Major League Baseball has unveiled its plan for the 2020 season, which includes an 82-game schedule, expanded playoffs, and a 50/50 revenue split. Owners approved the plan and sent it to the MLBPA on Tuesday.
How players respond, and what ultimately is agreed upon, remain to be seen.
“At the end of the day, a majority of players, if they’re told the circumstances are safe, they will want to play,” MLB Network insider Jon Morosi said on Tiki & Tierney. “I also believe that, yes, there are going to be strong statements on both sides and economic arguments to be made because that’s a function of bargaining and pro sports and that’s what happens.
“I just really think that because of what baseball represents in our country – and also the potential of the moment for the game to serve a real national role and also to reclaim some of its cultural importance – I just think there is so much at stake for the sport and the people in it that, at the end of the day, there will be an agreement … between MLB and the union to play this season.”
Under MLB’s proposed plan, Opening Day will occur in early July. The 50/50 revenue-sharing plan, meanwhile, would be unprecedented in MLB.
“We have never really seen the owners or the commissioners … making the case for a salary cap,” Morosi said. “It’s never been something that they have really pushed for, and they’re unique in that respect in our country. They’re the only league that still has not gone to that point. And I think this year, because of the tremendous amount of risk . . . it really is incumbent on the players and I think the owners to realize just how much they have to be partners for this year especially. If part of that has to be the owners saying ‘Listen, we will make this agreement now in exchange for not imposing – or even asking for – a cap in future negotiations, I think that’s a very fair compromise if that’s how it comes out.
“But both sides have to realize that the money to be made for baseball is not in 2020,” Morosi continued. “It’s in 2021, 2022 and 2023 and beyond. If you do things right this year, if you do them safely and appropriately and with the right amount of sensitivity and empathy all the way around, you’ve got a chance to have a really special and unique year for your sport that will, I believe, endear itself to the American public for years to come. And the opposite, the inverse, is probably true as well.”