Major League Baseball has been slowly progressing toward starting its 2020 season, with the owners approving the league’s proposal for starting the season. It is expected that the MLB Players Association will vote upon the proposal sometime this week. It is not guaranteed that players association will agree upon the terms outlined in the league’s proposal, but there is one former player who thinks the players should.
Mark Teixeira played 14 seasons in the MLB from 2003-2016, and is now an analyst for ESPN. On Tuesday appearing on ESPN’s Get Up said that he felt that the players should not negotiate and accept the proposal the owners have approved so that other issues can be taken care of and the MLB season can start as soon as possible. “Players need to understand that if they turn this deal down and shut the sport down, they’re not making a cent. I would rather make pennies on the dollar and give hope to people and play baseball than not make anything and lose an entire year off their career,” Teixeira said.
The league hopes to have abbreviated spring training in June, with the season starting in July, but that still seems unlikely as it is not expected that the players will accept the owners offer given that the players and owners will be splitting all revenue for this season.
Teixeira does have a point in saying that if the owners and the players negotiate for an extended period of time that fans will become less inclined to watch baseball when it comes back, given how hungry people are for the return of live sports, but the fact that baseball could be coming back in the near future has fans excited.
