Baseballhead:
Do The Evolution

Michael Cox

Are you ready for some Baseballhead? Ooh, good.

This past week, the ongoing saga of MLB labor relations took a dramatic turn. What happened? Someone said the word "strike." And "August." Furthermore, that someone was a player. Needless to say, thousands of column inches, millions of pixels, and countless cubic yards of precious oxygen have been wasted in the ensuing media furor, all of which boil down to one of three statements:

• The sky is falling. A scout has confirmed this.
   
  
• There won't be a strike. It's all a ruse to give the players the upper hand in negotiations. A scout has confirmed this.
   
  
• Being a Gemini, I just never know what to expect.

The fact is, right this minute you know about as much about the potential for a strike as Bob Nightengale, Jayson Stark, or yours truly. However, I can hazard my very best guess based on past events, as well as the fact that the MLBPA has demonstrated one trait that the owners have not: the players learn from their past mistakes. And the evidence is a mile high that the players' 1994-1995 strike was a stupid mistake that they're still paying for today.

"Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis? The players came out of that 'labor action' smelling like fancy toilet water, like they always do," I hear you say. Sure, the players won concessions, like they do every time the owners try and break the union, but it may well have been a Pyrrhic victory. Let's review.

The reason the MLBPA made August 1994 the target month for its last strike is out of the notion of "leverage." The idea was that by walking off the job before the season ended, tremendous financial pressure would be brought to bear on the owners. To wit, most of the network TV money is made in October. Fans would yell, Congress would yell, it'd be like a huge Irish family, all ready to smack Selig and his boys upside the head. A new Basic Agreement would be signed in time for the Division Series.

It didn't happen. Season canceled, playoffs canceled, World Series canceled. The owners did exactly what they had planned to do in the first place: wait until November, declare an impasse in negotiations, and begin using their own rules. So much for "leverage." The MLBPA had to go to court and have a judge declare that there was no impasse and reimpose the old Basic Agreement, just as they would have had to do if they'd stayed on the job. All the players gained by striking was a month and a half of unpaid vacation. Pay and postseason bonuses were lost, never to be seen again.

Those were just the immediate consequences of the strike. When baseball returned, attendance immediately dropped 15 percent. Since then, attendance has crept up slowly until last year MLB finally drew as many fans per game as it did in 1993. Trends prior to the strike indicate that attendance would likely have grown steadily over the past eight years even if there had been no strike. (However, this year the Commissioner has done an excellent job of keeping fans away by using national airwaves to tell them the sport is dying and their team has no chance.)

Again, money out of the owners' pockets is money out of the players' pockets, and using even the questionable revenue figures Selig presented to Congress last year, the strike may have cost almost $245 million in lost ballpark-related revenues last year alone, and well over a billion since '94. That's several A-Rods worth of jack, Jack.

But that's not all. The strike also helped scotch the infamous "Baseball Network," with both ABC and NBC invoking their escape clauses and running like hell after the '95 playoffs' disastrous ratings. With network TV deals for other sports reaching record levels, MLB recently granted exclusive over-the-air rights to FOX for $416 million per year -- far, far short of Selig's $1 billion-plus goal. MLB's total broadcast and cable fees total $570 million, far less than even the NBA's new $767 million per year package.

So the players, being historically much smarter than the owners, surely must realize the fact that their 1994 walkout is costing them money even today. "But what other choice do they have," I hear you ask?

If they won a court decision overturning the '94 "impasse," they can surely win one this winter. Paul Beeston had almost finalized an agreement with the players when Selig walked in and tore it up, apparently because futile attempts at breaking the union is the only way Selig knows. Beeston then resigned, and Selig replaced him with a lawyer. If the Commish declares a breakdown and imposes his version of martial law in November, it might not be long before Beeston becomes the prime witness for the prosecution.

Also, the players know that Selig is not an intelligent man when it comes to matters of labor. While his personal charm has apparently hypnotized many who should know better than to allow him into a leadership role of any kind, he instead seems to feel that the only way to a labor agreement is to bludgeon the union into submission. After decades of the union bludgeoning back, he has not learned a single thing.

Thus, if the union strikes this August, Selig will think nothing of canceling another World Series. And the union should know that means there is no leverage to gain by an August strike, and that even if they win the bargaining battle, they will ultimately lose the financial war.

At least, let's hope they know.

He's Not Going To Win 'Salesman Of The Month': Our favorite Lord High Commissioner of All Things Baseball was at it again last week, declaring that six to eight teams will fold within 18 months if he doesn't get a salary cap tout de suite. "Baseball has $4 billion of debt, the bankers are nervous and the losses are very real," Selig said, while refusing to name even one fold-ready team or one nervous banker who could prove the losses are real.

Selig's latest outburst ought to really help sagging attendance, because as we all know there's nothing like a failing team to get fans out to the ballpark. "You know how serious the problem is when six to eight clubs are for sale, including the Angels," the Commish added, somehow forgetting to mention the record prices teams are fetching, or that they might fetch even more if new owners weren't required to agree with Selig.

From the Gee, That Sounds Familiar Desk:

"What, are you people on dope?" -- Mr. Hand, Fast Times at Ridgemont High

"There would be no baseball left if they drug-tested everyone today." -- Jose Canseco, who sincerely believes that there was some sort of universal conspiracy to keep him from playing.

Speaking of conspiracy theories, Jose ain't seen nothing until he finds out how Hall of Fame voters feel about him, now that they know his 462 career homers were mostly fueled by steroids...

I'll See Your Gum And Raise You a Bone Chip: After the Luis Gonzalez ABC gum debacle comes the news that Mariner/former Yankee reliever Jeff Nelson recently placed his own bone chips on Ebay, with bids reaching $23,600 before the online auctioneer pulled the plug. (Evidently they have a strict "no-body-parts" rule.)

What's amazing is not that Nelson put the elbow fragments up for bid (he told reporters he did it as a joke), but that despite almost no press, his auction reached more than double the amount of Gonzo's much-ballyhooed Juicy Fruit. "It's kind of embarrassing that someone would want to buy something that came out of your elbow," Nelson opined. Speak for yourself, Jeff.

about the author

Michael Cox can't see the forest for the Louisville Sluggers. Suggest a career change to logging at mc@strikethree.com.