{"id":506195,"date":"2026-10-24T05:12:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-24T05:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/506195\/"},"modified":"2026-10-24T05:12:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T05:12:11","slug":"cba-tensions-between-mlb-players-union-rise-at-world-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/506195\/","title":{"rendered":"CBA tensions between MLB, players’ union rise at World Series"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

MILWAUKEE\u00a0\u2014\u00a0It was an evening for pomp and pageantry, for celebrating a World Series<\/a> between two of the five major league teams never to win one. But, before the first pitch of the first game, the commissioner of baseball and the head of the players\u2019 union held separate media gatherings that only served to reinforce the notion that a lockout in December<\/a> is a virtual certainty and Opening Day next March is in serious jeopardy.<\/p>\n

Of all the major North American sports, baseball is the only one without a salary cap. The players and their union vow to keep it that way, and union chief Bruce Meyer said every proposal the owners make on every issue is contingent upon a salary cap. How, someone asked commissioner Rob Manfred<\/a>, can the owners strike a deal if the union is entrenched against a cap?<\/p>\n

\u201cRe-thinking where you are is a really important part of trying to make a deal,\u201d Manfred said. \u201cIt\u2019s actually a skill in collective bargaining. It\u2019s easy to say, \u2018I\u2019m here and I\u2019m never moving.\u2019 That\u2019s not a particularly skilled approach to the process.\u201d<\/p>\n

That is perilously close to telling the other guy at the negotiating table how to negotiate. It\u2019s also something you might say when you\u2019re feeling pretty darn good that you\u2019re going to win the negotiation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have an unprecedented level of unanimity among ownership that it is something that we need to do,\u201d Manfred said.<\/p>\n

He wouldn\u2019t say otherwise at this point, of course. The owners were unified in 1994, when they last demanded a salary cap. They didn\u2019t win, and fans lost the final two months of the 1994 season<\/a> and the first month of the 1995 season.<\/p>\n

When the NHL got its salary cap, owners shut down the league for a full year. Would MLB owners forgo a year \u2014 or at least several months \u2014 of ticket sales and media revenue to get their cap? Would MLB players forgo a year \u2014 or at least several months \u2014 of their salaries to stave off a cap?<\/p>\n

We won\u2019t know the answer to either question until the spring, and until then a new collective bargaining agreement would require one side or the other to abandon its position.<\/p>\n

\"MLB <\/p>\n

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred speaks with the media before Game 1 of the World Series in Milwaukee on Friday.<\/p>\n

(John Fisher \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

That makes this year\u2019s World Series something of a Rorschach test: Is a Brewers-Rays series<\/a> proof that the system actually works just fine the way it is?<\/p>\n

To Manfred, the answer is no. A series featuring two of baseball\u2019s smaller markets is an anomaly when history shows a correlation between payroll and success, not only in the regular season but in advancing through the playoffs.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that no small market can win,\u201d Manfred said. \u201cIt\u2019s just that it\u2019s pretty rare.\u201d<\/p>\n

To Meyer, the answer is yes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has nothing to do with what the Dodgers are doing,\u201d Meyer said. \u201cThere is no reason whatsoever that the Pirates can\u2019t do what the Brewers have done, or what the Rays have done.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Pirates, Meyer said, do not spend all the money they are allotted to sign draft picks. The Brewers, playing in baseball\u2019s smallest market, might not routinely hand out free-agent riches, but owner Mark Attanasio said his team ranks \u201cright in the middle\u201d of the 30 teams in spending on baseball operations.<\/p>\n

Attanasio publicly stumped for a salary cap here Friday, saying it would \u201chelp us compete but more importantly all of the other teams with lower payrolls too.\u201d He said Brewers fans already fear it might take another 44 years to return to the World Series.<\/p>\n

Said Meyer: \u201cThat doesn\u2019t seem like a great way, with all due respect, to try and generate excitement among your fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meyer said this year\u2019s series \u201cundermines their argument\u201d for what he called \u201cthe nuclear bomb of a salary cap.\u201d He said the owners are uninterested in the union\u2019s proposals for addressing competitive balance, including increased revenue sharing among owners and a tax against teams that fail to win consistently, and he alleged the league\u2019s argument is \u201ca charade\u201d for what the owners really want: \u201cto suppress salaries and gut player rights.\u201d<\/p>\n

The takeaway: Don\u2019t book non-refundable airline tickets and hotel rooms for spring training.<\/p>\n

On other topics:<\/p>\n

\u2014 As The Times has reported<\/a>, MLB is keeping an eye on federal investigations into Dodgers owner Mark Walter<\/a> and his insurance empire, which is under scrutiny for allegedly violating laws designed to protect investors. Walter also is a defendant in multiple civil lawsuits filed by investors alleging fraud and breach of contract.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs always when we have an investigation \u2014 external, law enforcement, whatever \u2014 we monitor that,\u201d Manfred said. \u201cThat\u2019s where we are right now. We\u2019re just watching what\u2019s going on right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the past two months, amid efforts to find what could be more than $20 billion to recapitalize insurance funds, Walter has sold his controlling interest in the Lakers and a minority share of Chelsea, the English Premier League club. On Friday, Bloomberg reported<\/a> he is seeking to sell the Sparks. He has no plan to sell the Dodgers, team president Stan Kasten has said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Meyer said the MLBPA continues negotiations with LA28 over how major league players would be accommodated in the 2028 Olympics<\/a>. \u201cAs of now, we\u2019re not getting satisfaction on those things,\u201d Meyer said.<\/p>\n

Both the league and the union say they want to participate in the Games, but Manfred said MLB would normally start preparing its 2028 schedule early in 2027. The league has agreed to an extended All-Star break to accommodate the Olympics, but MLB also could tire of waiting for the union to agree with LA28<\/a>, which badly wants MLB players to participate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MILWAUKEE\u00a0\u2014\u00a0It was an evening for pomp and pageantry, for celebrating a World Series between two of the five…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":506196,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[2135,32809,9472,48,52,51,10572,47,50,49,18432,10937,1334,1831,9442,24786,195648,427,195647,8843,4470],"class_list":["post-506195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-baseball","tag-full-year","tag-investor","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-league","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-manfred","tag-meyer","tag-mlb","tag-owner","tag-player","tag-salary-cap","tag-small-market","tag-team","tag-union-rise","tag-way","tag-world-series"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=506195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/506196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=506195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=506195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=506195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}