerous industries and trades all the time without strike threats. 

Edited March 3, 2022 by StrangeSox

[Dick Allen]

If the owners wanted, they could end the lockout and play with the terms of the last CBA, but they don't want to do that because that gives the union a right to strike when it hurts the owners most.

[ptatc]

21 minutes ago, bmags said:

This doesn't make any sense as a response. Yes, labor has tools at their disposal to create leverage and urgency and aren't always on defense, but my point is not every CBA ends up in a strike or a lockout. As evidenced by the last 25 years.

Manfred was the one that decided he could create enough leverage through the lockout. He was wrong. Blaming the players because they could do the same thing and therefore Manfred isn't at fault is silly.

He's paid a lot to make decisions, he failed in 2020. He failed now. He is surrounded by leagues shoveling revenues into his mouth while he is watching his cash cow of RSNs fail and he ... fails in a labor agreement.

He fails and he fails and he fails. He fails at building baseballs. He fails at telling the truth about building baseballs. He fails at fixing baseballs. He fails at telling the truth about fixing baseballs. 

He's bad at everything except keeping his job. It's okay to acknowledge it.

Of course they don't all end in a strike or lockout. A strike authorization isn't a strike. It's a vote by the union members to authorize the union leaders to call a strike. The union leaders use this authorization as a bargaining chip showing the union resolve and he possibility of a strike. 

Everything you say about Manfred is true. I'm just saying that every collective bargaining negotiation has the same person saying the same things. He hasn't failed yet. If he gets the players to agree to a deal that the owners think is acceptable, he succeeded in his job. If the players get too many concessions from the owners then he fails. 

[ptatc]

Just now, Dick Allen said:

If the owners wanted, they could end the lockout and play with the terms of the last CBA, but they don't want to do that because that gives the union a right to strike when it hurts the owners most.

From listening to the negotiations, I don't think this is correct. I think the players are holding fast to increasing the pay for the younger, pre-arb players. 

[ChiSox59]

Is there any indication the sides are meeting or talking today?  Don't have the energy to read the last 24 hours or so of posts. 

[ptatc]

27 minutes ago, StrangeSox said:

CBA's are negotiated for millions of workers in numerous industries and trades all the time without strike threats. 

Could be. Can't say I follow all of them. Did they have a lock out as in this situation?

[Bob Sacamano]

1 minute ago, ChiSox59 said:

Is there any indication the sides are meeting or talking today?  Don't have the energy to read the last 24 hours or so of posts. 

Just the heads of each group.

The Tweet is somewhere on the last page or 2.

Edited March 3, 2022 by Bob Sacamano

[ptatc]

1 minute ago, ChiSox59 said:

Is there any indication the sides are meeting or talking today?  Don't have the energy to read the last 24 hours or so of posts. 

An informal meeting between the 2 lead negotiators.