By Every baseball fan knew a lockout was coming after the 2021 MLB season. The collective bargaining agreement was due up and there were things that each side wanted to be addressed. Baseball has not had a lockout since 1990. In 1990 they only had to delay games by a week at the start of the season. Of course, there was the player strike in 1994 that ruined the whole season and saw limited baseball played, but that was not a lockout. And here we are now. The 2021-22 MLB lockout began on December 2. Fans were hopeful at the time that this would be short-lived and the issues would get resolved. It is now February 25th and things are grim. The end-all deadline of February 28th is approaching and if there is no deal by then, the season is in jeopardy of losing games. It is not great.
Current Lockout Standing
I have had my Twitter notifications on for months trying to keep up and make sense of all the breaking lockout news. It would not have made a difference if I did or not because of how little actual traction has been made. Just getting the two sides to meet has been a struggle. The lockout officially started on December 2nd. The two sides did not have their first meeting until a whole month later on January 13th. It was not even in person but was over Zoom. They would meet a total of an astounding two other times in the month of January. If that was not enough these meetings were not long by any means. They were lasting under an hour and had little progress made.
February has been better in the sense that they have met more than 3 times. They have resolved some issues, and by some issues I mean the players have backed off of some of the things they wanted. The owners retreated from wanting to shorten the overall amount of minor leaguers you can roster. I highlight this because it is just a preposterous thing to bring up with the MLBPA during the MLB lockout. People are trying to figure out how to get baseball activities going like they are supposed to and some owners are concerned about paying 20 more minor league players a very minimal salary. Feel like there are more pressing matters at hand.
The Important Week (Feb 21-25)
This past week was supposed to be the big week where the two sides figure it out. Owners and players alike were showing up in person in Florida with meetings scheduled every day to try and save the season from any delay. Every day more and more players have shown up to give their support to the MLBPA. Different owners have also shown up sparingly throughout the week.
However, on February 23rd, Wednesday, the league came out and stated that if they did not figure a deal out by the 28th, games were going to be canceled. And that is canceled, not postponed. The players would have to give up their respective salaries they would make in those games with no chance of recouping it. The owners did not even give it until the end of the week to give an ultimatum. Besides, why would they, the rich owners, care about that if they can squeeze out a few extra dollars?
The players are the ones who will get penalized the hardest from this deadline. This in turn is why the owners have planted their feet in the ground about certain things, largely the collective bargaining tax. The CBT kind of acts as a salary cap for teams and there is a large disparity between where the players and owners are.
Negative Lockout Implications
It seems inevitable that we are losing games. The players association feels like they have to go to bat on certain issues that the owners are not giving ground on and you have to respect them for that. This is going to send ripples throughout the league.
Free agency still cannot take place and there are still some large names on the market. Players like Carlos Correa, Trevor Story, Freddie Freeman still are free agents. Furthermore, when it does happen it is not going to be the typical process for players. Some of the mid-tier guys still out there may have to settle for offers they would not have taken in normal circumstances. Additionally, players at this point in time are having to try and prepare on their own since they do not have access to team facilities. I am curious to see if this impacts any of their qualities of play or durability in the shortened season.
Most of all it is not fair to the fans. Baseball has been on the recent trend of trying to once again grow the popularity of the game. And let me tell you having a 3-month lockout that forces the season to be shortened and completely altering the offseason is not the way to go about it. It is just angering fans. The lockout is something not all fans understand, me included. I try my best to comprehend it on the simplest level possible. Jeff Passan and Evan Drellich have been the saving graces for fans. They have constant updates and try to simply the facts as much as possible.
Simply put, the lockout should have ended by now. If both sides actually compromised like they were supposed to we could have constant baseball news about pitchers and catchers in Florida and Arizona. Instead, we wait on a miracle that the owners give in a little so we can get Opening Day baseball on March 31st. This whole situation is brutal and unnecessary and I put it entirely on the owners. Let’s just keep the faith I guess.
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