Thursday, May 16, 2002
Baseball players threaten strike
Union considers August stoppage as negotiations stall
The Associated Press
NEW YORK — With no labor agreement in sight, some baseball players say the union inevitably will set a strike date for August.
“That's really the only thing we can do,” pitcher Mike Stanton, the New York Yankees' player representative, said Wednesday.
Union officials told player agents at a meeting Tuesday in New York that the staff is considering if and when to set a strike date, two agents said Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity. Players union head Donald Fehr, who told players during spring training to prepare for missing their last two or three paychecks, will hold a similar meeting with West Coast agents today in Los Angeles.
Reds player representative Aaron Boone, speaking before Wednesday's game at Milwaukee, said he had not heard any report of the union contemplating a strike date. He said there was no strike talk when union officials updated player reps during a conference call last week.
“I'm an optimist,” Boone said. “We're not at that point, and I hope we don't get there.”
For now, the union is trying to play down the possibility of a work stoppage, which would be baseball's ninth since 1972.
“The executive board has not yet considered whether to set a strike date,” Fehr said. “We hope not to have to do so.”
The consideration of a strike date, first reported Wednesday by The New York Times, is of little surprise. Players are unhappy that owners, in an effort to slow payroll growth, have proposed a 50 percent luxury tax on the portions of payrolls exceeding $98 million. Management also angered players by asking for an increase of locally generated revenue that teams must share from 20 percent to 50 percent, after a deduction for ballpark expenses.
Owners have promised that, through the World Series, they will not attempt to declare an impasse in talks and implement their proposals. But the union fears management will do so immediately after the postseason, when the players have no leverage.
“For them to rattle their strike-date cage is frankly disappointing and, in my view, counterproductive,” said Bob DuPuy, baseball's chief operating officer. “We didn't put proposals on the table that were designed to provoke a work stoppage. There's no salary cap. There's no rebate or excise tax, like the other leagues have. We put proposals on the table that were designed to allow bargaining to an agreement.”
In management's view, commissioner Bud Selig already made a concession by saying owners would not lock out players or implement its proposals during this season. The union views that pledge as meaning little, because 2002 salaries already had been determined when Selig made the pledge March 26.
“We bargained last time for the ability to affect 2002, and we chose not to exercise our bargaining rights, our leverage,” DuPuy said. “We're going to continue to lose enormous sums.”
Owners claim $232 million in operating losses last year on revenue of $3.5 billion. Players are suspicious but haven't challenged the figures at bargaining sessions, management lawyers say.
In 1993, the last season before the 232-day strike that wiped out the World Series, baseball revenue was $1.87 billion. The average salary has doubled from $1.17 million at the time of the strike to $2.38 million this season.
“Every year, the owners cry poverty and you look at the industry and it's almost doubled financially,” Cleveland player rep Charles Nagy said.
The sides probably will resume talks May 28, according to Gene Orza, the union's No.2 official.
Enquirer reporter John Fay contributed to this report.
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Baseball players threaten strike
