WTF - what do they have to strike for?
Bad Working Conditions, Being Underpaid.
It must be really hard to play baseball all day, and get paid really well. I feel really bad for them, shlepping to the Park, and
getting paid rediculous pay-checks.
And why can’t the owners and the players, negotiate and get a new deal worked out before the season starts.
Please play 80 percent of the schedule and then decide to Strike.
Someone please explain.
I am glad football season is almost here, F - Baseball.
They never learn. They had a hard enough time recovering from the last strike. If there is another and it kills the world series I fear they may do permanent damage to the game.
The players apparently can’t bear to have a luxury tax that kicks in any lower than $130 million. Whatever.
Why can’t the members of the Kansas City Royals, Minnesota Twins, Milwaukee Brewers and all the other small-market teams realize that this luxury tax is for THEM? So that they might aspire to the World Series one of these decades? The small-market players are standing shoulder to shoulder with their counterparts on the rich teams for the right to continue to be screwed.
Because in the age of the Free Agent, there’s no significant loyalty on the part of the players to their teams or to the cities and markets they play in. They all want to be Sterling Hitchcock, who went from being a beleaguered starter for the current NL West basement dweller San Diego Padres to becoming the highest paid long reliever ever, making upwards of $7 million this year for the payroll-heavy Yankees.
The two New York teams alone account for a lot of the migration from small- to big-market teams (and payrolls) in the last couple of years. Think Roger Cedeno, Jeromy Burnitz, Chuck Knoblauch (although he did go BACK to the Royals), Raul Mondesi. Think Johnny Damon, who after not unprofitable stopoff in Oakland, ended up with the Boston Red Sox, proprietors of the second-highest payroll in the majors. Think he’d be happy now if he was in Beantown watching revenue-sharing drain the money he might be making back to Kansas City?
That’s not to say that I don’t support the ‘luxury tax’ scheme; I do. I just don’t think it’s reasonable to expect individual players to want to look at the bigger picture. They don’t see it as standing up for the right to get screwed – they just want the other players to get screwed.
Bah. I got sick of this drama years ago and it seriously soured my love of major league baseball.
I say let ‘em strike. They can just freakin’ sit there for all I care anymore. Just once I would like to see management not cave because it’s pretty clear to me that the major league players are no longer in it for the sheer joy of the game and haven’t been for quite some time.
I’ll watch the minors and the college teams (those that have them). Those guys, for the most part, still love the sport.
The theory behind the “luxury” tax is that the owners in the small market will take the money and use it to build up the quality of their teams, rather than simply pocket it as extra profit.
Anyone really believe they’ll do that, I gotta investment for you in a growing company called Enron.
I’ve never liked baseball, but seeing this happen really sickens me. What a bunch of overpaid, immature, greedy idiots.
A couple weeks ago one of the sports shows was interviewing an MLB player (I forget who). The host brings up one of ESPN’s informal polls which said something like 60% of the fans would bolt if the strike happened. I forget the actual number, but in my mind it was a stunning figure. I expected the player to show some (actually, a lot of) alarm at this, but instead he says “Well, we just have to go out there and not think about it.” I couldn’t believe it. Screw the fans, we want more money, even if it means killing the sport.
I truly hope the strike happens and is the beginning of the end for MLB.
I’ve not been back to a baseball game since the last strike - and I used to actually like baseball quite a bit.
The whining, pissy, petulant little babies can shove a Louisville Slugger up their collective asses as far as I’m concerned.
Unfortunate for my industry (and my TV station) is that without the playoffs and World Series this year, we’ll have nothing but the election to talk about and bring in big, fat advertising checks - so much for MY raise.
Well, at least it is almost time for the college sports season to start again. I am looking forward to University of Michigan field hockey (defending national champions!!!), women’s basketball in the winter, and softball in the spring.
Also, Wolverine football, ice hockey, and more…
The more pro athletes act like spoiled babies, the more I like college sports.
Damn! Only eleven days and a few hours to go. Don’t get me wrong the players are athletes in the truest sense of the word. But, 162 games is excessive in the least. Football-16 games. That means every game is important. Baseball-your team is 4-16. Who cares! You STILL have 142 games to get better. Thank whatever diety there is for football, hockey and golf. (yea, golf is boring to watch but what a game to play!)
I’ve never been a baseball fan, so I don’t care one way or the other if they strike. The funny thing is, many people will swear that if the players strike, they (the fans) will never go to another game.
Right.
As soon as the team of choice is on a winning streak next season (or maybe the season after) the same people will be back in the bleachers. They’ll curse a little, but it won’t be too serious.
Unfortunately, the players and owners know this, so they’ll just keep doing whatever they want.
Unless…
Unless the fans strike. Don’t go to a game at all next year. See how they like it. Go to little league games, or minor league, or soccer. Or just do something else. There are a lot of museums out there too, you know.
Fans at Shea Stadium were chanting “Go On Strike, Go On Strike!” over the weekend while the Dodgers were amidst sweeping the Mets.
If the strike happens on August 30, the Mets have played their last game at Shea Stadium this year.
I watched MSG network’s replay of Game 5 of the 1969 World Series earlier. Wow, what a better game it was then. It was a day game (I wasn’t even three years old then). Tomorrow night they’re showing the 16 inning 1986 pennant-clincher -v- Houston Astros. Wow, what a better game it was then…
My last game at Shea was Game 5 of the 2000 World Series. There is pain seeing The Yankees celebrate a Championship in your teams field, particularly if half the fans are Yankee fans.
I would have totally been behind The Red Sox eliminating the Yankees in the ALCS. But sigh Alfonso Soriano would likely have pulled a Bucky-Dent.
According to Tim Kurkjiian, while the player have set a strike date of Aug. 30, they apparently said that they would definitely be back playing on Sept. 11.
Which leads to the following question: Why go on strike in the first place if you aren’t serious about it?!?!
WSLer, Kornheiser seemed stuck on that question too. There’s just no answer… You can’t really use a lame-duck strike to get any leverage, and everybody knows it. I suppose the owners would be hurt by even a 10-day work stoppage, and the players think that’ll matter enough to get some concessions. You’re right though, everyone that knows anything about it says that they won’t strike, and if they do, it won’t last. I dunno what to tell you – they’re just a bunch of idiots anyway.