Report: MLB could eliminate draft pick compensation in next CBA

With reports of a potential lockout surfacing, and the deadline for the current collective bargaining agreement set for Dec. 1, Major League Baseball may be willing to negotiate some changes to avoid shutting things down.

MLB has offered to remove draft-pick compensation to teams who lose top players to free agency in exchange for an international draft, Jon Heyman of Today's Knuckleball reports.

Heyman writes union leaders and MLB negotiators will be back at the bargaining table on Sunday, and the two sides have high hopes of reaching an agreement on a new CBA.

The removal of draft-pick compensation would make baseball "the freest free agency in sports," according to a person familiar with the situation, and would "take the legs out" of the qualifying offer system that has cost players as much as $1 billion-to-1.5 billion in compensation, according to a players' source of Heyman's.

Although both sides, including baseball commissioner Rob Manfred, believe in getting things done as far as a new CBA, Heyman writes "MLB people" are not ruling out the threat of a lockout if things are unresolved before Thursday's deadline.

Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports first reported the possibility of a lockout on Nov. 22 if a new CBA was not reached.