Nation
MLB spring training was supposed to start this week. What's going on with baseball's lockout?
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On the day spring training workouts for pitchers and catchers were to begin, baseball stayed underground.
Certainly, the crack of the bat and the snap of the catcher’s mitt were audible, somewhere. Just not in the 30 gleaming facilities that host Major League Baseball’s franchises for their annual spring ritual and run-up to the regular season.
Instead, it was merely Day 77 of the owners’ lockout of players as both sides continue negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement after the previous one expired Dec. 1.
A look at where things stand – and which key dates are in peril – as the impasse continues:
Is MLB spring training canceled?
Um, not totally. And there’s still been no official announcement of its delay; the padlocked gates and silence speak enough volumes, apparently.
Yet instead of bullpen sessions and their subsequent bro hugs witnessed by a smattering of baseball-thirsty fans, players are left to get their work in sprinkled throughout private workout facilities in Arizona and Florida and wherever else they may typically train before report date. The holding pattern remains.
You can forget about first full-squad workouts, as well; those were largely set to occur beginning Feb. 21. And spring-training games?
Well, that’s only a matter of time. The Cactus and Grapefruit league slates were set to begin Feb. 25, but a trickle, and eventually a flood, of cancellations is now inevitable. MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said in a press briefing last week that once a CBA is ratified, it would take several days, though perhaps less than a week, to fling open facility doors to players.
While they’d presumably arrive in optimal shape, it would still take several days for pitchers and catchers and position players to ramp into game-ready condition, even for the fake baseball contested in spring.
And with no new bargaining sessions slated until perhaps the end of this week, you can easily project that no exhibition baseball will be played until March – if at all.
Why is the lockout taking so long?
Good question. When MLB imposed the lockout, Manfred claimed it’d be a key mechanism to jump-start the collective bargaining process. The sides then proceeded to not meet in person for the next sevn weeks.
And they’ve only met five times, total, the most recent coming on Saturday when players walked away unimpressed with the owners’ modest revisions to previous proposals.
The only progress, in a sense, is that players dropped one of a handful of nuclear options and agreed not to seek free agency after five years of service time instead of six. Owners agreed to a universal DH and to eliminate draft-pick compensation attached to top free agents.
While that reduced the chances of a massive gulf between the sides, with one hoping for a significant alteration to the landscape, the issues have remained nettlesome enough to keep them apart.
Ultimately, the luxury-tax ceiling and dispersal of salary to high-achieving young players represent the widest rivers to cross. Currently, owners are sitting on an offer of a $214 million ceiling, rising to $222 million by 2026, with teams not penalized a draft pick until they exceed $234 million.
Players are aiming for a $245 million ceiling, a mark that wouldn’t likely be exceeded by more than two or three teams, and would enable upper middle class clubs more maneuverability when they’re inclined to contend.
Meanwhile, a proposed system of creating a pool for top young players who, as it stands, are confined to minimum-wage level salaries for the first three years of their career is even wider. Owners are proposing $15 million; players are seeking $100 million.
Still, the waters are navigable.
Is the regular season in jeopardy?
Sure is! While Manfred repeatedly cites the calendar as a way to produce a “breakthrough” between sides and greatly clear the path to an agreement, less than two weeks remain before a projected Feb. 28 deadline to strike a deal and get players in camp long enough to ramp them up for the March 31 Opening Day.
Both sides are well aware of the terrible fallout that would result if regular-season games are canceled, which hasn’t happened since the disastrous 1994-95 strike/lockout. If an agreement is reached in an ambiguous zone to get games going on time – say, between Feb. 28 and March 4 – you’d assume the league and players would pull any available levers to ensure Opening Day comes March 31. Significantly expanded rosters? Pitch limits? Hey, whatever it takes to ensure the bunting is hanging from the upper deck before April Fools’ Day.
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Uber, Lyft made safety improvements, but many of those protect riders more than drivers. But drivers are also in danger.
Naomi Ogutu
Opinion contributor
I’ve been a rideshare driver in New York City for six years, and I take pride in my job and helping my passengers get where they need to go safely. But my safety is not a guarantee. I’m a mom of three. I need to know that I’ll make it home to my kids at the end of each night.
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Business
'A bad déjà vu': Under the crush of Western sanctions, Russians fear a return to dark economic days
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The lone No. 1 seed still alive heading into the Elite Eight, Kansas needs only a win against No. 10 Miami (Fla.) to book a spot in the Final Four.
No. 2 Duke and coach Mike Krzyzewski can make one last Final Four and chase one final national championship by beating No. 4 Arkansas.
No. 2 Villanova can reach the national semifinals for the third time in six tournaments by winning what should be a defense-dominated brawl against No. 5 Houston.
And after beating No. 4 UCLA in the Sweet 16, No. 8 North Carolina is one win from reaching the Final Four under first-year coach Hubert Davis.
If everything goes according to plan, this year’s Final Four will consist of some of the biggest names in the history of the sport.
But the last week has taught us that this year’s NCAA Tournament will inevitably deviate from the script.
So look for the Jayhawks to be shocked in the Elite Eight, as the Bill Self collection of tournament collapses adds another painful chapter. Based on how things have gone through three rounds, Arkansas is a lock to send Krzyzewski into retirement one game shy of the Final Four. Villanova may be a two-time champion under Jay Wright, but the Wildcats will be smothered by Houston.
And, of course, the Tar Heels will lose to the team that embodies the wackiness and uncertainty of this entire tournament.
Saint Peter’s stands at the precipice of another outlandish achievement: being the first No. 15 seed — the first seed lower than No. 11, in fact — to reach the Final Four.
The Peacocks will be the underdog once again come Sunday, when they’ll match against a deeper and more talented opponent with decades of history to more than overshadow the Peacocks’ three-game run.
But beating another college basketball giant will simply take what we already know the Peacocks can bring to the table: Saint Peter’s reached the Elite Eight with energy, aggressiveness and composure, following the model set by unflappable coach Shaheen Holloway, and that same combination will give the Peacocks a chance at etching themselves into an even more permanent place in NCAA Tournament history.
“We’re happy but don’t mistake, we’re not satisfied, we’re not satisfied at all,” said guard Doug Edert. “The job is not finished. We feel like we belong and the more games we win the more confidence we build.”
That sounds like bad news for the Tar Heels, who might’ve righted the ship after a poor start to ACC play but could be the latest blueblood to the Peacocks’ formula.
At some point, the magic has to run out — for Saint Peter’s, which somehow keeps stacking upsets of higher-ranked opponents, and for the tournament at large, which has been wackier than ever but could suddenly snap back to the status quo.
But this March has not gone according to plan. Several big names lost early. Others failed to get out of the second round. The story of this year’s tournament has been upsets, shockers, letdowns, unpredictable officiating and unpredictability, period — why should the next two days be any different?
Follow colleges reporter Paul Myerberg on Twitter @PaulMyerberg
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