Lou Merloni breaks down the latest on the MLB lockout and explains why he’s “panicking” that the league will miss at least the first month of the season based on where negotiations currently stand.
Following the latest breakdown in negotiations between Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association, many players took to social media on Friday in a showing of unity against the owners and their request for federal mediation.
Two Boston Red Sox pitchers were among those to chime in, including Matt Barnes and Nick Pivetta, as the chances of the 2022 season starting on time -- Opening Day is scheduled for March 31 -- begin to dwindle.
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SIGN UP HERE MLB had requested help in negotiations on Thursday from the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, according to ESPN, under the premise that it could speed up the process of stalled talks between the two sides.
"We don't think it speeds up the process at all," former Red Sox reliever Andrew Miller told ESPN. "History tells us in our sport, it hasn't been favorable to reaching a deal. Our position is that it is quite the opposite from negotiating and being ready to negotiate."
Pivetta retweeted many of his fellow players who'd used the hashtag #AtTheTable, as they come together in hopes of reaching a solution.
What exactly are the players seeking in negotiations?
"We want a system where threshold and penalties don’t function as caps, allows younger players to realize more of their market value, makes service time manipulation a thing of the past, and eliminate tanking as a winning strategy," New York Mets pitcher Max Scherzer said on Twitter.