With the 2026 Baseball Season upcoming, and a majority of the big-name free agents having been signed, I think it is a good time to take a look ahead at a possible disaster looming in 2027 for Major League Baseball (MLB).
In 2027 the collective bargaining agreement between the owners and Players Association (PA) will expire. If you are unfamiliar with what a collective bargaining agreement is, a simple way of explaining it is as an agreement made between owners and players which acts as a rule going forward in the league. This agreement can contain, but is not limited to, the following: pay for players, types of working conditions and the one most important to our conversation today, the rules surrounding team spending.
Currently the MLB is known for some of the largest contracts in sports history. Juan Soto currently holds that title with his 15-year, $765,000,000 contract with the New York Mets signed in 2025. While this system is extremely unique and different from other American sports it does cause serious issues within the sport itself. This is because of a lack of regulations regarding spending, which means that some teams tend to be more frugal. Yes, there are owners such as the Mets Steve Cohn that spend large amounts of money, but this does not help baseball any more than the frugal owners do. The disparity in team spending in the MLB is large. So large that the Los Angeles Dodgers 2026 $387 million payroll will double that of 18 of the 30 teams in the MLB.
This will be a large point of contention in discussions even before the owners meet with the MLB’s PA. The owners will essentially have to agree on whether they would want a salary cap and salary floor or keep things as they are today. This is where the lockout will begin. The main reason being the high liklihood the owners won’t be able to agree. Big spending teams such as Dodgers, Phillies and Toronto with others will be largely against the salary cap as it would seriously hinder any significant signings they could make in the future with the large contracts they already have. Frugal owners will most likely oppose the salary floor as some owners have claimed throughout the years that owning a baseball team is not profitable. This is a heavily debated talking point and unclear if true. While the owners could agree to keep things the same as they are, it most likely won’t be approved by the PA.
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The Players’ Association will also have some internal issues in terms of what they want in this negotiation. It is certainly bad for business to try and limit the amount of money able to be made by players with a salary cap. The advantage of a cap is that it also comes with a salary floor, which will seriously help in keeping teams not only balanced but competitive. The current system causes teams who do not have high spending owners or have small market fan bases to remain one step behind unless they are hyper successful in their drafting. Even then baseball players recently signed or drafted spend time in the minors and often don’t make real big-league impact until their 2nd or 3rd year consistently in the majors.
In the end, the fans, owners, and players will all find themselves in one giant loop in my opinion. The owners will eventually agree on what they believe is fair offer for the PA. The fans will get excited and think that the lockout will end, the Players’ Association will not find the terms agreeable. The owners will go back to arguing about what should be in the agreement and the cycle will begin again. I think after a couple of tries, they will figure out a solution. Something else to consider is the issues I have talked about is only a small piece of a much larger problem that Major League Baseball will face in 2027. So, while I will keep my hopes up, my advice would be to enjoy this 2026 season because it might be the last bit of baseball we see for a while.