Scratch at least the first six games off the Braves’ regular-season schedule.
Negotiators for the Major League Baseball owners and players failed again Tuesday to reach agreement on a new labor deal. MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred responded by canceling the first week of the season, marking the first time in 27 years that baseball’s opening day will be delayed by a labor dispute.
“The calendar dictates that we’re not going to be able to play (each team’s) first two series of the regular season, and those games are officially canceled,” Manfred said.
For the defending World Series champion Braves, Manfred’s announcement wiped out the scheduled season opener March 31 against the Marlins in Miami, as well as three more games in Miami through April 3 and two games against the Mets in New York on April 4-5.
The breakdown in negotiations came the day after a marathon bargaining session on Monday seemed to produce some progress. MLB previously had said it would begin canceling games if a deal weren’t reached by the end of Monday, but at 2:30 a.m. Tuesday, the league extended the deadline until 5 p.m. Tuesday.
That, too, passed without an agreement after the union rejected MLB’s final offer before the deadline.
Significant gaps remained in a series of economic issues, including the payroll level at which teams would incur “luxury tax” penalties, the amount of money MLB would put into a new bonus pool for top players not yet eligible for salary arbitration and the minimum salary.
MLB has said regular-season games missed because of the lockout won’t be made up and that players will lose pay for those games. The Players Association is expected to challenge that stance in subsequent negotiations.
But if MLB’s pronouncement holds, Braves players would lose a combined total of more than $800,000 for each day eliminated from the regular-season schedule, based on a projected 2022 payroll at or above last year’s end-of-season level.
That would include daily losses of $107,527 by starting pitcher Charlie Morton, $86,021 by outfielder Marcell Ozuna, $80,645 by outfielder Ronald Acuna, $69,892 by relief pitcher Will Smith, $43,011 by catcher Travis d’Arnaud and $26,882 by second baseman Ozzie Albies, according to calculations by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The continuing lockout will keep spring training camps closed to major league players and will keep much of the business of baseball shut down, including trades and free agent negotiations.
