Reese Kaplan -- That 82-Game Season May or May Not Happen

It didn’t take long for the lid to blow off the pot when it came to the decision by the owners to put the onus of reduced revenue onto the players in the form of greatly reduced salaries.  From a business person’s perspective it makes sense -- less income to them should be offset in a way to reduce expenses.  Paying up to $200 million in total payroll is an obvious target for them to approach.  If they are going to get half the number of games and potentially highly limited ticket transactions (and the ancillary reduction in related revenues from the sale of parking, refreshments and souvenirs), then it’s understandable that they want to cut back on one of their biggest expenses.

However, the owners are not the ones who are literally putting their lives at risk, going out onto the fields and sharing locker rooms with potential carriers of this fatal disease, COVID-19.  Just as stores and other businesses had to scramble to assemble minimal protections from the disease, so too will baseball teams have to figure out how to put measures into place to make the changes necessary to ensure no more interruptions to the season.  We’ve been to some stores that seem to be handling the pandemic somewhat professionally like the average Walmart which has professionally printed signs, barriers at the cash registers and designated six-foot stickers on the floor to indicate how far apart people should be. 

Unfortunately, we’ve also encountered other stores where the cash register barricade is a piece of corrugated plastic or even cardboard, no attention paid to cleaning card payment machines and all of the intelligent separation of customers gone to naught when they back up, cart-to-cart for the unnecessary checking of receipts upon exit from the store.

Now let’s extrapolate that scenario onto the baseball diamond.  What happens when the batter stays well within six feet of the catcher and the umpire?  What about the guy who walks or gets a hit and then must reside within six feet of the first baseman?  What about the stolen base which pushes the runner and the middle infielder on top of one another (with the umpire hovering over them)?  How about the very close play at the plate?  

These issues are just about proximity on the field.  What about off the field?  How do we handle proper sanitation in a bathroom?  How about the shared showers?  What about the whirlpools and other training devices and locations?  How are the uniforms being laundered and how many people are touching the fabrics before the players do?  What if it is the player who is the carrier?

Thursday many people were put off by the comments of former Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell of the Tampa Bay Rays who was not at all hesitant about his refusal to play under the proposed reduction in salary.

Snell said, “Bro, I’m risking my life.  What do you mean it shouldn’t be a thing? It should be 100% one thing. If I am going to play, I should receive the money that I signed to be paid. I shouldn’t be getting half of what I’m paid for because the season has halved, in addition to a 33% reduction from the half that is already there – so I really get, like, 25%.

Perhaps feeling as if he came across as greedy, he texted the Tampa Bay Times further explanation, “I honestly mean it’s just scary to risk my life to catch Covid-19 and not know it and spread it to others.  I just want everyone to be healthy and return to normal. lives because i know i miss mine!“

He has a point.  The team owners are asking the players to risk their lives for what is calculated to be up to a 75% reduction in compensation for 50% of a season.  That doesn’t seem quite fair to the players who are the lifeblood of the teams.  Had the comments come from some fringe middle infielder earning close to minimum wage (which isn’t too shabby at over $500K per year) then it wouldn’t have drawn as much attention, but this very high profile player who leads the Rays staff certainly raised quite a few eyebrows.  

There is no solid answer on how to make this reduced season happen, but it’s not as simple as getting owners to agree and expecting players to nod their heads and put their lives at risk to keep the owners wealthy.  Snell said he might just skip the 2020 season than play under these circumstances.  I wonder how many others could follow suit?