Well I guess I should write something

On Tuesday the talks fell apart.  It's probably more accurate to say the talks were never actually building as we had hoped and the pieces remained unassembled on the ground, but why quibble?  The results are the same - no baseball, not now, probably not soon. 

There are a faction of hardline owners who have drawn a line in the sand. They must make more money out of baseball regardless of what happens going forward and that means limiting salaries. The best way to do that is to keep salaries for controlled young players low; so a lower minimum than the players' ask and no arbitration expansion, and to limit the amount anyone can spend for players; with a cap that doesn't increase with revenues or inflation and harsher penalties for going over.  Why do they want this? Because who doesn't want more money and more security? But its not about the difference between making or losing money. Don't believe that. It's about making money or making more money.

Sports labor fights are hard for fans.  I often have said fans are likely to side with owners because we understand what ownership does. They might not actually do the day to day stuff but someone is doing real work as we understand it. They run a business. You've got to hire and fire, and deal with contractors, and worry about prices, etc. etc. It might be a crazy lucrative spin on jobs we know of in a weird industry, but it's still a spin on jobs we know of.  

Athletes though, that's not a job to us. There is no relation for us to think "ok this guy should get paid just for playing a game" on an instinctual level. It goes against everything we took in growing up. We PLAY sports, for fun, all throughout our youth. We don't play at being boss. It's a game for kids. It's something most of us would love to do for a fraction of their salaries. Of course if we step back and think about it, it makes sense.  An entertainer draws a crowd and you pay to see them. These guys aren't just playing a game, but playing a game better than anyone can right now. But it takes those extra steps.  That makes a difference. That often makes fans side against the players. 

It's also tough because when we think of labor fights we aren't really thinking of people getting paid fair wages, but reasonable ones. We want people to be able to have the basics; food, clothes, shelter. We want people to be able to pay their bills and not worry about health care and be able to put their kids through school.  If a business is profitable we don't want the CEO driving his fancy car to his mansion to pack for a week his vacation home if the guy on the line can't take his family to the beach once a year. But what is reasonable when nearly everyone involved lives like that CEO? 

OK yes, minor league players and guys who have cups of coffee in the majors aren't living that life. A prorated 2-3 seasons doesn't set you up for life and a guy like... let's say James Borque might have played 8 years of baseball for about 100K total.  But the CBA isn't about them, officially so. It's about major leaguers. About major leaguers who stick around.  Changes to the minimum salary and arbitration are nice and needed but they don't really change the facts on the ground.  If you can stick on a roster for the equivalent of 3+ years, you are set for life (assuming you are smart enough to invest some, not waste money, and are planning on doing SOMETHING for income) If you can make it on a roster the full team control time you may not even have to do all that, and if you can get one contract post control you are officially idle rich.

So how does one deal with that? How does one deal with a labor issue that the guy we see as incredibly rich being robbed of some money by the guy with unimaginable wealth? How do we deal with it when this robbery materially changes nothing for the rich guy? He is still rich.  How do you get us to care? 

 It's very hard! Which is again why most of these things have ended with the majority of fans booing the players. Just get rich playing your game and shut up!

But this time it's a little different. We've come to back the players more because the owners haven't even bothered to try to make us care. They are the ones locking the players out. They spent a month doing nothing. Their offers to the players haven't shown movement. They sent up the unlikable Manford to smile his way through public appearances. Why? Because they don't need us to care. It's nice not to be yelled at.  It's nice for the fans to put pressure on the players. But this plays out the same with or without fans. This isn't about the fans. 

What now? 

The owners have some money coming in their mind from additional revenue sources in the CBA; Ads on jerseys, extra playoffs. That extends the time they can have no games. Eventually though that pressure of having no income will wear on ownerships and around 140 games TV deals start to break down into per game payments costing them a lot of money.  Does it wear more than on players? Maybe so.  The players have their personal pressures but it's internal. The ownerships often have external pressures. Other ownership members, debt collectors, shareholders, gambling partners; that don't care about wringing the last dollar from baseball. This is why ownership often loses. 

This is going to go on for a while. Ownership is willing to play chicken with the season . Players are willing to take that bet.  Since everything so far has gone as worse as possible I'll assume the same without the armageddon of losing a whole season. I'll say we're out until somewhere near Memorial Day.