Tom Brennan - What the Next CBA Would Include If I Was a Dictator

Don't you ever wonder what would happen if you were the head honcho, the dictator, who could dictate exactly what should be in the next CBA?  "I've heard enough, here's how it's gonna go."

Likewise, when you hear politicians argue about tax rates and spending levels, wouldn't you like to step in there and say, "fellas and gals, here's how it is going to work from here."  

I dunno about you, but the fact that the nation's deficit was $1 trillion in 1980 and $30 trillion now, just 42 years later, tells me someone should take away decision making abilities from our loony politicos.  But that's just me.

If I had the ability to dictate the terms of a new CBA, just off the top of my little head, it would go something like these 13 points:

1) A maximum cap on years on any new contract - 5 years.  Let's get back to some semblance of reality.  How are you supposed to have any idea how well a star player will be performing 9 years from now?  Do your 5 years, and start again.

2) Newer players...way I see it, guys who bust out of the gate like stars should not be paid almost identically in years 2 and 3 of their careers as marginal guys.  There needs to be a formula so that a Pete Alonso, for instance, could have made 3 times as much as the marginal guy in his second year, considering his first year was 53 HRs and 120 RBIs.  I'll leave the formula details to you guys, but it better be good.

3) Revenues - players and owners share at the same average % as the last 5 years.  What's wrong with that?

4) 27 man rosters - it was great to finally expand to 26 man rosters, but back in the day (1960s, for example) the basic split was 15 position players and 10 pitchers.  Pitchers crash and burn far more than in the 1960s, and starters probably throw an average of 2 less innings now than in the 1960s, so teams need 12 pitchers on their rosters.  Why should position players suffer due to that?  Keep them pegged at 15 position players on the roster. 15 + 12 = 27.

5) No service time manipulation.  Period.  So many of these players have short careers, and given that, postponing a player's free agency by a year is really criminal.  If you bring up a guy in the first half of a season, that is a full year.  If in the second half, his service time starts the next year.  In fact, I would shorten the time to free agency by one year.

6) September call-ups.  The old 40 # was absurdly high.  But 28 (the new number) is absurdly low and screws many borderline athletes (especially position players) from achieving their dream of reaching the major leagues.  I'd set the September call-up number at 5 above the normal roster level.  So, if that roster level is set at 27, that September total would be 32, not 28.

7) Super-prospect September call-ups: If the Mets, for example, don't call up a Francisco Alvarez in September because it would start his "clock", then change the rule so it doesn't start his clock and get him his September cameo.

8) Pay minor leaguers substantially more.  Doubling their minimum salaries is a reasonable approach.

9) If a player on a long term deal tests positive for PEDs afterwards, besides a suspension, the remainder of his contract gets reduced 10%.  Test positive twice, 20%.

10) I would add a new role - the mop up pitcher.  Designate a pitcher who 1) is over 30 years old and 2) never made the majors.  He is on the team all season at 1/3 of normal major league salary.  His one and only role is mop up in games where his team trails or leads by more than 10 runs, or if a game goes beyond 14 innings and he his needed to save arms.  

Doing this is rather than having position players pitch in mop-up roles in blow outs.  It cheaply gives 30 more guys a year (one per team) some big league time, even if at a lesser status.  This would be above the normal roster.  And these mop up pitchers can only have that status for one season.  Next season, a new candidate.

11) Every team must spend at least $60 million on payroll, indexed to inflation.  If a team can't afford it, then force them to sell the team to someone who will.  This will help parity.

12) To avoid tanking, put the 10 worst teams record-wise into a lottery for the ranking of their draft pick level.  So if the 10th worst team gets really lucky, they could get the first pick.  Conversely, the worst team gets really unlucky, they pick 10th.

13) One more player carve-out...take a minor league journeyman like Aderlin Rodriguez.  Now 30, and playing minor league ball since 2009, he hit .290/.362/.565 in the minors in 2021, which is impressive.  Yet he has never been on a major league roster.  How about, for one hitter like him per team annually, who is (say) 30 or older with 8 or more minor league seasons, promote him for one weekend series at home in September, so he can tell his grandkids he played in the big league.  I think fans would love it.  If I was the hitter, I would too.

There.  That settles it.  Now...

Let's play ball.