One of the biggest points of contention expected during negotiations between Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association is how players will be financially compensated in a shortened 2020 season without fans attending games.
The union has pushed back at the reported idea of revenue sharing between teams and players because it resembles a salary cap. Owners, meanwhile, don't want to pay prorated salaries because doing so will reportedly cause substantial losses.
Now an MLBPA insider tells Brendan Kuty of NJ.com that players won't consider the revenue-sharing proposal until owners open their books to the union.
"They’re going to lose all this money? We want them to show us," the source said. "Show us the financials. The only reason you would refuse is because we would find something that they don’t want us to know - and it’s that they would make a ton of money."
Players were told in March that teams would be able to afford prorated salaries even without fans in attendance, the source added.
"They literally had every opportunity to discuss this stuff in March," the source said. "Nothing has changed from then to now, and we talked about with or without fans, both scenarios.
"They specifically told us if we did agree (to prorated salaries), it was feasible to play without fans. Otherwise we wouldn’t have come to the agreement."
Agent Scott Boras also criticized the revenue-sharing plan, saying it's unfair to expect players to make financial concessions in down times when ownership isn't willing to share the wealth in boom periods.
"After this agreement was reached, you can’t come forward with a dynamic and say, 'Hi, I want to privatize the gains and socialize the losses,'" Boras told Bob Nightengale of USA TODAY Sports.
Discussions between the league and the union are ongoing, though Tuesday's meeting didn't include the topic of financial compensation, Jesse Rogers of ESPN reports.
