Did Scott Boras Blow Up The CBA Deal?

[chpettit19]

21 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

We need to be careful with assumptions.  What we can do is look at how the specific terms were devised.  The one that stands out is the demands for prearb players.  The original ask was $200K increase in the minimum and $100M bonus pool which went up to $115M.

The 115M pool represents a potential additional payout equivalent to $338K per prearb player calculated in terms of full-time equivalents.  In other words, 4 players playing 40 games each = 1 FTE.  The $338K represents 64% of the total raise.  Yet, this would be distributed to 1% of the players.  Do you think the players would have voted for these funds to be split 64/36 in favor of 1% or would they have voted to give the increase equally to all players?
What would be the difference to Boras?  If he represents 10% of the players currently in the league (not Milb) and he makes a 10% commission, that equates to 1% to Boras Corporation.  IDK what % he gets so I will solve for a ratio so that it does not matter.

Now, if 36% of the money goes to 10% he gets .36%.  Then, if 64% goes to the elite players of whom he represents half.  He gets 3.2% plus the .36 or almost 4 times what he would have made if all players received the total proposed increase to prearb players.

Do you think this is coincidental?  Boras is smart but he is also likely part of the problem not the solution.
 

If they split the pre-arb pool evenly it'd just be a raise to the minimum. The league is already balking at the raise they've approved to the minimum so I find it hard to believe they'd be willing to make the minimum 1.03M (700k minimum plus the 338k you present).

[Major League Ready]

7 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

If they split the pre-arb pool evenly it'd just be a raise to the minimum. The league is already balking at the raise they've approved to the minimum so I find it hard to believe they'd be willing to make the minimum 1.03M (700k minimum plus the 338k you present).

I did not say it would get passed.  The FACT is that this was the demand, and that demand did not represent 99% of the players.  The fact that the money is split is absolutely meaningless in terms of financial; impact to the owners.  If I pay you a $100K salary and a 50K bonus or just pay you $150K it's exactly the same thing.

[bean5302]

It's a math thing. If Boras clients represent 1/3 of the player committee, they're going to have enough power to sway the negotiations agreements one way or the other. If 33% of the committee is willing to unanimously vote "no" on a deal, that means you'd need 75% of the other committee members voting "yes" against some of the strongest and most recognizable players in the game.

For people who didn't want to listen to a 30 minute meandering rant, Bill Madden essentially talks about a whole bunch of major concessions owners made where the MLBPA committee had essentially agreed to the proposals in principle only to have Max Scherzer and other Boras clients blow up the negotiations entirely.

The owners have made enormous concessions in my opinion, and those concessions have been reported on from multiple sources.

• No draft pick compensation for qualifying offers.
• Increasing luxury tax floor ask from $180MM to $220MM.
• Eliminating draft pick penalties for exceeding luxury tax.
• Raising the league minimum salary.
• Establishing bonus pool for pre-arbitration players.
• Draft lottery
• Age 29.5 or 6 years free agency

Players have made... zero concessions. The MLBPA came in asking for the moon and stars and have asked for multiple things like the age 29.5 free agency only to see the owners agree, and then backtrack and ask for something else.

I hope the owners move ahead with replacement players at this point. I want the MLBPA to burn to the ground.

[Major League Ready]

21 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

The team reps were on zoom calls all week with the people actually in the room. Every time there was a report that the players and league reps were going back to their sides of the stadium to discuss the player reps for the entire league were on zoom calls. The player reps then were passing the info to the rest of the 40-man players through group texts. It's certainly not just Scherzer and Andrew Miller making all the decisions for the players. The entire union is kept up to date with what's going on and why the negotiators are doing what they're doing.

I have seen many examples of one or two people on a committee having major influence on decisions.  It is quite common and there seems to be a lot of talk about how aggressive Scherzer has been.  I have rarely if ever seen a case where all the committee members had relatively the same influence.

[chpettit19]

Just now, Major League Ready said:

I did not say it would get passed.  The FACT is that this was the demand, and that demand did not represent 99% of the players.

Yes it did. The demand represents 100% of pre-arb eligible players. It gives every last guy the chance to earn more money by performing well. It doesn't say only Scott Boras clients are eligible to gain an increase. It doesn't say only top 100 prospects are eligible. It says the players who significantly outperform their peers will now be rewarded for it instead of just being paid the minimum. The demand represents 100% of minor leaguers even. It tells Bailey Ober that despite not being a celebrated prospect he can come up and perform well and earn more.

[Major League Ready]

3 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

Yes it did. The demand represents 100% of pre-arb eligible players. It gives every last guy the chance to earn more money by performing well. It doesn't say only Scott Boras clients are eligible to gain an increase. It doesn't say only top 100 prospects are eligible. It says the players who significantly outperform their peers will now be rewarded for it instead of just being paid the minimum. The demand represents 100% of minor leaguers even. It tells Bailey Ober that despite not being a celebrated prospect he can come up and perform well and earn more.

Are you really going to debate that Boras represents a high percentage of the top players and therefore his clients would be far more likely to be the players earning these bonuses?  The fact that 64% of the demand was targeted at top performers speaks volumes.

[chpettit19]

4 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

It's a math thing. If Boras clients represent 1/3 of the player committee, they're going to have enough power to sway the negotiations agreements one way or the other. If 33% of the committee is willing to unanimously vote "no" on a deal, that means you'd need 75% of the other committee members voting "yes" against some of the strongest and most recognizable players in the game.

For people who didn't want to listen to a 30 minute meandering rant, Bill Madden essentially talks about a whole bunch of major concessions owners made where the MLBPA committee had essentially agreed to the proposals in principle only to have Max Scherzer and other Boras clients blow up the negotiations entirely.

4 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

I have seen many examples of one or two people on a committee having major influence on decisions.  It is quite common and there seems to be a lot of talk about how aggressive Scherzer has been.  I have rarely if ever seen a case where all the committee members had relatively the same influence.

The suggestions you guys are making is that the majority of the union agreed to some cutoff lines in the negotiations and now a handful of Boras people are saying "f you" to that majority of the union and pushing the negotiations the way they want while ignoring all the players they're representing and who's paychecks are now being withheld. That's your claim. You think Max Scherzer and the other Boras clients on the committee are holding their teammates paychecks hostage to get what they want without a care to what their teammates want and you think the rest of those players are then getting on Twitter and backing the union negotiators and the decisions they're making while they lose pay.

[chpettit19]

1 minute ago, Major League Ready said:

Are you really going to debate that Boras represents a high percentage of the top players and therefore his clients would be far more likely to be the players earning these bonuses?  The fact that 64% of the demand was targeted at top performers speaks volumes.

Yes. Scott Boras represents about 175 players in total. That's between the majors and minors. Run the math for me real quick and tell me what percent of pre-arb and minor leaguers that'd be. We'll completely ignore the fact that many of those 175 are already arb eligible or on contract extensions and I'll give you the entire 175. Shoot, I'll up it to 200 and you can still run the math and tell me what percent of just currently pre-arb players he'd represent. You're drastically overstating his client pool and power.

[Squirrel]

1 hour ago, diehardtwinsfan said:

It never hit the 1200 for a vote.

That’s not how it works. Not every offer goes for a vote. The elected committee only brings what they deem to be something that is close or something they feel is acceptable, that the membership agreed on ahead of time. Same could be said the other way around. All owners aren’t in the room, either. They don’t bring everything to the owners for a vote, either. What might pass if they did? Each sides’ committee goes in there with specific ideas what they want, based on lots of polling and questioning their memberships, and the two committees hash it out and only bring it to the rest of them when they feel there is something to vote on. The process would get really bogged down if every offer was voted on. But I’m sure the negotiating committees on both sides are keeping their respective memberships updated

[Major League Ready]

7 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

The suggestions you guys are making is that the majority of the union agreed to some cutoff lines in the negotiations and now a handful of Boras people are saying "f you" to that majority of the union and pushing the negotiations the way they want while ignoring all the players they're representing and who's paychecks are now being withheld. That's your claim. You think Max Scherzer and the other Boras clients on the committee are holding their teammates paychecks hostage to get what they want without a care to what their teammates want and you think the rest of those players are then getting on Twitter and backing the union negotiators and the decisions they're making while they lose pay.

These are the same people who during the Covid year said they saw no evidence any concessions are their part were warranted.  Looking at owners books is certainly not required given we know 40% of revenue is generated by attendance.  In all of the years I have negotiated contracts, they may have been the most ignorant position / statement I have ever witnessed.  Having said this, I think the sole focus on Boras is probably not accurate, but these players are not rationale. Just like everyone jumped all over the six week delay when the problem was that the players were not budging a bit.  It took that long for them to come down a notch from utterly absurd to something sinificantly short of reasonable.

[chpettit19]

3 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

These are the same people who during the Covid year said they saw no evidence any concessions are their part were warranted.  Looking at owners books is certainly not required given we know 40% of revenue is generated by attendance.  In all of the years I have negotiated contracts, they may have been the most ignorant position / statement I have ever witnessed.  Having said this, I think the sole focus on Boras is probably not accurate, but these players are not rationale. Just like everyone jumped all over the six week delay when the problem was that the players were not budging a bit.  It took that long for them to come down a notch from utterly absurd to something sinificantly short of reasonable.

Now you've completely changed the topic of conversation. I never said they shouldn't have taken the deal. I've never said they're being rationale. I've never spoken on the deal itself at all. You 2 were claiming that Boras and his clients are controlling things and the rest of the union more or less has no power. I'm pointing out that that stance isn't rationale. If the rest of the union had stated earlier that they'd be good with a 220M CBT and now Boras' clients are shutting it down at the expense of the rest of the union's paychecks you wouldn't be able to go on Twitter and see nothing but positive things being said by players about how the MLBPA is doing. It's absurd to think Scherzer (or Boras, or his entire client list) is holding this thing up and pushing for things the rest of the union doesn't want. 

[Major League Ready]

5 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

Yes. Scott Boras represents about 175 players in total. That's between the majors and minors. Run the math for me real quick and tell me what percent of pre-arb and minor leaguers that'd be. We'll completely ignore the fact that many of those 175 are already arb eligible or on contract extensions and I'll give you the entire 175. Shoot, I'll up it to 200 and you can still run the math and tell me what percent of just currently pre-arb players he'd represent. You're drastically overstating his client pool and power.

Milb players are irrelevant.  They would not partake in the pool  The only portion of the population that matters is prearb players and how many prearb players he represents.  I assumed the 10% might be generous.  I was being conservative,  If he represents a smaller portion of the total players it would widen the ratio when compared against the top players who would be most probable to benefit from the bonus.  

[chpettit19]

Just now, Major League Ready said:

Milb players are irrelevant.  They would not partake in the pool  The only portion of the population that matters is prearb players and how many prearb players he represents.  I assumed the 10% might be generous.  I was being conservative,  If he represents a smaller portion of the total players it would widen the ratio when compared against the top players who would be most probable to benefit from the bonus.  

Of course the MiLB players are relevant. They're the ones that turn into pre-arb players. If Boras doesn't represent any MiLB players this part of the deal would only affect his players for a maximum of the next 2 years. And I'm quite positive that Scott Boras doesn't represent the entirety of top 100 lists or prospects with the chance to earn these bonuses.

I know where this goes from here so I'm done with this line of discussion. You can believe what you want and look at it from whatever perspective you want. Agree to disagree.

[Brock Beauchamp]

If anyone wants a good, nuanced take on the lockout and where the two sides are right now, Effectively Wild (as usual) does a great job of it. Today, they brought in Evan Drellich, who has probably been the best reporter through this process.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/effectively-wild-episode-1818-smile-youre-on-manfred-camera/

[Major League Ready]

39 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

Of course the MiLB players are relevant. They're the ones that turn into pre-arb players. If Boras doesn't represent any MiLB players this part of the deal would only affect his players for a maximum of the next 2 years. And I'm quite positive that Scott Boras doesn't represent the entirety of top 100 lists or prospects with the chance to earn these bonuses.

I know where this goes from here so I'm done with this line of discussion. You can believe what you want and look at it from whatever perspective you want. Agree to disagree.

We are talking about how a pool that is distributed among MLB players.  Milb are completely irrelevant.

[RJA]

Great topic.  As I have said many times, I find lots of fault on both sides.  Since the topic of conversation is Boras, I will address the union situation.  Count me in the group that thinks Boras exercises way too much control over the union.  It is not an accident that so many player reps are Boras clients, and that they will carry water for Boras given the deals he has struck on their behalf.  He is a brilliant, articulate and charismatic guy who makes even outlandish opinions sound sensible and rational.  And, what he is pushing for is a higher competitive balance cap, more money for super 2's, no compensation for losing free agents, etc. all because it helps his big time clients get more money, and him to get bigger fees.  I think if the players said they would accept a small increase in the competitive balance cap and a small bonus pool if the minimum wage went up significantly, the owners would accept it.  But, that doesn't help Boras get what he wants. He wants bigger contracts for his significant clients both established like Correa and those coming up who would benefit from the bonus pool being very large.  In the end, the union is pushing for items that help that elite players and does not do much for the average joe.

Another problem with the union is that it is not really a traditional union.  How many Teamsters, autoworkers or teachers have salary scale where the top paid union member gets 40 million a year and the lowest hundreds of thousands?  Players have the ability to negotiate their own salaries, something that no union member in the non-sports industries have.  Therefore, the interests of Correa and Scherzer are far different than those of Willians Astudillo and Charlie Barnes.  It is difficult for any union to protect the interests of all players when such disparities in salary exist no matter how well intentioned it may be.  Naturally, the famous elite players have more clout and are listened to more.  And, in baseball the high tide does not raise all ships.  If Correa gets 45 million it does not mean that ordinary joes get the same percentage increase.

Finally, I think the fact the union turned down mediation speaks volumes about their goals in negotiation.  A mediator will start with the existing contract and see what each side is asking for in the way of changes.  In this process, the union's demands will look more outrageous than those of the owners.  I think they knew that and turned down mediation for that reason.  I think it was a mistake for them to do so.

Nothing I have said means I favor the owners, not by a long shot.  They used tough negotiation tactics from the beginning and tried to put time pressure on the negotiations at the end.  But, my frustration with the owners will be for another post.

[chpettit19]

16 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

We are talking about how a pool that is distributed among MLB players.  Milb are completely irrelevant.

MiLB are the ones who turn into MLB players. They're actually the ones who turn into the pre-arb guys that have the opportunity to earn money from this pre-arb pool. You're too smart to be making this argument. I'm done with this conversation. Have a good day.

[Richie the Rally Goat]

On 3/3/2022 at 12:53 PM, Doctor Gast said:

I thought I'd post this so fans can decide for themselves on what happened. I've never been a Scott Boras fan, he never has cared about the sport or the fans. I believe there is some owner bias but there is probable truth to it.

That was a convincing script the owners wrote up for Bill Madden. The jab at Manfred almost made it believable 

[bean5302]

1 minute ago, chpettit19 said:

MiLB are the ones who turn into MLB players. They're actually the ones who turn into the pre-arb guys that have the opportunity to earn money from this pre-arb pool. You're too smart to be making this argument. I'm done with this conversation. Have a good day.

Most MiLB players never make the MLB. In fact, 9 of 10 MiLB will never make MLB. So the 10% of MiLB who will become pre-arb eligible, yes, that tiny minority of players would eventually become pre-arbitration eligible, but many of those 10% not within the currently being negotiated CBA period.

Boras often represents the elite players, not the rank and file guys, and it's not surprising why Boras would want the MLBPA to ask for the pre-arbitration pool to be applied to a very select few top elite players.

The MLBPA entered into negotiation ill-prepared with poor leadership. They've been unreasonable, reckless, emotional and unprofessional throughout the process. I'm cautious about declaring Boras some mysterious puppeteer behind the scenes, carrying out some Machiavellian plot, but the idea he's exercising dramatically too much power is an understatement.

[chpettit19]

3 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

Most MiLB players never make the MLB. In fact, 9 of 10 MiLB will never make MLB. So the 10% of MiLB who will become pre-arb eligible, yes, that tiny minority of players would eventually become pre-arbitration eligible, but many of those 10% not within the currently being negotiated CBA period.

Boras often represents the elite players, not the rank and file guys, and it's not surprising why Boras would want the MLBPA to ask for the pre-arbitration pool to be applied to a very select few top elite players.

The MLBPA entered into negotiation ill-prepared with poor leadership. They've been unreasonable, reckless, emotional and unprofessional throughout the process. I'm cautious about declaring Boras some mysterious puppeteer behind the scenes, carrying out some Machiavellian plot, but the idea he's exercising dramatically too much power is an understatement.

And most MLB players never hit arbitration (average career is 2.7 years), yet the union has been fighting for arbitration numbers to go up since the day it was implemented. That a Boras plot, too? Even fewer players get extensions, let alone lucrative ones, yet the union has been fighting for no cap and higher amounts of revenue going their way since the start of time. Some Boras shenanigans there, too?

Look, Boras represents less than 15% of all major leaguers. You're literally claiming the other 85% are so dumb and gullible that they're doing his bidding in the name of that 15%. Their agents can't convince them that all of his plots and tricks are just ways to take money out of their pockets? Dude should be president or world czar or something if he can convince 1100 guys to agree with each other and fight so hard in lockstep to their own detriment just so everyone gets along. We may have a shot at world peace.

As for the MiLB numbers...I get that. But MLR is suggesting that MiLB don't matter in a discussion about a pre-arb pool of which graduating MiLB will make up the vast majority! That argument is saying Pete Alonso and Aaron Judge didn't matter before their rookie seasons because they were MiLB and that pool is for MLB players. That's absurd. It being some Boras in the shadows maneuver to have that pool go towards the elite young players is suggesting that the current pre-arb guys who wouldn't have made any money off that deal think it's a good idea despite it not helping them at all just because almighty Boras said it was. I'm sorry that I believe the other 85% of MLBPA members can think for themselves. Or have agents who are self-serving enough to convince them it's better if the money is distributed differently. 

[Major League Ready]

22 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

MiLB are the ones who turn into MLB players. They're actually the ones who turn into the pre-arb guys that have the opportunity to earn money from this pre-arb pool. You're too smart to be making this argument. I'm done with this conversation. Have a good day.

We are discussing splitting compensation among MLB players.  How much of that bonus pool is going to be paid to Milb players?  Zero!  I can't believe I have to explain that players that are not yet MLB players don't get paid from a bonus pool for MLB players. 

Obviously, they will eventually become MLB players.  Let's say 300 are prearb just to make the math easy.  If Boras has 10% that's 30 prearb players.  Next year 10 more Boras players will participate in this pool but guess what, 10 will become free agents and no longer participate in prearb compensation.  See how that works. 10 in 10 out, same number of players participating in prearb compensation.   

[Major League Ready]

Still not a single person willing to offer an opinion on the proposal that was rejected.   Everyone up in arms but nobody willing to discuss the relative merit of the contract that was offered.  I don't give a crap if Boras killed the negotiations, or the players did it 100% on their own.  What specifically was wrong with the latest offer that should be holding up playing baseball?

[chpettit19]

1 minute ago, Major League Ready said:

We are discussing splitting compensation among MLB players.  How much of that bonus pool is going to be paid to Milb players?  Zero!  I can't believe I have to explain that players that are not yet MLB players don't get paid from a bonus pool for MLB players. 

Obviously, they will eventually become MLB players.  Let's say 300 are prearb just to make the math easy.  If Boras has 10% that's 30 prearb players.  Next year 10 more Boras players will participate in this pool but guess what, 10 will become free agents and no longer participate in prearb compensation.  See how that works. 10 in 10 out, same number of players participating in prearb compensation.   

That isn't how it works. This isn't a college recruiting program. He doesn't have a set number of scholarships he hands out each year. He may have 0 players eligible next year and 45 the year after that. Agent X who you've never heard of so don't know if their client list is 5 times the size of Boras' or not may have 74 guys graduate this year and 3 next year. Jose Miranda is a minor league player with every chance in the world to graduate this year, and if things go well he may even be in the battle for RoY. Tell me again how this bonus pool doesn't affect him, please. Explain that to me. Austin Martin (Boras client) isn't on the 40 man, but has every chance to graduate this year and could be in the running for RoY. Tell me how this bonus pool doesn't affect him. 

[chpettit19]

13 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

Still not a single person willing to offer an opinion on the proposal that was rejected.   Everyone up in arms but nobody willing to discuss the relative merit of the contract that was offered.  I don't give a crap if Boras killed the negotiations, or the players did it 100% on their own.  What specifically was wrong with the latest offer that should be holding up playing baseball?

This isn't a thread about the merits of the proposal, it's a thread about Scott Boras and his influence over negotiations.

[AceWrigley]

3 hours ago, South Dakota Tom said:

It was reported that four owners (they can only lose 7 and still pass a deal) voted against even offering the current MLB proposal.

I saw that too. If this is true and accurate, seems to me to be an an indicator that the MLB offer is a little painful to a few owners.  Maybe the perfect deal is the point where 23 owners and 51% of the players agree to it (if 51% is the min).

[Major League Ready]

1 hour ago, chpettit19 said:

That isn't how it works. This isn't a college recruiting program. He doesn't have a set number of scholarships he hands out each year. He may have 0 players eligible next year and 45 the year after that. Agent X who you've never heard of so don't know if their client list is 5 times the size of Boras' or not may have 74 guys graduate this year and 3 next year. Jose Miranda is a minor league player with every chance in the world to graduate this year, and if things go well he may even be in the battle for RoY. Tell me again how this bonus pool doesn't affect him, please. Explain that to me. Austin Martin (Boras client) isn't on the 40 man, but has every chance to graduate this year and could be in the running for RoY. Tell me how this bonus pool doesn't affect him. 

And he could have 45 eligible this year and none the next.  That is an absurd assumption.  I really doubt he signs 45 clients one year and none the next.  The reasonable assumption especially for an exercise like this is that he signs the same number of new clients each year.  Therefore, 10 graduate to free agency and 10 new players come into to the league.  

Again, we are talking about major league compensation.  How much major league compensation is paid to Milb players.  I never had to pay employees I had not yet hired.

[Major League Ready]

1 hour ago, chpettit19 said:

This isn't a thread about the merits of the proposal, it's a thread about Scott Boras and his influence over negotiations.

And the relative merit of the offer should not matter to us in terms of our opinion of that happening.  It's one thing if it was a terrible offer.  It's entirely another if that offer should have had teams back on the field.  If he was responsible, we should applaud him if the offer and condemn him if it was a good offer.  None of you want to admit it was a good offer so you avoid the subject

[chpettit19]

15 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

And he could have 45 eligible this year and none the next.  That is an absurd assumption.  I really doubt he signs 45 clients one year and none the next.  The reasonable assumption especially for an exercise like this is that he signs the same number of new clients each year.  Therefore, 10 graduate to free agency and 10 new players come into to the league.  

Again, we are talking about major league compensation.  How much major league compensation is paid to Milb players.  I never had to pay employees I had not yet hired.

That isn't even close to how this works. Do you think Scott Boras only has major league clients? I literally just told you that Austin Martin is a Scott Boras client. He doesn't wait til someone makes the majors and then sign the 10 best prospects from that year. You're not even making an argument that reflects the reality of the baseball industry. You're literally making up your own rules and arguing for how things would work if those were the rules in real life and then calling my assumptions absurd because they don't work in your made up world with your made up rules. There's no such thing as 10 in and 10 out. That is a completely incorrect description of how things work.

It's the weekend and I have plans so I don't have time to explain how things actually work. You can feel free to research on your own. But I promise you 10 in and 10 out is the only absurd assumption being made on this topic. Like you're describing scholarships for a college football team. It doesn't work that way. At all. Have a good weekend.

[chpettit19]

20 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

And the relative merit of the offer should not matter to us in terms of our opinion of that happening.  It's one thing if it was a terrible offer.  It's entirely another if that offer should have had teams back on the field.  If he was responsible, we should applaud him if the offer and condemn him if it was a good offer.  None of you want to admit it was a good offer so you avoid the subject

I think the offer was fine. I think the players could've counted as a win if they'd accepted it. I don't have a problem with them rejecting it if it didn't meet their demands. I blame both the owners and the players for the loss of games. I have no problem discussing the merits of the offer. But, as I said, this is not a thread about the merits of the offer it is a thread about Boras' influence on the negotiations so we are sticking to our thoughts on Boras' influence. People have discussed that they believe he has influence because of the demands the players are making. But this is not a thread for discussion on the merits of the deal and whether the players should have accepted it or not. If you'd like to have that conversation you're welcome to create a new thread or go to previously created threads about that topic and discuss it there.

[Seth Stohs]

This kind of stuff is why I have a hard time getting too upset at either side... Hard to know for sure what's going on. 

Honestly, if it's just these two things, I don't know why they couldn't reach an agreement: 

Min Wage: Players ($750K), Owners ($700K)... Midpoint ($725K... easy)
CBT: Players ($238M), Owners ($220M)... Midpoint ($229M... easy) 

The Players have done pretty well, from what we know... Big increase in minimum salary. New money for players with 0-3 years of service time what wasn't there before, got 12 playoff teams instead of 14. 

There has to be more because right now, I don't get why they're so far apart.