The Texas Rangers agreed to a $325 million deal to land Los Angeles Dodgers shortstop Corey Seager. The New York Mets got their first 2021 free-agent prize in ace pitcher and Max Scherzer. And to pry Scherzer from the Dodgers, new Major League Baseball owner Steve Cohen agreed to pay the 37-year-old $130 million over three years.
Scherzer now has a $43.3 million annual contract value – a record-high. In addition, those two mega contracts are among the more than $2 billion in player contracts so for in the 2021 offseason.
If you aren’t paying close attention to baseball affairs, it seems like normal offseason business for MLB. But baseball is approaching another game of tug of war as new labor problems are unresolved.
Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred, left, and Major League Baseball Players Association executive director Tony Clark speak before Game 1 in baseball’s World Series between the Houston Astros and the Atlanta Braves, Oct. 26, 2021, in Houston.
Ron Blum | AP
MLB’s collective bargaining agreement with players expires Wednesday at 11:59 p.m. With no extension or a new deal in place, MLB would likely see its ninth work stoppage, its first in 27 years. The previous labor dispute came in 1994 after a player strike caused MLB owners to cancel the World Series.
It took baseball a few years to repair its image from that billionaire-versus-billionaire-versus-millionaire bargaining battle.
But for all the progress MLB made over the last quarter century to repair its image, the problems this time resemble those of the past.
The MLB Players Association wants players to enter free agency sooner in their career to cash in on Scherzer-like deals faster. Currently, it could take up to six years before a player gets completely free of club control. MLB owners want to retain that control, install a salary floor and add more postseason games. If they vote to lockout players on Dec. 2, baseball business will temporarily stop.
“I look at it as a tug of war,” said former MLB executive Marty Conway. “There’s a marker in the ground and ribbon on the rope. The winner is the one that pulls that ribbon to their side of the mid-line.”
Manager Brian Snitker #43 of the Atlanta Braves hoists the commissioner’s trophy following the team’s 7-0 victory against the Houston Astros in Game Six to win the 2021 World Series at Minute Maid Park on November 02, 2021 in Houston, Texas.
Bob Levey | Getty Images Sport | Getty Images
How did MLB get to this point?
Paul Staudohar, a long-time author for the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics, described MLB’s relationship with its players the most accurately.
“Baseball’s problem is that players and owners do not appear to trust each other,” wrote Staudohar in the March 1997 edition of BLS’ Monthly Labor Review.
The distrust goes back beyond this century but intensified after a $280 million collusion settlement in 1990. Then, MLB owners were found guilty of manipulating free agency. And to secure the settlement, owners were even required…
Read More: MLB lockout to begin December 2