Bobby and Alex talk Bill de Blasio’s desperate plea for a resolution in MLB’s ongoing labor battle, then turn their attention to the Tyler Skaggs & Eric Kay case and discuss the broader implications the saddening tale may have on the sport. Then they bring on Harry Marino, executive director at Advocates For Minor Leaguers, to talk about the plan for housing in the minors, the complicated nature of pushing for better pay, getting players to open up, what’s coming up for the organization, and more. Plus, a few listener questions on the A’s quest for a stadium, conflicted fandom, shooting for the moon, baseball’s comparatively intense labor front, and the sport’s potential point of no return.
Links:
Songs featured in this episode:
Arcade Fire — “Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)”• Pavement — “Cut Your Hair” • Somos — “Lives of Others” • Booker T & the M.G.’s — “Green Onions”
Episode Transcript
Tell us a little bit about what you saw and and and being able to relay that message to Cora when you watch Kimbrel pitching and kind of help out so he wasn’t Tipping his Pitches. So Tipping Pitches, we hear about it all the time. People are home on the stand, what Tipping Pitches it’s all about. It’s amazing. That’s remarkable.
BOBBY: Alex, we have a late breaking cold open for the podcast. I was gonna start with something completely different. And our friend and former guest of this podcast, Eric Silver, tagged me in a tweet. mere seconds before we logged on to the Zoom. I’m going to read you the tweet, and then I’m going to have you tried to guess who tweeted it? Are you–
ALEX: All right.
BOBBY: –ready?
ALEX: I think so. Yeah.
BOBBY: “Here’s my message to @MLB and @MLBPA.” Capital, “STOP IT! Everybody CHILL. Spring Training should be starting RIGHT NOW. Americans have been through so much with COVID and we need the joy back in our lives. For the good of your country, put aside differences,” in all caps, “PLAY BALL.” Alex, I turn it to you, who tweeted that tweet?
ALEX: Wow, yeah. There, there’s a lot to unpack there, right?
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: I mean–
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: –you can really break this tweet down into parts. I think you said it was directed at both MLB and MLPPA.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: They’re both they’re both being implored to, to just stop it.
BOBBY: Yeah, cut it out.
ALEX: Everybody chill. I think that’s what you said.
BOBBY: Everybody chill. For the good of your country, put aside the differences and play ball.
ALEX: So it’s like a a a cool dad, politician, right? Someone who’s like country over party.
BOBBY: Wow.
ALEX: But also who can say like, the word chill.
BOBBY: I like how you jumped straight to politician. I guess–
ALEX: Well.
BOBBY: –for the good of your country is kind of a dead giveaway.
ALEX: Right. I mean, that’s kind of what I was thinking. I’m not sure how to narrow it down from there, though.
BOBBY: Hey, I’ll give you a hint. I’ll give you a hint.
ALEX: Okay. Okay.
BOBBY: It’s a man that’s been very near and dear to you for the past six years? Six years or so, near and dear to Alex Bazeley.
ALEX: I mean, I I would have said our former President, but he is neither near and dear to me, nor is he even on on Twitter. Like kind of rules that went out.
BOBBY: Yeah, exactly. And it can’t–
ALEX: He did–
BOBBY: –be, It can’t be J.D. Vance, because you know, he has not been relevant for the last six years. He doesn’t have that kind of staying power.
ALEX: Right. It does have kind of like boil, boiler plate, like milk toasts Republican energy.
BOBBY: Uhm I bet you say that. Cuz it’s not Republican.
ALEX: Is it, is it de Blasio?
BOBBY: Yep. It is. It absolutely is, it absolutely–
ALEX: Wowww.
BOBBY: –is. Isn’t that really special?
ALEX: That really is special.
BOBBY: Eric wants to know, he asked us to answer this question for him. Have they tried this yet? Did they tried putting inside their differences yet?
ALEX: Right, right. Just have, they tried just taking a chill pill.
BOBBY: I I patiently await the day that current New York City Mayor Eric Adams, weighs in with his solution for how to fix this problem. Perhaps it’s just sending a SWAT team to burst down the door of negotiations, and just arrest everybody who’s not doing a good enough job.
ALEX: Is Eric Adams, a a baseball guy? Like I feel like I haven’t heard him talk much about sports in general.
BOBBY: I know, if there’s one thing you could say about Bill de Blasio, it’s that he was a huge baseball guy.
ALEX: Yeah. Hey, I mean, even Andrew Yang knew that there were two basketball teams in New York. Even though he kind of flip flopped between the Nets and the Knicks.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Fair, fair weather fan, which–
BOBBY: Supposedly he was a Mets fan.
ALEX: –top two teams to be a fair weather fan of.
BOBBY: Come on Lord Andrew. The water’s warm.
ALEX: I do think the Mets kind of need a technocratic response to, you know, the the trials and tribulations that they’ve been facing. You know, like–
BOBBY: They could have used the universal basic income for the last two decades, that’s for sure.
ALEX: Boy could they have.
BOBBY: I think Eric Adams is probably Yankees fan. Though, I have not seen any quotes about how he feels about Jameson Taillon’s health heading into the 2022 season. But we’ll, we’ll see somebody will ask him about it when the lockout is over. Somebody should ask him how the lockout should end.
ALEX: I would like to see that. He might advocate for them to continue to simply be locked out and locked up. Yeah. Well, I would love to see someone spring that question. His solution might be to to to mean as you said, Sen–you know, maybe it doesn’t, doesn’t cops into the room and just whip the two sides into shape?
BOBBY: Yeah, exactly
ALEX: But you know, sometimes that’s what you need.
BOBBY: He’s the exact kind of loose cannon that could get it done federal mediator.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Just sent in ERIC. Once again, we continue our years long streak of talking about New York City politics. Even though, I assumed that a majority of our listeners are not even in New York City. Let’s talk about all the other stuff that our listeners actually want to talk, want to hear us talk about Alex. That is MLB collective bargaining negotiations. And even more excitingly, an interview with Harry Marino, the Executive Director of Advocates for Minor Leaguers. Who, if you’ve been listening for a while, you know, are a nonprofit group who helped to educate and bring awareness about problems facing Minor League Baseball. We’ve talked a ton about a lot of their work in the past year. Including the influential nature that they had in getting MLB to change their housing policy in Minor League Baseball. We’re gonna get into all of that with Harry that’s a little bit later in the episode. Before we do, I am Bobby Wagner.
ALEX: I am Alex Bazeley.
BOBBY: And you are listening to Tipping Pitches.
[6:13]
[Music Theme]
BOBBY: You want to hear what I was gonna start the podcast with before Bill de Blasio handed a cold open to me on a silver platter. Do you [6:29]–
ALEX: Please.
BOBBY: –this was like the B-sides of the, of the cold open.
ALEX: Right, what’s left on the cutting room floor? I just want to say before you tell me that. I did find the de Blasio tweet. And it’s even tweeted kind of in the the the Trumpy cadence, right?
BOBBY: Right. Random–
ALEX: Random–
BOBBY: –caps.
ALEX: –capitalizations?
BOBBY: Yeah, I tried to do that justice.
ALEX: Yeah, you did.
BOBBY: It’s really bleak, when you go to Bill de Blasio’s Twitter page. Former Mayor of New York City, proud Brooklynite. Fighting for working people, no matter how much you make, or where you live.
ALEX: I love that his, he had a thread about fascism, and being on the brink of war. Prior to this, he had, he had that a handful of tweets about crises of democracy. And then and then followed it up with everybody chill, guys. Let’s just take it easy.
BOBBY: I saw someone replied to the, to that tweet about, not the fascist tweet. Tweet about MLB labor negotiations and say, okay, now I’m for the lockout, which is a really good joke. Okay, here’s the, here’s the B-side of the cold open. I was gonna ask you, do you ever think about what this podcast but more generally what your baseball fandom will be like after Rob Manfred retires? Because like he’s not going to be the Commissioner forever. He’ll, he’ll probably be it for a good while. But we’re young gentlemen, much younger than Rob. So we will be watching the sport of baseball, host Rob.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: Has that ever occurred to you? Because it just occurred to me for the first time last week.
ALEX: I mean, I suppose I haven’t thought about it in such concrete terms. Although I think in the back of my head, I, you know, you recognize that, Commissioners usually don’t hang around forever. Although if there’s someone who, who would be able to it’s probably Rob Manfred.
BOBBY: Yeah, he’s 63 years old, but he’s a young 63.
ALEX: He is a young 63, as I’ve always said. The thing is, if Manfred was gone, I don’t know if things would be better or or worse. Because Manfred is relatively good at his job of going out there and defending owners. But he also consistently kind of, you know, steps on a rake, or like slips on a banana peel in front of the media.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: And my fear is that the owners will say, the players have really kind of, you know, drawn a line in the sand here. And they’re taking a much more hardline stance. We need someone who can stand up to them a little bit more and like not go out there and make a fool out of himself. Not go out there and tell blatant lies, right? Someone who’s a little more, you know, like someone who’s a little more conniving and–
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
ALEX: –cunning with–
BOBBY: Savvy.
ALEX: –the way that they present their side. Yeah, exactly.
BOBBY: The cynic in me just hears you describing Adam Silver.
ALEX: Wow.
BOBBY: I mean, everybody’s fave. Silver.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: That’s what that sounds like to me. All right, well, I mean, I agree with you that I don’t think that anything about baseball fandom would materially change if Rob Manfred was not Commissioner. But I do think that stuff about this podcast would materially change. So I just was wondering if it ever occurred to you?
ALEX: We’d lose a ton of material–
BOBBY: Exactly.
ALEX: –of [9:59] much.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Like I’m sorry, Rob Manfred is, is terrible for the sport, but it is incredible content.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: So what are you going to do?
BOBBY: Okay, shall we talk about Rob Manfred its beloved baseball labor negotiations?
ALEX: Yes, let’s get to it.
BOBBY: So, last week, the only update that we really got was that MLBPA returned a proposal they met only one day last week, and only for 15 minutes. Much discussed in the media only for 15 minutes. You know, who loves to talk about the length of bargaining sessions? Literally everybody, that’s all anybody was talking about last week. They’re like, oh–
ALEX: Uhmm.
BOBBY: –15 minutes. It’s longer than the 5 minutes that they met two weeks ago.
ALEX: Yeah, every everyone made a joke about it. Oh, I had a podcast appearance, it was longer than the MLB and MLBPA met. Oh, I had, I had a–
BOBBY: Oh, this is the length–
ALEX: Kim’s–
BOBBY: –of the SpongeBob episode.
ALEX: Kim’s marriage to Khris Humphries last longer than like–
BOBBY: That’s a good one.
ALEX: Pulling out deep cuts.
BOBBY: Did you, did you see that one? Or do you just come up with that. You should [11:05]–
ALEX: No. I was just, I was just coming up–
BOBBY: Yeah, fire that one off, man.
ALEX: All right.
BOBBY: That would have been a good joke for, for when the owners didn’t return a proposal for 43 days. It took the owners longer to return a proposal than it did for Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries to break up. Shit, man, we’re six weeks late.
ALEX: Oh, man, that was the golden age of of jokes, you know,
BOBBY: What was? When Kim Kardashian was married to Kris Humphreys.
ALEX: Right. And that was just like, the only thing anyone could talk about, right? It was kind of like, hey, man, this is, this is the life cycle of the internet for the next week.
BOBBY: That is true. And now the lifecycle of the internet happens in the time that it takes MLB and MLBPA to meet. Oh, got ’em! No, much discuss was that 15 minutes. I just know that Michael Baumann was somewhere just punching the wall in frustration. Because he is on this quarter of the length of the sessions does not matter. And I agree with him. Because all of this, this, the only thing that happens in a bargaining session is you go to the table, you pass them your proposal, and you say, hey, do you have any questions? And the other side says, yes, we have two questions. And then they ask the two questions and you answer them. Or the other side says, no, we don’t have any questions, and then you go back to your respective corners. That’s it. I don’t think people really, I don’t think most people really understand that. I think that the like, the reasonable criticism that you could have is, why isn’t MLB looking over the proposal? Seeing what’s changed, meeting and doing the work of coming up with a counter proposal? The answer to that is because there are billions of dollars on the line. So they want to take more than just three hours to meet and send a proposal back in the same day. So they don’t bother meeting for longer, because they’re like, we’re not going to send you something back today anyway. So you don’t have to hang around here and wait for us. We’re just going to go home. And then we’re going to talk to our lawyers. This is not weird, like this is how this works. I think a reasonable request would be can you guys meet on consecutive days, maybe? But that would involve you know, both sides feeling a sense of urgency, which I think maybe the players are starting to feel a sense of urgency. And I think Manfred is starting to craft a faux sense of public urgency with delaying spring training back to March 5th. And saying we need to get this done by February 28, which is a week from when you’re listening to this podcast or a week from when this podcast is coming out. And that’s why they said that they will meet likely every day, this coming week. Now all of that being said, do you want to talk quickly about what changed in the proposal? Because I think both of us thought that we had talked about this last week, but we didn’t. We talked about it on a separate podcast appearance that we went on. So let’s really quickly go over what changed materially about the MLBPA’s proposals. So previously, the MLBPA wanted 100% of third year service time players to be arbitration eligible. That would not be a complete departure from the past. There have been areas of MLB where after two years, you, two years of service, you become arbitration eligible. Owners are, are not willing to give that extra year back. So as a move towards owners, the PA said that instead of 100% of third year service time players, we will drop that proposal down to 80% of third year service of players with three years of service will be arbitration eligible. And instead, we will add $15 million back to that pre-arbitration bonus pool. Which has been much discussed on this podcast and elsewhere. The the amount of the pre-arbitration bonus pool, the two sides are very far apart. MLB–MLBPA is currently at 115 million. And MLB is at like 10, I think or 15 was the latest proposal that they gave $15 million league wide, for all pre-arbitration players, Alex. There are 30 teams, 30 teams, $15 million, fight for it. This is like when, this is like those really awful dystopian game shows. Where they make you like run around and try to grab as many $1 bills as you can in a certain amount of time.
ALEX: Right, yeah.
BOBBY: This is like the MLB equivalent of that. I think a lot of people saw this, and the way that it was reported. Because most people are not following detail by detail. Most fans are not following, they’re just following the Jeff Passan tweets waiting for him to be like, they’ve reached a deal. And they see this, and the number of the pre-arbitration pool goes in the other direction, it goes back up. And people are like MLBPA is moving further away from the owners. But actually, the fucked up part, is this was a huge move from them. They’re starting to move down on that year of arbitration. That year of service time equating to getting to arbitration earlier. And that is something that the owners have been very against. And so that players are saying, hey, we’re willing to meet you in the middle. And now we’re waiting to see how the owners respond. But of course, this news comes out. And everybody’s like, we’re screwed, we’re getting no season.
ALEX: Right. Well, all of this is couched in the the the the barbs that have kind of been shot back and forth, right? With Manfred, threatening to the the Players Association that, you know, this is the deadline, I believe was the 28 for a February, for the regular season to start on time. And the the Players Association turns around and says, if we don’t get 162 games, you’re not getting expanded playoffs. So I think, I think you’re definitely right that like, there is some sense of urgency on each side, maybe for different reasons. But that feels to me kind of why like why we’re in the position we are right now? Where the players are finally making concessions. And to the extent that we know about the owners are the ones who who have yet to really cave on any major issues. So now it’s their turn, right? Now, it’s kind of on them to come back and say, we see where you’re coming from.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Do you think they’ll do that? Do you think they’ll come back and be like, okay, you make a good point.
BOBBY: It so, it’s actually a really interesting question. And I’m glad that you brought up the, the fact that Ben Nicholson-Smith, who’s a reporter, at Sportsnet Canada, reported that MLBPA has told MLB not to expect expanded playoffs in 2022. If players miss, miss the chance to play a full 162 games, and be compensated for the full season. I feel like that’s massive news in this negotiation, that wasn’t reported, at least I didn’t see it reported by Passan. I didn’t see it reported by Evan Drellich. So it’s hard to like truly verify if that is the case. But it would seem to make sense, because there are a myriad of different strategies that you can take, when you’re a union, heading into negotiation. One of those strategies is shoot for pie in the sky, and then have them chip away at that pie in the sky until you land pie on the mountaintop, or something. Like you might land somewhere in between, you know. Shoot for the moon land in the stars.
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: And.
ALEX: That was very poetic.
BOBBY: Thank you. I I work really hard at being a poet on mic. That’s one strategy. I don’t think that’s a very effective strategy for MLBPA, since everybody already thinks they’re greedy and selfish, and they’re fighting over money that they don’t deserve. And when I say everybody, I mean, a loud, vocal minority. So I think, from my perspective, the strategy that they have taken is set hard lines on certain things. Propose something that is pretty close to those hard lines, and just don’t move off of that. So move on other places, but move less or not at all, on the things that you’re not willing to bring back to your constituencies. To bring back to your unit members of the, of the MLB Players Association. And to do that you need to have in your bag, in your back pocket, either a move or a piece of leverage that will allow you to hold that hard line and say to owners, it’s in your court now. I can’t go back to my members and say we’re giving up on X. I can’t go back to my members and say we’re giving up on the competitive balance tax raising. Or I can’t go back to my members and say we don’t have a pre-arbitration bonus pool. And to me, this report about them saying we will pull expanded playoffs if you don’t give us a full season. That’s that’s a pretty big trump card. Like that’s a pretty big point of leverage that I did not know that the MLB Players Association Executive Committee and lead negotiator Bruce Meyer had in their back pocket. Because that’s, that’s the kind of thing that, that has to have buy in from all players. Like, players have to be willing to say, yes, I will miss a much bigger chunk of the season, potentially the full season, because you pulled that off the table after missing one game. Like everybody in the union has to be on board with that. Or at least a majority of people have to be on board with that. And that takes an incredible amount of organizing to be able to empower your negotiator to say this is the case. And if it’s a big bluff, they might actually be fucked. But I don’t think that it is a big bluff, because I don’t think you bluff over something like that.
ALEX: Yeah, well, and the league’s position is on much shakier ground because they don’t necessarily have a similar bargaining chip in their pocket, right? Because the the the players have said, yes, we’ll do expanded playoffs for you. In exchange, we want XYZ. But that’s where the conversation starts, right? It kind of hinges on that center of the package.
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: The owner, the owner is saying, this is the drop dead deadline to get a full season. That means very little, because the players have kind of already indicated that they’re willing to miss some games. Now whether again, whether or not that’s that’s true, is another issue. I’m sure the players would rather not miss games. But it does seem like the the pressure is kind of mounting on MLB to really make a significant move–
BOBBY: I agree.
ALEX: –at this point.
BOBBY: Yeah. Because if this is the case, like if if they truly have like buy in from all players, and all reports, lead you to believe that they do. Because the Players Association has been telling players for two years, this is what life will be like when you miss paychecks because of this lockout, or strike. They’ve been educating players about this, they’ve been saying, you have to plan for the fact that you will be working, even though we have a built in strike fund, we have all that stuff, it’s not going to be the same amount as your normal paycheck, you have to be prepared for that. And they do that because they knew that the owners were going to lock them out. And if not, they knew that it might come down to like it did in 1994, a player strike. And if they’ve waited until this moment, a week before the artificial deadline that Rob Manfred is saying to play the card of hey, we’ll pull expand to playoffs. Which to this point, everybody assumed was just going to be in the deal, you and I assumed it was going to be in the deal. As we were heading even before the lockout, when we’re talking about, hey, what are the biggest things, what are the biggest bargaining chips that players have? And we’re talking about expanded playoffs. I think, because it was so assumed that we were going to get expanded playoffs because they universally instituted them in the short and pandemic season. And it seemed like an obvious thing to trade for the players to get stuff back financially. I think there’s a decent case to make that MLB and the owners got complacent. And just assume they were going to get that. And if you pull that off the table at the last minute, suddenly there’s like a little bit of chaos and a little bit of scrambling on their side, in my opinion. So so I think this is the biggest piece of news that we’ve gotten about the actual dynamics at the table since the lockout started.
ALEX: So does this mean that, does this mean there hasn’t been a formal agreement on playoffs yet? Like if if the players have already said ok to this and have more or less kind of agreed on at least the existence of expanded playoffs. Can they renege on that offer and say, well, you’re not giving us what we want? So we’re, we’re taking this back, essentially.
BOBBY: So it’s hard to say without being in the room, like how expended playoffs has been discussed or proposed or negotiated or passed back and forth. But my guess would be the players have never put something across the table that did not tie expanded playoffs to something else, that they really want that the owners have not said yes to yet. So they can pull back expanded playoffs if they were, if they were saying what we’ve offered you is a package deal in exchange for 30 year arbitration or in exchange for a competitive balance tax that starts at 275 million. So they probably have not put in a proposal. Yes, we agree to expand it playoffs, but we need to talk about the term still. They’ve probably said this is a trade, we will only agree to expanded playoffs, if you agree to this other thing. And since the owners have said no to those other things, they still have the right to pull it off the table entirely.
ALEX: Sweet, good for them. That’s, that’s smart, smart negotiating. That’s why they are at the table. And not and not me.
BOBBY: Now, we’re obviously having this conversation without the complete picture. Like maybe we put this podcast out into the world and a day from now, we have a deal. Because owners are like, no, we need expanded playoffs. Because honestly, if you have been like I theorized complacent about the fact that you are getting expanded playoffs, you’re probably like, at the goal line of closing the TV deals for expanded playoffs. So you’re just waiting for the CBA to give you that, right. And if you don’t get that right, and you have to go back to Fox. And you have to say, just kidding, I have to leave $100 million dollars on the table this year, or whatever it actually costs for Fox or Valley Sports or ESPN or whoever to buy the rights for those extended playoffs. Man, you look really dumb, you look really dumb.
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: And, you know, owners do not like leaving money at the table in negotiations. Losing their leverage at the last second. So–
ALEX: Shocking.
BOBBY: I don’t know. It’s really interesting. I’m I;m curious to see how it plays out. As like I said, bargaining will be, if not daily, much more frequent this week, as we head towards that deadline, “that Manfred set” to reach, to reach a deal before games would have to get delayed.
ALEX: Are we getting a season you think?
BOBBY: I think we’re, I think we’re getting a season. I’ve already started to emotionally hedge for if we don’t. You know, fair, yeah. I’ve already started to think about the fact that Max Scherzer Smith’s contract wouldn’t start to lose 38.
ALEX: Ouch. Wow.
BOBBY: Yeah. I mean, it wouldn’t be the biggest, it wouldn’t be the biggest problem that would come from missing an entire season. But I’m thinking–
ALEX: Right.
BOBBY: –about it in that context.
ALEX: Yeah, you know, we all, we all come to it with our own baggage and our own hopes and desires.
BOBBY: All right, suffice to say, if we get a CBA in the next couple days, Alex and I will be back for at bare minimum, a reaction podcast to that. Can’t promise emergency pods for anything else other than if MLB and the MLBPA tended to fully agree on the collective bargaining agreement.
ALEX: Yeah, that’s kind of if we don’t do emergency pods for that whatever happened, you know, what are we been doing this for?
BOBBY: All right, let’s move on. We’re, I’m gonna get to Harry Marino in just a minute. But Alex, I wanted to talk to you about something that we haven’t spent any time in the podcast talking about in the last month or so, as news about it has been unfolding. And that is the Eric Kay trial. Eric Kay, the former Communications Director for the Los Angeles Angels was on trial for providing the deadly drug fentanyl, which caused the death of Angels pitcher Tyler Skaggs. This has been, It’s been huge news in the baseball world, for the last few weeks. As many baseball reporters have been covering this trial. Because obviously, it’s worthy of covering on its own. But in the course of the trial, the discussion of how big of a problem are opiates, in Major League Baseball, within clubhouses. Is there a larger systemic problem that we did not previously know about. And that this trial was going to surface. And I think TBD on that last question. But the reason that we haven’t been talking about it is because it’s been every single piece of news coming out of this trial is crushing. It’s heartbreaking. There’s no winner to come out of this. Eric Kay’s lawyer after the trial set as much after his client had been found guilty. There’s no, there’s no winner here at all, no matter the result. Whether his client would have won or not. Tyler Skaggs is dead. And it’s a tragedy. And it was a tragedy from the second we found out about it, a truly shocking one. And the reason I wanted to talk to you about it today is because this trial just strikes me as another one of the things that Major League Baseball, the baseball community in general, is just woefully under prepared to cover respond to or fix. Like there are massive systematic lapses that had to happen for us to get this far. And we’ve already allowed those lapses to happen. And then we’re still, we the baseball community are still making mistakes after the fact. Like Matt Harvey goes on trial with immunity so that he can talk openly about his cocaine use, his addiction, his depression. Because of some of these things when he was with the Mets. And then the next day, we have a new cycle, where former Mets Manager Terry Collins comes out and shares private information that Matt Harvey told him while playing for Collins. And uses it as an opportunity to go around to anyone who will listen and try to absolve the Mets organization of any responsibility in this situation. Aside from the fact that, that’s a shitty thing to do. And you don’t share private conversations about mental health or addiction, or personal struggle in the media, let alone with anyone else in the media. The impulse for Terry to go out there and try to defend the organization’s role in all of this, is the reason that stuff like this is under wraps. Is the reason that things can be so bad with certain players that Tyler Skaggs tragically dies. And people had no idea what was going on. It took this long, and it took this trial to figure out what was happening. Like an organization’s tendency to try to express anything, when it comes to these problems, is how you get to this point. And it’s just really, there’s like, no satisfying end to this conversation. But I just find it incredibly depressing and crushing. As we were following the story for the last couple weeks.
ALEX: Yeah, I mean, certainly you and I, and and I’m sure many baseball fans are familiar with the way that Harvey was treated by the New York media in his time as a New York Met, right? Which he was heavily scrutinized. And, you know, to a certain extent, there’s a sort of, I wouldn’t go go so far as to say glorification, but a bit of kind of tacit endorsement.
BOBBY: A sensationalization at least.
ALEX: Yeah, exactly. Of, of this sort of thing, right? To say, oh, yeah, Harvey’s a party [32:18] man. He, you know, he goes out there on the town and has fun, he’s at one oak. But to like, live under that level of scrutiny as a Major League Baseball player. Especially, one dealing with copious amounts of injuries, right? Which, which this, which clearly played a role in this, again, like you said, it’s, it’s no surprise why these things stay under wraps. Because if you come out and talk about it, you, you know, you open yourself up even more to that kind of microscopic level of investigation. And, you know, as you mentioned up top, like, we kind of, we really don’t know, the extent of the opioid problem in MLB. If it’s anything like the rest of America, the chances are, it was probably not limited to these five players, these five Angels players.
BOBBY: Yeah. And if you don’t even want to widen the scope that far, just look at the NFL. It’s like–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –huge, huge problem that’s not a secret at all that former players come out and talk about very openly.
ALEX: Yeah, so this, this moves to a civil suit now, which could drag out for months, or years. And at this point, I think kind of attention turns to Major League Baseball, and how it’s going to approach this and handle it moving forward, right? When, following Skaggs’ death, the league started testing for these sorts of drugs. And they’ve they’ve made a statement that, you know, no other player has has tested positive since they started started testing for it. Although I’m sure that’s something that they would rather the public not know about anyway.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: But I have a a weird feeling that this is the sort of thing that MLB would love to kind of sweep under the rug, right? They can, they can either kind of see how the rest of this, see how the rest of the story plays out in the legal system and see and you know, see what comes out there. And really do their own deep investigation on the extent of this issue and their sport. Or they can cast Eric Kay as–
BOBBY: One bad actor.
ALEX: Right, the the the bad apple and something tells me they’ll kind of lean towards the latter of that move, right? Because this none of this paints MLB in a great light at all, right? There’s there’s culpability on plenty of people’s parts. And it does not begin or end with Eric Kay.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: There’s no way that this is where the problem ends. And as you mentioned, it’s just a sad story. Although I mean, there’s no, there’s no proper justice that can, that can be done–
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: –for Skaggs, there is nothing about this case that is going to tie this up in a nice little bow. And, frankly, there’s nothing that is really helped by putting Eric Kay in jail for 20 years.
BOBBY: No.
ALEX: As a result of this.
BOBBY: No, because I agree with you that MLB will probably default to saying this is for for legal protection reasons, they’ll say this is one instance, we can’t be held responsible for whatever else is going on, if we don’t know about. But beyond that, like beyond the practicality, of knowing what each player and each employee of every team is doing, at all times, to to truly transformably address, addiction, which for a myriad of reasons, is going to be a problem in your sport. Because it’s a huge problem in this country, how we treat pain, how we respond to pain. The first thing we do is prescribe opioids for all pain, and pitchers are in pain most of the time. As pitchers have come on this podcast and told about, told us about, my elbow hurt a lot all the time when I was pitching. In order to truly transformably respond to the potential of addiction in your sport. It requires a truly honest approach where we show player’s grace for faults, which is not what we do in professional sports in America. Like, imagine you’re Matt Harvey, and you are struggling with addiction. And you show up late, and you’re being hammered as a lazy party or diva who doesn’t care about the team. Because of your dark night persona. It’s over, it’s a wrap from there, you’re never going to come out and be honest with with your teammates, or God for never with the media. But you don’t need to be honest with the media. But you’re never going to be honest, in a forum, where change can actually happen. You’re just going to shrink inward with it. Or I would, I know I would, I don’t want to speak for Matt Harvey. But that’s what I would do, if I was having this problem. And then from that point on, we’ve already taken the wrong path. We’ve already sent, we’ve already signaled to players, you can’t be honest about this. Because the media is going to crush you. And but then that’s just going to cause you to continue to have this problem. And that’s what happened with Matt Harvey. Problems just continued to get worse in New York. I don’t know exactly why. Nor should I, especially from the mouth of Terry Collins. And then we find ourselves here, where he is three organizations later. And now he’s on trial talking about these things, talking about these problems. And he can’t be the only one, he’s not the only player.
ALEX: Yeah, and again, I mean, Collins’ actions throughout this have been pretty reprehensible–
BOBBY: Extremely disappointing.
ALEX: –and, and feeds into the exact reason why this problem has gone under the radar for so long, has gone unchecked.
BOBBY: Exactly. If you’re gonna, if you’re a player, if you’re struggling with addiction, and after the fact, your organization is going to come out and publicly try to wipe their han–wipe their hands of the situation. You’re not–
ALEX: So we tried to help them–
BOBBY: –you’re not gonna go–
ALEX: That’s right, people knew.
BOBBY: If if you see that, and you’re a player, you’re not going to approach your organization the next time through. It’s just incredibly disappointing. I was like, as someone who spent a lot of time with Terry Collins, not in person, but as a fan who spent a lot of time rooting for watching, consuming the team that he was at the helm of the longest tenured Mets manager ever. It really upset me to see him in that context. And to do that dirty work for the Mets organization, in any outlet that would print it, essentially.
ALEX: Especially knowing the organization’s history with addiction issues like this.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Right? They’re being a team, cheekily known for their open use of cocaine, right? Despite the fact that it was a real issue that was afflicting multiple players.
BOBBY: And it’s, it’s not even worth categorically talking about the organization. I’m sure there were people within the organization who were earnestly trying to help Matt Harvey. Like there were definitely good people and teammates, and friends and employees of the Mets who were like, yeah, this is a problem. We’re going to try to help Matt as much as possible. I’m going to do my absolute best. But if the, if the overall umbrella of the organization, at the end of all of this is Terry Collins coming out and saying we tried our best, and then sharing stuff that he shouldn’t share. It’s a failure. It’s an organizational failure. And it, it should be acknowledged as such.
ALEX: Yeah, I don’t have a lot more to add on this. Will obviously be following this story and it’s just incredibly disheartening and and saddening. I’m sad. That’s it.
BOBBY: All right, we’re gonna take a quick break and then when we come back we’ll bring in Harry Marino.
[40:18]
[Transition Music]
BOBBY: Longtime coming, we’re now joined by Harry Marino, Executive Director of Advocates for Minor Leaguers. Harry, how you doing? Thanks for joining the show.
HARRY: Doing well. I’m doing well, Bobby, thanks for having me.
BOBBY: I say a long time coming because we have been discussing your work at Advocates for Minor Leaguers for quite a bit now. We’ve, listeners might remember that we had Matt and Ty on the podcast at the beginning of the pandemic just to talk about the formation of Advocates for Minor Leaguers. But so much has changed since then. So before we even get into any of the stuff that’s happened, any of the Major League Baseball policies that’s changed. Any of the news about spring training. Any of what what you’re looking to accomplish in 2022? I want to ask you, Harry, when you were part of the beginning of Advocates for Minor Leaguers, you know, what was your vision? And how much has it changed since then as the outside baseball world has changed drastically?
HARRY: So at the beginning of this journey for Advocates for Minor Leaguers. I think the biggest question was, how involved are players going to be in this effort, right? Is this going to be a purely third party effort? Where it’s former players and you know, fans and and outside folks who are supportive and want to see a change, speaking up on behalf of minor leaguers for our players at themselves actually going to be a part of the effort? And I think at the outset, it was hard to know exactly what direction that was going to go in. We certainly always knew that the more involved players themselves were going to be the more successful the effort was going to be, right? And so, I would say that, you know, when I think back to sort of the beginning stages, I think that was the big question mark. I I think we were very hopeful about what we could accomplish regardless of that. But we certainly knew that the more involved players we’re going to be, you know, the more successful it’s going to be. And over the last, you know, two years since the organization was founded, and really over the last year, I I took over as the first staff member just in April of 2021, right. So in terms of actually having like an operational staff, now we’ve grown, you know, it’s been less than a year. The biggest and most exciting change has been how involved active players have been in, in the movement and in advocating for themselves. And so that’s, I would say the biggest change has been just saying, you know, seeing how how involved players are willing to be and I think that’s changed the horizons and made more possible for what we can accomplish.
ALEX: Yeah, it’s really, really remarkable, the amount of voices that we’ve seen from both major leaguers and minor leaguers, speaking up about conditions in the minor leagues that have been this way for decades. But the I feel like the the broader public maybe just doesn’t have that in depth knowledge, right? You assume you’re a professional athlete? Oh, I’m sure they make 1000s of dollars each month, right? And you hit them with the facts and say, no, this guy’s living on a couch for five people and gets 500 bucks a month, right? And everyone sits back and says, whoa! So it’s been, it’s been really cool to see that. I’m I’m wondering, did you guys have any trouble early on kind of getting that buy in from players? And and kind of what does that work actually mobilizing them looked like? Because obviously, there’s it’s kind of a precarious situation that a lot of them are in and there are reasons why they may choose to to kind of stay silent, keep their head down. So what does that process been like?
HARRY: I think important context for this is everything that happened, right, with COVID and the canceled season, right? Because so I I compare things, I’m a former, I’m a former player, right? I played in 2012, 13, and 14. So, you know, when I was playing in the minor leagues, obviously, the issues were, were very much the same, were very much known to the players. And certainly there was no shortage of dialogue amongst players, right? About how bad the conditions were. But that really never made its way out into the public. And it was always seen as something that was sort of, you know, you’re supposed to just keep your head down. And, and kind of grin and bear it as it were, right? I mean, just really just deal with it. And I think what happened in 2020 with the canceled season and with the pandemic was players really saw it In a very front and center way, what it felt like to have absolutely no power, right? Beyond just the typical working conditions, and low pay and all that, they really realized, wow, like, we have no say over this at all. Like we’re missing an entire season here. We don’t even know what’s happening. Some cases, you guys know, like, things aren’t even being communicated to us. We don’t know, you know, we’re basically pulled into a meeting told, like, you know, head out, and we’ll be in touch. And I think that feeling of powerlessness really like resonated with guys. And then you compound that with then a long, prolonged period of time, where guys had a moment to sit back and reflect. Rather than being at the field 12 hours a day. And I think what happened was guys kind of came back last year, with a different mindset, right? And having sort of reevaluated some of the things that that players had accepted for so long. And so when we, you know, engage in outreach, from advocates, to players. And now like, you know, having more players involved in what we’re doing player to player outreach. A lot of it is just changing a culture, right? And, and I think the culture is changing right before our eyes where guys are just more and more willing to speak openly and speak frankly, with their teammates. But then also, you know, with the media, on social media themselves. And just become more candidly, it even in some cases, to their front office’s guys just saying, hey, what’s going on here? Like, what’s this policy, what’s that? Just stuff that wouldn’t have necessarily happened 5 or 10 years ago, that guys are just much more willing to do now. And I think it is that cultural shift. I don’t think the story could be told without the canceled season, and and COVID. And I think it’s, it’s something that, like much social change just builds on itself. So it’s continuing to build as we, as we move into the season.
BOBBY: Yeah, I think it’s kind of hard to overstate how different things are now than they were when you play it. And and and for even five years ago, or even three years ago, when Alex and I were doing this podcast. Like, there was not this much news about Minor League Baseball, organizing in Minor League Baseball, about protesting conditions in Minor League Baseball. Sympathy from fans, sympathy from certain members of front office’s. Sympathy from writers who are writing these stories. Like how much are you surprised by how quickly all that has changed? Are you kind of like, do you attribute a lot of that to the pandemic? Because there was sort of like a leveling, and everybody was kind of in their homes. But you know, I think of something like, like Matt, who’s been on the show, Matt Paré, who, who made this video, homeless, the ‘Homeless Minor Leaguers’, and it was kind of like this joking tone. And this was like a very long time ago, and it kind of went mini viral for a while there. And that was like, a roundabout way of addressing the very real problems that now people are just not having to do that round about. Like the the climate, the Overton window has shifted. So how much are you surprised by how quickly a lot of that has happened?
HARRY: You know, I think it has been surprising to see how quickly some of it has has changed and how much especially and it’s been heartening to see how much sort of, you know, mainstream baseball media and the fans, you know, major league fans have taken on this issue. I mean, you guys probably saw this. But when The Athletic posted a couple weeks ago, this survey of their, of their subscribers write about what issue they would most like to see change. They could people could pick a few issues and like something like 80% of people pick minor league pay and working conditions as something they would most like to see change. That there’s no you guys know, there’s no way that that probably wouldn’t have even been on the list. Definitely would not have been at the top of the list three years ago, right?
BOBBY: Yeah.
HARRY: So that’s been, that I would say, you know, it would be disingenuous to say that that’s not surprising. I don’t think that could have been predicted. You know, I will say that what our organization has been able to do and certainly set out to do is provide sort of that central space for some of this work to happen, right? And I think that is a big change, right? Is okay, now there’s actually, and Matt and Ty probably, you know, said some version of this when they spoke to you. But, you know, part of what we’re trying to accomplish is fill the gap that exists. Because there’s nobody who’s day in and day out working on these issues, right? Before that was kind of how we thought about it was. Like there’s nobody who’s actually supposed to be advocating for minor leaguers and speaking up for minor leaguers day in and day out. That’s nobody’s job description yet, like let’s change that, let’s create an organization where there will be, you know, folks who are actually dedicated to doing that day in and day out. And then that becomes the hub as it were, right, of this energy that might otherwise be out there among players, among fans, among meda members to, to see this and have been troubled by it. But haven’t necessarily had anything, you know, to channel it towards. Like now we have sort of a central hub where it’s like we could bring everyone together. and start talking in a more unified way and kind of get a drumbeat going. And I think that’s largely how we see our role is like, is centering and collecting the voices that were otherwise disparate, and maybe whispering and maybe didn’t know that there was another voice out there to even have dialogue with about this. But they’ve been out there. I think we kind of knew that was out there. But it’s been really rewarding to see how quickly the conversation has shifted, as all those voices have come together more.
ALEX: Obviously, there have been a lot of kind of milestones over the last couple years for you guys. But one of the the biggest ones, and one of the biggest victories in my mind so far came this past November, right? When Major League Baseball announced that the 30 teams were going to provide housing to all minor leaguers face, I mean, under a certain light, you know, if you’re making less than 100k, which is huge, right? And I think it took a lot of people on the baseball community aback that, that the league was actually like willing to engage on this issue and say, okay, maybe you’re right, maybe we should–
BOBBY: Oh, meaningful [51:06]–
ALEX: –address, addressing the issue.
BOBBY: That’s what that looks like.
ALEX: But I’m curious if you can speak a little bit bit about what that campaign was like? What the, what the dialogues were that you were having? And, and like where it stands now? Like, do you see the policy as being finalized? Is it set in stone? Do you think there’s still places that improvements can be made? Like where’s your head at with that right now?
HARRY: So to go back to sort of the beginning of the housing campaign, and kind of walk you through how that evolved. And even maybe, to take you back just a bit before that, I think when you zoom out, and you talk to most minor leaguers, certainly that I’ve talked to, and in my own personal experience, you know, I felt this way. Housing, and the lack of year round pay, were always kind of the two issues that seemed most egregious. Because they not only weren’t fair, obviously, to the players. But they also didn’t make any sense from a player development standpoint, right? Like, didn’t make any sense to have players facing housing insecurity, sleeping on air mattresses. You know, really stressing about like leases and double rents and all that stuff, never made sense, right? And then same thing like never made sense to have, and to continue to have players work in second and third jobs in the offseason not having enough money for training, right? So I think those two issues were always very prevalent in any kind of dialogue about the minor leagues, among players. About like, what should change because for the, for that reason, that they’re not just unfair, but also, like the team should want this to be different themselves, right? So anyway, you know that I say that just as sort of like, you know, a starting point. But really, as I said, you know, in April, is when I started in the job, and when we could really devote like full time resources to an actual issue campaign, that could actually have a chance to win, right? You actually maybe have the manpower to do that. And we just started talking to players. Because at the end of the day, that’s what we want to do is advocate for players like, All right, let’s talk to current players in here. Like, where would they start, right? In terms of making changes. And what we were hearing was housing, housing, housing, housing, right? Like, it was like, all right, let’s, let’s just, we could just go out and kind of complain, or raise awareness about all the different issues, you know. And it’s, there’s some value to that, but let’s like try to actually hone in on one particular issue and, and see if we can really get an actual change there. Because in doing so, we can hopefully, show players that their voice actually has some clout and some power, right? And so over the course of the season, that was really, a lot of our our player contacts and player outreach, were about housing. It was every day, you know, dozens of players, sometimes hundreds of players a day, just reaching out. Hey, what’s going on housing, what’s going on housing, and what we saw as the season went on was more and more players engaged in that conversation and wanting to talk about that. And in turn, you know, then we were able to, you know, share those stories with people in the media. Share those stories, you know, with the with folks directly on social media, ourselves. And I think that just created a little bit of a drumbeat where people were like, raise, you know, raising awareness, raising awareness. And then, you know, Britt Gourley wrote a great story in August, that compiled a ton of player voices. And I think there was something like 30+ players that talk to her for that story, which is pretty unprecedented, right? And it made, made a huge impact. And then Joon Lee, wrote another story in September that I think, again, made a huge impact in terms of really shining a light on where players were coming from. And so at that point, we knew that that teams were paying attention, that the league was paying attention, that fans were paying attention, the players were paying attention. And that’s when we decided to to really go for this Fan Appreciation Day, on September 18, the last Saturday of the season. Say let’s try and take it up a level and see if players will wear these #FairBall wristbands on the field and raise awareness in an actual demonstration on the field. That obviously never had been before. We weren’t sure, you know, what the appetite was going to be for that. But as we talked to guys, on both of those clubs, we had some really strong leaders in both those clubs and talked to them about it, they were really interested in doing so. And to be there in Brooklyn that day and see all these guys out on the field wearing these wristbands say, you know, demanding #FairBall was really powerful. And I don’t think it was last in the league, it’d be when you look at the timeline, right? Three days later, was with the owners meeting where they voted to change the housing policy unanimously, after decades of it being the old way. So that was kind of the progression. It’s a credit to a ton of people, honestly, primarily the the many players who are willing to tell their story that that we were able to get it done.
BOBBY: You know, Harry, as a Mets fan, this is not that high of a bar to clear. But that was probably one of the most heartening things that I saw all of this 2021 baseball season was that #FairBall that, you know, organized, right, wearing the wristbands at the end of the season. So congratulations to everybody who had a hand in that. We we immediately were like, this is amazing. But I wanted to ask you, you know, obviously the owner took notice, you know. Obviously, Major League Baseball took notice, how much are you engaging with like MLB? The league, the the off–the front office? You know, like, how much are you talking with people, if at all, who have the ability to kind of change some of these things? Because I know that certain clubs, you know, did have better policies on housing than others before every club made it, you know, a a league wide instituted thing. Like, you know, we saw that the Astros were one of the first to move the Royals were one of the first to move. And so are you talking with people from those clubs to talk about how they’ve made some of those changes ahead of the curve of the rest of the league? And how you can maybe institute some of those strategies league wide? Or is this more of a, let’s centralize this at advocates. And let’s hope that what we’re doing who we’re talking to in the media, the conversations we’re having with players is then going to build a groundswell up to the entire league.
HARRY: So at the beginning of our time, during this work, I think there was a bit of a question on our end about how willing teens would be to engage with us directly on some of this stuff. And, you know, without going into too much detail, I think it became clear that the league certainly wasn’t going to be interested in us doing a ton of talking to players. I mean, you seem to be talking to teams directly. And you know, that a lot of teams were going to be pretty reticent to do that as well. And so at, you know, at that point, we basically decided, right, we have to take this other path because they don’t want to engage with us directly. Which, you know, and I think basically, the reason there is probably understood to you guys and and to many of your listeners. But is the, the mistreatment of minor leaguers is fundamentally based on collusion, right? And uniform treatment across every team. As soon as there’s competition between teams for minor leaguers, you know, labor costs in the minor leagues skyrocket. So then they do not want that. The owners don’t want that the league doesn’t want that, right? They want uniformity, period. And we can talk about that in the context of this housing policy and some of why, you know, they probably changed it was like to re-institute some of that uniformity. So anyway, having said that, because there’s that desire for uniformity on the other side. Yeah, we’ve certainly had some dialogue with different people in front offices and different folks on the team side who are more inclined towards, like, let’s make this better. Let’s modernize player development. Let’s give guys housing. Let’s pay them year round, those people are out there. I mean, for anyone who doesn’t know, like, there’s people are out there, 100%, who see this, who want it to change. But ultimately, the answer you get from them usually is my hands are tied, and I’ve made, you know, I’ve made this pitch year in and year out, like let’s do this, let’s do that. And it’s really coming from on high from the league, you know, at the behest of the owners that we’re going to keep things right where they are. And so the level of dialogue that you can have with, you know, player development folks, even higher player development, folks that will be that fruitful is pretty limited. Because of that sort of centralized approach that the league takes to minor league conditions. So that’s kind of why we’ve taken the approach we have of like, let’s take it straight to the, to the to the fans and and and, you know, make our case in public because we’re not really you know, we’re barking up the wrong tree if we’re trying to make it happen, you know, at the league wide level.
ALEX: Right. Just asking owners to do the right thing doesn’t often really–
HARRY: Yeah.
ALEX: [59:56]
HARRY: Exactly, exactly.
ALEX: I’m I’m wondering has, have you guys received any pushback? Or has there been any dissent in kind of these organizing campaigns? Whether that’s among players who are saying, hey, it’s, it’s, you know, maybe it’s not our place to do this, or it’s from maybe minor league team or minor league owner or something like that. Obviously, I’m not asking you to name names or anything like that. But just more the broad culture there, there has been a bit of a cultural divide between players who say, this is this is the grind, right? This is just what you do to play the game. And then and then players who were willing to speak up and say, no, maybe we should all get together and do something about this. So like, have you kind of come into any of those roadblocks along the way?
HARRY: I don’t think there’s been a whole lot of dissent, right? As it were, are people who are saying like, hey, what are you doing? Like, why are you trying to make things change? They’re, they’re good enough, right? Like anything like that. I think there’s certainly a group of players, understandably, who still don’t want to speak out, right? And are just more comfortable being silent about it, and are perfectly happy to see other guys speaking up, and that people are doing it. I mean, you know, I can give you some anecdotes, just like, there’s, there’s a handful of guys who have certainly said, I so appreciate the work that you guys are doing, and the work that these other players are doing and speaking up. I personally, I’m still scared to to speak up or just don’t feel comfortable speaking up or don’t really want to rock the boat or feel like I’m in a precarious position in my organization, I’m not a prospect, I’m really on the fringes as as it is. Certainly there are some guys like that. But no, I mean, they’re really kind of going back to the first thing that we talked about here, the thing that’s been really crazy to see is just how engaged players are, how willing guys are to speak up about this, how much they do want to actually be a part of this and be a part of the change, and how much a lot of that conversation has been. And this has been really cool, and really heartening to see has been about like, let’s, let’s make this better for the next generation, like a lot of guys who understand the time horizon of this stuff, and that it’s not all gonna happen overnight. And that the reality is, whether they’re in the show, or they’re released, they’re probably not gonna be in the minor leagues, you know, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 years from now, right? Whatever the case may be. But they still want to be a part of it, because they see this as a moment to make things better for the guys who are in college, in high school, Little League, and so on right now. And and that those are actually sometimes the terms that guys use in talking about. So that’s been really powerful, to hear, to hear and to see. And I think it’s really promising for, you know, moving forward the kind of change that we can accomplish.
BOBBY: Is that something you were thinking about in real time, when you were in the minor leagues, when you were kind of experiencing some of this stuff firsthand? Like, take us back to the mindset of a Harry Marino in 2012? Like, were you thinking like, hey, I would love to change this someday, if I get a chance. Or did you not even have, because I think sometimes we talk about these things. And what we don’t acknowledge or or what we, what we should acknowledge maybe more often is the the version of this conversation where we’re like, this is really hard for guys to do. Like, this is a lot of work for players who are being shipped off to towns that they’re not from, they’re 18 years old, they are just trying to make the team. They’re not a bonus baby. So the organization is not maybe as invested in them as they might be in some other guys who are playing alongside them. I, I wonder like, how much was that on your mind? The person who eventually goes on to become Executive Director of Advocates for Minor Leaguers? How much did you even have time to think about that when you were playing Minor League Baseball?
HARRY: Yeah, it’s an interesting question. I I definitely was very, very surprised by the reality of playing in the minor leagues, pretty much immediately. In my first year, it’s been short season, I remember making like $3,300, right? For the year and just being like, this doesn’t add up, right? This is like not right. This isn’t like, oh, I made 30 grand or I made you know, there’s a low paying job or something like that. It’s like three, I mean, it’s hard to wrap your mind around like $3,000, right? I mean, it’s like what’s going on here? So that definitely was very impactful, I think, particularly in 2013. I was with the Orioles’ in Aberdeen in the New York-Penn League and was in a bullpen with.
BOBBY: RIP New–
HARRY: I’m not sure.
BOBBY: –York-Penn League.
HARRY: I know, I know, a great league, a great–
ALEX: Perfect league.
HARRY: –league. Really great fan support really, really fun League. And you know, I was in the bullpen. I was relief pitcher and the other guys in the bullpen were like five guys who were all from the Dominican Republic. All through very hard, great guys. At that time, I, my Spanish was pretty decent. And so we just sit out in the bullpen. We just talk about life and about everything and and I just came to really understand the minor leagues through their lens of like, you know, signing. You know, not to go down that whole road of like sort of the Dominican academies and like all of that whole ecosystem, right? But just like learning the real story of like dropping out of school and playing baseball all day. Every day from the time they were 10, you know, and making already through so many levels just to get to short season a ball, right. And I think like now, none of them made us a big release, right? And just seeing, okay, we and these guys are making like 3 grand a month right now. And most of them are sending a lot of it home, right? There, it’s being, it’s being sort of use to support their families. And I remember just thinking, as I watched that, like, this is, this is not right. You know, we’re providing way more value to these teams than this. And he has, some guys will make it to the big leagues, and they’ll get a payoff, and it’ll come out in the wash for them. But for a lot of guys, that’s not going to happen. This was like what they were put on earth to do. They’re really amazingly good. I mean, you’re throwing a ball 100 miles an hour, I can say, as a guy could barely touch 90, but that’s pretty crazy, right? So like they like–
BOBBY: Hey you we’re doing southpaw, though, right?
HARRY: Like just some other things, but but, you know, realizing like this is, this is an exceptional talent. And there’s a real demand to watch these guys perform. And there’s a short window in which they can do it, you know, and, and actually make money off it. And they’re not cashing in on that in any way. And the only reason is like the system is structurally set up in a way that’s not fair to them. That definitely was on my mind at the time. And, you know, I applied to law school, in the offseason, after that 2013 season. And I remember in my law school admissions essay writing about advocating for those guys as like some didn’t know what it would look like. But just as something that really just like an attorney and a lawyer, as somebody who can be an advocate for someone who isn’t in a position to necessarily advocate for themselves. That was kind of like what I had written about. And I’d use those guys, just as one example, doesn’t mean I knew I was going to be in this role, you know.
BOBBY: Yeah.
HARRY: All these years that align.
BOBBY: Uh-hmm.
HARRY: But it was definitely something that was very much in my mind at that time.
ALEX: Minorly pay seems like it’s kind of the the next big hurdle that that minor leaguers are facing. That the the broader cultural conversation is facing around this, right? Just just a few days ago, we had the league come out and argue in court, that players that minor league play–layers should remain unpaid in spring training. Obviously, they don’t, they don’t get paid in the offseason, either. Although they’re required in their contract to to perform duties in the offseason, which is a really interesting twist. But I’m wondering how you, not only kind of how you approach this issue, in in general. Because it’s obviously a really unwieldy one. And there’s a lot of different issues with it, right? Times that players don’t get paid, the amount that they get paid, that sort of thing. But then there’s also kind of this, this larger public messaging fight that you have to wage, right? Because the league really doesn’t, you know, they wanted they want to tamp down on costs, right? So it makes sense that they’re going to come out and say, we we don’t think that you should be paid during spring training. We’re going to lobby for the Save America’s Pastime Act to make minor leaguers exempt. So how are you kind of approaching that from a communication standpoint to really rally, I guess, favor in in, you know, towards you guys?
HARRY: So I think the thing with pay is, as as you rightly note, there’s a few different ways to think about it or to approach it, right? And the way just as a first cut that we are thinking about right now is trying to take it to just a very basic level, which is zero and drop. Whatever specific value guys are providing, which we can argue about. It’s more than, you know, a livable annual salary, period. Nobody to this point, at least we’ve never heard anybody make, even on the League side, any actual argument to the contrary, right? Like nobody’s actually said, no, actually guys are providing less value than that. So I mean, I guess I should, you know, never say never maybe that maybe that day is coming soon. But we haven’t heard that at this point. So–
BOBBY: That be a big fan of Tipping Pitches [1:09:31] come soon.
HARRY: No kidding. But, you know, so I think the way that we look at it right now is is kind of at that base, baseline level, right? Like, guys deserve a livable annual salary, because a year out job, and they’re providing at least that much value to their team. And so I think that’s kind of like the first cut. And then, you know, to be clear, that isn’t sort of, you know, the end point of where we see the [1:09:58] conversation going. I think the second stage and that will be a conversation around. Okay, let’s now actually talk about what’s the real value that minor leaguers provide? And, you know, again, I think that’s a conversation for a later date. But really, just as a preview, I think the way to think about it in some way is minor league is really provide two forms of value, right? They’re kind of they’re provide, like current entertainment value to minor league fans. And then they provide, you know, value as prospects to their major league team. And so, you know, there are different ways to quantify what that value is. And I think, again, I think that’s a conversation for a later date. But at this point, it’s very clear that that’s well above the livable annual salary. So at this point, we’re focused on that, that as like, the threshold issue is like, let’s get to a livable annual salary. Let’s make sure guys are not having to work second and third jobs in the offseason, make sure you guys can afford training, right? Let’s make sure that guys are making ends meet as a starting point. And then we can have the later conversation about getting them paid what they’re actually worth and what they’re actually owed. But let’s start here, because I think it’s it’s just kind of like with housing, there’s just no argument to the contrary. There’s no viable, rational feasible argument that says, guys shouldn’t be making a livable annual salary. So, you know, that’s kind of where we want to start.
ALEX: I mean, can’t you go to your landlord, or go to the grocery store and say, I don’t have money, but I do have baseball player experience, right? Because you are being paid in that, you do have the skills to grow 90 mile per hour fastball, so that counts for something.
HARRY: And you know, it’s so funny, obviously, like, the argument that MLB made, and in court, right, last week, about spring training pay, that got a lot of attention. I can say that really struck a chord with players really did, I think it was so, there’s certain level of you come into the minor leagues, you know, it’s not glamorous, you know, it’s not right. But you kind of know what it is, right? And it’s your only path. And so you don’t have a choice. So guys go in and with eyes wide open, they, and they deal with it the best they can. I think hearing from the league and from the teams, that that’s how the teams actually think about these guys that they’re so little respect, right? That it’s like, hey, we actually, we respect you so little that were willing, in a federal court, to get up with a straight face. And say that we are actually providing you $2,200 a week of value, because that’s how much you would have to pay if you were an amateur player coming to get, you know, coached up by our coaches and use our facilities. It’s so offensive to guys, there’s really angered them. And I’m not that surprised, because I find it very offensive and very angering. But like the number of even top prospects, top round guys, like across the sector, and guys, who I’ve talked to in the last week. Who have been so angry about that comment by Major League Baseball in that argument by Major League Baseball has been has been really powerful to see. And I think it shows that these guys know that they’re the best players in the world. They’re proud of that they’re proud of the work they’ve put in. And it’s one it’s it’s sort of like, it’s one thing to say, we’re going to underpay you, we’re going to explain to you, you know, all the all of that, right? And guys are like, All right, I’m wearing it, I’m wearing it, I get it, I get it. But to say like, hey, also, like you’re just an amateur, like you’re, you know, you’re lucky to be here. Because it’s in some ways, kind of interesting. It’s almost like that was just a bridge too far, right? Where a lot of guys they’re like, come on.
BOBBY: They flew so damn close to the sun, Harry. Like that, they had it, you know, they have it 12 or 11 and a half months a year. And then for those three weeks, you want to continue to fly that close to the sun. Like to the point where it’s it’s, you’re right, it is insulting. To the, to the point that the number one overall draft pick from last year is like what the hell, like this is just it is it’s a bridge too far. But I mean, I want to go back to it really quickly what you said about like getting people a livable year round salary. It alwa-it has always struck me as so, you know, confounding, but not really confounding because I just understand that it’s disingenuous from our men for to go up there and say, you know, it’s a an administrative burden to try to figure out how much minor leaguers are playing and that’s why how much they’re playing, how much they’re working. How often they’re in, you know, should they be paid during team meals? Should they be getting paid for bus rides? Like all that stuff. And I’m like, you realized that that is a problem in the rest of society also. Like that you some jobs, you don’t know how much you’re working or how often you’re working or how many hours. Some people don’t log their hours. That’s called a salaried employee. And there’s a minimum salary that you have to pay those people so like, why are you getting up into court and not making that same exact case for minor leaguers. That that minimum salary in each state is like 10 times higher than what you’re currently paying minor leaguers. So i don’t know, I it’s I don’t think there’s even a question in there, I’m just now frustrated because of all of the stuff that we’ve been talking about. But it it’s hard and I imagine it must be very hard for you guys to even enter that field of play. When that is the level of argument that you have to try to approach. And as someone who went to law school understands why they would make that case in a court. But how it makes no sense in the real world, I imagine that that must be very frustrating for you.
HARRY: Yeah, look, I mean, certainly, I think strategy and argument discipline are really key here. Because it is so easy to say the other side’s being disingenuous, they’re being offensive, they’re being just frankly, ridiculous, and how they’re arguing about this. And to just say, like, let’s just throw the kitchen sink at them, like just say, this is all crazy. And just like, you know, get really upset about it. And I think there’s a strong impulse to do that. And I mean, personally, and I think in our group, and among a lot of players. And I think what has been really beneficial has been saying, like, look, at the end of the day, we want to be, we don’t just want to be outraged about this, we want to make change. And the way to do that is to like step back and say, they’re gonna say what they’re gonna say, we know what we’re up against. Like, let’s think about how we actually make a change here. And let’s hone in on things where we kind of ignore their framing of it. And we just think about what’s actually fair here, what’s actually equitable, what’s actually just, and let’s just stay in that in that ground. And I think, you know, you guys could be a judge of this better than, than me, probably. But I think there have been tons of opportunities over the last year or two, for us to take shots at the league, take shots at the Commissioner, take shots at owners. And really like just, you know, kind of go after them. And, you know, potentially, ju–in a justified way for some of the stuff they’ve done. I think, time and again, we’ve chosen not to do that, and instead just stayed sort of focused on like, let’s hold them accountable to what they’re doing. Let’s stick to ours to our talking points. Let’s take the high road here. Because that’s how we’re going to get the public on our side. Like this doesn’t need to be a spitting match. Everyone knows we’re on the right side of this thing. Let’s stay focused, let’s not get thrown off our game. And I think that’s benefited us so far. I think it’s a credit to all the players who have all the reason in the world to be really angry and emotional about this. But have really done a great job of, of staying even keeled. And just and just putting stuff out there even you see over the last week guys on Twitter, just saying like, look, this is these are the facts. This is how I’ve been treated. This is it, like I’m not not saying–
BOBBY: This is–
HARRY: –screw the owner.
BOBBY: This is not a political opinionated statement. This is just my…this is my W-2.
HARRY: Period, right? Like, here are the facts. You make your own decision about whether this is fair. And the facts in this particular circumstance speak for themselves.
BOBBY: I think that’s very reasonable. You can leave the cathartic reactionary outrage to guys like us. We will carry that mantle.
HARRY: Be to have you guys do that. No, I mean, I get it completely. And I think it’s, it is, look, it’s frustrating to hear things that are obviously disingenuous. Like, it’s not a good investment to own a major league team or minor league players should pay $2,200 a week for spring training because they’re getting an opportunity. Like those are very frustrating things. And I would say that, I think you just zoom out and look at the lockout right now and where, where the fans are at. I think a large part of why the fans seem to be so much on the players side at this point, has to do more with like the nature of those disingenuous arguments from the League side than even the substance of what they’re arguing about. I think, fancy through that, they don’t like you know, the average person is. I mean, the average person is smart, right? Like if you, if you approach the world, like the average fan, the average person is is dumb or is like is going to be bamboozled by just, you know, whatever talking points are out there, you’ll be sorely disappointed. The average person is smart, the average baseball fans smart, they see through this, they know what’s really going on here. And I think those kinds of statements don’t get the league very far. I can really think they’d be far better off if they just said, look, we know you guys don’t, you know, agree with this necessarily. But this is business. This comes up every five years. We got to do, we got to do we’ll get back to the field as soon as we can. I really think that would be a much better position for the league to take. But instead it’s this disingenuous argument of it’s so hard to be an owner and and players are already getting too much. And I just think people see through it.
ALEX: Right. It it is kind of like one step too far. It’s for for people to take. Harry, you’ve been really generous with your time and we really appreciate you coming on. Before we let you go, can you talk a little bit about without spoiling anything, obviously, about what is coming down the pipeline for you guys? If there’s anything that you’re working on that fans should keep an eye out for? And and if there’s anything that fans can do to engage with this and kind of help voice their support?
BOBBY: Yeah, specifically I want to add to that like, with the sort of existential threat towards the minor leaguers with like the trimming of clubs. And like how teams have started to plant some of those seeds for limiting the total amount of minor leaguers or limiting what communities have teams. Like, how do you guys approach that and and spending it forward? Like what what is on the horizon for you guys?
HARRY: Yeah, so, I think in terms of what’s on the horizon, you know, substantively over the next period of months in this season. It’s a lot of some of the stuff we’ve touched on, which is this fight for a livable annual salary, right, for year round pay spring training pay. For guys to actually be able to make ends meet all year round. I think a lot of our dialogue and a lot of our public facing stuff is going to be about that. And he’s going to be about centering players voices even more in that fight. Around pay, I think the other main substantive thing that you can expect us to be talking about is the implementation of the new housing policy. So we’re already seeing that, you know, despite the league’s desire for uniformity, that’s not going to happen. There are going to be teams that look at that policy and try to exploit it and put everyone in most families or everyone in hotel rooms and two guys in the room. And don’t make accommodations for guys with spouses and families. And then on the other side, there are going to be teams that do things the right way. Give every guy their own room, make accommodations, and and pay live out stipends for guys who want to live out, you know, with a significant other. And so I would expect that we will call teams out by name as those things start to happen and simply hold them accountable. If they make the right decision, we’ll say they made the right decision. They don’t, then say, you didn’t. So I think that that will happen over the course of of this year. In terms of fans, I would encourage everyone to go to our website, right? To advocatesforminorleaguers.com, to follow us on Twitter, on Instagram, right on social media. Especially our Twitter account has been a good place where, you know, we really try to hold out and, and put stuff out there when it’s worth people really engaging with, right? Like there, we hear all kinds of things, there’s all kinds of content that we could put out, you know, on an hour by hour basis. But we want it to be a place where people know when we put something out there, it’s it’s legitimate, it deserves the attention of the baseball, public as it were right. And so I really encourage people to follow that account.
BOBBY: Every tweet from Advocates for Minor Leaguers for, I mean I imagine most people listening to Tipping Pitches are already following Advocates for Minor Leaguers. But every single tweet that you guys do is like truly an investigative report. Like you guys have done the homework, it’s like almost straight up real journalism, you know, like, this is the, this is the meal. This is what this team provided at this day. Like it’s it really is incredible work that you guys have done.
HARRY: I appreciate that. And look, I could say that we there’s a lot of stuff that doesn’t make it out there, right? Where we say like, you know, we’re respectful of the fact we’re not trying to, you know, as I said, we’re not trying to, you know, take shots at teams for any if there’s any doubt, like we hold it back, right? If there’s any ambiguity, any sense of maybe that’s not exactly what happened, you hold it back. But so when we put it out there, we really, you know, we do stand behind it. And we want people to know, to the end of holding people accountable, holding teams accountable for their conduct. And the last thing I would say with fans is just to keep your ears out because, you know, like, that day where we had guys wearing the #FairBall wristbands, right? We were at about a dozen stadiums around the country, hosting a Fan Appreciation Day, the handing out wristbands to fans, handing out pamphlets and information to fans. I would expect more opportunities for that kind of stuff, right? For sort of public actions to raise awareness, whether it’s at minor league stadiums or in other locations. So that’s the kind of stuff where if you, if you follow us on Twitter, follow our social media and check out our website. You’ll absolutely be able to, to keep an eye on that and and be involved and support the cause in any way that that you’re able. So that’s what we’re, that’s we’re hoping for.
BOBBY: Harry Marino, Executive Director of Advocates for Minor Leaguers. Thank you so much for joining us. I’m glad that we finally did this.
HARRY: Thanks guys really appreciate you guys having me on.
[1:24:07]
[Transition Music]
BOBBY: Thank you to Harry Marino. I mean, as Tipping Pitches listeners know, the work that Advocates for Minor Leaguers is doing is among the most important work being done in the professional baseball community. We cite them all the time. We have tremendous respect for everybody working there, Harry, our friends, Matt and Ty. These people are doing the transformative organizational work that needs to be done to improve minor league labor conditions.
ALEX: I also learned that I could have gone and played minor league baseball instead of going to journalism school and probably ended up in the same place.
BOBBY: Working for a non [1:25:00]. I would love to see you play minor league baseball. You should give it another go. Open tryouts Alex Bazeley.
ALEX: Right. Yeah. Pop over to a MCU Park on Coney Island so as Brooklyn Cyclones, what’s up?
BOBBY: I think we’re better suited to pop over the MCU Park and spit some seeds–
ALEX: [1:25:19] teen.
BOBBY: –team what’s up? No. I was gonna say, spit some seeds and drink some beers. But we can try to get on the NYU team, I guess, we already graduated, though. I don’t think we have eligibility. Although we never played a sport while at NYU. So I think technically, we would have eligibility if we went back as as postgrads. But that would involve going $300,000 further into debt.
ALEX: At this point, it’s just numbers–
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: –right? It’s all for a couple more zeros.
BOBBY: Right. That’s what the Nats thought when they offered Juan Soto a $325 billion extension. It’s just numbers, he’ll say yes, right?
HARRY: Uh-hmm, yeah.
BOBBY: And he was like, oh, no, 27 million a year for me? No, no, thank you. Okay, we’re gonna do a a quick speed round of listener questions at the end here. Because a lot of them are collective bargaining related. So we want to address them before anything materially changes over the coming week. But before we get to any CBA ones, we got a email a few weeks ago, actually, that we forgot to respond to, from listener Eli, and he wanted to know if anything has changed or updated on the Oakland A’s stadium front. Since that was such a big theme of Tipping Pitches for a while there. Alex, I’ll turn it over to you to talk about Oakland City Council politics. bureaucratic process of the Oakland City Council.
ALEX: Yeah, man, I’ve been mired in this stuff for months at this point. And–
BOBBY: Some might think your whole life has been affected by–
ALEX: Somebody rule.
BOBBY: –my erratic policies of the Oakland City Council.
ALEX: Yeah, it’s too bad. I decided to tune in when my favorite baseball team, was like a new new baseball stadium.
BOBBY: Right.
ALEX: Yeah, I mean, there hasn’t been a a ton of incredibly notable progress. The most recent piece of news that actually just came out this past week was that the City Council voted to certify an environmental impact report for the the proposed Howard Terminal plan. They still need to agree on community benefits and a lot of details surrounding the actual development. And there’s still approval from quite a few other parties that that needs to happen for this project to move forward.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Including a lot of authorities that work in or around the port of Oakland. But it’s one step at least, the next step is going to be talking about those aforementioned community benefits. Dave Cavill is still going tweeting out, you know, Howard Terminal or bust.
BOBBY: Yup.
ALEX: Which [1:28:08] respects he’s back on his bullshit. He was not tweeting there for a while.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: And he just pops in every month or so. Just–
BOBBY: Dave where are you Dave.
ALEX: –mind people that is still a show.
BOBBY: Wow. Get his ass. Remember the days when we were trying to get Dave Cavill on this pod? Do you think those days have come and gone?
ALEX: I think so. But maybe we can, we can get him once Fisher tosses on the side after the stadium–
BOBBY: Oh–
ALEX: –search.
BOBBY: We get a radicalized Dave Cavill.
ALEX: Right, exactly. If if he feels–
BOBBY: [1:28:31]–
ALEX: [1:28:31]
BOBBY: –opens up. Dave Cavill breaks his silence.
ALEX: Tells all.
BOBBY: Yeah, uhm, I did see there was some language on the A’s website, I saw someone circulating this in the A’s Twitter fan community. Which I’m loosely a part of, because of you. Someone circulating some language that was like, if you sign up for a season ticket package this season, you will have first dibs or something at the upcoming season ticket packages at the Howard Terminal Stadium. So that’s at least like some form of a paper commitment to the idea that that is the plan, you know?
ALEX: Uh-hmm.
BOBBY: But that’s the whole confusing part about this entire saga. It’s like they say that and then their Executives are getting on a private jet to fly to Las Vegas to tour sites. So which is guys like that building a stadium takes a full on commitment from what I understand, from what I’ve been led to believe.
ALEX: Dave just likes the strip, man. He just likes that that Las Vegas Strip and I don’t really know what to tell you. It’s a fantastic place. Goes there to let off some steam after John Fisher is finished using under the foot rest. Like–
BOBBY: For on the floor, for on the floor. All right, let’s move on. Uhh, let’s go to the voicemails.
VOICEMAIL 1: Hey guys, Josh here. First off, I, after eight years of teaching, I’ve finally joined the teachers union. And your show has been a big influence in that. So first, thank you. I got one question, I’ve learned so much from listening to Tipping Pitches. And it just seems like labor relations and baseball seem to be so much worse than like football, basketball, and other professional sports. Why is that? Is that the antitrust exemption? Is it, are there other factors? Or is it just you guys are bringing a huge awareness to the issues in baseball, and there’s just not as much content out there for the other leaks? Oh, love the show, and can’t wait to listen next week.
BOBBY: First off, Josh, solidarity, congratulations on joining the teachers union. Teachers unions are great. They’re the backbone of American education, in my view. Secondly, it’s definitely not us. We are definitely not the reason that it seems like baseball, labor relations are much more at the forefront than other sports, I think it’s a combination of things. You’re not totally off, I think a lot of baseball writers are interested in talking about these things moreso, than writers for other sports. For whatever reason, all of us lefties might have just found our muse in baseball. But I I think that more so it’s that the MLB Players Association, started out as the strongest union amongst American professional sports, by far. And therefore, it necessitated more conversation around this because the owners have been trying to chip away at that, since Marvin Miller helped to create the Players Association. So the answer is, it’s more at the forefront, because players are more powerful, and therefore their union is more at the forefront of their sport than in other sports.
ALEX: Yeah, well, and there’s a a lot more to mine, from the players, because they have been kind of hardline on some of these major issues in the past, right? And so where, whereas in other leagues, things may be a bit more calm, because the owners actually probably have a lot of what they already want.
BOBBY: Yes, exactly.
ALEX: The I think the owners in baseball see that there’s still money to be made off of the players. And then they’ve gotten just a lot more frank and honest about that. Which hate credit to them, man, I think it makes the players job a lot easier. And it makes our job a lot easier. So you got to tip their cap your cap to them.
BOBBY: Yeah, I think if, if another sports union took a hardline stance in the next CBA and was like no salary cap, I think it would be massive news that everybody would have to be covering at that negotiation. But that is just the thing that happened with the players 40 years ago, came up again 20, 30 years ago, 25 years ago, with the ’95 strike, and ’94-’95 strike. And therefore characterize that relationship as something that is a little bit more relevant every time a CBA comes up. There’s always the chance that it might blow up in this sport. Although I’ll say I don’t know as much about hockey and their labor relations. But hockey is the only other American sport that has like missed a full season, or missed a postseason because of a lockout or a strike. So I think if I if, in an alternate world were Alex and I really love hockey, and we bond over that fact at New York University. This podcast is about hockey, labor relations. But that alternate world is weird and doesn’t exist.
ALEX: Yeah. Outside of NYU hockey games. We did, we did manage to bond over that.
BOBBY: For different reasons. We bonded over a water bottle filled with whiskey at NYU hockey games. Next question.
VOICEMAIL 2: Hey, guys, it’s Mike from Syracuse. I am calling because I have been very torn up about what to do with the upcoming minor league season. Our local team is owned by the New York Mets. And we are the New York Mets Triple-A affiliate. And I would normally love going into games, but it feels kind of scabby this year with the lockout going on. And I don’t really want to put money into Steve Cohen’s pockets if I don’t have to. That said, I know a lot of people who work over there and they’re good people who work there who obviously have no affiliation with the actual Mets. And it’s just really confusing and I’m not sure what to do and I was hoping you guys could help me out with this problem. Thanks, love the show, bye.
BOBBY: So I think there are a few things to consider. Thank you for calling and asking this question. It’s a tough question. We’ve been asked it multiple times from multiple people haven’t yet fully addressed it on the show. But it’s something that I’ve been thinking about, as well, Alex, as I get ready to move back to New York, and you and I get ready to try and go to baseball games together and may not have New York Mets baseball games to go to? It’s a hard question. There are a few things in my mind that define how I would feel about going to minor league games. And I I would not be boycotting minor league games. I’ll start by saying that. The first reason is because I don’t think that your minor league ticket is the financial boon for Steve Cohen that will keep the Mets afloat while the lockout is going on. Like I don’t think that you will be providing that much of the supplemental income that will make it possible for the lockout to continue. I think that there is so much more money that they are getting from TV deals and stadium deals and, and advertising and marketing deals, that keeps them afloat. Other than you going to enjoy your local minor league team. That’s number one, number two, the players union has not called for you to boycott minor league games. And if they have not made the call that that is what they need, in order to break this lockout, then it becomes a slippery slope for consumers fans to start calling boycotts on their own as a way to show support for a union that hasn’t yet asked for that. And that’s not to say that you’re wrong if you don’t want to go to minor league games, because it leaves a bad taste in your mouth because of all of this. That is completely your right, but not going fully on behalf of the players union because of the lockout, I think starts to become a complicated conversation that we as fans can’t really make full on decisions in that respect.
ALEX: Yeah, I think like you said, it’s a it’s a personal choice about you know, just how you feel about doing that. Uhm, I also think that it’s important to not, to not let owners and not let the state of baseball like sap your joy, sap the enjoyment that you get out of the game.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: Because again, it’s a Minor League Baseball, especially as a huge part of a lot of smaller cities and towns across the country. And for many towns, it might be the, the, you know, one of the centers of culture there, right? So it is this kind of tightrope walk you have to take between community and Corporation.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: But I think ultimately, until, as you said, until things get more dire, and there actually is some sort of picket line that has been dictated that should not be crossed. I think you’d like, do what makes you happy, you know? Like–
BOBBY: Yeah, yeah. And you go into minor league games and buying a ticket for minor league games is more so supporting the employees that work there and bring you those minor league games. Like that money is more directly going to that club, even if it is owned by Steve Cohen, like, then ever, your dollars ever really reaching Steve Cohen himself. In my opinion, I I–
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: –don’t really have the numbers to verify that but that is just that’s just my guess. And if you’re going into it with open eyes, and you’re potentially wearing a Unionize the Minors shirt and saying, hey, I’m not here because I’m, I’m not here because I’m supporting the owners. I’m here because I love baseball. I’m supporting the the players who drive my love for that, then I I think that’s not okay. All right, let’s move on. Next question.
VOICEMAIL 3: What’s up guys, found you guys podcast about a month ago. And second, I heard you guys say that the lockout wasn’t a both sides issue and that it’s an owner issue. New I found the right podcast. So kudos on the correct opinion. My question for you guys is what do you guys think the max amount of games myth that would be as the legendary Bobby Manford put it disastrous for MLB. Like, you know, if you were to look two to three years from now, you’d say yep, since I missed, you know, X amount of games MLB still hasn’t recovered from it. Like from a fan growth perspective. Curious, send you guys take love the show and keep up the good work.
BOBBY: This is a tough question, because I do think it depends on what kind of Olive Branch they extend to fans after all of this happens. Like do they take a more holistic approach to giving a shit about fans after this? Or do they just continue the status quo of being like that sucks for you buy an NFT. Or that sucks for you bet on how many strikeouts Jacob deGrom will have tonight. Because if that’s the case, I think that like 20 games is the maximum that they can lose before this has a seriously detrimental effect on fit and growth. In a better world where they take a step back, and they realize that, oh, we really stepped in it with the with this lockout. Perhaps we should start making better faith efforts to grow fandom and continue to grow fandom at higher rates among underrepresented groups of fans. I think that they could miss like, I don’t know, half a season? The whole season? Like it it really is hard to say because there are some fans who would understand why we’re missing that much. And be okay with it. But it it just depends on whether there’s a mayhem called afterwards, in my opinion.
ALEX: Yeah, I think I agree with that. I think that I mean, this is this is maybe like, you know, captain obvious statement, but like missing a full year would would would not be good.
BOBBY: Yeah.
ALEX: That would not be good for the sport.
BOBBY: Yeah, it’d be really hard to recover from.
ALEX: And I’m not just talking about the owners checkbooks. But actually, in terms of building a fan base, building trust between you and and a fan base, building trust between you and players. That really would would not be good. That would set the table in a really poor fashion. So I’m, you know, I’m hoping it doesn’t get to that point necessarily. Unless, unless that is what needs to happen. In which case, you know, you and I will still be here. It’s we will find, we will find Rob Manfred quotes to talk about even if there is no baseball season.
BOBBY: Let’s make up Rob Manfred quotes.
ALEX: Can you tell the difference? Probably not.
BOBBY: It’s parody. He can’t sue us. Okay, last question.
VOICEMAIL 4: Hey, guys, Joe, here from actually pictures on Twitter. I have a question. Am I the only one who’s disappointed the Players Association isn’t taking a bigger swing? They asked for one year of team control and like, immediately dropped it in the first round of negotiating. Like, why would they ask for two or three years less team control, and then let MLB talk him down? I don’t really know when the last time they had this kind of public sport and play player solidarity. Maybe I’m reading that wrong. Maybe the public hates the lockout. But I haven’t really seen anything drastic in the player proposals. I was kind of expecting more, what give? Thanks, fellas.
BOBBY: Uhm, I mean, this goes back to what we talked about when I was talking about pulling expanded playoffs off the table, right? Like they’ve they’ve taken the strategy of here, we’re going to give you a proposal wherever you want it to be pretty damn close to this. And we’re just going to hold our line. And I think they’ve done that because they know if they put a proposal across the table that was like no more service time. Every player makes X, you’re immediately eligible for free agency, no draft, all that stuff at the owners would have just put their PR machine into place. And it would have been extremely effective, because it’s already been effective, even with these modest proposals, as Joe lays out. So yeah, I mean, I’m disappointed. I’m disappointed that the state of labor, in baseball, and in America, under capitalism. If you go back a year or two, in our state of labor and baseball conversation, I think you’ll probably hear me advocating for players to strike for 2, 3, 4 years if it blows up the entire ownership structure of baseball. But there’s like 100 of us that actually believe that and the rest of fans don’t. So I think that that probably answers your question. Am I right there, Alex?
ALEX: Yeah, I’d I’d love for them to shoot for the moon and land among the stars as you put it so eloquently.
BOBBY: I think first time I said–
ALEX: Pie in the sky–
BOBBY: –pie in the sky, landed on the mountain.
ALEX: –pie a pie in the mountain. Yeah.
BOBBY: Just sounds like a good weekend trip. Some pie in the mountain. [1:44:27] Lakeside cabin.
ALEX: I think they probably recognized that they needed to put forth a somewhat serious proposal for the owners to really take them seriously. Like I I think they kind of recognize the bounds, the boundaries within which they are working and negotiating. I think it’s also probably worth noting that the players are likely not as militant or politically invested in this fight as maybe the average listener of this podcast is, right?
BOBBY: Absolutely, true.
ALEX: I mean–
BOBBY: Yes.
ALEX: –we can, we can expect or we can, we can want the players to, like, go for it all, you know, to go for the farm. But, but it’s just, it’s just not going to it’s not going to happen. And I think they they know who they’re negotiating with on the other side of the table. And yeah, I think that’s where we live right now. You know, maybe the next generation of ballplayers. Maybe the next generation of Gen Z players is, we’ll be ready to to burn it all down–
BOBBY: Down with–
ALEX: –who knows.
BOBBY: –the system, bro.
ALEX: Yeah.
BOBBY: Down with the system. The generation of ballplayers raised on Tipping Pitches listening to this pod every day–
ALEX: Exactly.
BOBBY: –on the way to baseball practice, hell yeah. The stated position of this podcast is it would be better for baseball in the long run. If the players went on strike until they completely broke the owners and got them out of baseball. There are approximately five players that you could find who would agree with that even in private. Let alone and publicly reported on labor negotiations. So yeah, I think that you’re, I think that you’re right there, Alex. I believe we are officially out of time on this very long, very bloated podcast. But thank you to everybody who stuck it out until the end. If you want to call into our voicemail. Have your voicemail played on the podcast. Like these ones. The number is 785-422-5881. If you want to acquire some Tipping Pitches merch, proceeds of the Unionize the Minors merch go towards More Than Baseball, you can do that @tiny.cc/nationalize. Reach out to us otherwise tippingpitchespod@gmail.com, tipping_pitches on Twitter. Like I said, we’ll be back this week if there’s a CBA or we’ll be back next Monday. If there’s not, we will be talking about how, oh oh, looks like we might get a delay to the season. Anything else that the listeners need to know Alex before we get out of here?
ALEX: July 29, 2021, then Brooklyn Borough President, Eric Adams.
BOBBY: Oh yeah, here we go.
ALEX: Catches, catches the the first pitch at a New York Metropolitans game from his son. And he says, “Every Mets fan, every Mets fan.”
BOBBY: Every.
ALEX: “Dreams dreams of throwing a first pitch at Citi Field, Shea Stadium before that, for those of us who are OG fans.
BOBBY: He’s a Mets fan? Dang, he has–
ALEX: I guess.
BOBBY: He has like tried and true Yankees fan New Yorker energy to me.
ALEX: Right. I mean, he’s because he’s a cop.
BOBBY: No, cuz he’s a cop that allegedly lives in New York City.
ALEX: Right. Yeah.
BOBBY: Cops who live on Long Island are Mets fans?
ALEX: Yes, exactly.
BOBBY: That’s a distinction. Okay, thank you for listening to Tipping Pitches and getting that very important knowledge in the outro of this podcast. We appreciate you all very much. Tell someone to listen to this podcast. And we’ll be back next week. Bye.
[1:48:14]
[Music]
[1:48:29]
[Outro]
ALEX RODRIGUEZ: Hello everybody, I’m Alex Rodriguez, Tipping Pitches, Tipping Pitches. This is the one that I love the most Tipping Pitches. So we’ll see you next week. See ya.
Transcriptionist: Vernon Bryann Casil
Editor: Krizia Marrie Casil
Tipping Pitches 
Leave a comment