08/30/2002 12:02 pm ET
Deal in place, games go on
By Tom Singer / MLB.com
NEW YORK -- The sport with no clock completed one of its most memorable deadline performances in history Friday morning.
Major League Baseball owners and the players association -- through an exhaustive sequence of all-night discussions Thursday that led to a climactic late-morning gathering in Commissioner Bud Selig's office -- settled their differences on various off-the-field adjustments and, for the first time, successfully negotiated a collective bargaining agreement without enduring a work stoppage.
At 11:30 a.m., merely 90 minutes before the negotiating deadline set two weeks ago by the player, the Boston Red Sox climbed aboard buses outside Fenway Park. A bit later, the Cubs began taking batting practice in Wrigley Field. The Braves and Orioles were also given clearance to fly, to Montreal and Anaheim, respectively.
Baseball players and clubs mobilized around the nation as as word emanated from New York of an accord.
''I got a call at 10:50 (a.m.) Chicago time from Tony Bernazard (of the union)," said Joe Girardi, the Cubs' player representative. "He said, 'Call your guys and go to the ballpark.' I'm thrilled. I'm really happy to be going back, and I'm really thrilled for the game. I was optimistic all the time. People realize after '94 that we couldn't afford another one. We couldn't go down that road again.''
Don Fehr, executive director of the players association, and Selig held a joint press conference in New York at 1 p.m., during which each talked about "the long, hard and winding road" to the labor agreement.
Demonstrating a spirit of resolve and compromise not typically seen in the previous 30 years of the sport's management-union dealings, representatives of both sides went about the business of dealmaking as a strike deadline set two weeks earlier loomed a mere minutes away -- with one team, the Boston Red Sox, pushing back a charter flight to Cleveland by more than several hours after players gathered for further instructions in the Fenway Park clubhouse at 7:30 a.m..
As a result, the season picks up where it left off, and the game that has an average current player salary of $2.4 million can forge ahead with a system that should help narrow the talent gap between large- and small-revenue ballclubs.
The four-year CBA includes initiatives designed to more effectively address economic disparity among franchises -- expanding the use of local revenue sharing and a competitive balance tax on payrolls -- while at the same time elevating minimum salaries from $200,000 this season to $300,000 in 2003 and providing a $500 million benefit plan. Furthermore, a new rule that's part of the deal would shorten the four-year period to fund deferred contracts.
In an unprecedented gesture, players accepted a policy that authorizes random testing for steroid use -- a policy that originally was proposed by management as one with more substantial teeth.
The owners also pulled back on their plans to eliminate any teams, agreeing to not revisit contraction during the life of the agreement, set to expire on October 31, 2006.
The agreement also ensures harmony in a sport that risked being closed for business just days before the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Friday's deal ends a negotation that intensified after the players set the deadline for Aug. 30 two weeks ago.
Those two rivals took the field on time and as scheduled, as will 28 other teams Friday night for a full slate of games kicking off the Labor Day weekend
