Minor Leagues Labor Deal!

[julio]

BREAKING: A deal is in place between the minor league players in the MLBPA and Major League Baseball on the historic first collective-bargaining agreement for minor leaguers, union officials tell ESPN. Deal is five years and includes at least 2x pay at all levels of the minors.

— Jeff Passan ( @JeffPassan ) March 30, 2023

Details on pay increases in the minor leagues:

Complex league: From $4,800 per year to $19,800
Low-A: $11,000 to $26,200
High-A: $11,000 to $27,300
AA: $13,800 to $30,250
AAA: $17,500 to $35,800

Players will be paid almost year-round, aside from a six-week break in the winter.

— Jeff Passan ( @JeffPassan ) March 30, 2023

New in minor league CBA: players who sign at age 19 or older are under club reserve for 6 years, rather than the current 7. This does not apply retroactively.

— Evan Drellich ( @EvanDrellich ) March 30, 2023

[julio]

[julio]

One additional piece, as reported by Steve Potter:

3/29/23 : Minor League CBA

The Domestic Reserve List, which governs the maximum number of players in an organization outside of Latin America, will be reduced starting in the 2024 season from 180 to 165. The league has sought a reduction in the reserve list since the major league negotiations last year.

More details here, at the Athletic:

MLBPA, MLB agree to tentative deal on first minor league CBA

[Austinfan]

The reduction in the Domestic Reserve List will encourage teams to keep all but their top LA prospects in LA for an extra season or two, so they can be ready to move up quickly when promoted to the states (and fewer will be promoted). One result is stronger LA leagues will be better at developing players, so we may see fewer LA to GCL and more LA to A and even A+.

The extra cost won't bother the big market teams, but this explains the reduction in the List, the $2-3M in higher salaries (180 x $15K = $2.7M) will be slightly balanced by eliminating 15 slots (x $25K = $375K). It will also make it harder for rich teams to stash long shot prospects, both the loss of 15 slots and 1 less year to protect prospects.

[BaseballCat]

It also states there will be “no culling of minor league teams for at least the next five years”. Do you think they want to trim another level of development if they can keep decreasing the Domestic Reserve List? MLB wanted 150, but this current CBA is 165. If you lose 30 players, that is a whole team. I could be reading something into it, but as a person who spends most of the summer watching minor league games, this would suck. Especially since it would doom my local team for sure. Thoughts?

[allentown]

The agreement is a big step forward. Minor league players get a reasonable wage. I don't mind the reduction in domestic player count. Minor league baseball had been a start-your-real-life career trap for far too many young men with not much better than zilch chance of reaching MLB. Now fewer caught in that trap and less of a trap, because the pay is better. When I began following the Phillies minor leagues, it was fairly common to have several players loaned out to other teams' miinor league systems. That has been replaced by selling minor league 'filler' players for cash to be able to complete teams. The reduced control time for older minor league signees is also a step forward. This is the major step forward in minor league compensation we have been calling for at least the past dozen years.

This will increase the emphasis on scouting and development. In addition to AF's conclusion that LA players will stay at the academies longer, I believe this will put big pressure on successful organizations to do a better job of evaluating their own minor league talent so that they can trade or release those unlikely to succeed, in order to be able to add more prospects at the beginning of the pipeline each year. It's going to increasingly be up or out.

I also expect to see a further shortening of the time from draft to signing deadline and an increase in length of complex league seasons, so that the first year isn't such a waste. The larger salary at that level says these guys are going to be active close to year round, with a short time to go back home.

[julio]

It also states there will be “no culling of minor league teams for at least the next five years”. Do you think they want to trim another level of development if they can keep decreasing the Domestic Reserve List? MLB wanted 150, but this current CBA is 165.

Well, the contract reduction (15 players) equates to a reduction of 3 players on each of the 5 domestic minor league rosters. Given that the roster limits (38 in AAA, 37 in AA, 35 on the Single-A and FCL rosters) are cumulatively 29 players higher than the active roster limits (28 in AAA and AAA, 30 in Single-A), one of the main short-term effects may be to just somewhat reduce the amount of paper transactions (i.e., moving players on and off the active rosters, "assigning" them to Extended Spring without actually having them go to Florida, etc.). There has been an increasing amount of these paper moves in recent seasons. I don't have any numbers on how many players were actually in the Phils' system in the season or two before they re-organized the minors, but my suspicion is that when they eliminated the one Gulf Coast League club, they may not have culled the domestic rosters by a full 30 slots or so. @Matt_Winkelman has tracked total players in the system, if I recall correctly, and may have some insight on this.

[andyb]

One huge flaw in the agreement - Latin American players are NOT included.

Sources: Minor leaguers, MLB reach deal on CBA

That means they are not going to make that $19,800 minimum. Would love some attorneys to weigh in on whether there are civil rights concerns with this. At the very least I imagine most Latin American ballplayers will be angry about their second class status.

In general this is improvement of course. The downsizing of players from 180 to 165 was probably inevitable unfortunately as MLB continues to take the "save pennies" approach to player development. And since the rules are the same for everyone, the only losers are 450 kids who don't get a longshot chance to develop and must go to indy leagues (where they probably play for a year or two before they need to get a real job). 5 teams still only require about 30 players. I know the rookie rosters are larger and the team often floats players on and off the roster between starts, but really this won't change much. Just a shame of course.

[julio]

Formally off-topic here, but not irrelevant to this major change in the minors... Does anybody know what's going on with Jim Peyton (PhuturePhillies)? I know he announced a "hiatus" several weeks ago... is he OK?

[andyb]

I think he just got tired of moderating disputes within the comments. Hopefully he is OK health-wise. We are all (at least many of us) getting up there.

[BaseballCat]

I am happy players are being paid more and yes to “afford” this MLB is cutting bodies. But since there is wording about not cutting teams for the next five years, I have to think their movement to be “efficient” is at least exploring removing a level. This is my fear - they want more independent leagues that get paid peanuts that they can siphon off the best without cost to them.

[Matt_Winkelman]

The "cull" when they last reduced the number came heavily from pushing an international period by half a year and a 5 round draft in 2020. This is coming a lot from the 20 round draft vs the old 40, but also the Phillies (and I presume others) are signing a lot fewer international players and bringing fewer stateside. This definitely will affect the "paper" moves, but also the number of players in Extended Spring Training, on injured lists (only 7-10 day, not 60+), and on development lists during the season. It also incentivizes teams to not put new draftees into games so they don't count against the roster.

Overall, the culling of the rosters, still low salaries in the complexes, and the lack of representation of international players not stateside in this deal is a real blow to international players.

In the long term I think they want to eliminate another level and they do want to outsource the dev as BaseballCat indicated.

[julio]

I think he just got tired of moderating disputes within the comments. Hopefully he is OK health-wise. We are all (at least many of us) getting up there.

Getting up there? Getting up where?

[Just kidding, obviously. For the record, I'm 69 now.]

[zambonir]

One huge flaw in the agreement - Latin American players are NOT included.

Wasn't sure exactly what you meant here until I read it.

While it is easy to assume the worst - i.e. MLB still saving money and squeezing Latin American prospects while, as noted, giving themselves a further reason to keep players there - isn't it also likely a matter of international law? i.e. this union and CBA can't exist in the D.R. (or any other country besides the U.S.)

Among those not included in the deal are players at teams' complexes in the Dominican Republic. The minor league unit of the MLBPA includes only players on teams' domestic rosters -- and players from the Dominican Republic, Venezuela and other foreign countries will still reap the benefits when stateside.

[Austinfan]

The DR and Venezuelan players live in places with much lower costs of living, so if they raised their wages, it wouldn't be to stateside levels. Also, since they often start at 17, they're a year or too younger than US players - and the academies are somewhat like HSs - so it's sorta like paying juniors and seniors in HS to play baseball.

It'll hurt the 20 year olds who don't come stateside, but they'd be closer to UFA status, so if they can actually play, they'd soon be liberated from an organization trying to exploit them.

I wonder if this reflects more players going to college, which means less years of development for a sizeable proportion of prospects.

[allentown]

So, you're one of the young ones. I'm going to be 76 in less than a month.

[allentown]

And they are housed and fed at the DR Academy. A bonus goes a lot farther there. Baseball should increase the bonus amount which doesn't count against the allocation and set a minimum signing bonus.

[andyb]

So your argument is they deserve less money and employment rights because they come from a poorer country?

This reflects MLB trying to save a tiny bit of money any way they can - offloading development to the colleges and independent leagues. Realizing they can get away with paying players less in other countries (because they were going to lose the lawsuits around paying players the minimum wage, etc.).

This agreement costs $3 million per team per year. The sport does not go under if it ended up costing teams $4 million a year.

[zambonir]

Yeah the right thing to do would be for MLB to say, we have no legal obligation or ability to include this group of players in this CBA but we're going to raise their pay anyway. But understandable the new union was willing to take that L, plus they still can't actually represent those players until they come to work in the U.S.

It's a battle that should still be fought but I assume there's no governmental interest in doing so down there, so it will still have to come from fans and players up here.

It wouldn't be like paying high school kids to play baseball, it would be like paying high school kids to do any kind of job.

[fish]

Moving the international signing period to January encourages players to want to stay in the dominican that first year too- otherwise their bonus would take a huge tax hit.