New CBA negotiations

[Andy]

i bet you goons hate the nhl shootout in the regular season too

The NHL shootout actually serves a purpose. Shrinking the average length of the already-uncommon extra-inning game by four minutes did not.

[Tim]

I just want to say...Hell Yeah! Baseball!

[jersey cubs fan]

WTF is wrong with ties? :ducks:

only wear one at weddings and funerals

[Tim]

Does anyone know if:

 

1) Draft pick compensation was officially axed

2) That takes effect this year?

[Andy]

Does anyone know if:

 

1) Draft pick compensation was officially axed

2) That takes effect this year?

Compensation is axed for the 2022-23 offseason pending the agreement on an international draft, the deadline for which is later this summer. If they don't come to an agreement the qualifying offer would stay.

[Rob]

If by ruled you mean sucked the joy out of extra innings games, then yes it did!

 

i watched so many non-cubs extra inning games that i wouldn't have. it's instant action/strategy, and 17 inning slogs are overrated.

There is just something magical about the possibility of that 17 inning game. By no means do I want to stay up until 2am every night watching extra innings marathons, but I want to know that it "might" happen. I like the unknown of going to the ballpark and expecting a 3 hour game but understanding that we might end up being there for 5+ hours instead. That could all just be me, but I enjoy the unpredictability and the chance to see something crazy/historic on any given day.

 

Agreed. Long ago, I went to Wrigley to celebrate my birthday, and was rewarded with a 14 inning game with a rain delay. I got to hang out in my Mecca for like 7 hours that day. Even though the Cubs lost, it was glorious, and a memory I'll always cherish.

[UMFan83]

 

Say goodbye to the wild card games, now a best of 3 round

[David]

 

Say goodbye to the wild card games, now a best of 3 round

 

 

this is so lame

 

the one time i'm in favor of (slightly) increasing variance. mainly because best of 3 does almost nothing to reduce it and takes away a lot of the fun.

[Gilby]

 

Say goodbye to the wild card games, now a best of 3 round

 

Don't like it but was expecting it to be worse so I'll take it. Regular season still very much matters

[17 Seconds]

it's sad that the 12 team playoff actually benefits the cubs

[soccer10k]

 

Say goodbye to the wild card games, now a best of 3 round

 

Don't like it but was expecting it to be worse so I'll take it. Regular season still very much matters

 

There’s no more Game 163 tiebreakers either because of the 3 game first round.

[UMFan83]

 

Say goodbye to the wild card games, now a best of 3 round

 

Don't like it but was expecting it to be worse so I'll take it. Regular season still very much matters

 

There’s no more Game 163 tiebreakers either because of the 3 game first round.

 

I’m confused. What about in a scenario like 2018 where the Cubs and Brewers tied for the best record in the NL? Which team would get a bye and which would have to play an entire extra round?

[UMFan83]

 

Holy crap, balanced schedules and you play all 29 other teams at least once a year?

 

I still hope teams play more games against their division than anyone else. Maybe not as many as before. If they don’t, what’s the point of divisions?

[Irrelevant Dude]

 

Holy crap, balanced schedules and you play all 29 other teams at least once a year?

 

I still hope teams play more games against their division than anyone else. Maybe not as many as before. If they don’t, what’s the point of divisions?

I don't love that. I will miss having home and home series against each NL opponent. There really is no point of leagues anymore except as an arbitrary split for playoff purposes.

 

Edit - My math was off. I guess the home and home series against all NL teams is still possible, at the expense of some division games. But they should also eliminate the extra games against the opposite league rivals (White Sox) as that creates an unfair imbalance in a balanced schedule.

[CubColtPacer]

 

Holy crap, balanced schedules and you play all 29 other teams at least once a year?

 

I still hope teams play more games against their division than anyone else. Maybe not as many as before. If they don’t, what’s the point of divisions?

I don't love that. I will miss having home and home series against each NL opponent. There really is no point of leagues anymore except as an arbitrary split for playoff purposes.

 

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That's seemingly still possible if they lower the amount of division games. Something like

 

12 games against your 4 division opponents (48 games)

6 games against the 10 other teams in your league (60 games)

3 games against the 15 teams in the other league (45 games).

 

That leaves 9 games to put wherever. That would be way more balanced in terms of comparing teams in different divisions.

 

Edit: Saw your edit after I finished mine, sorry.

[Bertz]

[UMFan83]

 

Guess Rizzo isn’t signing with the Jays

[soccer10k]

 

Don't like it but was expecting it to be worse so I'll take it. Regular season still very much matters

 

There’s no more Game 163 tiebreakers either because of the 3 game first round.

 

I’m confused. What about in a scenario like 2018 where the Cubs and Brewers tied for the best record in the NL? Which team would get a bye and which would have to play an entire extra round?

 

They’d have tiebreakers similar to other leagues. H2H would certainly be first. Maybe division record after that.

[UMFan83]

 

There’s no more Game 163 tiebreakers either because of the 3 game first round.

 

I’m confused. What about in a scenario like 2018 where the Cubs and Brewers tied for the best record in the NL? Which team would get a bye and which would have to play an entire extra round?

 

They’d have tiebreakers similar to other leagues. H2H would certainly be first. Maybe division record after that.

 

That sounds terrible. A tiebreaker to see who gets to play one less round of playoffs? Don’t like it

[Bertz]

This was expected but first time I've seen it mentioned

 

[Irrelevant Dude]

 

I’m confused. What about in a scenario like 2018 where the Cubs and Brewers tied for the best record in the NL? Which team would get a bye and which would have to play an entire extra round?

 

They’d have tiebreakers similar to other leagues. H2H would certainly be first. Maybe division record after that.

 

That sounds terrible. A tiebreaker to see who gets to play one less round of playoffs? Don’t like it

I just don't like that 1 division winner ends up having to play an extra round. I would much rather have all 3 division winners get a bye, with the 3 wild card teams playing a series of first round games. Bob Costas suggested having the #2 and #3 wild card teams have a 1 game playoff, with the winner advancing to a 3 game series against the #1 would card team. There would still be tiebreaker issues though.

 

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[Rob]

Ultimately, I'm just surprised that once again the MLBPA seems to have settled for minor incremental change on a system that's incredibly owner-friendly as currently constructed.

 

After they got embarrassed by how the last CBA played out, I always expected their asks to be much bigger this time around.

[Bertz]

We won't have a full accounting of the new CBA for possibly years (Brett found the revenue sharing penalties tied to repeat CBT offenders in 2019), but I think this is where we netted out with the new CBA.

 

The Bad

 

- Little changed systemically. Free agency works the same, arbitration works the same, the tanking and service time manipulation measures are marginal

- Because of the above, there's almost no chance the egregiously cheap teams (Rays, Pirates, A's, Marlins) change their behavior one bit over the next five years

- The new CBT tier ($60M over the first) seems destined to progress into a fairly hard cap, if it's not there already

 

 

The Unknown (as of now)

 

- We know the thresholds, but I don't believe we know the penalties for the CBT. I think I saw financially they were status quo, but what about the increases for repeat offenders? The draft penalties? Revenue sharing? The CBT served as a cap last go around because it was a death by a thousand cuts sort of deal, particularly for repeat offenders. If some of those other penalties got dropped, it'll function as more of a soft cap again

- Did any revenue sharing changes make it to the final agreement? Even pretty late in the process the players offers all had a small ($20M) decrease

- Obviously, are there any quirks none of the writers have found yet, any monkey paw sort of unintended consequence deals, etc.

 

The Okay

- Expanded playoffs. Expanding the playoffs is bad, but we knew inevitable. Keeping it to 12 instead of 14 was good. The structure seems solid? I've been going back and forth on whether I think it's okay that Division winner #3 and WC #1 are treated the same, but otherwise I think it's good

- The CBT increases of $20M this year and another $14M over the life of the deal. They're substantial from last year to this year, but probably not enough during the deal itself

 

The Good

- While little changed systemically, the players did get the pre-arb bonus pool created, and introduced artificial ways to increase service time. Like the CBT has for the owners, these are things that could snowball if the players keep building on them in future agreements

- Young players are getting paid a lot more. The league minimum is up ~30% this year, and will jump another 10% over the deal. I haven't seen details, but it sounds like minor leaguers on the 40 man got substantial raises as well. Possibly AAA players too (not sure if this was just someone poorly wording the 40 man player raise?)? And then of course the $50M bonus pool

- I'm curious to see the reverberations of more money flowing to young players. Does this commensurately increase arb salaries? With more guaranteed money in hand, are we less likely to see team friendly extensions?

- Manfred got more power to make rule changes faster. The game needs to evolve, and while it seems clear that the initial implementation of any rule from Manfred will be as ham-fisted as possible, changes are necessary. And the players have frankly been babies about a lot of this stuff

- the anti-tanking measures of a draft lottery + bonus draft picks for small market teams who make the playoffs and/or finish over .500. While these measures aren't going to change how e.g. the Pirates operate, they might impact how small (but not tiny) markets like Cincy and KC operate? I'd guess they've also made it very unlikely we ever see a large market do a prolonged full scale teardown again like the Cubs, White Sox, or Astros

- Similar vibe with the service time manipulation. The issue is not suddenly solved, not even close. But the calculus is now more complicated, particularly for mega prospects like Kris Bryant who compete for MVPs/Cys, and also for super polished prospects who will compete for the RoY

- The players fought. After 2016, the MLBPA was rightly viewed as a joke. This led Manfred and the owners to habitually line step over the last five years. The players' modest win here won't make the owners cower in fear, but it should help keep their most egregious horsefeathers in check

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Ultimately, I'm just surprised that once again the MLBPA seems to have settled for minor incremental change on a system that's incredibly owner-friendly as currently constructed.

 

After they got embarrassed by how the last CBA played out, I always expected their asks to be much bigger this time around.

 

That's kinda how it has to work given the power dynamics, right? One favorable interpretation for the players is that they learned from the owners and started opening cracks in the system that can be expanded, the same way that the way the CBT operates now is far from what it was initially marketed. The bonus pool for pre-arb is a big thing there, and it'll be easier to continue to reform pre-FA comp with that mechanism to be added to/adjusted than it was in November. Service time levers are the other in that vein, though they are more modest in their current benefit. When you layer that on top of significant increases to minimum salary, the CBT, and closing some player unfriendly loopholes(option limits, draft/tanking reforms), I think they can be reasonably happy with the outcome, even if the net result isn't as much as our hopes and dreams given the last 2 CBAs.

[Andy]

Ultimately, I'm just surprised that once again the MLBPA seems to have settled for minor incremental change on a system that's incredibly owner-friendly as currently constructed.

 

After they got embarrassed by how the last CBA played out, I always expected their asks to be much bigger this time around.

 

That's kinda how it has to work given the power dynamics, right? One favorable interpretation for the players is that they learned from the owners and started opening cracks in the system that can be expanded, the same way that the way the CBT operates now is far from what it was initially marketed. The bonus pool for pre-arb is a big thing there, and it'll be easier to continue to reform pre-FA comp with that mechanism to be added to/adjusted than it was in November. Service time levers are the other in that vein, though they are more modest in their current benefit. When you layer that on top of significant increases to minimum salary, the CBT, and closing some player unfriendly loopholes(option limits, draft/tanking reforms), I think they can be reasonably happy with the outcome, even if the net result isn't as much as our hopes and dreams given the last 2 CBAs.

Yeah, the owners didn't get to the power side of the arrangement just through the last CBA, they got there through several of them. The players took a step back in the right direction this time and they'll just have to keep it up in 2026.