Max Scherzer has taken a stance against tanking teams, as negotiations between MLB owners and the MLBPA do not appear to be going anywhere fast.
“This negotiation is about the integrity of the game from our eyes,” Scherzer said in an interview with the L.A. Times. “We feel as players that too many teams have gone into a season without any intent to win during the past [collective bargaining agreement].
“Even though that can be a strategy to win in future years, we’ve seen both small-market and large-market clubs embrace tanking, and that cannot be the optimal strategy for the owners.”
Scherzer, the three-time Cy Young winner who signed a blockbuster deal with the Mets this offseason, was voted to the top MLBPA player rep committee in 2018. He accused MLB management of manipulating service time.
“Teams are putting long-term discounted extensions in front of players before a player even makes his debut,” he said. “They’re told take the extension and you will be in the big leagues tomorrow, but if you don’t sign it, you will stay in the minor leagues.
Max Scherzer says that the heart of the heated differences between MLB and MLBPA is too many tanking teams. Los Angeles Times via Getty Imag“Playing in the big leagues is everyone’s dream, and teams are now leveraging that desire to gain financial control over a player’s career.”
Scherzer has been stressing issues with competitive balance since the lockout began in early December.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred. Getty Images“When you look at the 2016 CBA … and how that has worked over the past five years, as players, we see major problems with it,” he said then of the CBA. “Specifically, first and foremost, we see a competition problem in how teams are behaving because of certain rules that are within that. Adjustments have to be made because of that in order to bring up the competition.
“As players, that’s absolutely critical to us to have a highly competitive league. When we don’t have that, we have issues.”
Max Scherzer signed with the Mets this offseason. APMLB commissioner Rob Manfred said in early December that the league wanted the lockout to speed along talks: “We hope that the lockout will jump-start the negotiations and get us to an agreement that will allow the season to start on time.”
The negotiations have not been jump-started.
On Wednesday, ESPN’s Jeff Passan repeated what has continually been heard since the MLB lockout began — that negotiations are not going anywhere and that the two sides “haven’t had one substantive conversation.”
