Shifting Tides

MLB and the Players Association have kept their word to negotiate every day this week. Sadly, the news out of these sessions doesn't really provide much hope that an agreement will be reached in time to get the 2022 season underway as scheduled on March 31. I started writing a piece on that subject but realized I just wasn't feeling it. Even for folks like myself who write as a hobby rather than for a living, the golden rule is still to write about something that interests you. These CBA negotiations are the equivalent of watching Steve Trachsel pitching on a day that he didn't have it. They're proceeding at roughly the same pace as a bad Trachsel outing, too.

The Road Not Taken

I spend a lot of time thinking about the New York Mets. Fortunately for my mental health, it's been a much more pleasant experience since Steve Cohen bought the team than it was previously. Sure, 2021 didn't turn out to be the year that Mets fans hoped for, but the club has done a good job addressing the root causes of last season's disappointment — at least until the lockout brought MLB operations to a halt. Conversely, in the final years of the Wilpon ownership, time spent pondering the Mets inevitably brought on persistent feelings of helplessness and despair.

Beware the Self-Inflicted Wound

A CBA Win for MLB Owners Might Cost Them in the Future

I wrote a piece last month outlining why I was skeptical that a new CBA would be reached in time to get the season started as scheduled on March 31. MLB owners seem absolutely committed to not ceding ground to the players on the core economic issues, including the Competitive Balance Tax (or Luxury Tax) and how young players are paid. The owners have relentlessly utilized gains they made in the last two CBAs to hold MLB salary increases well below the rate that revenues have increased over the last few years.

Andy Does It Again

The more things change, the more they stay the same. This famous phrase was coined by a French journalist more than 170 years ago, but it's never seemed more timely than right now. First, I read a piece by Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich in The Athletic, puncturing the small amount of optimism I was clinging to regarding MLB baseball being played. Then I came across an Andy Martino column for SNY pondering why "so many fans dislike Robinson Cano." As soon as I saw the title, I thought to myself, "let me guess — could it be racism?"