Ever since the owners issued their first economic proposal on Tuesday afternoon, it has been met by criticism in all directions from players across the league. Nationals starting pitcher Max Scherzer is one of the latest to openly bash the new plan in a tweet late last night.
— Max Scherzer (@Max_Scherzer) May 28, 2020
A quick read through and the outlook for a Major League season looks bleak, especially considering that Scherzer is one of eight players on the MLBPA’s executive subcommittee. Despite all of this, ESPN’s Jeff Passan and The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich are reporting that the union is preparing a revised proposal to send to the league later in the week. The new plan would call for a season of over 100 games and a guarantee of full prorated salaries.
“One potential compromise might be for players to be paid for 81 games while playing a season in the 100-game range — an idea some players have discussed loosely, according to a source with knowledge of those talks. Under such a plan, the players would receive full prorated salaries for a half-season, but essentially perform for “free” in the additional games.”
– Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich via The Athletic
By this reasoning, owners would be receiving more money from the additional televised games, while also paying more in terms of player salaries. This is sure to be met with criticism since the increase of games without fans mixed with full prorated salaries would also likely result in higher financial losses.
An additional concern to this, as pointed out by Jeff Passan, is the risk of seeing the tail end of the season get wiped out due to the rumored second wave of COVID-19.
“The league has balked at a longer schedule, fearful that a potential second wave of the coronavirus could wipe out the postseason — and the lucrative national television money that comes with it.”
– Jeff Passan via ESPN
This is completely fair, given that many owners will be banking on this postseason deal for additional revenue. If these negotiations linger, the timeline for a season will only get pushed back even more so both sides should be striving to reach a resolution ASAP.
With other major sports already plotting their comebacks, Major League Baseball cannot afford to miss out on an entire season. I personally don’t see how the owners will consider this counter anymore than the players considered the original proposal. All I know is both sides need to find some common ground to work with and soon if they want any shot at making an early July return, or 2020 season for that matter, a reality.
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