State of the Union - the MLBPA that is.

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Every website, newspaper, and media outlet has been full of articles on steroids. This one is no different. I’ve been warning about the infiltration of steroids and other illegal substances into the game but it wasn’t until the revelations about Giambi, Bonds and Sheffield that the fans understood how bad it really has been. The outrage of the fans is not the story though. It’s about the outrage of the players.

Something unprecedented has happened - something that will transform the game forever. Instead of the Players Union telling the players how things are going to be done, the players have told the union what needs to be done. For a change the horse is pulling the cart, instead of the cart pulling the horse. Things are in the correct balance. The players told the union in no uncertain terms that the status quo was not acceptable and that baseball needed a new drug policy.

For years Donald Fehr and Gene Orza have dictated the policies that the players have lived by, and that included a code of silence when it came to the truth about baseballs’ drug problems. Despite the deaths of minor leaguer Steve Bechler last season and the recent passing of admitted user and former MVP Ken Caminiti, union leaders refused to budge. The innocent were told to shut up, not talk about steroids, and never under any circumstances to come forward to take a voluntary drug test. For some reason the players listened to union leaders instead of their heart.

The grand jury testimony leaked by the San Francisco Chronicle changed all that. Many players were as outraged as the fans to hear that the top players in the game have been cheating. The listened to the fans, they listened to their heart, and then they really stepped up to the plate in a way that mattered. Instead of letting the Union leaders dictate what issues should be negotiated and how things would be handled, the players have dictated the terms to the MLBPA leaders. The players told the MLBPA to go back to the negotiating table, to re-open the Collective Bargaining Agreement and to work out a real drug policy.

That’s something which just days ago Fehr and Orza had fought against. Vowing that the current policy would work if just given time. The policy is a joke, a bad joke, and the players finally have recognized that. What’s remarkable is that it is not pressure from Washington, or pressure from the fans that are motivating the players. All the fan and political pressure has landed on the union and MLB. Now the peasants.. er.. I mean players have revolted against their elected union leaders.

Donald Fehr and company has treated the players as puppets for too long. Like many union leaders they’ve never ever approached a bargaining table willing to give up anything, because somehow they thought it would give ownership the upper hand. Because of that they’ve been blinded to the fact that some things are good for the players, good for baseball, good for the health of the sport and would only help their members. A drug policy should never have been tied to concessions from owners.

The players have just realized that and this may open their eyes to a lot of issues and make them doubt the wisdom of following union membership blindly. Unions have always done a lot of good for workers in almost all industries, but a union like an owner needs to be reasonable not just adversarial and they need to look out for their members. When a union becomes too adversarial it loses sight of it’s industry and becomes more akin to a terrorist organization by weakening the infrastructure that supports both the workers and the owners. Before that analogy upsets you, think about it. Would you prefer to work with someone who threatens you? Fights you on every issue? Sabotages your work? Or tries to work with you towards a mutually beneficial goal? I think we’d all agree that the last of those options is the best.

But that goes both ways. Management must take a similar approach. For too long MLB and the MLBPA have been at each other’s throats. Both sides have been forced to take a hard line, because the other did. When one side has tried to retrench in a more peaceable manner they have been met with anger and an intractable adversarial opponent on the other side of the fence.

The heads of the MLBPA have been the main culprits here. The old days are dead and gone. The players will never again be exploited with less than living wages, conditions and equipment provided are superb as is the medical care that every player gets. Yes there were years of exploitation, but not by the current owners, and the Union needs to recognize this.

No player is being cheated. Even the minimum MLB Salary is 75% of what the President of the United States is paid. If the players feel they deserve a bigger part of the pie that can be negotiated - but the health of the players and the health of the game should never be negotiable. Drug policy is on the table and being negotiated now, the only question is if this is going to be a real policy comparable to Olympic standards with real punishment and drug treatment options, or if once again if the Union pushes through another policy better greeted with laughter than applause.

In its approach to drug testing and keeping the game honest the Union up until now has betrayed its members. It can make partial amends by doing the right thing now, by pushing the policy that everyone wants, or it can sabotage the players and fans once again. This scandal has hurt the game, and the drugs which were taken have hurt the players, both the ones who’ll suffer the harmful effects of the drugs they’ve taken, and the ones who earned less because of the salaries paid to the Giambis, Sheffields and Bonds’ who have cheated. The realization of that betrayal and the fact that the Union stood by knowingly and let this go on should weigh heavy on the minds of players, and could lead to a whole new attitude when it comes to labor relations between the players and owners.