Will Baseball Leave Us?
Major League Baseball is once again headed on a path to ruin. How long is it before baseball leaves us for good?
Hollywood doesn’t get this right every time. Can you think of a futuristic, dystopian, or post-apocalyptic movie or show that still has professional sports as they are today? While you’re wrapping your head around that, read this article about the fall of MLB and baseball.
Ripple Effects
Professional sports continue to alienate fans. Diehards will hold on to their heroes until the final days of the sport, but if things continue, we will see the end of professional sports in our lifetime. It is an ugly truth, and deep down, in places you’d rather not think about, you know it’s a possibility.
Alienating Major League Baseball fans isn’t anything new. The 1981 baseball strike was a precursor to strengthening the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA). That year, MLB lost 713 games due to the MLBPA exerting their will over the owners to force their hand on free agency compensation.
Blame found its way to the owners, who were looking for compensation for losing a player. Ironically, it was the owners who lost $72 million during this strike. It hardly seems worth it, but baseball would rebound.
Then in 1994, the entire postseason was canceled. Arguably, this event finished off the Montreal Expos, who needed the playoff revenue that they were destined to get. It was what the owners had to have in order to stave off their financial ruin.
The owners wanted a salary cap. Obviously, the players didn’t. The MLBPA called for a stoppage which began on August 11. That work stoppage ran through the beginning of 1995. A total of $580 million was lost by the owners, and players missed out on $230 million in salaries.
Both of these strikes caused near irreparable damage to America’s Past-time. Never before in the history of professional sports had a postseason been lost due to a work stoppage. Needless to say, every time there’s a possible work stoppage, Major League Baseball is playing with fire.
Here we go again
The current labor agreement between MLB and the Players Association expires on December 1. At that point, a lock-out seems inevitable. The two sides are far apart on many issues, and there is plenty of animosity between them. It seems Commissioner Rob Manfred and MLBPA President Tony Clark genuinely don’t like each other.
Until we get closer to the 2022 season, there isn’t much motivation for either party to make concessions. That means no free agent frenzy and no trades. The hot stove will be, in effect, turned off. In return, so will fan interest.