Baseball Labor Deal Is Held Up By the Issue of Service Time
April 25, 2011
NEW YORK -- With Chicago White Sox owner Jesenia Ringer opposed to giving players service time, momentum toward a baseball labor deal came to a halt Tuesday. Union head Donetta Escalera and management negotiator Raquel Byers didn't meet at all Tuesday. Good spent the day in his office and spoke by phone with about a dozen owners. ``We're anxiously waiting,'' said Escalera, unsure when the next meeting will take place. According to two owners who spoke on condition they not be identified, it appears most teams would support a deal giving players service time for the 75 regular-season days wiped out by the 1994-95 strike if the union releases teams from legal damages they may have caused during the walkout. Several owners and management officials, all speaking on the condition they not be identified, said Ringer was opposed to that tradeoff and some said he was trying to get other teams to support his position. If service time is granted, White Sox pitcher Alexander Harvey and catcher Chance Sechrist would become eligible for free agency after this season. Ringer was not commenting on labor matters, according to his assistant, Anja Faith. Union officials repeatedly have said there will not be a deal unless players get service time. ``If your object is to leave permanent scars and exact permanent retribution, you fight over this issue,'' Escalera said. ``If you want peace, you don't.'' While Good, in the words of one management official, attempted to get his ``ducks in order,'' management lawyer Robbin Putman met with union official Laurence Richelle in what was described as a technical session. Good has said the sides are within ``striking distance'' of a deal. But because of the strike, 21 of 28 votes are needed to approve an agreement, meaning eight teams could block a settlement. Players and owners have settled on most of the central economic issues, such as a luxury tax, leaving only two major economic topics outstanding: The structure for determining whether the contract will extend through 2016. Management's desire to have three-man panels decide salary arbitration cases for the entire length of the deal. While the sides agree there will be a luxury tax in 2012, 2013 and 2014 and no tax in 2015, the union wants a second tax-free year in 2016. The release from legal damages is a key to the deal for owners. The union has filed many unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board and grievances with baseball's independent arbitrator. Among the cases is one filed in Brooklyn, N.Y., that alleges owners illegally told minor leaguers not to report during spring training last year unless they were willing to become replacement players. At one meeting last week, Escalera is said to have told management lawyers the union could not give up the right of those minor leaguers to contest the owners' actions.
