Welcome fans of the LA Angels as we come near the end of another unproductive week of negotiations. The MLBPA did make a modest drop in the size of their proposed bonus pool allotment. The union basically wants all the players to have arbitration eligibility after two years rather than only the super 2 players. No one agreed to anything, but we have all the time in the world. They made it clear up to 90 minutes before they failed to agree on anything.
Links Specific To LA Angels
On Tuesday I linked to the Bleacher Report version of LA Angels farm ranking where they were came in at number 26. MLB itself is a bit more charitable, ranking the Angels at number 24. Meanwhile, they have the Orioles and Mariners at 1 and 2. (I can’t insert Max Scherzer griping about the integrity of the game here because this is the LA Angels section).
If the pace of negotiations doesn’t pick up soon maybe “Historic Season Bobblehead Night” will be in jeopardy. Get your tickets now! Meanwhile, get a load of this manga inspired image of Mr. Historic Season on MLB The Show 22 MVP Edition. I always thought he kind of looked like Kaneda from Akira, except bigger. Here is additional Ohtani content. How, indeed, do you value an incomparable player? Well, I guess you don’t extend him. Let the blouse rending begin.
Speaking of two way players, this article suggests Michael Lorenzen baseball cards might be a good investment.
Here is a link to The Big If I Were Perry Minasian Link Thread. Do we have any more takers? The off season isn’t getting any shorter and pretty soon I might have to link to Cricket results. The Caribbean Series has already reached the Semi-finals.
Now For The Other Links
The Dominican Republic is cruising right through the opposition at the Caribbean Series.
Here are the American League ZiPS projections.
Voting is now open for the 2022 SABR Analytics Conference Research Awards.
Kumar Rocker may pitch some independent ball before re-entering the MLB draft. If the draft pick itself wasn’t so valuable it might be fun to watch the Mets pick him and then not sign him just to troll Boras.
Former MLB outfielder and first baseman David Green passed away at the age of 61.
Photo credit: Rex Fregosi
This is pretty cool
https://twitter.com/mlbelites_/status/1489068564472471554
I now we have gotten to see how baseball can be destroyed in 3 short months
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/mlb-requests-help-from-federal-mediators-in-lockout-negotiations-with-mlbpa-per-report/amp/
Interesting. It shows they realize they are too far apart. This is in line with Red Floyd’s earlier comments.
I’ll miss you, mota. Thanks for being a huge part of my life the last 20 years.
Truly one of the nicest, most approachable of them all. Going to miss Jose and his Mota-isms.
Indeed. Jose always playe “good enough until last out until also something good happens for you.”
he was the real deal – wishing the best for him – was always glad to see him in Tempe, he was always upbeat and friendly.
https://twitter.com/samblum3/status/1489373997019983872?s=21
Harvey, Heaney, and Bedrosian
whew – all of them listed are former players – a big releif
Angels hiring
https://view.mail.mlblists.com/messages/1643912024985c34f0a700490/raw
Jose Mota will not be returning to the Halos broadcast team.
I couldn’t get the link to copy
Jeez.
Victor, Mota, and Alex all gone :/
https://www.pe.com/2022/02/03/jose-mota-leaves-angels-broadcast-team/
MLB requesting federal mediation.
https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2022/02/mlb-requests-federal-mediator-to-help-resolve-lockout.html
About f***ing time.
Maybe a mediator can shame these guys into talking for more than an hour a day.
Don’t know if they will get anywhere with a mediator. The MLB seems to be playing hardball and have been digging in their feet to stand at their joke of an offer.
Rob Manfred: Mommy! Daddy! Tony and his buddies aren’t playing very nice. You need to make them stop.
Thievery
https://twitter.com/jphoornstra/status/1478734149586354179?s=20&t=I6nCC5XlwoSragy_eTFjBw
If they don’t make significate progress by the end of next week, send both parties to the Golden Corral to settle it…. with no Steak. https://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/2022/02/01/watch-massive-brawl-breaks-out-in-bensalem-golden-corral-over-alleged-steak-shortage
I just watched that video you put up and read the article and was flabbergasted. I can’t imagine that happening and with children in the place to boot. YIKES!
“Hey honey I feel like a steak tonight.”
“Good idea, let’s go to Golden Corral”.
😂
Well, Golden Corral.
Who chooses Golden Corral for a steak? Seriously, was Sizzler booked for the evening? Norms?
They’d have this all figured out by now if they met in a Del Taco
Reading all of this teeth-gnashing about the lockout, it seems to me that we are losing sight of the fact that this is a lockout, not a strike. What are the players pushing? More fairness to the younger players to get paid for their talents, a remedy for tanking, penalties for using revenue sharing monies for profit instead of payroll. This seems to be a pretty reasonable list to me. Don’t forget this is a freaking lockout, not a strike. The owners and Mighty Manfred cooked this up.
That’s not how this works. It’s not like the players would be good to go without a CBA if only the owners wouldn’t lock them out. And let’s not forget, the players are fighting to get SOME slightly younger players paid, while still getting even more old worthless players overpaid…. which in no way helps with tanking issues. Thus all the bargaining and posturing.
Only a simple child thinks things should work like;
MLBPA – “You guys are, like, super rich. You should be willing to just take one in the balls cause, like, you’re super rich.”
Owners – “You’re so right. OK. After all, we are super rich.”
the owners have the strongest position in money terms. Billionaires versus millionaires. If a player loses $5mil it’s a huge thing. If a billionaire loses $5 mil it’s not.
But it reminds me of some local commercial buildings. I’ve seen small business owners (the equivalent of the players) move out because the landlords (similar to the owners) have raised the rent. That’s too much for the businesses. Meanwhile the buildings sit empty because, at this time, nobody wants to pay that rent. Yet the landlords don’t lower it because they can wait it out. It’s not just the rent. The landlords might lose money on the rent but eventually someone will move in and (here’s the thing!) the value of the property will then go up way beyond any consideration of the landlords’ rental income. I think it would be something like that for the baseball owners. They’d be willing to lose short-term money in order to get a deal that will increase their teams’ sale value.
Something similar happened at 3rd st Promenade in Santa Monica. Although now, the landlords that want to charge a reasonable rent to get a tenant, can’t because of the homeless problem and nightly vandalism and theft.
Seems like a wacky economic plan. No wonder why the Stro’s used to play in Enron Field
This is a lockout because the owners acted first. In fact, for months they were the only ones even pretending to act. They mostly acted poorly, but they acted.
Had the owners no acted first, the players would have gone on strike. After all, they’d have no protection of a CBA and all of the leverage.
Both sides have had years to talk things out and make a deal. Neither one did. Pointing out they are all assholes is the correct thing here, I think.
So sad we are talking about labor negotiations rather than baseball, with the season scheduled to start shortly. There’s not a single comment so far that even mentions actual baseball or baseball players.
Lots of legal news today- a witness list for the Skaggs trial to be unveiled and that’ll generate some noise
It’s been since about 2019 that I’ve accepted that the 2022 season would be delayed or affected by the CBA. Both sides have been publicly griping for so long, coupled with inept Manfred as commissioner, that it just seemed like this was going to happen. Doesn’t make it easier to accept that the season won’t start as usual in April. I have a very bad feeling about this lockout… it may be even more severe than we think.
Key words are “inept Manfred”.
I’m asking out of ignorance here. Knowing what Manfred’s actual powers are, what was he supposed to do about this back in, say, 2019?
Interesting question. If he’s the caretaker of MLB and an experienced labor attorney, he should have pushed the two sides to have more talks starting about 2020.
I’m not sure if he could effectively demand them from his chair, but he certainly didn’t make a public fuss about it.
That’s what I thought. All he can really do is drop a huge pile of “Ummm, guys? Guys? Come on guys…… guys? This will look bad. It’s getting late. Guys?”
So in essence, he’s “inept” in the case the same way he would be as an airline pilot. It’s not his job to make these two tool piles fly right.
Anyone know if it’s possible for someone like me, an ordinary fan, to somehow request that the NLRB step in?
Ha! Good luck with that!
The fans interests are barely considered because the players and owners are egomaniac narcissists who believe the fans are simpletons with short memories. If any portion of this season is lost because of these negotiations, I hope that the fans stay away. I will be personally giving up my season tickets and not attend a game this season if even one game is missed. Your wallet is the only way you can be heard.
Well, the owners are egomaniacs who think fans are simpletons with short memories. The players are just people who like to play baseball and make a lot of money.
When you played Little League were you playing for your parents and family, or were you playing because it was fun? Similarly, in the MLB people play for fun and money. They might appreciate the fans and the nice ones will do things for the fans like sign autographs and take pictures, but they aren’t playing for the fans.
In sum, you are absolutely right. Both sides are considering only their own interests.
With MLB’s weird anti monopoly exemption, I don’t know if the NLRB would get involved unless directed by the POTUS or Congress.
Congress could toy with yanking the anti-trust exemption, and then the owners would have a huge incentive.
This would be interesting, especially the way Manfred jammed the minor leagues contraction up everyone’s rear end. Could be incentive for some money guys to start up a competitive league in towns currently not served by MLB and provide competition for drafting players.
I am really in favor of this idea. MLB is really asking for it.
Punxsutawney Phil said hello……….
Surprised really there hasn’t been a class action suit filed by fans against them both
I am wondering if there is anywhere that we as fans can send emails/calls to the billionaires (owners or Manfred or MLB), and/or to the millionaires (Players Union) asking/telling them get their acts together?
Do you believe they give a 💩?
The collectively give none.
If enough fans write in, meaning a million pulse then they would “git ‘er dun”. Now when does the writing start?
Grandpa- I love your optimism. Millions of letters abd emails would not make one iota of difference but I love that your willing to try.
feedback@mlbpa.org
mlbexecutiverelations@website.mlb.com.
Yesterday I watched Curling until after 3am today, yes, I am hooked. More Curling today too. Nice to be able to watch the Curling and not have to go to work.
Good morning, what a beautiful day yesterday was and some more on tap for today.
So, a couple of Black coaches claim they were offered money to lose games for better draft picks. Yikes Stripes. Now that is taking tanking to far, don’t you think?
Another San Francisco fans coming south just to end up in the Hospital and getting into a beat down with Ram fans. This is just wrong in so many ways. Soon it may get a lot worse with much more serious end results.
Someday I would like to see people of color only hired because they are the best a team could hire for a position without the mention of color.
Blame the media for the constant focus on color rather than qualifications. I agree that the quality of ones character, experience and mind are the only things that should matter. But where is the story in that?
The beating up of fans who have different allegiances is inexcusable. It’s a reflection of the ‘my way or the Highway’ and super machismo Country in which we are living. Hopefully the folks who do these things are prosecuted to the full extent of the law.