Why Dodgers owner’s ‘parity’ comments matter with potential MLB lockout looming

As the 2026 Major League Baseball season gets underway, the machinery of the game off the field continues to whir in the background. Most notably, the December expiration of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), which governs labor relations between MLB players and clubs, constitutes the unspoken subplot of the year.

Unfortunately, team owners are expected to lock out players after the collective bargaining agreement expires, meaning another work stoppage. The hope, of course, is that the lockout doesn’t last 99 days like the 2021-2022 shutdown did, but there’s a good chance the union fight will be extreme. That’s because the owners and their employee, Commissioner Rob Manfred, intend to push for a salary cap.

That’s going to be a tall order, in large part because the MLB Players Association, the union that represents players on every 40-man roster, has historically resisted efforts to install a cap. Another challenge is the potentially fractured coalition whose interests represent Manfred.

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The owners of large markets carry the sport. Contrary to MLB’s reputation, significant revenue sharing is already in place. Teams pool 48% of their local revenue into a common pool and then receive equal shares of these pooled funds. Least spenders in the league – think Pittsburgh Pirates, Cleveland Guardians, Tampa Bay Rays, Miami Marlins, etc. — almost certainly enjoy enough revenue sharing to cover their entire payroll and then some (there’s a reason MLB is less than open about team finances).

If you own, say, the New York Yankees, the New York Mets, or the Los Angeles Dodgers, then why would you want to continue to subsidize the profitability of those owners? Why would you want to structurally limit what you can invest in the product on the ground just to make their lack of baseline effort a little less infuriating in comparison? That’s the challenge Manfred faces in convincing 30 team owners to act as one during CBA negotiations.

“I have owners with very strong opinions that I have to bring together to take a position that we will ultimately take with the MLBPA,” Manfred said in February 2025.

Speaking of which, maybe this isn’t as big a task as it seems in theory? Consider what Mark Walter, owner and chairman of the two-time defending World Series champion Dodgers, said recently about his team’s current status as baseball’s overlord and, by implication, the upcoming CBA negotiations. Via the Los Angeles Times:

“Here’s what the problem is: Money helps us win. We can’t win all the time. We have to have some parity.

“So we need to find something that will give us some parity.”

Why Mark Walter’s Comments Matter

Regarding Manfred’s “potentially fractured coalition,” Walter’s comments are powerful words from an owner who wields great influence within his guild. The Dodgers win first and foremost because they are an exceptionally smart organization with an ownership group willing to invest in the team’s success. Yes, money helps, but sports has countless examples of teams that spend and don’t end up hoisting the trophy. But accuracy isn’t the issue. The point is, Walter made it clear that the Dodgers were on board with whatever changes came out of the wash.

Presumably the “something” Walter is referring to is a salary cap on team payrolls. MLB is the only uncapped league among the four major North American sports and baseball owners can barely hide their envy from their capped league counterparts. There is actually no relationship between a cap and competitive parity: the NFL has apparent parity because it plays a relatively small sample of games, has a single-elimination playoff format, and is fueled by equally shared national revenues rather than local revenues. MLB is the opposite.

Parity is just a way to put pressure on gullible fans and media. MLB owners want a cap because it will increase franchise valuations, and Walter is likely no exception.

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Another path to increased parity – or at least in theory increased parity – is increased income sharing. As noted above, MLB already has significant revenue sharing, but Manfred has positioned the league to completely restructure how the league makes money through media contracts. It is very likely that this will evolve into the NFL’s national model, which would mean that MLB revenue as a whole would be shared more equitably. That, however, requires buy-in from teams like the Dodgers, Yankees, Mets and Cubs, who make big money through their regional sports networks or local broadcast deals.

Walter, at the same time, perhaps signals the Dodgers’ willingness to participate without internecine battles between ownership blocs. Any changes to the league’s revenue sharing system require player approval through CBA negotiations, but the first step is getting high-revenue teams on board. Perhaps this first step is being taken?

What MLB needs more than anything is increased accountability from owners who don’t spend what they receive from spending teams. Maybe it will come out of the wash. Either way, it looks like the owners may present a more unified front than you might think, at least if Walter’s revealing comments are any guide.