Rob Manfred's Public Arguments Framing the MLBPA's Desires As Harmful to Fans Make Little Sense

[Lucas Seehafer PT]

Just past 11 p.m. central this past Wednesday evening, MLB’s 30 owners initiated the sport’s first lockout in 26 years after failing to come to terms on a new collective bargaining agreement with the MLB Players Association. While the work stoppage ultimately falls on the shoulders of both the owners and the players, commissioner Rob Manfred’s public arguments framing the players as the primary culprits are largely nonsensical.

“This defensive lockout was necessary because the Players Association’s vision for Major League Baseball would threaten the ability of most teams to be competitive,” Manfred opined in a letter to fans shortly after the lockout began. “It’s simply not a viable option.” 

Expounding further during a press conference on Thursday morning, Manfred stated, “Things like a shortened reserve period, a $100 million reduction in revenue sharing, and salary arbitration for the whole two-year class are bad for the sport, bad for the fans, and bad for competitive balance.”

The three bargaining chips cited by Manfred are among the most coveted by the Players Association during negotiations, according to The Athletic’s Evan Drellich. (For those curious, ESPN's Jeff Passan outlined "the myriad issues being discussed" between the two sides in a recent column.) Despite his bold claims, the commissioner did not provide concrete evidence to back them up. 

From an outsider’s perspective, it’s difficult to envision how the Players Association’s proposals would negatively impact the sport, competitive balance, or the fans, in particular. American professional baseball and the fans of MLB would not be impacted directly — and perhaps only indirectly with interventions such as slightly increased ticket and souvenir prices, though the impact would likely be marginal — by a reduction in revenue sharing between the owners. (However, as Passan discusses, decreased revenue sharing would likely negatively impact the owners of small market teams more than those in large markets, but, it should be noted, they're still billionaires.) A change to the arbitration process and a reduction in time before players reach free agency would only end up with them making more money, more quickly while having an opportunity to change teams earlier in their careers, potentially opening up a wider path to regular playing time in the Major Leagues. 

In reality, the major changes the Players Association is seeking during negotiations would only negatively impact one entity, though it’s important to note that Manfred is technically an employee of said entity: the owners. As such, it shouldn’t be surprising that the commissioner framed the lockout in the way he ultimately did.

However, doing so, particularly by saying that the players’ demands are bad for the fans, is misleading at best, insulting at worst, and nonsensical overall. The fans of MLB will only be harmed — and even that is a dramatic way to describe the theoretical effects of the stoppage — if the lockout extends into Spring Training and the regular season, reducing the amount of games to take in. 

Again, neither party is without fault for the current lockout, but Manfred’s framing of the bargaining chips getting played against the owners as a negative for the fan should not be taken with a grain of salt, but rather thrown away all together. 

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[Richie the Rally Goat]

Stupid point of clarification, first lockout in 31 years, first stoppage in 26

1994 was a strike

1990 was a lockout

actually kinda nice having 26 years of peace because for the first 28 years they averaged a work stoppage every 4 years.

[RJA]

Actually, Lucas, both sides are villians in this matter.  Take your three issues.  The players want to reduce revenue sharing.  Who would that benefit--players like Scherzer, Correa, Ray, etc.--in other words, the top 5% of players who would benefit from large markets having more money to spend.  The "ordinary joes" will not see this help them much at all as the additional revenue will all go to big name players, like Scherzer, who can make 48 million dollars a year rather than 43.  How about the reduced reserve period?  Who are the big winners again?  The same super rich big name players who will make more money earlier.  The average players are not going to see a huge jump in their salaries. Why don't the players make increasing the minimum salary by 200 thousand as a top 3 priority to help those average players at a time when they most need the income?  Why don't they act as powerful advocates for how minor leaguers are paid, housed, etc?  Why?  Because it does not affect the powerful element in the player's union--we all know that a majority of the players on the negotiating committee are Boras clients and he brags to prospective clients how much pull he has with the union.  Boras does not represent many ordinary joes.  Finally, earlier arbitration would be the one part that would help everyone, so I could definitely see how this might help all players.  Overall though, this is a battle between spoiled billionaire owners and the spoiled millionaires in charge of the players union.  This is not to be taken as support for the owners.  I just think your analysis was too one sided and showed your bias.  Great article though.  Made me think.

[Dman]

In my mind Manfred isn't completely wrong.  If that is what the Players union truly wants I would counter propose contracting all teams that currently need revenue sharing to be competitive.  That would allow the other 20 teams to be closer in revenue and then compete at a closer revenue level which would allow for what the Players union wants in terms of player movement and flexibility. All teams would have close to the same amount of money to compete for FA's so there wouldn't be as large a disparity.  Granted the players would lose around 300 jobs but they can gain the flexibility they require.

Otherwise the players union needs to understand there needs to be a cap of some kind and greater revenue sharing to allow teams to compete in the FA market fairly.  So for me yeah what the players union is proposing is likely the death of my team maybe not right away but most likely eventually. It would strengthen the larger revenue teams and those fans would be happy.  It would also cost the players lots of jobs but increased pay for the ones who remain. 

With less revenue sharing and a shorter path to free agency teams like Tampa, Oakland, Pittsburgh, and Miami really shouldn't be included in MLB anymore.  It would take a miner miracle for them to compete.  They are able to now only because they control players just long enough to make a run and or can sometimes trade their way back to relevancy.  What the Players union is proposing is their certain death.

So to me yeah I think Manfred is right their proposal will help the rich teams get richer and the poor teams get poorer.  Eventually teams won't be able to draw fans when all their good players move on after 3 or 4 years to teams that can pay them more in free agency.  I just don't see how this works without more revenue sharing and a cap or contraction to keep spending at a fairer level.  IMO I don't think it will be good for baseball but who knows maybe getting rid of the weaker teams will make the sport stronger?

 

[4twinsJA]

The difference between where things should be to have a fair competitive system is too large to get there in one step. The owners don't want to give up what they have, they are making too much money. But to me they are being a little short sighted, granted the pie is of finite size and they don't want to reduce the size of their portion. But if they make the game fairer and level the playing field for all teams, the size of the pie would grow and even if they had less of a portion, they would make more money. Start making moves to get to a more level playing field for all teams-increased revenue sharing, hard max. salary cap,, min. salary level for teams, I would like to see a salary max. contract like in NBA, doubt if present player reps would be in favor of that.

[tony&rodney]

There was zero reason for Manfred to write a letter to fans. The negotiations should be between the two parties within a room. Clearly, without going into everything, there is blame that may be cast upon either party but the letter was egregious and nonproductive.

[Sousy]

6 minutes ago, tony&rodney said:

There was zero reason for Manfred to write a letter to fans. The negotiations should be between the two parties within a room. Clearly, without going into everything, there is blame that may be cast upon either party but the letter was egregious and nonproductive.

Every labor dispute will involve marketing a particular case to the public - Manfred's letter here isn't much different.

Where I don't see the players being able to make any traction (I'm struggling to see how this actually does improve competitive balance) is in changes to the revenue sharing system.  Those rules weren't just players-vs-owners, there was a lot of owners-vs-owners in getting to any kind of agreement on splitting the MLB pie in the first place.

[Major League Ready]

50 minutes ago, 4twinsJA said:

The difference between where things should be to have a fair competitive system is too large to get there in one step. The owners don't want to give up what they have, they are making too much money. But to me they are being a little short sighted, granted the pie is of finite size and they don't want to reduce the size of their portion. But if they make the game fairer and level the playing field for all teams, the size of the pie would grow and even if they had less of a portion, they would make more money. Start making moves to get to a more level playing field for all teams-increased revenue sharing, hard max. salary cap,, min. salary level for teams, I would like to see a salary max. contract like in NBA, doubt if present player reps would be in favor of that.

The players would never accept a cap and they want to decrease revenue sharing.

[jmlease1]

Look, I'm not going to pretend the owners are an aggrieved party here. They've been doing very well, and want no changes because right now things favor them overall. 

That said, Manfred isn't wrong in the points he's choosing to make. All of these changes would create competitive balance issues (some more than others). Reducing revenue sharing? When there's already a huge problem with relative imbalances between franchises? Oof.

Obviously, Manfred is just trying to get some marketing out to start the finger pointing...but he's not wrong about this particular set of things in this framework. Whether or not how they impact competitive balance also isn't the only thing that matters, either...

[bean5302]

Sorry, but Manfred's arguments are logical, even if inflammatory. I agree the letter is nonsensical, but not because it's inaccurate. The letter is nonsensical because it will undoubtedly anger the players and make them less interested in resolving the dispute.

Equally nonsensical is believing the players are heroes or saints or champions of righteousness fighting for the little guy (fans). Players don't care, at all, about the fans in these negotiations. It's not a knock against them. The MLBPA's job is to secure the best compensation they can from MLB owners and the owners job is to prevent the compensation from exceeding viable team operation. 

[jmlease1]

4 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

Sorry, but Manfred's arguments are logical, even if inflammatory. I agree the letter is nonsensical, but not because it's inaccurate. The letter is nonsensical because it will undoubtedly anger the players and make them less interested in resolving the dispute.

Eh. he's doing a little PR work since the owners locked out the players and it's being reported that way (accurately). He doesn't care if it makes the players mad, they already hate the owners and management anyway. He's just trying to get some people riled up against the players so it's not all "the owners are greedy bastards!" If he can get people to be as mad at the millionaire players as they are at the billionaire owners, he wins this round on PR games.

The owners are a bunch of contemptible greedheads, generally, who give zero Fs about the fans or even "the franchise", really. They also know they can wait longer than the players, because they are very very rich especially if they stop paying the players. They'll even start furloughing the rest of the staff and blame the players for that too. Despite being frequently despicable, they won't be entirely wrong about everything. But everything that Manfred says will be carefully wordsmithed so that it framers the players in the worst light and the owners in the best. everyone involved will care deeply about the game and the fans...right until it costs their side money.

The fans have no friends in this fight; we will be lucky to have allies of convenience, on occasion.

[Dman]

7 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

Sorry, but Manfred's arguments are logical, even if inflammatory. I agree the letter is nonsensical, but not because it's inaccurate. The letter is nonsensical because it will undoubtedly anger the players and make them less interested in resolving the dispute.

Equally nonsensical is believing the players are heroes or saints or champions of righteousness fighting for the little guy (fans). Players don't care, at all, about the fans in these negotiations. It's not a knock against them. The MLBPA's job is to secure the best compensation they can from MLB owners and the owners job is to prevent the compensation from exceeding viable team operation. 

I don't love the owners either and I agree with you that this is about money for both sides.  To me it looks like the players union is cozying up to the richer more powerful teams owners as this proposal benefits them as it weakens their competition and strengthens their pocket book.  The owners of the top 10 to 15 revenue generating teams have nothing to fear in this proposal absolutely nothing. 

The bottom 10 teams have much more to lose. As a fan of actually one the better lower end teams it stinks that we can't compete in the FA market.  How many revenue sharing teams came out with the winning bid for one of the big FA signings this year?  Any?  I can't think of one.  Things are skewed enough as it is and they expect us as fans to hang onto hope every year?  The players association wants to make my team even less competitive?  Yeah they will never have me on their side with proposals like this, never.

[bean5302]

38 minutes ago, jmlease1 said:

Eh. he's doing a little PR work since the owners locked out the players and it's being reported that way (accurately). He doesn't care if it makes the players mad, they already hate the owners and management anyway. He's just trying to get some people riled up against the players so it's not all "the owners are greedy bastards!" If he can get people to be as mad at the millionaire players as they are at the billionaire owners, he wins this round on PR games.

The owners are a bunch of contemptible greedheads, generally, who give zero Fs about the fans or even "the franchise", really. They also know they can wait longer than the players, because they are very very rich especially if they stop paying the players. They'll even start furloughing the rest of the staff and blame the players for that too. Despite being frequently despicable, they won't be entirely wrong about everything. But everything that Manfred says will be carefully wordsmithed so that it framers the players in the worst light and the owners in the best. everyone involved will care deeply about the game and the fans...right until it costs their side money.

The fans have no friends in this fight; we will be lucky to have allies of convenience, on occasion.

The fans are definitely going to hate Major League Baseball as a whole if the lockout drags on and games or spring training gets canceled. That's why I say Manfred's letter is nonsensical. It doesn't actually accomplish anything except making negotiations tougher, haha.

[Eris]

The MLBPA association are hardly saints in this process. Look at how the sold out on the minor leaguers, negotiating their salaries and conditions but not letting them be part on the union so they can actually vote. The MLBPA resistance to drug testing was one of their larger disgraces. 
 

There are proposals that would seem to make a more competitive balance. Increased revenue sharing in return for a salary floor. Such a proposal would be popular with the average to below average players as it would mean higher salaries for the none elite. They get to vote on the contract as well. Correct?  I realize the opposite has been presented in the Manfred discussion.  But why would the average player agree to a provision that means fewer opportunities for them  

 I think a form of restricted free agency (as in football) would be useful. A player can be controlled by one team for upto 14 years. This is too long. 
 

[4twinsJA]

3 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

The players would never accept a cap and they want to decrease revenue sharing.

In 2019 MLB payrolls totaled just over 4,000,000,000 averaging somewhere around 134.000,000 per team. If they set the min. payroll at 125,000,000, and max at 225,000,000, the average would surely be higher than 134,000,000 and more money going to the players. Players want to reduce revenue sharing because they think owners are cutting payroll and pocketing the profits, if have min. payroll would help solve that. Revenue sharing is only way to help level playing field for teams, Pittsburg will never be able to generate the revenue Yankees do. Is this realistic at this point, probably not, but hope things at least move in this direction this CBA.

[gil4]

10 minutes ago, 4twinsJA said:

In 2019 MLB payrolls totaled just over 4,000,000,000 averaging somewhere around 134.000,000 per team. If they set the min. payroll at 125,000,000, and max at 225,000,000, the average would surely be higher than 134,000,000 and more money going to the players. Players want to reduce revenue sharing because they think owners are cutting payroll and pocketing the profits, if have min. payroll would help solve that. Revenue sharing is only way to help level playing field for teams, Pittsburg will never be able to generate the revenue Yankees do. Is this realistic at this point, probably not, but hope things at least move in this direction this CBA.

I agree and think it is realistic (although the numbers may vary.)  Just to expand on what the players would want, the minimum would have to be a hard minimum with stiff penalties, and the maximum would have to be a soft cap, with penalties scaled based on the amount over the cap and the number of years over the cap (like they are now.)

[DocBauer]

Just to be clear, I'm not on either side of the aisle here. I'm on the side of BASEBALL and the health and well-being of the game!

The owners are just that, they OWN their business and have a right to profits and control and structure of their business. The players absolutely have the right to benefits and financial rewards and opportunity for growth as a player and individual.

IMO, BOTH sides are to blame as neither side seems to be concerned about the game itself. The owners appear to me to just be obtuse about the health and growth if the game. How can they not see the health, wealth and growth of the NFL where things such as balanced revenue sharing and financial floors and ceilings create much better open competition for all franchises in the league?

Again, my opinion, how can the union also not see the same things in the NFL? Further, it feels they are concerned more about the wealth of the top 10-20% "star" players and their earnings and less about the bulk of the players and their salaries that make up the league as a whole. If a floor and cap situation restricts the earnings of that top 20% but the remaining 80% earn more, isn't that a good thing? Isn't the purpose of a union to provide better pay and benefits for ALL members?

Isn't a strong game, with shared wealth, and opportunjty for ALL franchises to compete and make the sport more balanced and fun for everyone, including the fans? Doesn't that lead to greater popularity for the game to grow and more than likely increase financial growth?

I don't think Manfred's letter does anything other than toss fuel on a smoldering fire of discontent, even if his points have validity. 

But I am against ANYTHING that increases an already lopsided playing field for the "haves" and further lessens competitive balance and opportunity for all franchises and the health and growth of the game.

[Dman]

5 hours ago, bean5302 said:

The fans are definitely going to hate Major League Baseball as a whole if the lockout drags on and games or spring training gets canceled. That's why I say Manfred's letter is nonsensical. It doesn't actually accomplish anything except making negotiations tougher, haha.

I don't think it makes negotiations tougher lets be honest the owners hold all the cards here.  They can hold out forever and move to use MiLB players.  The players are not going to risk losing all that money over a strike.  It won't work and the owners will come out ahead one way or another.  Players will start to cave one by one.   There is too much at stake especially for the highest paid players.

Personally I am pissed at the players union and hope their lawyer has to choke on his proposal.  He doesn't have the best interests of baseball in mind.  If I was a revenue sharing team I would propose major league baseball buy me out for market value and take 1 billion in salary off the books for all of baseball and see what kind of win the players get.  Let them lose hundreds of jobs and lose millions of fans because his proposal does half of the teams no good.  They might as well not exist and if he thinks less competition for players is a good thing then he has to be one of the biggest fools alive.  If he wanted to make the players look bad he has done an excellent job. No one in their right mind could come to the conclusion that what the players are proposing is good for the teams or the players.  This guy is dumber than a rock.

If the players association lawyer was trying to find a way to make the game more competitive for all that is something I could get behind as a fan but personally I hope he chokes on this proposal.  He has me on the side of the owners right now and I hope most baseball fans see him for the clown he is.  

 

[HrbieFan]

Doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure out how the players proposals would hurt many markets. As a small market writer, the OP should at least have a clue. Players want to remove the soft cap, hurting small markets 

[Major League Ready]

13 hours ago, 4twinsJA said:

In 2019 MLB payrolls totaled just over 4,000,000,000 averaging somewhere around 134.000,000 per team. If they set the min. payroll at 125,000,000, and max at 225,000,000, the average would surely be higher than 134,000,000 and more money going to the players. Players want to reduce revenue sharing because they think owners are cutting payroll and pocketing the profits, if have min. payroll would help solve that. Revenue sharing is only way to help level playing field for teams, Pittsburg will never be able to generate the revenue Yankees do. Is this realistic at this point, probably not, but hope things at least move in this direction this CBA.

The might accept a cap if the floor was crazy high.  However, the bottom teams can't afford a $125M minimum.  At least not when they are losing.  Half of the league was below $125M last year.  Instituting such a system would cut team values by 75% for the bottom revenue teams.  How would you feel about that if you are Derek Jeter.  Who would ever want to own a team in a small market with this type of system?  How about the fans.  Would you want a system where we were forced to sign mediocre vets to huge salaries?  It's not like we can manufacture more great FAs.  We would be forced to play them instead of the prospects that could eventually bring us back to contention.  Didn't we all want to play prospects last year when the season was lost? 

[Whitey333]

Excellent well thought out comments by all.  Both sides are equally at fault.  It's been very upsetting to me as a long time baseball fan to watch the sports decline over the past few years.  Attendance is down and tv ratings are bad.  Plus many of us can't watch the games anyway due to tv contract issues with Sinclair and streaming services.  Any games lost due to a prolonged lockout could be disastorus.  Nobody seems to care anymore about fans.  Just about how much money they can make for themselves and not for what's best for the game and it's fans 

[MGM4706]

Author doesn't live in a small market!! Manfred makes sense. If Big Markets can get their hands on Small Market Stars even faster than they do now that is not good for baseball!! Makes perfect sense.

[nicksaviking]

21 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

The players would never accept a cap and they want to decrease revenue sharing.

The MLBPA is ONLY asking to reduce revenue sharing because overall, clubs are not spending what they should be on player salaries.

If the owners get together, agree to be transparent with their books and as a whole work with the MLBPA on what percentage of revenue should be allotted to the players, the MLBPA wouldn’t care how the revenue is shared.

[ashbury]

15 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

The MLBPA is ONLY asking to reduce revenue sharing because overall, clubs are not spending what they should be on player salaries.

If the owners get together, agree to be transparent with their books and as a whole work with the MLBPA on what percentage of revenue should be allotted to the players, the MLBPA wouldn’t care how the revenue is shared.

Revenue sharing was billed one way, and has turned out to be just another variation on collusion.  "You don't spend, I don't spend, and we solidify our profit margins."  From the players' perspective, better to just let the large market teams spend those sums on player contracts. 

I expect this negotiation point to be one the players association lets go of first, because indeed the big-time free agents are being paid well anyway.

I'm ready for another try at the 1890 Players League.  So I'm not feeling too immersed in this present negotiation.

[beckmt]

Too win the players , there has to be a floor, but MLB must force out the bad owner(s) (Pittsburg, Cleveland) and fix the stadium situations (Oakland, TB).  Then you could afford a floor of like $100, and a hard cap around $225 million.  Increase revenue sharing, but insist the money be spent (not put in the owners profits).  

All you are doing now is squeezing the marginal decent major league player (like programming, you can always find someone cheaper to do 90% of the same work as the player replaced).  If you balance the money clubs have to spend (which floor and cap could be closer, but probably would not sell that to the owners), you at least give the lower clubs a chance to compete, not need lightning strikes or very good player development and management (like TB).  

Doubt any of this will happen, my guess is the mid level and lower level players will fold as spring training nears and they become concerned for their jobs.  

 

Hope I am wrong.

[SanoMustGo]

This is all about the highest paid players, and highest revenue teams.  Period.  They don't care about any level of competitiveness.  Just effing greed.  They all suck, and I will never pay to attend a baseball game ever again.(I haven't for years)  I'll follow like I have the past few seasons.  I hope eventually the league is damaged severely in some way.  I say threaten to fold a half dozen teams, and lets see what happens...LOL

[Dman]

8 hours ago, beckmt said:

Too win the players , there has to be a floor, but MLB must force out the bad owner(s) (Pittsburg, Cleveland) and fix the stadium situations (Oakland, TB).  Then you could afford a floor of like $100, and a hard cap around $225 million.  Increase revenue sharing, but insist the money be spent (not put in the owners profits).  

All you are doing now is squeezing the marginal decent major league player (like programming, you can always find someone cheaper to do 90% of the same work as the player replaced).  If you balance the money clubs have to spend (which floor and cap could be closer, but probably would not sell that to the owners), you at least give the lower clubs a chance to compete, not need lightning strikes or very good player development and management (like TB).  

Doubt any of this will happen, my guess is the mid level and lower level players will fold as spring training nears and they become concerned for their jobs.  

 

Hope I am wrong.

I agree that if we don't want the players association to go just with the big teams the floor has to be higher.  The money has to be spent on the players not just pocketed by the owners.  I do think teams like Tampa, Oakland, and maybe Pittsburgh and Miami need to be moved to cities that can support them or contracted so that the floor can be at least 100M.  

I want to be behind the players believe me but proposing to make half the league less competitive is a non starter for me.  As a fan I really do like caps as it creates a fair playing field. Everyone has the same things to work with they just need to make better decisions than the other clubs.  I get why the players don't want a cap as they have no idea what the owners are making and it seems likely that it is a lot.  I hate this whole thing but as a fan my greatest concern is fairer competition among teams.  I don't see either side as having a proposal I am in complete agreement on but so far the players side with less revenue sharing is where they have lost me completely.

[Dman]

10 hours ago, nicksaviking said:

The MLBPA is ONLY asking to reduce revenue sharing because overall, clubs are not spending what they should be on player salaries.

If the owners get together, agree to be transparent with their books and as a whole work with the MLBPA on what percentage of revenue should be allotted to the players, the MLBPA wouldn’t care how the revenue is shared.

I can agree with this for the most part.  The owners are not showing their books and not negotiating in good faith.  I think there needs to be a solid floor and I believe the owners proposed something along those lines.  I am fine with a floor but what is the players association doing about creating fairer competition for Free Agents?  I want my team to be able to compete in Free Agency and they currently can't.  If they want me on their side they need to work on things like that as well.  Until they do I am sorry but I am with the evil owners who at least afford my team some measure of fairness.  Even if it is small it is better than anything the players association is offering.

[ashbury]

It's the teams' collective responsibility to do what's best for the fans, and for the long-term health of the game. 

Each player has just one life to live.  The franchise lives on for generations, if run successfully. 

When the game is healthy and a player retires, the baseball world gives him a hearty handshake and its thanks - maybe even a HoF nod eventually .  When the game is healthy and an owner "retires", he (or his heirs) gets significant capital gains.  So, who has the real incentive and responsibility?

Propaganda equating the two sides is deceptive and pernicious, and comes mainly from the ownership side.  There's a lockout on, and gee whiz, look at which side of the line the majority of PR people stand.

[Trov]

I could write a ton on this subject but I will try to keep short.  Both sides are to blame for this, and they should stop trying to 'win' the public on this, because they both look dumb doing it.  That being said, addressing the main issues Manfred brought up I do agree will hurt the game. 

We saw in the late 90's Yankees, Red Sox, and a few other huge market teams signing crazy large contracts, pricing so many out of the market.  You would see some teams dipping toe in, the Rangers, or Mariners from time to time, but mostly just the top 6 or so teams would sign all the big names.

Teams like the Twins were being talked about contracting the league.  The league said we need to reign this in a little bit, and convinced the players of the tax.  The gap in payrolls is still crazy from the top to the bottom.  If you take away revenue sharing small market teams will in now way ever be able to keep home grown players.  Not that Oakland or Rays do now.  However, if you add in reducing years of control, this will make the issue larger.  Small market teams will have to either keep top talents in minor longer to have them during peak years, or lose them prior to peak years. 

The writer talks about how they are all billionaire owners, which is true, but that does not mean as business owners they should be expected to lose money to keep fans happy, they will not be billionaires for long if they start losing 50 to 100 mil a year because they try to keep up with Yankees and Dodgers in terms of contracts.

The NFL and NBA CBA's will not work in MLB.  For a few reasons, one NFL all the money is from national media contracts, and NBA has huge national media contracts.  Much of the money from media contracts for MLB are local, and some teams have their own network. You would then require the Yes network to share money with Rays which Yankees would never agree to do. That would make NFL style no workable.

NBA style is not workable either because they have 15 man rosters, and single players make huge differences, so doing a max contract based on salery cap is workable, but in baseball, guys come up and down all the time, more than 35 guys get used in a normal year.  

That being said, you can take parts of either to try and make a working cap/floor system.  The players have been against the cap always because they have never wanted to cap what they could earn, but in both NFL and NBA the cap brings a floor.  Meaning teams have to spend above a certain amount no matter what.  This leads to more vets getting contracts.  One of the main issues the MLB players have had is teams going with young cheap guys and "tanking" and not offering the young to mid 30 vets that are just above replacement value contracts.  

If you impose a floor then those guys will start to get those contracts again, because a teams will need to pay more to players.  If you then added the first FA period being a restricted FA time, like both leagues have, where team leaving can match the contract, this could lead to teams willing to shorten the initial 6 years service time for FA.  

I bet they could work out a situation where there is max years on that first FA contract based on say MVP voting, or something like that.  Say 4 years of play equals FA now.  Then if they had got MVP award or certain other rewards and ranking on the voting will affect how long the contract can be.  The cost will never be capped.  

This will be a huge change in the CBA and I doubt it will at all happen because of how the players have always wanted to get back at the owners from the start of baseball where the owners made a ton of the players and the players had a take or leave it option for contracts and could not take services elsewhere. The players and owners need to understand the bigger the pie to share is better for all, but if you fight over the pie you have, the people making it will take their money to other entertainment.