2021 Collective Bargaining Negotiations

allentown 2022-02-12 23:05:51 UTC #181

Baseball's offer is pathetic and the owners seem determined to keep an ever larger share of the revenue.

However, I don't blame Tampa Bay for 'gaming' the system. They excel at amateur talent identification and development. What they do is what the rules allow them to do, in order to garner the most wins and level of roster talent. I wish the Phillies would do the same, but they seem determined to always stand way back from the edge of what the rules allow as they labor to determine what the commissioner really wants as spirit of the rule. Boy Scouts lose in the cutthroat business of baseball.

If the rules permit obnoxious behavior, then the proper course of action is to change the rules. Otherwise, most of the playoff appearances and championships will go to those owners who push for the rotten rules and then stretch them as far as possible. If one group of owners crafts unfair rules to benefit themselves, then the other owners betray their fans and players to a)vote for the rules to appease those other owners and b)to behave as if the rule or loophole doesn't exist.

andyb 2022-02-12 23:47:42 UTC #182

If we paid younger players more when they are just as valuable it would not diminish the ability for a team to identify and sign talent. It would just make it tougher to execute a strategy partially based upon paying good players less.

There are 2 issues here. Applaud Tampa for figuring out how to not pay young talent but still win. But they are taking advantage of a system that lets you game service time and pay young players less. This is why we need $100 million in that year 0-3 bonus pool. $10 to $20 million of that might go to the players on the Tampa roster.

If Tampa were forced to essentially have a $100 million payroll they still would be able to figure out a way to win.

allentown 2022-02-13 00:37:52 UTC #183

As you should well know, I strongly favor paying the younger players more and think that every time a chance for 'free enterprise' bonuses to come into play, the result has demonstrated how much the owner's system diminishes bonuses. The same is true of the arb system which deliberately underpays young players. But... some teams, like Tampa Bay, flourish under the rules, while the Phillies get a dribble of talent from their minor leagues and manage to barely eke out a slightly positive record after years of losing or .500 records, despite paying huge $ to FAs.

I don't blame Tampa Bay for doing great under the system in place. I would not be at all surprised to learn that their owner is an ardent supporter of the system that harms amateurs and young players, but I know for certain that the Phillies have long been in the forefront of fighting player salaries and bonus amounts.

Unless I've missed something, Tampa Bay has not been among the cheaters and rule breakers. They've done more with less by assembling smart baseball minds. Unfortunately, our team does less with more.

Yes, the Phillies gave a big contract to Kingery very early on. However, they did that thinking they were saving $.

I just thought your original post was way out of line in singling TB out for derision. They are a small market team that tries and succeeds. Other small market teams don't seem to try much. Then there are big $ teams like the Cardinals, who reap the benefit of being treated as small market, despite always having top-5 attendance.

There are a lot of problems with baseball, but I simply do not see TB as the problem. The Phillies are more of the problem, as witness the whole JD Drew debacle 'for the good of baseball'.

I like smart baseball management. TB has it, unfortunately, we do not. I think our ownership over the years has had its collective noses much farther up the commissioner's derriere than almost every other team (I'm sure Selig's daughter was more of a synchophant than our ownership).

andyb 2022-02-13 15:02:02 UTC #184

You misunderstood the post I think. I am not blaming Tampa. Tampa is actually demonstrating a huge flaw in the system (young players get paid less than older players with equal talent) and taking advantage of it. There is nothing wrong with taking advantage in flaws in the system like many of us here advocated for when there were no international spending limits. The system is still flawed though. Tampa is smart, though they take advantage more than most in some of the worst aspects of the system (gaming service time, training pitchers to throw hard while they are cheap and discarding them when they get hurt or expensive).

Tampa would still be able to concentrate on younger and less expensive talent under any system. Unless baseball shortens the service time before being eligible for free agency and arbitration (and the players already caved under this huge thing) then young players will get paid less than they are worth. The only way to fix that under the current negotiations is to raise the minimum (might cost a Tampa $5 million more a year in salaries) and to fund the 0-3 bonus pool (which will cost Tampa nothing).

We can applaud Tampa for their smarts at the same time we realize we should minimize the flaw in the system they are taking advantage of. Kind of why I want more revenue sharing paired with a salary floor. The players should not resist this. They think the magic top end of the salary scale is all that helps them while raising the bottom end would probably do more for their membership.

allentown 2022-02-13 15:10:26 UTC #185

Okay, my bad, although I still think 'gaming the system' was a poor choice of words on your part.

You may be correct that the only way to 'fix' the problem under current negotiations is to raise the minimum. However, I think that is a very-suboptimal fix, as most of the $ will go to players who aren't actually worth a whole lot more than the minimum and the really good young players, who are cheated today, would still be cheated. It wouldn't fix the initial years of major league service, but I think the fairest fix for the arb years is to change the arb rules, such that the arbitrators are instructed to consider full player value, rather than the current discounted value. Another fix would be to set two minimums for pre-arb players, with the teams able to elect the higher value minimum for individual players. If the higher value isn't chosen, then the period of team control is reduced by a year and a half..

andyb 2022-02-13 15:18:44 UTC #186

Changing the arbitration rules is certainly interesting. I think a 1st year arbitration award is usually like a 90% discount on free agent value (with the advantage of it being only a 1-year contract). 2nd year is a 60%-70% discount and 3rd year more like a 30%-50% discount. Now one could argue that having little discount in arbitration awards would kill small market teams, but with adequate revenue sharing it would not have to. A Tampa would probably go even more all in on gaming service time to keep more of their roster in the pre-arbitration range.

It is not a bad solution. Assume it has 0% chance of ever happening of course. Personally, I'd just go age-based on everything. Arbitration at age 25 or after 3 years (whatever comes first). Free agency at age 28 or after 6 years (whatever comes first). If you want to eliminate much of the service time gaming then you base things on age like the NHL has done. Seems to work there pretty well with a league that has much less revenue. They have a cap obviously, but it is not as if the CBT threshold is not the same thing as a cap these days anyway.

Squire 2022-02-13 15:49:24 UTC #187

Random comment: My understanding is that while minor league teams are going forward on time, players on the 40 man roster are locked out so Hans Crouse, Francisco Morales, Luis Garcia, Simon Muzziotti, Jhailyn Ortiz, James McArthur, Mickey Moniak, Damon Jones, Bailey Falter won't be playing until the lockout is resolved.

zambonir 2022-02-13 17:17:48 UTC #188

Correct. Though I'm still not clear on Scott Kingery's status. He's on a major league contract and he's a member of the union (and I presume accruing service time and pension due to both of those things) but is he technically not locked out?

AAAA players are going to be walking a weird line as spring training gets closer. They won't be seens as scabs, but they will be disposable. And what do you do if the lockout is long enough that the minor league season has to start? Do you push AA players up to replace some of those names above or hang on to the fungibles?

A longish lockout would certainly not be good for Moniak's last-ditch development year. I think it would be good for Kingery because he's probably not ready to play yet anyway. The pitchers who are possible bullpen/spot starters will be fine as they'll just get the same ST as the big leaguers before going down.

allentown 2022-02-13 18:06:19 UTC #189

Is Kingery on the 40-man? I thought the Phillies were risking him to Rule 5.

bkox 2022-02-13 18:17:43 UTC #190

Hes not.. but he does have a major league contract

zambonir 2022-02-13 19:24:06 UTC #191

His status is unique/confusing. Franco was able to sign a minor-league deal with the Nats because he didn't finish the season on the 40, and obviously, neither did Kingery.

Incidentally:

andyb 2022-02-13 19:26:54 UTC #192

And 3 days after that memo to teams went out, we have the Yankees with a minor league "mini" camp.

zambonir 2022-02-13 19:31:45 UTC #193

Amazing.

And of course they don't get paid as you noted with the Athletic article.

andyb 2022-02-13 19:32:41 UTC #194

I saw MLB Trade Rumors linked to this player pay analysis today also:

Makes a pretty good case for the players here. I think there might also be a pretty good case for the players to start negotiating themselves a share of the revenue paired with some sort of salary cap (likely a soft cap like the NBA has). It just seems MLB owners will game the current system to death and the only way for players to win will be to give something big (a cap) to get something big (a defined share of revenue).

MLB finances are more secretive than most other sports, but this is a problem that could be solved by collective bargaining.

zambonir 2022-02-14 18:05:08 UTC #195

And then there's the Phillies, a franchise that really invests every year and still isn't in it.

Yeah, really, as good as Erik (Neander) has done down in Tampa Bay, remember they have not won yet. Remember that their ability to be competing at the highest level in a 10- or 15-year period, it’s a very small margin of years. So it’s not like one of the franchises that really invests every year, and they’re in it seven out of 10 or six out of 10 years. (For Tampa Bay) it might be three or four out of 10.

andyb 2022-02-14 19:32:37 UTC #196

I guess the Athletic did have to publish a blatantly pro-owner piece at some point:

zambonir 2022-02-14 19:40:38 UTC #197

Seems like the whole "no early minor league spring training thing" is just semantics (i.e. a "mini-camp" that is presumably "optional").

When the Phillies convene a minicamp in Florida this week

andyb 2022-02-14 19:46:46 UTC #198

A tiny silver lining of progress if the Phillies are ignoring MLB here?

What responsible team would not invite their top prospects to come in early and take advantage of some exposure to the major league coaching staff? I am doubting it is mandatory, but if I were a prospect I would certainly take advantage if the team would at least pay room and board.

zambonir 2022-02-14 19:54:48 UTC #199

Well of course it's a great thing for the team and players, and not really that different than what they would do in normal times, except the players who would have otherwise had a big league camp invite don't get that level of expenses covered. But I'm sure even a lot of the minor leaguers without big league camp invites still choose to be at the complex for the last two weeks of February in normal times.

MLB's concern might be more bringing in a bunch of AAAA players early, which probably doesn't happen here. Like, Joe Long is not gonna be focused on Yaior Munoz (if he's even there).

andyb 2022-02-14 21:42:50 UTC #200

But if he is spending a few hours with Johan Rojas then that is good.