Elephant Rumblings: Players counter with offer of 89-game season

Good afternoon, Athletics Nation!

Around and around we go, always moving but never actually going anywhere in our quest to see a Major League Baseball season in 2020 amid the coronavirus pandemic. After the owners offered a 76-game season with further pay cuts earlier this week (mathematically no different from their other offers), the players responded with their latest proposal: 89 games at full prorated salaries, plus some other details, reports Jeff Passan of ESPN.

What might the owners think of that? Let’s check in!

Welp.

The owners’ stance all along has been that they’ll only do full prorated salaries for around 50ish games with no fans in the stands. The players asked for 114 games in their last official proposal, so they’ve moved toward the middle, but the owners won’t budge. The players even included the chance for an extra money-maker for the league, in the form of an All-Star Game and Home Run Derby after the postseason.

We could have been getting ready to watch the beginning of “spring” training right now, and indeed the Oakland Coliseum is now available for use by the A’s (see John Hickey link below), but instead the two sides are still squabbling over money — to inject my personal opinion for a moment, the players appear to be making real efforts to find common ground while the owners are being penny-wise and pound-foolish.

Baseball, led by its owners, is missing a prime opportunity for the sport to take center stage at a crucial moment in U.S. history and capture that youth market they’re always talking about wanting. Meanwhile, Cardinals owner Bill DeWitt claims that the baseball industry “isn’t very profitable” (see links below). Feel free to sell your team, Bill.

On the bright side, the MLB draft is today! Of course, the players won’t be able to do anything once drafted, since there are no minor leagues this year.

A’s Coverage:

• Brazil: What makes MLB’s potential return exciting, different for Glen Kuiper
• Hickey: Coliseum Is Ready For Athletics to Host MLB Games Without Fans
• Hickey: Athletics Eckersley Growing Impatient With Owners & Players Not Getting Deal Done
• Hickey: Athletics’ Dorfman Set Stage for Current Crop of MLB Mental Skills Coaches

MLB News & Interest:

• Finn: Baseball is at risk of losing the lifers like me
• Schulman: MLB asks Supreme Court to derail landmark class-action suit over minor-league pay ($)
• Todd (roundup): DeWitt Claims Baseball Industry “Isn’t Very Profitable” (source audio link: 590 The Fan)
• Rosenthal: Union tells Boras not to proceed on pledge to pay released minor leaguers ($$$)
• Adams (roundup): MLBPA Pushes Back Against Boras’ Offer To Cover Salaries Of Released Minor League Clients
• Joey Votto: My Awakening
• Stone: Jerry Dipoto, Mariners confident rebuild remains on track despite prospects’ lost playing time
• Todd: American League Future Salary Guarantees
• Today in Baseball History

MLB draft:

• 2020 MLB draft: Time, how to watch, and TV schedule info
• Slusser podcast: Guest is J.J. Cooper of Baseball America, talking 2020 draft
• Slusser: As A’s draft preparations wrap up, furloughs of area scouts ‘really hurt’
• Shea: Petaluma’s Spencer Torkelson projected as 1st overall draft pick by Tigers
• Jenkins: Draft day reveals baseball’s most troubling issues

Best of Twitter:

Another detail of the players’ proposal

I can’t even imagine