On Baseball: MLB work stoppage in 2022 increasingly likely

NEW YORK (AP) — A work stoppage at the start of spring training 2022 seems increasingly likely after baseball players refused to negotiate with owners over a one-month delay for this spring training and regular season.

The breakdown Monday came after the sides were unable to reach a deal last June over the start of the pandemic-shortened 2021 season, although they did work out an opening-day agreement for expanded 2020 playoffs.

With the collective bargaining agreement set to expire Dec. 1, it is not hard to envision management instituting a lockout for baseball's first work stoppage since the 7 1/2-month strike that wiped out the 1994 World Series.

“I hope we don't have a work stoppage. I hope we are able to play,” All-Star third baseman Nolan Arenado said Tuesday during his introductory news conference following his trade to St. Louis from Colorado. “I think both sides want to play, and especially with this 2020 season and it got delayed and all the things that are going on in the country, it probably wouldn't be very good if we had a stoppage.”

Baseball had five strikes and three lockouts from 1972-95, losing 86 regular-season games at the start of the 1972 season, 713 during midseason in 1981 and 669 games during the final two months of 1994, a stoppage that cut 1995 schedules from 162 games per team to 144.

Whatever ability to work together that developed after the last stoppage has dissipated, largely because union head Tony Clark, his staff and players believe economics have tilted toward owners and clubs during the labor contracts agreed to in 2011 and 2016.

Those agreements saw luxury tax rates increase and restraints imposed on signing bonuses for amateurs, while among the objectives players gained included increases in minimum salaries, earlier...

source https://www.chron.com/sports/article/On-Baseball-MLB-work-stoppage-in-2022-15919573.php