MLB Owners and Manfred Continue to Dig the Grave of Baseball
Here we are again — at the end of yet another week and there is still no agreement in place for the MLB and the MLBPA. What started as negotiations months ago to make sure the game was brought back safely in the wake of COVID-19 has turned into nothing but greed.
While every other major sports league in America has been able to figure out their financial situation, the MLB keeps kicking the can down the road. It came out yesterday that MLB commissioner Rob Manfred had met with the executive director of the MLBPA Tony Clark and that the two sides had a deal in place.
Then it comes out today that they, in fact, didn’t have a deal agreed upon and that negotiations are still ongoing. The owners want a 60-game season and the players countered today with a 70-game season. Perhaps they will meet in the middle. Or perhaps they will not.
Many fans and media members are absolutely fed up with the MLB and the MLBPA. Nobody wants to see billionaires and millionaires fighting over money when forty million people are unemployed due to COVID-19.
One thing we are seeing during this whole mess between players and owners is that for the first time maybe ever, the public opinion has changed on the owners and more people are siding with the players. Throughout the history of sports in America, most fans have always sided with billionaire owners on most of their dealings. Some of that mindset might be because fans don’t want players having too much freedom to up and leave their hometown team and taking the owner's side is usually taking the side of having more control over the contracts of the players.
Nevertheless, public perception is changing, and people are seeing for the owners for who they really are. It is reported that six of the MLB owners don’t want to have a season at all. It takes eight owners to come together for them to cancel the season fully. Is it possible that those alleged six owners could convince two other owners that it’s “just not worth it”?
The owners have been crying poor during this entire negotiation and it’s very hard to sympathize with them just because they may not be able to have fans at their games this season. They still have massive TV deals. So, while they may not be making as much money as they’re used to, they are still going to be profitable, I’m sure. Most of the owners have businesses and investments outside of the team that they own, so that isn’t their only income. The billionaires will be just fine. Plus, they will lose more money long-term with the effects of these ugly negotiations are having on casual fans. Even the hardcore fans are completely turned off by this. And they will lose so many of those if they don’t play at all.
The owners need to close a deal by the end of the week. The start date keeps getting pushed back. How awesome would it have been if the first major sports league back from the pandemic was America’s pastime? Especially if it was on July 4th like what was most recently the plan. Now, the start date is looking like it’ll be on July 15th because they cannot get a deal done. How much damage has already been done to the fans of Major League Baseball?
MLB has already had its issues with the youth and the national spotlight of the game. Young people have just been drawn to football and basketball here in America. Baseball is coming in third in most of the markets with its younger people. And certain markets maybe even fourth depending on where NHL and MLS ranks.
National TV games continue to see decreases year after year. Attendance in the ballpark is down across most cities. Yet MLB had a chance to come back first by a long shot in America and they blew it. And even if they are first, the damage could be done where people will just hold out for a couple more weeks until the NBA starts back up.
After the cheating scandal of the 2017 World Series Champion Houston Astros, you would think that Rob Manfred and the entire MLB would be doing everything they could to stay face. Instead, they managed to anger even more people. Most fans already thought that Manfred should’ve stripped the Astros of the title, and he didn’t. Then he went on to call the World Series trophy “a piece of metal” which angered even more fans. Now, he’s at the center of doing the owners bidding for them and making it so we see as little of baseball this year as possible.
So, will we see baseball this year? More than likely. There is a good chance it’ll only be roughly a 60-game season, though. Which of course could be fun, but it’s not what has made baseball great. Baseball has always been a marathon, not a sprint. For instance, after 50 games in the 2019 season, the Washington Nationals only had 19 wins. Even with an expanded playoff that is being proposed, the 2019 World Series Champions would more than likely not even make the playoffs.
Who knows, maybe having the season be a sprint rather than a marathon will do the sport some good. It can have teams go all-in. Our society, especially the younger generation, has a huge problem with attention span, which is why baseball is slowly being lost in the youth.
Perhaps this sprint of a season could be beneficial to show off some of the games' best aspects and attract a new fan base. But for that to happen, the owners and players need to strike a deal. Every day that goes on is another opportunity missed. Figure it out. We all need baseball back in our lives.
