Report: MLB owners vote unanimously to institute lockout
America's pastime is shut down.
Major League Baseball's 30 owners voted unanimously to institute a lockout a few hours before the current Collective Bargaining Agreement was set to expire, according to a report by MLB Network's Jon Heyman.
The lockout began at 12:01 a.m. Thursday and is the first work stoppage since 1994-95.
It isn't a surprise considering it was clear that MLB and the MLB Players Association were clearly miles apart in their negotiations.
There has been considerable tension between the two sides since last summer when negotiations involved the parameters of a shortened season. It also isn't surprising considering MLB's owners haven't given up much ground in the past two years in negotiations.
Tensions rose at several points in the summer of 2020 while the game was shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
It was particularly heated when Tony Clark, head of the MLBPA, said in a statement, "Tell us when and where." That was effectively the MLBPA throwing its hands up and agreeing to what the owners wanted.
The owners, instead of beginning the season, came back and said they also now wanted assurances against any kind of a grievance, too.
That came after several rounds of proposals and counter-offers in which the owners basically dressed up the same offer in different disguises, giving up little ground as the summer dragged on without baseball.
There was also reportedly a basic agreement in place in regards to compensation that was torn up by the owners and renegotiated, lengthening the game's absence.
Commissioner Rob Manfred even went back and forth. Within the same week, Manfred first said he was "100 percent" positive that there would be baseball in 2020 and then quickly changed that answer, later saying he was "not confident" there would be any season at all.
It was an ugly sequence of negotiating, if it can be called that, and it didn't inspire much confidence that a lockout could be avoided once the CBA was set to expire.
That time has come, with all 30 owners deciding to institute a lockout.
Ryan Lewis can be reached at rlewis@thebeaconjournal.com. Read more about the Indians at www.beaconjournal.com/indians. Follow him on Twitter at @ByRyanLewis.
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Report: MLB votes unanimously to institute lockout
