Major League Baseball players reached a new labor agreement with team owners in 11th-hour talks on Friday, averting a strike that had threatened to damage America's pastime for years to come. þþDonald Fehr, chief of the powerful players' union, confirmed there would be no strike as he emerged from marathon negotiations at baseball's New York headquarters. þþÿThere's no strike,ÿ Fehr told a swarm of reporters, declining further comment. þþMore details were due to be released at a news conference scheduled for 1 p.m. EDT. þþRepresentatives for team owners and players apparently reached a compromise on key issues regarding revenue sharing and a luxury tax, which the owners said were essential to level the playing field between big and small market teams. þþThe deal means baseball will skirt -- for now -- what would have been its ninth work stoppage since 1972, relieving millions of supporters still jaded by a 1994 strike that canceled the World Series for the first time in 90 years. þþAround 100 baseball fans were ejected from a game on Thursday night in Anaheim, California, after they threw objects on the playing field to show their displeasure over a possible strike. The average player salary is now $2.4 million. þþÿThere is still a lot of work to be done by both sides if they're going to repair things with fans,ÿ said Arthur Bernstein, sports consultant and the former executive director of the fan advocacy group United Sports Fans of America. þþÿIf they're smart, they'll have fan events, reduced ticket prices, and have the players out there talking to the people. Basically, anything to tell the fans, 'We really didn't mean to be such jerks the whole time.ÿ' þþHad the talks broken down, the first game affected by a strike would have been Friday afternoon's contest between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs at Chicago's Wrigley Field. þþThe previous bargaining agreement between the 30 team owners and players expired last year, and the players' union set the Aug. 30 strike date two weeks ago to force the owners to negotiate a new contract. þþThe players feared that after the regular season and World Series were played, the owners could lock out the players. þþThe players had accepted the general structure of revenue sharing and a luxury tax on payrolls that exceed a certain level -- a double-pronged approach to close the gap between rich and poor clubs and rein in spiraling salaries. þþWith revenue of billions of dollars at stake and the average player salary now at $2.4 million, only a legacy of antipathy and distrust between the owners and players had stood in the way of compromise. þþ
Source: Reuters
