Baseball’s owners and players went to extra innings Tuesday but failed to reach agreement on a new labor deal, leading commissioner Rob Manfred to officially cancel the first two series of the regular season, starting with the March 31 opening-day games.
Owners originally set a Monday deadline for a deal but agreed, after both sides felt there was progress in the marathon negotiating session that lasted until 2:30 Tuesday morning, to continue talks until 5 p.m. Tuesday.
That still wasn’t enough time and raised the question if any amount would have been enough.
Talks broke off with the players rejecting what the owners said was their final offer and with some obvious animus. Owners claimed the players changed their tone on Tuesday, and the union said the owners had been falsely portraying that the sides were close to a deal Monday in order to shift blame.
There was no set date to resume negotiations, as union officials said they were heading to their homes after eight days of talks in Jupiter.
Manfred said the games were canceled based on the calendar to have a proper spring training. Next is to see how many regular-season games are canceled beyond the first two series. The Rays were to open the season at Boston and Toronto. The owners have said the games won’t be made up and players won’t get paid or service time for them. Whenever the sides start talking again, the union may try to convince owners to restore some or all of the missed games.
The Rays, coming off the momentum of 100 wins and a second straight American League East title, were scheduled to open their season March 31 at Boston and play their home opener April 8 against Baltimore.
The owners and players reconvened at Roger Dean Stadium around 10 a.m. Tuesday amid optimism a settlement was within reach, but after several afternoon meetings the remaining issues, both financial and philosophical, proved to be too much to agree on.
The key unresolved items were reported to be minimum salaries, the amount of the bonus pool for pre-arbitration players and thresholds for the Competitive Balance Tax (CBT).
The owners’ final offer, shared with reporters by the union, was for a $700,000 minimum salary with $10,000 annual increases, a $30 million bonus pool for the pre-arbitration players and maintaining the current CBT thresholds ranging from $220 million to $230 million.
The players’ most recent proposal was for a $725,000 minimum salary with $20,000 annual raises, an $85 million pool with $5 million annual increases and an increase in the CBT thresholds starting at $238 million and climbing to $263 million in the fifth year.
