Contributor: MLB’s biggest rivalry this season will be players vs. owners

Major League Baseball Players Association. is arguably the most powerful union in the United States, whose members include some of the most conservative athletes in professional sports. The owners of Major League Baseball’s 30 teams, who built their wealth through free enterprise capitalism, want to limit player salaries. This apparent political and philosophical irony will most likely lead to a shutdown of baseball at the end of this season.

Wednesday is opening day of the 162-game major league season. The 2025 season ended on November 1 with an 11-inning Dodgers victory over the Toronto Blue Jays in what was one of the most riveting World Series of all time. Last season, the Dodgers attracted more than 4 million fans for the first time. The Dodgers weren’t alone. More than 71 million fans attended major league games – the third consecutive season of growth. Over the past decade, league revenue has increased 33%.

And yet, despite all this good news about baseball’s financial health, team owners have threatened to lock out players – essentially an owners’ strike – at the end of this season because of the terms of a new collective bargaining agreement that will soon be negotiated with the players’ union.

Major League Baseball, unlike the NFL, NBA and NHL, does not have a strict salary cap that limits what teams can spend on players. That’s the key question for the 30 team owners and Commissioner Rob Manfred, who says the system is “broken.” Small-market teams can’t compete effectively, Manfred insists, with economic giants like the Dodgers and Yankees. But over the past 10 seasons, 14 teams have reached the World Series, so the league isn’t dominated by a few big spenders.

Major leaguers and fans have weathered five players’ strikes and four owners’ lockouts since 1972. The 1994-95 strike lasted 232 days, canceling more than 900 games, including the World Series. Unlike the NFL, where top players like San Francisco 49ers quarterback Joe Montana crossed a picket line during the 1987 NFL Players Assn. strike, union baseball players remained united. Until now, no star player has been a strikebreaker in baseball. Paul Skenes of the Pittsburgh Pirates and Tarik Skubal of the Detroit Tigers – the 2025 Cy Young Award winners for their respective leagues – also hold leadership positions in the players’ union.

A recent report analyze the political affiliation of major league baseball players found that among those living in states that allow public access to voter registration records, nearly 54 percent of players were Republicans, compared to 8 percent Democrats. Why do right-wing members maintain such union loyalty?

For Miami Marlins pitcher Pete Fairbanks, who is also a member of the players’ union leadership, it means recognizing that they stand on the shoulders of players who have challenged the baseball establishment.

“If you look at the history of the union, we have a strong foundation for us,” Fairbanks said. “They fought for the rights of the players and for the overall betterment of the whole and it’s the job of the veteran players to pass that story on to the younger players.”

Marvin Miller, a former United Steelworkers union leader, revolutionized the players’ union and baseball when he led the association from 1966 to 1982. He told the New York Times in 1999 that he was “upset” that many players didn’t know it was the union that made their huge salaries and benefits, arbitration and free agency possible. “When you don’t know your history, you tend to relive it,” Miller said.

Miller, who died in 2012, was a labor history buff who realized that highly skilled workers often developed elaborate ethical codes that fostered solidarity with other employees.

Bruce Meyer, the current executive director of the players’ association, puts the union’s checkered history with owners at the center of his communications with players. He spent weeks talking with union members during spring training in Florida and Arizona, emphasizing the importance of unity within the ranks. “The bottom line is that our players have always believed that they are fighting not only for themselves but also for their teammates and for the players who will follow them,” Meyer said.

Manfred’s strategy as commissioner of Major League Baseball has been to speak directly with the players himself, particularly with young, low-income players who he believes are being shortchanged. He claims that “10 percent of our players make 72 percent of the money,” figures Meyer disputes.

The commissioner essentially told the players that their union engaged in malpractice, losing touch with its own members as the economics of baseball changed around them. Meyer calls Manfred’s attempt to divide the players a “standard labor-management tactic.”

Senior agent Scott Boras said that, unlike the NFL, baseball’s open salary system works for players because “your talent allows you to earn what you can earn without taking money out of someone else’s pocket.”

Paradoxically, the union adopted the principles of Adam Smith: let the free market work. Nobody made the Dodgers pay Shohei Ohtani $700 million. Good for Ohtani, great for Dodgers fans. And this year, Japanese clothing retailer Uniqlo will be a sponsor of Dodger Stadium. Owners, who accept team revenue sharing and luxury taxes and demand restrictions on wage competition, look like socialists.

When labor strife interrupts baseball, many fans no doubt feel like victims of a feud between “millionaires and billionaires.” Ryan Long, a 26-year-old minor league pitcher in the Baltimore Orioles system and union leader, thinks the players’ association should try to understand how regular workers feel about a potential lockout. “Whether it’s hot dog vendors at stadiums or cleaning local hotel rooms, the union should help in any way possible other workers who could be hurt if baseball stops,” he said.

In late February, at the Yankees’ spring training field in Tampa, I spoke with season ticket holder Richard Barnitt, who wore a shirt designed like a baseball, making it look like it could be scuffed and thrown. “There has to be some sort of cap because the Dodgers and the New York Mets had unlimited money,” he said. Another fan, Carlos Rodriquez, an aircraft mechanic living in Tampa, disagrees. “I don’t think a salary cap would be fair to the players,” he said. “The players association does a magical job for these guys.”

In the event of a lockout, players will need the support of fans, for whom a salary cap may seem reasonable. The owners will do what owners do: maximize profits and franchise value. The players’ union should find ways to show fans that they are not forgotten.

During a previous owners’ lockout, the association created a $1 million fund to help pay the bills for stadium concessions employees who were laid off. They can do the same thing again, letting fans know that they understand that most Americans are struggling to pay their salaries. And maybe Ohtani can earn a few hundred dollars — like former Dodger Mike Piazza did decades ago — for every home run.

Kelly Candaele produced the documentary “A League of Their Own,” about her mother’s years playing in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.