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4. Strike
- Rutgers University Press
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61 4 Strike “Baseball games are won and lost because of errors. This will go down as the biggest ‘E’ of all. The losers are the fans, and there is no winner.” —Former baseball commissioner Peter Ueberroth on the cancellation of the 1994 World Series due to the players’ strike On August 12, 1994, the Major League Baseball players went on strike. It was the eighth time in twenty-three seasons that a work stoppage occurred, so the strike itself was not a rare occurrence.1 Still, this one seemed more serious than the others. Years of pent-up frustration, resentment, and deep mistrust had built up between the owners and the Major League Baseball Players Association. Much of it stemmed from the period of 1985–1987, when owners colluded with each other not to sign free-agent players in an attempt to keep salaries down.2 The owners were eventually caught and forced to pay the players $280 million in damages.3 Both sides never truly trusted each other from then on. When the owners essentially forced Commissioner Fay Vincent to resign in 1992, only to replace him with an owner (Bud Selig, of the Brewers), the tension grew worse.4 When the collective bargaining agreement between the owners and players expired in 1994, the tension came to a head. The average salary for a ballplayer stood at $1.2 million, nearly twenty times what it had 62 • BASEBALL’S GREATEST SERIES been in 1976.5 Claiming fears that escalating salaries would eliminate competitive play and crush small-market teams, the owners wanted to institute the sport’s first-ever salary cap.6 The Players Association, which had gradually gained strength since the inception of free agency in the 1970s, refused to agree to one. Its stand was not just one of principle. It simply didn’t believe the owners’ claims that baseball was in financial difficulty, considering that revenues from the game had gone from $625 million in 1985 to $1.8 billion in 1994.7 The two sides discussed a new agreement throughout the 1994 season, but by July 28, they were far apart on negotiations. It appeared the owners might simply impose a salary cap upon players, which they could do if the season ended without a new agreement. To gain leverage in that contingency, the players set a strike date of August 12.8 The deadline came and went without a deal. In fact, on August 11, negotiators on both sides never even met.9 On August 12, the season was halted. “There is no doubt in my mind the players are united, as always, and the owners are united this time for a significant series of reasons,” said Acting Commissioner Bud Selig. “But having said that, now we have to figure out a way to solve this thing.”10 The potential fallout from the strike was so alarming that even President Bill Clinton weighed in, saying, “There are a lot of little kids out there who want to see this season come to a close and there are a lot of not-so-little kids out there who know this is the most exciting baseball season in forty years.”11 But the stoppage continued for days, then weeks. Finally, on September 14, Selig announced the cancellation of the World Series and, thus, the official end of the 1994 season. Fifty-two days and 669 games were lost.12 For the first time since 1904, there was no postseason. The contentiousness on both sides was clear, as player representative Donald Fehr noted, “I have every reason to believe, given the calmness with which [Selig’s] announcement was preceded, it was something the owners had long since come to accept as necessary.”13 Though fans were angry over the strike in general, the cancellation of the season was unfathomable and the backlash severe. Players were seen as greedy and vilified across the country. Many fans did not know or care to know the intricacies of the strike or the Players Association’s position. “There came a time when you just threw up your hands trying to explain your position. I remember the fans I spoke to didn’t want to hear any of it. They just looked at us and the owners as millionaires fighting with billionaires,” said Tony Gwynn.14 [18.219.140.227] Project MUSE (2024-04-17 22:00 GMT) STRIKE • 63 Fans were also repulsed at the cancellation of what...