Last weekend, Ken Rosenthal was still holding out plenty of hope that the lockout wouldn’t last long enough to disrupt the scheduled start of the regular season.
But after another week of no progress and a delay to the start of spring training, The Athletics’ MLB insider’s optimism has waned significantly.
“My feeling was that there was still plenty of time,” Rosenthal said of his mindset last weekend. “The way baseball works, every negotiation, trade, arbitration, it all comes down to the end all the time…so given the nature of the sport, and a lot of different industries like this, it does down to the end, and the end is going to be [Feb. 28] as far as starting the season on time is concerned.
“A week later, we still have no indication that it’s going to get done. We do know the owners will be flying in, there will be daily meeting next week, finally. But they’re so far apart, I don’t know that I have a good feel for this.”
The daily scheduled meetings for the upcoming week seem long overdue, as the lockout was implemented by commissioner Rob Manfred back in December before the owners took nearly six weeks to present an initial proposal for a new CBA. The players weren’t shy in voicing their frustrations about the delay, and now, months later, there is still little progress toward a potential agreement.
“Logically, this should have been done in December,” Rosenthal said. “But, we have two sides that are diametrically opposed and in my opinion, have a very poor relationship, a very poor way of communicating with each other, and here we are.
“I don’t know. If I had to bet, I would bet…that the season isn’t going to start on time. Logically, it should get done, but realistically, I don’t think it gets done to start on time.”
If the season is indeed delayed, what will the impact be on a sport that has already taken a back seat to the NFL and NBA? Rosenthal says previous work stoppages showed that the sport can rebound, but now, in a time where there are countless other options for entertainment, it may not be as much of a certainty that the sport will maintain the bulk of its preexisting fanbase, let alone attract new ones.
“Fans came back [after 1994],” Rosenthal said. “It took a while in some cases…but if games are not lost, I believe most fans will just say ‘let’s go.’ But there is that danger where you’re alienating a portion of the fanbase, at a time where your sport is not the NFL, in some ways is not the NBA, and has lost its place as this national pastime…it hasn’t been that way for a while.”
Follow Ryan Chichester on Twitter: @ryanchichester1
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