In three days of talks since the union's executive board postponed its plan to set a baseball strike date, negotiators for the two sides have not made enough progress for the board to delay a second time. The board is scheduled to have a conference call at 10 a.m. today and is expected to approve Aug. 30 as the date the players will walk out if they do not have a new labor agreement.þþUnion officials were not talking yesterday, but their silence was pointed comment enough. The owners' proposal for a luxury tax on payrolls on Wednesday evening turned the union officials sour, and nothing the clubs' negotiators said at two bargaining sessions yesterday altered their mood. þþOne report circulating in baseball circles yesterday was that after the union opted last Monday not to set a strike date, management's negotiators thought they could get to a deal. But several owners who have been described as hard-line were said to have told Commissioner Bud Selig they would hold up a deal that did not get what they wanted in a luxury tax and urged him to maintain his firm stance.þþRob Manfred, the clubs' chief labor lawyer, did not hold what has become his almost daily conference call with reporters, and a spokesman for Manfred said he was not commenting other than to say that the two sides met twice during the day.þþPlayers, for their part, were prepared to do what they felt was necessary.þþÿSetting a strike date doesn't mean we're going on strike,ÿ Steve Karsay, who attended the union meeting Monday in Chicago, representing the Yankee players, said before the team's game in Kansas City. ÿIt's just a day to let everyone know we're serious.ÿþþWhen a date is set, the pitcher added, ÿThere's a deadline on the table.ÿþþIn 1994, the last time the players struck, the executive board met July 28 and set a strike date 15 days afterward — Aug. 12, which is when the players walked out.þþThis time the board will give two weeks' notice. þþAfter the players postponed the action they had been expected to take in Chicago, a rush of optimism suffused the negotiating environment. But as the talks developed, union negotiators felt that their management counterparts had seemed to promise more than they could deliver. ÿIt's back to just a flat-out refusal to move,ÿ Mike Remlinger, the Braves' player representative, said in Atlanta.þþThe clubs' bargaining team gave some reason for hope when it adapted the structure of the union's luxury tax proposal to the owners' demands. þþSeeking to retard player salaries, the owners initially proposed a 50 percent tax on portions of payrolls of more than $98 million. They agreed last Sunday to raise that threshold to $100 million. In their most recent proposal, they inched up again, to $102 million.þþTom Glavine of Atlanta, the National League player representative, called the latest proposal ÿfairly meaningless.ÿþþSeven clubs began the season with payrolls, for luxury tax purposes, of more than $100 million. The Yankees, on opening day, had a $164 million payroll. It has since risen to $171 million, meaning a 50 percent tax under that plan would cost them more than $30 million. The players feel that kind of tax bite would inhibit even the Yankees from spending lavishly on players' salaries.þþÿWe made an offer to try to rein in the Yankees and maybe one or two others,ÿ Glavine said. ÿInstead they want to affect six or seven others immediately, and maybe six or seven more on the periphery. That's a salary cap.ÿþþSince the Sunday proposal, neither side has talked about either side's tax proposals. What became clear, though, was that the owners' counterproposal Wednesday evening to a proposal the players had made earlier in the day was totally unacceptable to the union.þþWhen negotiators resumed meeting yesterday morning, one person familiar with the talks said, they focused on whether they had the ability to move closer together on the tax issue. When they gathered a second time later in the day, they determined they did not, at least now. The discussions apparently reinforced the feeling union officials had from the night before.þþThe tax issue remains the most critical one in the talks for a labor agreement to replace the one that expired last Nov. 7.þþRevenue sharing is also a critical issue, but at least some of the negotiators believe that if they can agree on a tax, the necessary elements of a plan to increase the amount of local revenue that clubs will share will fall into place.þþThe players believe the combined amount that clubs will have to pay in revenue sharing and the payroll, or competitive balance, tax will deter the free-spending clubs from continuing to spend freely.þþThe clubs say the two issues should be viewed separately, but they understand why the union links them. Ideally, the clubs say, no team would have to pay the luxury tax. But the union says that if that situation developed, it would mean the tax threshold was serving as a payroll cap, which the players have always opposed.þ
Source: NY Times
