Jeter and Rojas agree: MLB negotiations being so public were bad optics for baseball
Miguel Rojas, the Miami Marlins’ player representative, had a front seat for the “roller coaster” that was the Major League Baseball and MLB Players Association’s negotiations that unraveled during the course of six weeks. Both sides were trying to come to an agreement to start the season in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. Those negotiations ended in a stalemate, with commissioner Rob Manfred having to step in and implement a 60-game, regionalized schedule.
Unfortunately, in Rojas’ eyes, everyone else who follows baseball saw the developments as they were happening, too.
The arguments and offers and negotiations over salaries and playing time, at times contentious with each side at one point accusing the other of bad-faith negotiating, seeped into the public domain as each new detail was unearthed.
So yes, a 2020 Major League Baseball season will be played, with Opening Day tentatively set for July 23 and 24 if all goes right over the next three weeks.
But the optics of players and owners arguing over finances so publicly while tens of millions are unemployed and more than 2.5 million cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed in the United States provided a bad look for the sport.
All sides, at least inside in the Marlins’ organization, agreed with that.
Marlins CEO and part-owner Derek Jeter called it “embarrassing at times.” Manager Don Mattingly said it “hurts our game in the whole.” Rojas didn’t think “everybody else has to see how the players and owners are fighting over things.” Manfred previously called it a “disaster.”
“It seems like sometimes people are trying to win a PR battle,” Jeter said, “and ultimately it’s the sport that’s gonna suffer.”
Mattingly and Jeter, both former players themselves, understand and respect the players’ rights and needs to fight to get themselves the best deal they can.
And the players stuck to their guns at the virtual negotiating table.
But reading the room is important, too.
“They really don’t want to hear owners and players going back and forth about how much money they deserve and how much money they need,” Jeter said. “And I get it. I was a player. I feel as though the players should fight for everything that they feel as though they should have. I’ll always support them in that sense, but in this particular case, I think some things should’ve been done behind the scenes.”
Added Mattingly: “Honestly, it’s one of those things that you’re hoping for the best because of the state of the country and so many people out of work. I wish that it would have been done a little bit more behind the scenes, the negotiating. Obviously negotiating, that’s what’s gone on forever. I was part of the ‘94 strike so I don’t want to be hypocritical, but you just wish that more of it would have been handled behind the scenes because there’s so many people hurting.”
And Rojas: “People out there didn’t have to see the whole process and how it went down. I feel like it being in media and all that stuff, I didn’t like it as a player and as a person because we’re in the middle of a pandemic, and everybody else has to see how the players and owners are fighting over things that they can take.”
One positive that Rojas saw come out of the negotiations: “The players were united as ever.”
The players made it clear they wanted to play as many games as possible for full pro-rated salaries, which they agreed to in a March 26 deal with the league before negotiations began.
League owners wanted to limit the number of games and keep the postseason in October due to network contracts, a fear of a second wave of the coronavirus and the desire to keep their revenue losses to a minimum. The league also contended that the March agreement calls for renegotiation of salaries if games are to be played without fans.
“We were always trying to get the benefit for the group and the integrity of the game,” Rojas said. “So, with that being said, I feel like at the at the same time, players wanted to be back on the field, wanted to play as many games as possible and that was always our goal. In our clubhouse, I can talk just for my guys in the clubhouse, we always wanted to be back on the field as soon as possible and playing as many games as possible as long as it’s safe to do it.”
That’s important considering another round of negotiations between MLB and the MLBPA will happen soon with the collective bargaining agreement expiring in December 2021.
Maybe these will happen more behind the scenes.
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