Category: Labor

Notes: Manfred speaks, the disposable pitcher, Diamond Holdings

Looks at the week that was.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

Forgive me for being a little behind here on the coverage dates, but my phone was undergoing a slow and then rapid death, which cuts into the whole keeping up with the news thing. So now, new and working phone in hand, we can hit some notes from around MLB, starting with the thing Rob Manfred recently opened his mouth about.

On May 6, Manfred spoke to (or spoke “at,” as Neil deMause put it) a gathering of editors at an Associated Press conference, with an emphasis on extolling the virtues of publicly financed stadium projects. It is incredibly Manfred for its… style. You know the one. That thing where he exaggerates and makes wild, indefensible claims without any proof to back them up, and would definitely get angry at a reporter or fans or sitting Congressperson for calling him out on it and asking for more details.

Continue reading “Notes: Manfred speaks, the disposable pitcher, Diamond Holdings”

Notes: Other teams unhappy with A’s, gambling, Scott Boras axed

Catching up on a week of news that wouldn’t stop.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

Last week, Buster Olney tweeted out something that made the whole internet groan. Not at Olney — not this time — but at pretty much all of MLB. You can probably figure out why just from reading what was said:

Within other organizations, there is a lot of disgust with how the A’s have handled the ballpark situation — especially when there’s no actual ballpark plan settled in Las Vegas. And there is an assumption the A’s will tank in the next few years, because their revenue stream will be down to a trickle. “This makes us all look bad,” said one person.

This was met with a chorus of “why did they approve the A’s move, then?!” which, understandable. A few things I’ve been thinking about, though, that should get a mention. For one, Olney doesn’t clarify whether this is from an owner, or an executive who happens to work for one, who had nothing to do with the move being allowed. It would be helpful if we knew: my guess is that it’s an executive who knows how bad of a look this is, and not one of the owners, who by and large are too removed from humanity to ever consider how something will make them “look” to people at large.

Continue reading “Notes: Other teams unhappy with A’s, gambling, Scott Boras axed”

Notes: MLBPA, Orioles ownership change, A’s boycott

A normal week, a change of hands via loophole, and John Fisher getting embarrassed. A busy Friday, really.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

As promised, my latest for Baseball Prospectus is a reaction to the news that there is a whole lot of internal grumbling going on in the Players Association — grumbling that, for a brief time, made it look as if there was going to be major leadership turnover in the form of lead negotiator and deputy director Bruce Meyer and executive director Tony Clark losing their jobs.

That time has passed, however, the worst possible damage from the storm now evaded. However, that storm is not quite finished. Luckily, as I get into, everything left is honestly just normal business: the kind of behaviors that you’d expect from a union that is nearly six times the size now as it was when it signed the 2022 MLB collective bargaining agreement, thanks to the addition of 5,400 minor leaguers as a sub-unit under the PA’s umbrella.

Continue reading “Notes: MLBPA, Orioles ownership change, A’s boycott”

Peter Angelos was an MLB owner from another time

Peter Angelos, 94, passed away this weekend, shortly before a sale of the team he’s owned for decades takes place.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

Given you’re reading a newsletter dedicated to sports labor, and especially in baseball, chances are good that you’re aware that Orioles’ owner Peter Angelos, who passed away over the weekend at the age of 94, refused to use scabbing replacement players during spring training in 1995. It’s been mentioned in every obituary and reflection on his professional life that’s come out since, but that’s because it’s still worth pointing out — especially in today’s climate, where it’s unlikely you could find an owner willing to go against the majority on practically anything, never mind something that was anti-labor and pro-ownership.

The thing is, this wasn’t some random act by Angelos. And not even in the sense that Angelos was a union and personal injury lawyer whose practice made a point of representing “working men and women since 1961.” Angelos purchased the Orioles in 1993, and then made enemies of practically every other owner in the course of a year. Here’s the Washington Post on Angelos, from February 5, 1995:

Continue reading “Peter Angelos was an MLB owner from another time”

Notes: J.D. Davis, MLBPA’s ‘coup’ attempt

Loopholes and growing pains.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

My latest for Baseball Prospectus published on Thursday, and it covered the J.D. Davis/Giants saga. Davis was awarded a $6.9 million salary in arbitration for the 2024 season, and then the Giants signed free agent Matt Chapman. Davis was shopped around for a trade, placed on waivers for anyone willing to take him and the $6.9 million for ’24, and then, when no one bit on either method of acquisition, San Francisco cut him.

They did so using what was described as a loophole in the collective bargaining agreement, but as I got into for BP, that’s not an entirely accurate way to explain what went down. What the Giants did was not great, in the sense they made a move they needed to make in a way that is only technically correct if you’re willing to grant them a whole lot of leeway on the spirit of that rule. Like, to the point of it being a different rule entirely: Davis was not cut because of a sudden injury or decline in his skills, but because the team signed a better player, and only after his arbitration hearing had already come and gone.

Continue reading “Notes: J.D. Davis, MLBPA’s ‘coup’ attempt”

The 2024 season begins in 10 days. Snell, Montgomery are still free agents

What are we even doing here?

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

The reigning NL Cy Young award winner, Blake Snell, is still a free agent. The midseason trade pickup that helped propel the Rangers to their first-ever World Series championship, Jordan Montgomery, is also still a free agent. The 2024 Major League Baseball season kicks off on March 28, 10 days from this writing, and yet, the preceding two sentences can exist.

Some hesitation regarding Snell’s future is understandable, given that yes, he did win the Cy Young, but he also did this by allowing the fewest hits per nine of any NL starter — which isn’t exactly something you can bet on repeating to that degree — and his 180 innings is the most he’s thrown since 2018, when he managed two-thirds of a frame more than that en route to his first Cy Young award. It’s not that 180 innings is terrible in this day and age when starters aren’t allowed to pitch deep into games, it’s that Snell’s low inning totals come from a combination of high pitch counts and injuries. He made 32 starts in 2023, and threw at least 100 pitches in 18 of those, so it’s not like he was getting constantly pulled early in his day.

Continue reading “The 2024 season begins in 10 days. Snell, Montgomery are still free agents”

It feels like MLB is trying to force a signing deadline

MLB can’t get a salary cap, but they’ve got other ideas for artificially depressing free agent spending.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

It’s March 6. Major League Baseball is weeks into spring training now, and yet, some of the top free agents are still sitting there by the phone, waiting to be signed. It’s a real problem, but what the problem is, exactly, is not something that the league and the Players Association agree on.

MLB wants to institute a signing deadline, for all free agent activity, that’ll create “flurried,” short-term activity in the offseason. They’ve even proposed such a deadline to the union, which was not interested in that kind of arrangement, and have since brought up the fact they proposed it as if it would have been a true solution to the issue. Alden Gonzalez recently wrote about all of this for ESPN:

Continue reading “It feels like MLB is trying to force a signing deadline”

Notes: Manfred’s legacy, uniforms, ‘collusion’

What will we remember Rob Manfred for, plus the latest on the pants, and the use of the “c-word”

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

For Baseball Prospectus this week, I covered what commissioner Rob Manfred’s legacy could be (paid subscription required). It’s not a simple question, really, for two reasons: one, by the time Manfred leaves the role after the 2028 season, he’ll have been commissioner for nearly a decade-and-a-half, and two, there seems to be some new embarrassing thing he’s yelling about pretty much constantly.

Continue reading “Notes: Manfred’s legacy, uniforms, ‘collusion’”

Notes: White Sox stadium rumors, changing free agency, Diamond

Jerry Reinsdorf is doing it doing, changes are needed to get players to free agency sooner, and Diamond has a deal, maybe.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

Remember back during the winter meetings, when Jerry Reinsdorf went and had lunch with the mayor of Nashville? With the idea being that it was solely to help build up some leverage for some stadium demands in Chicago? Last week, the Chicago Sun-Times reported that the White Sox were in “serious talks” to build a stadium, following a meeting between Reinsdorf and Chicago’s mayor, Brandon Johnson.

Continue reading “Notes: White Sox stadium rumors, changing free agency, Diamond”

Mailbag: MLBPA members, licensing, and scabs

A question on why scabs were even allowed into the league in the first place.

This article is free for anyone to read, but please consider becoming a Patreon subscriber to allow me to keep writing posts like this one. Sign up to receive articles like this one in your inbox here.

Mailbag time!

One of the things that has come up in our internal [organization] discussions lately is how if we are able to successfully unionize where I work, every employee that falls under the proper umbrellas is required to be a member of the union (that may be a California-specific thing, but I can’t remember). That got me thinking about some baseball players who I know historically were not part of the MLBPA. Barry Bonds and Kevin Millar (aka Jon Dowd and Anthony Friese) are the two big guys that came to mind. Under what circumstances was it okay for non-union members to participate in the league though? Couldn’t those guys have signed contracts that undermine things the MLBPA was doing? Wouldn’t the union have wanted to stop those non-union guys from signing into the league?

-HB

Continue reading “Mailbag: MLBPA members, licensing, and scabs”