JUPITER, Fla. — Major League Baseball will begin canceling regular-season games if the league and the MLBPA can’t come to terms on a new collective bargaining agreement by Monday, a league spokesperson said on Wednesday.
The games would not be made up and players would not be paid a full-season salary, the spokesperson said.
“A deadline is a deadline,” the spokesperson said. “Missed games are missed games. Salary will not be paid for those games.”
It’s the first time the league has publicly said it would shorten the season if a new deal isn’t reached by the deadline. The league first gave the players the Feb. 28 deadline two weeks ago and reiterated it to them Wednesday. Citing health concerns, the league wants about four weeks of spring training — hence their Feb. 28 deadline. Opening Day is scheduled for March 31.
The players have never acknowledged the deadline.
The sides remain far apart on a new agreement. The union is likely to pull expanded playoffs off the table if players aren’t paid a full season’s salary, according to sources familiar with the union’s thinking.
The news came after five hours of negotiations Wednesday that included “vigorous” dialogue, according to sources familiar with the talks. The only new proposal of the day had the league slightly tweaking the minimum salary structure, offering $10,000 more than previous proposals. The union wants minimum salaries to begin at $775,000 next season; the league is now offering $640,000, with $10,000 raises for every year of the deal after that. The movement was viewed by the union as very minor, according to sources.
Players were joined on Wednesday by executive subcommittee members Andrew Miller, Zack Britton and Gerrit Cole for the first time this week. They joined committee holdovers Max Scherzer, Francisco Lindor and Jason Castro in the meetings which have produced little progress towards a new agreement.
So far, after 13 hours inside Roger Dean Stadium, both sides provided tweaks to previous offers, including:
• On Monday, the league added $5 million to the pre-arbitration pool, now offering $20 million in it. The union wants $115 million.
• On Tuesday, the union reduced their ask for Super 2 eligibility, from 80 percent of players to 75 percent but wants $30,0000 annual raises to the minimum salary structure instead of $25,000 which was previously offered.
The sides have a lot of ground to cover to meet the league’s Feb. 28 deadline. The competitive balance tax, revenue sharing, service-time manipulation and the draft are still all unresolved. If the league holds onto its timeline, there are only five days left before playing less than 162 games in 2022 becomes a reality.
The move to cancel and not make up games is a dramatic one by the league. Though the 1990 lockout extended into March, once an agreement was reached, the sides pushed back Opening Day by a week and then extended the season by three days to get all the games in. The league is currently refusing to make up games this year with doubleheaders or lengthening the season on the back end. Some in the union believe both are still negotiable if the season doesn’t start on time.