The first-ever collective bargaining agreement in minor league baseball history is imminent, a milestone in the history of the sport and especially for the players.
Around 9 p.m. Wednesday, Major League Baseball Players Association leadership notified thousands of minor league players that the union had reached a five-year tentative agreement with MLB. Minor leagues are now voting on whether to officially accept the deal, a process union officials said they expect to complete by midnight on Friday.
Technically, both sides will need to ratify the deal, and it’s possible MLB owners may need beyond Friday to do so. But with leadership on both sides in agreement, ratification is ultimately expected and the parties were able to reach an agreement in time for minor league opening day, Friday.
The deal – which would have sounded strange a year ago when smaller leagues didn’t have a union – offers player increases and a range of other improvements, including the creation of a formal grievance procedure with access to neutral umpires in most cases, union officials said.
According to the collective agreement, the annual minimum salaries would be as follows:
Complex league and rookie ball $19,800 vs $4,800; Single A: $26,200, up from $11,000; High A: $27,300, up from $11,000; Double A: $30,250, up from $13,800; Triple A: $35,800, down from $17,500. It’s estimated that raises cost MLB around $90 million annually.
The pay increases will come into effect upon ratification of the deal and players will be paid retroactively for four weeks of this year’s spring training session. According to one estimate, the CBA MLB will cost around $90 million in its first year.
According to union officials, here are other elements of the deal:
• Players signing aged 19 or over are placed in the club reserve for six years instead of seven, which is the flat number previously applied to all players. This policy does not apply retrospectively to players who previously signed at the age of 19 or older.
• Some improvements to MLB’s housing policy. Players will have their own bedrooms at home in Double A and Triple A. Players will either be given a bedroom or will be able to opt out and receive a stipend in Low A and High A instead. Spouses and children are accommodated in apartments provided by the association. Housing is free for players except for those earning a higher amount.
• One of the elements MLB was adamantly pushing for in the deal, and an issue on which the MLBPA relented somewhat, was the right to reduce the size of the maximum number of players that can be held on the domestic reserve lists. The union agreed to allow MLB to reduce the mid-season max from 180 to 165; and from 190 to 175 in the off-season. However, these cuts cannot take place until 2024 at the earliest. MLB sees this as the right roster size and believes that if it started with the smaller leagues today, there wouldn’t be as many spots. MLB originally wanted a blanket right to downsize rosters at its discretion, which the MLBPA would not allow.
• Transportation: Players are guaranteed transportation to and from the field for Rookie Ball, Low A and High A. With Double A and Triple A, issues need to be addressed as soon as they arise.
• Establishment of a joint clubhouse nutrition committee to oversee meal quality and increase daily rates.
• A committee to provide feedback on rule changes MLB is implementing with minors.
• A common drug treaty and domestic violence policy.
• Players will receive their NIL rights and the MLBPA plans group licenses.
• For medical issues, players are entitled to a second opinion under certain circumstances.
• Different Training Periods: The fall training period runs from the end of the season to the Friday before Thanksgiving. There is a dead period from the Saturday before Thanksgiving through January 1st. Then there is a winter training phase from January 2nd until spring training. During practice times, players are paid at one rate when they are at home and when they are called to the complex for apprentice leagues or other work they are paid at a higher rate. The minimum wages listed above assume players are at home during these training times, allowing players to earn more money than the minimum wages listed.
• The MLB formally agreed that there would be no contraction of minor league teams during the term of the CBA. A contraction would be highly unlikely anyway, given that MLB has signed 10-year deals with every minor league club and those deals won’t expire before the end of this CBA. But the MLBPA wanted the language for future business and for peace of mind.
The interim CBA comes 213 days after the MLBPA publicly moved to over-unionize the minor leagues. Creating a CBA from the ground up in more than four months leading up to the start of formal negotiations in November was no easy feat, and meetings between the MLB and the MLBPA have taken place more or less daily for the past three weeks.
All along, both sides said they are aiming for opening day to finalize a deal. Had Friday passed without an agreement, talks would have continued rather than give way to a work stoppage that would halt minor league baseball. The players were not on the brink of a strike, nor did the owners want to lock out the players.
As much as the players wanted a move as soon as possible, the commissioner’s office and owners also had some incentive to strike a deal ahead of the season.
Without a deal, MLB could have found itself in a tight spot administratively: Teams may have to pay players in different states different amounts to avoid violating local minimum wage laws. Minor league players sued MLB in 2014 for violating wage laws in a case dubbed “Senne,” which was settled for $185 million last year.
This case showed that, in the eyes of a federal judge, MLB did not adequately follow some laws. But since salaries will now be a collective bargaining matter — and reportedly above current state minimum wage laws — MLB appears less prone to wage-related lawsuits going forward. (Nonetheless, during negotiations, MLB lobbied various state legislatures, including Florida, to ensure minor leagues were exempt from minimum wage laws.)
MLB also had a PR incentive to close a deal quickly. As minor leagues began to speak out about their pay and general treatment in recent years, pressure mounted on the league to do better. Before players started unionizing, MLB voluntarily decided to provide lodging for minor leagues starting last season. Many players have previously struggled to find decent accommodation for their meager salaries.
Last summer, members of the US Senate Judiciary Committee began asking questions of MLB, and a hearing on Capitol Hill threatened over the league’s famous antitrust exemption. Then, late August 28, the MLBPA mailed authorization cards to minor league players, revealing to the public for the first time that the MLBPA was interested in bringing minor league players under its umbrella.
Given the history of the union, this decision was radical. More than half a century earlier, the MLBPA had elected not to organize minor leagues. Successfully reaching the 5,000 or so players was an effort led by several people, including MLBPA chief Tony Clark and a lawyer who worked outside the union before joining the MLBPA himself, Harry Marino.
Marino was the leader of the nonprofit Advocate for Minor Leaguers and moved to the MLBPA when the union decided to incorporate the minor leagues. Advocates for Minor Leaguers was co-founded by Garrett Broshuis, one of the attorneys representing players in the Senne case. Both Broshuis and Marino are ex-minor league pitchers.
The negotiators in the minor league deal were the same as in the major league deal last year: Bruce Meyer of the MLBPA and Dan Halem of the MLB. A senior employment attorney at the MLBPA, Ian Penny, was also instrumental in the organizing process.
The settlement of the minor league litigation is nearing completion
Coincidentally, a federal judge in California on Wednesday brought the $185 million settlement in the Senne case closer to completion. On average, after legal fees, the settlement would call for around $5,000 to $5,500 per player. More than 20,000 players are involved in the settlement.
A small group of players, represented by two lawyers, had objected to the settlement, but the court ruled on Wednesday that those objections were unfounded. All appeals to the 9th Federal Court would have to be filed within 30 days. If no further appeals are made, players can start receiving their money shortly after. Any appeal would likely at least slow down the process.
“We do not believe the objections raised were well founded and the district court agreed with us,” Broshuis said. “We hope no appeals take place so players can finally have access to that back pay they deserve.”
Samuel Kornhauser, an attorney representing players who have raised objections, could not be immediately reached for comment.
It hadn’t escaped Broshuis that Judge Joseph Spero of the Northern District of California would deliver his verdict on the objections Wednesday, the same day that minor leagues reached an interim agreement on their CBA.
“It’s crazy that those two things happened at the same time,” Broshuis said. “When I was playing over a decade ago it was pretty common at that point to have six, seven guys crammed into a two bedroom apartment and sleeping on air mattresses, some guys skipping breakfast, even lunch, because they were too much had credit card debt.
“Boys didn’t have to get a paycheck for months, even though they had to work during times like spring training and the apprenticeship league. This case is finally offering some payback to the thousands of players who have had to go through it… and has truly laid the groundwork for major shifts that are now taking place in collective bargaining. It’s great to see these steps being taken and finally we’re seeing better days for minor league baseball players.”
(Photo above: Associated Press/Charlie Riedel)