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Snell’s comments show lack of perspective during time of rapid change – Sportsnet.ca

Published

4 years ago

May 15, 2020

Self-assessment is an important trait in navigating life and an essential one in negotiations. Blake Snell is lacking it.

He’s a very good pitcher but he’s not someone who unilaterally impacts the profit margin of his MLB team or the league as a whole. So, the suggestion that he won’t play unless he makes his full salary is misguided, misinformed and out of line with what’s going on in the world around him.

On his Twitch channel Wednesday, Snell made his feelings clear. Citing the elevated risk of playing in this atmosphere, he said taking a pay cut “is not happening.”

“I gotta get my money,” continued Snell, who’s slated to earn a $7.6 million salary in 2020. “I’m not playing unless I get mine, okay?”

The 2018 AL Cy Young winner went on to say “Y’all gotta understand, man, for me to go, for me to take a pay cut is not happening, because the risk is through the roof. It’s a shorter season, less pay. I gotta get my money. I’m not playing unless I get mine, okay? And that’s just the way it is for me.”

“Like, I’m sorry you guys think differently, but the risk is way the hell higher and the amount of money I’m making is way lower. Why would I think about doing that? Like, you know, I’m just, I’m sorry.”

MLBPA executive director Tony Clark has recently pointed out that owners agreed in March to pay players a prorated portion of their 2020 salaries. A lot has changed since March.

If that agreed-upon plan goes through, Snell would get around half his salary for half the work. Owners are seeking a further reduction since those games will almost certainly be played without fans.

Plus, MLB owners are looking at additional expenses during a season in which big-league rosters are expanded to 30 per team and many additional logistics must be taken into consideration. When you factor in the additional costs of COVID-19 tests, personal protective equipment, and additional accommodations, you’re adding an inordinate expense to your business without adding any additional guaranteed profit.

Under the owners’ proposed plan, players would get more if revenue somehow goes through the roof. Is a better alternative MLB owners deciding they can’t afford to pay salaries without ticket income? In that case, they could close shop and mitigate their losses for a year or more. How many players in their prime would be calling the owners cheap and greedy in that scenario? How many fans would be outraged?

To be fair, Snell is right: he is risking his life. And if he chose not to play due to the health concerns, I would get that and would be 100 per cent supportive.

Fellow player Sean Doolittle articulated the nuance of that risk well and the concerns are valid.

Bear with me, but it feels like we’ve zoomed past the most important aspect of any MLB restart plan: health protections for players, families, staff, stadium workers and the workforce it would require to resume a season. Here are some things I’ll be looking for in the proposal…

— Obi-Sean Kenobi Doolittle (@whatwouldDOOdo) May 11, 2020

But Snell is conflating two separate issues here. If it isn’t safe to play, the players are not going to be playing – that’s a non-starter. These negotiations are happening under the assumption that it is safe to play.

When Snell signed his five-year, $50 million contract last spring, there was no accounting for the health risks he’d face in a global pandemic. This is not danger pay. So, for him to say he should get his full salary because of a health risk is nonsensical because that health risk had nothing to do with his willingness to accept the number he signed for.

What did impact it was his understanding of the revenue the team and league was making off of the labour of the players. Well, that revenue is inevitably now going to go down. And if you don’t believe it’s going to go down? If you don’t trust the owners? That’s why you tie salaries to revenue. Then you’re partners in the highs and lows.

It would be one thing if he said a 50/50 split isn’t fair because players are assuming 100 per cent of the health risk. That I’d understand. The owners can watch from the comfort of their homes while players risk their health. But he didn’t say the revenue should be more tilted to the players. He said he wants the contract he signed for. Well, the reality is we don’t live in that world anymore.

With that in mind, there’s already outside pressure for players to take less.

“I’m disappointed in many ways that players are holding out for high salaries and payments during a time when everybody is sacrificing,” Governor of Illinois J. B. Pritzker said recently.

Even former player Mark Teixeira isn’t holding the company line.

“You have people all around the world d taking pay cuts. Losing their jobs, losing their lives, frontline workers putting their lives at risk these are unprecedented times and this is the one time that I would advocate for the players accepting a deal like this,” he told ESPN Tuesday. “A 50/50 split of revenue is not that crazy.”

What Snell fails to understand is the privilege he has, even after a relatively modest season in which he posted a 4.29 ERA in only 107 innings. Almost everybody in society has had to make some concessions the rest of the world is making. Really the rest of pro athletes are. MLB teams are laying off employees and Snell is upset he has to split profit with the organization?

Some will argue Snell has a skill and he should be paid what the skill is worth on the open market. I agree. Anyone should leverage their power to secure as much economic wealth as they legally can. But Snell isn’t just making his salary due to his skill. Part of the reason Snell makes as much as he does is due to the fact he pitches for an MLB team. Over the course of generations, MLB teams have built up infrastructure and marketing that helps bring in revenue.

Snell could ask to be let out of his contract tomorrow, yet he’s not going to be paid more money to pitch overseas than he is in the MLB. The KBO’s Doosan Bears or Kia Tigers could sign him tomorrow and he’d make max $1 million a year, the top salary for the three foreign players any team is permitted to sign.

The players’ distrust of the owners is real. And I get it. But this is a time in our history where everyone is being asked to think collectively and not individually. Is it better for the health of baseball if the players hold their bargaining chips but sit at home? The 1994 strike badly crippled baseball and that was at a time when the North American economy was booming.

Again, I’m not arguing a 50/50 split is fair or correct. But it’s not like the idea is insulting. Marvin Miller fought hard and wanted a free market system with no cap and no floor. But if that comes at an expense of a World Series again, that’s not an opportunity either side will be able to recoup in the future.

Traditionally players take the heat, and generally I’m pro player in labour negotiations. The common man has more in common with the player, who is an employee than the owner who is an employer. I don’t often side with billionaires against millionaires.

Yet if players aren’t willing to concede at all in talks with the league, we’ve got a bigger issue on our hands and we likely won’t have baseball this year.

And then what will Blake Snell do then? Not something that’s going to pay him millions.

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Joel Embiid signs a 3-year, $193 million contract extension with the 76ers

Published

31 mins ago

September 20, 2024

Anne Joseph

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Already an NBA MVP and an Olympic gold medalist, All-Star center Joel Embiid now has until the end of the decade to try to win his first NBA championship with the Philadelphia 76ers.

With another maximum contract secured, Embiid wants to chase that title in Philly — and remain a Sixer for the rest of his career.

“Philadelphia is home,” Embiid wrote on Instagram.

A seven-time NBA All-Star, Embiid and the 76ers agreed to a $193 million extension with a player option for the 2028-29 season, a person familiar with the deal said. The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the terms have not yet been announced.

The 30-year-old Embiid, who graduated from a Florida high school and played a season in college at Kansas, broke his own news early Friday morning when he posted a photo on Instagram of him signing a contract alongside team owner Josh Harris.

“I want to be here the rest of my career. I love this community and everything you’ve given me and my family,” Embiid wrote. “There is a lot more work to do. You guys deserve a championship and I think we’re just getting started.”

Embiid, who dropped a franchise-record 70 points last season against San Antonio, signed off with the familiar 76ers hashtag, “#trusttheprocess.”

Embiid — still in the second year of a $196 million extension he signed ahead of the 2021 season — became the third cornerstone player this offseason to sign a massive contract with the 76ers. The team hasn’t won an NBA title since 1983.

The 76ers enticed Paul George to leave the Los Angeles Clippers and sign a four-year, $212 million contract. The NBA’s Most Improved Player last season, Tyrese Maxey, was rewarded with a five-year, $204 million extension. The 76ers committed more than $400 million in salary to two players they believe position them as the top contender to dethrone the NBA champion Boston Celtics.

George and Maxey both congratulated Embiid on the extension on Instagram.

Throw in Embiid’s deal and the Sixers are counting on a Big Three that can contend for the life of their contracts. Embiid, though, has a history of injuries and has yet to lead to the franchise out of the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs. Embiid has never played more than 68 games in a season and averaged 34.7 points in just 39 games last season.

Originally selected by the 76ers with the No. 3 overall pick in the 2014 NBA draft, Embiid was named NBA MVP in the 2022-23 season and he won a gold medal with Team USA at this year’s Paris Olympics.

He has five All-NBA Team honors, seven consecutive All-Star selections from 2017-24, three All-Defensive Team nods, and twice has been the NBA scoring champion.

“Joel has cemented himself as one of the greatest Sixers of all time and is well on his way to being one of the best players to ever play the game. We’re ecstatic that this extension keeps him and his family in Philadelphia for years to come,” Harris said. “Joel is a great family man, leader, and person. He is an elite two-way player with a combination of size, strength, and athleticism that this league has rarely – if ever – seen. He is integral to this franchise’s quest for another NBA Championship, and we are honored that he continues to choose this organization as his NBA home.”

In 433 games (all starts) with the franchise, Embiid has averaged 27.9 points on 50.4% shooting, 11.2 rebounds, 3.6 assists and 1.7 blocked shots across 31.9 minutes per contest. He ranks first in franchise history in scoring average (27.9 points per game), fifth in blocked shots (720), tied for sixth in triple-doubles (seven), and seventh in total points scored (12,071). Embiid also ranks third on the franchise list with eight 50-point games.

“I had no idea when I was drafted as a 20-year-old kid from Cameroon how lucky I was to be in Philadelphia,” Embiid said in a team statement. “Through all the ups and downs, this city and the fans have been everything, and I am so grateful for how they’ve embraced me.”

A youth soccer player, Embiid didn’t pick up a basketball until he was a teenager in Africa, when a friend informed him that very few 7-footers succeed in soccer.

A few months later, Embiid was lured to a basketball camp in the capital of Yaounde run by NBA veteran Luc Mbah a Moute, one of just two players from Cameroon to have played in the NBA. Mbah a Moute persuaded Embiid’s parents to let him move 6,000 miles to Florida, and helped enroll him at Montverde Academy, one of the best high school programs in the country. He played just 28 games in his lone season at Kansas before leaving for the NBA.

Embiid missed his first two full seasons with injuries before settling in as one of the top big men — and richest players — of his generation.

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CN workers in Jasper face uncertainty as company plans to move rail ops an hour away

Published

13 hours ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

MONTREAL – Canadian National Railway Co. told employees this week it plans to relocate its operations in Jasper to near Hinton, Alta., about 100 kilometres away.

In a memo sent to employees in the fire-ravaged town, the company said it’s aiming to increase efficiency by minimizing train stops between Edmonton and Blue River, B.C., which sits across the Rockies.

CN plans to close its Jasper bunkhouse and build a crew change facility east of Hinton, with workers slated to clock in at the new site starting in September 2025, according to the document obtained by The Canadian Press.

“CN has made the decision to implement operational changes to improve network fluidity,” regional vice-president Nicole James said in the memo.

The union representing rail workers criticized the relocation, which affects about 200 employees, though no layoffs are expected.

“This is another devastating blow to the town of Jasper, after this year’s catastrophic wildfires. Rail is one of the largest industries in Jasper, after tourism, and CN’s move will cripple this community even further,” said Paul Boucher, president of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference.

“And for the workers who’ve already lost so much — some even their homes — this is a truly cruel blow.”

Union spokesman Christopher Monette noted that most residents or their spouses must work in town to qualify to live there under Jasper National Park’s residency rules. The company has told the union it will apply for an exception for the workers, he said.

CN spokeswoman Ashley Michnowski says the railway is committed to supporting employees through the transition and keeping them updated.

“These types of changes take time to fully plan out and implement. That’s why one of our initial steps was to have this discussion with our employees as well as advising the town of Jasper,” she said in an email.

A wildfire ripped through Jasper in July, destroying a third of the mountain town and displacing many of its 4,800 residents.

The blaze also caused smoke damage to the CN bunkhouse, which the company says it has worked to restore since it was allowed to re-enter the community with contractors on Aug. 16.

Engineers and conductors have been reporting for work in Hinton, roughly an hour away, since the wildfire.

With roots as a fur trade outpost, Jasper launched as a railway town in the early 20th century after tracks built by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway — CN’s predecessor — paved the way for the municipality.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

Companies in this story: (TSX:CNR)

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Red Wings sign Moritz Seider to 7-year deal worth nearly $60M

Published

19 hours ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

DETROIT (AP) — The Detroit Red Wings made another investment this week in a young standout, signing Moritz Seider to a seven-year contract worth nearly $60 million.

The Red Wings announced the move with the 23-year-old German defenseman on Thursday, three days after keeping 22-year-old forward Lucas Raymond with a $64.6 million, eight-year deal.

Detroit drafted Seider with the No. 6 pick overall eight years ago and he has proven to be a great pick. He has 134 career points, the most by a defenseman drafted in 2019.

He was the NHL’s only player to have at least 200 hits and block 200-plus shots last season, when he scored a career-high nine goals and had 42 points for the second straight year.

Seider won the Calder Trophy as the league’s top rookie in 2022 after he had a career-high 50 points.

Red Wings general manager Steve Yzerman is banking on Seider, whose contract will count $8.55 million annually against the cap, and Raymond to turn a rebuilding team into a winner.

Detroit has failed to make the playoffs in eight straight seasons, the longest postseason drought in franchise history.

The Red Wings, who won four Stanley Cups from 1997 to 2008, have been reeling since their run of 25 straight postseasons ended in 2016.

Detroit was 41-32-9 last season and finished with a winning record for the first time since its last playoff appearance.

Yzerman re-signed Patrick Kane last summer and signed some free agents, including Vladimir Tarasenko to a two-year contract worth $9.5 million after he helped the Florida Panthers hoist the Cup.

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AP NHL:

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