For a sport that isn’t being played and may not be played this year, Major League Baseball is still generating a lot of discussion. Unfortunately, most of that conversation is negative as team owners and players battle over salaries to be paid in a shortened season with no fans in attendance.
But that means I got to talk with an old friend, Clint Domingue on Acadiana’s 103.7 The Game, and we discussed MLB’s tendency to hurt itself in terms of promoting baseball.
Like an inning full of walks and errors that never ends, the spat between Major League Baseball’s team owners and players continues as the calendar shrinks, making a 2020 season less likely every day.
On this week’s WISE Sports Radio baseball segment, Pat Ryan and I discuss the latest salary and schedule proposal from MLB owners to the players, which really isn’t different from the previous plans they’ve proposed. This continues to be dancing around a negotiation, not an actual negotiation process.
I hope the WISE Sports Radio listeners in Asheville don’t think that I’m a broken record or automaton repeating the same bleak forecast. But I’ve been pessimistic about a 2020 Major League Baseball season being played since the COVID-19 shutdown. But I initially thought it would be due to health and safety concerns, not team revenues and player salaries.
On Wednesday’s baseball update, Pat Ryan and I responded to the news that MLB team owners rejected the latest proposal from players. And there doesn’t appear to be much urgency for another proposal or negotiation. To me, this just looks even more hopeless.
I’m always excited to talk to radio friends in Canada. It looked like I blew a chance to do so this week when I didn’t respond to a text message soon enough, but I ended up getting passed to another show on Edmonton’s TSN 1260. And I’ve never talked to morning host Dustin Nielson before, so that was fun.
Naturally, we talked baseball and whether or not MLB will have a 2020 season. What was once a question of COVID-19 safety concerns is now a money dispute. And I don’t think that bodes well for MLB playing this year.
Thanks to the crew at TSN 1260 — including producers Ryan Holt, Matthew Iwanyk, and Hernan Salas — for having me on. As I mentioned at the end of that segment, I hope to listen to the station’s Sandwich Draft when it happens. I have definite thoughts on sandwiches!
In the tennis match between Major League Baseball team owners and players, the players’ union volleyed back a counter-proposal for a 2020 season that includes more games on the schedule and prorated salaries. And… the owners are almost certain to turn it down.
So as I said to Pat Ryan on WISE Sports Radio, this doesn’t change my opinion that we won’t have a baseball season this year. The shame is that the stalemate is over money and not COVID-19 safety concerns.
Ian Casselberry 