Massarotti: MLBPA Continues To Fail Baseball's Middle Class
BOSTON (CBS) -- Just the other day, the Associated Press reported that the average player salary in major league this year will be roughly $4.3 million. Amid the fallout of the Kris Bryant situation in Chicago, this got me wondering.
Exactly whom does the Major League Baseball Players Association serve?
Here's the point: the average salary in MLB might be a projected $4.3 million this year, but we all know that number is skewed. Miguel Cabrera, Clayton Kershaw and Max Scherzer all make more than $30 million per season. Translated, Kershaw and 24 guys making $2.9 million each would amount to an average of $4 million, but we all know that number is grossly inflated.
What matters, of course, is the median salary in MLB, which last season was at about $1.45 million. This year, the number will certainly be higher – let's say $1.6 million or $1.7 million. Meanwhile, major league players are now earning, by some reports, less than 40 percent of all MLB revenue, which places them below football, hockey and basketball players.
Let's say that again: football, basketball and hockey players all earn roughly 50 percent of their respective sport's revenue. Baseball players have dipped under 40. And while baseball has some costs that the other sports do not – football and basketball have no real minor league system – it wasn't so long ago that baseball players earned roughly 50 percent of all revenue, too.
Before I inundate you with too many facts and figures – many of which you don't really care about – here's my point: The MLBPA could easily approach the next labor discussions by seeking to get a minimum percentage of revenues directed toward player salary. But the MLBPA won't. And you know why? Because to do so would effectively put in place a salary floor, which would open the door for the dreaded salary cap.
Which brings us back to the original issue:
The MLBPA is more interested in getting $30 million for the Miguel Cabreras of the world than in getting higher salaries for the middle class that makes up the large majority of its constituency. At the risk of sounding like a socialist, I just don't get that. The players' overall share of the revenue is down by more than 10 percent in the last 15 years or so, but the MLBPA would rather celebrate the fact that Kershaw eclipsed the $30 million threshold.
Of course, this is entirely consistent with how the MLBPA has done business in the past. When the steroids scandal hit, the MLBPA circled the wagons to protect the guilty, sacrificing the credibility of the innocent. As a result, no one who played in that era now gets the benefit of the doubt.
And the rest of us are to blame?
Whatever.
As to how this relates to Bryant, here's the point: There are lots of prospects who have had good springs and probably deserve to be on the major league roster. Nobody is kicking up a storm for any of them. And the reason is that Bryant is a potential superstar, a big earner who could skew that all-important average major league salary as soon as the fall of 2020 instead of the fall of 2021.
Why do the rest of the major league players put up with this nonsense?
Tony Massarotti co-hosts the Felger and Massarotti Show on 98.5 The Sports Hub weekdays from 2-6 p.m. Follow him on Twitter @TonyMassarotti. You can read more from Tony by clicking here.
