Just how well minor-league collective bargaining is progressing should become clearer in January.
In the past two months, the Players Association has made a series of proposals to the commissioner’s office, including those covering the major economic issues: minimum wage, housing, food, transportation, grievance procedure and benefits, people briefed on the said process. The league is digesting those proposals, and next month plans to make its first set of counter-offers. Once those move across the table, it should become clearer how close, or far apart, the sides are.
The specifics of the union’s opening proposals were not immediately known. In the old system, owners paid minor leaguers salaries of $400 per week in rookie ball, $500 in Class A, $600 in Double A and $700 in Triple A. Those amounts were paid during the season, as opposed to year-round. The MLBPA is looking for salary increases, among many other changes.
The league and the union have deliberately kept the process quiet so far, a contrast to the last two years that led up to the unionization of minor leaguers late this summer. Player advocates spoke loudly and frequently about the working conditions of minor leaguers as they built support for a union. But once bargaining formally began in November, both sides felt the process would be better off out of the public eye.
Now, with the start of spring training looming in February and negotiations set to intensify, the new year has the potential to bring more public commentary — depending on how players receive league proposals, and vice versa. But public dialogue would largely seem to be a tool the players are holding in reserve, rather than the owners. Efforts to pressure the league and rally support for the minor leaguers’ cause were so effective over the last 24 months that members of the US Senate Judiciary Committee joined the chorus.
From afar, one could assume that the process is moving slowly, considering that two months in, only one side has made proposals. But those on the inside describe a negotiation that’s largely unfolding at an expected pace. The task at hand for both sides is, if not a difficult one, a novel one: They’re building a brand new CBA, the first governing the relationship between minor leaguers and the teams in the sport’s history.
“Everything that we’re talking about, and looking to negotiate, is foundation,” MLBPA executive director Tony Clark told The Athletic during the World Series, shortly after the first bargaining session. “It’s the first CBA. Oftentimes, when we talk about collective bargaining, it’s against the backdrop of 60-some-odd years of CBAs that we have in place on the major-league side. This is a little different. A lot of the fundamentals need to be laid here, while at the same time making tangible improvements to the experience and lives of the minor-league players.
“So we’re looking to do all of that, and shared all of that, with the league, as part of our first formal sit down.”
From one angle, the parties could be considered to be moving quickly. Major-league negotiations moved slower than this when they first started in 2021, eight months before owners locked out the players.
The people at the table are largely the same as they were during the big-league talks, with MLB deputy commissioner Dan Halem leading the way for the owners, and MLBPA deputy director Bruce Meyer heading up the players’ contingent. A central figure in the unionization process, Harry Marino, is newly part of the MLBPA’s bargaining team. He was previously the executive director of the non-profit Advocates for Minor Leaguers, which disbanded once the MLBPA took in the players.
Whether the MLBPA and the minor leaguers have determined a formal governance structure for their bargaining unit was not immediately known. Minor-league players have regularly attended the eight or so meetings thus far, be it via Zoom or in person.
“The minor-league player engagement, unsurprisingly, has been tangible,” Clark said in October.
The chair of commissioner Rob Manfred’s labor committee, Rockies owner Dick Monfort, has participated in meetings as well, people briefed on the process said. He’s said to be the only owner to appear in meetings this far.
Both Clark and Manfred have publicly said the goal is to get a deal done in time for the start of the season.
“Not much has changed from the time that I was in the minor leagues, which is part and parcel, I suppose, to why we’re in the place that we are, having the negotiation and discussions that we are. And so with that, we’ll see where it goes,” Clark said in October. “We remain hopeful, and the league has professed the same, that a deal can be found prior to the start of the 2023 season.”
Said Manfred in November: “The natural timeline would be to try to get it done during the offseason. We always do better negotiating in the offseason. So I think that sort of the natural expectation would be to try to get something done before Opening Day.”
One issue to watch for during negotiations: MLB’s operating requirements following the settlement of the Senne class-action lawsuit. MLB agreed to pay out $185 million to minor leaguers who had sued alleging wage and overtime law violations. As part of the settlement, the league also agreed to make changes going forward.
Per the settlement website: “MLB will also send a memorandum to all MLB Clubs, advising them of the change to the contract, and advising each Club that it must compensate minor league players in compliance with wage-and-hour laws in effect in Arizona and Florida during spring training, extended spring training, instructional leagues and the championship season in those states, including any minimum wage laws that apply.”
The lawsuit’s fallout also gives the league an incentive to reach a deal in time for the season. Otherwise, MLB would likely need to alter its minor-league operation twice: once to comply with various state laws in a post-Senne environment, and then again whenever a CBA is agreed to.
(Photo of Bruce Meyer and Tony Clark, during major league negotiations in 2022: Greg Lovett / USA Today Network)
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