MLB Players Association executive director Tony Clark doubled down on his opposition to a salary cap on Tuesday, saying during All-Star festivities in Atlanta that such a change to the game’s economic structure would move the game “backward.”
Both Clark and commissioner Rob Manfred addressed several topics with members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America before Tuesday’s All-Star Game. Manfred is reportedly pushing for a salary cap in the next collective bargaining agreement, calling for more competitive balance around the league.
Clark and the players’ union, meanwhile, remain vehemently against it.
“(The owners) obviously have their interests, and those interests aren’t much different from the interests they’ve had for the last three, four, five decades at this point,” Clark said, according to Sports Business Journal. “Whereas the game is in a great place — the game appears to be growing and moving in the right direction, with more attendance that we’ve had in a long time — and more people are watching and streaming the games than we’ve ever had before.
“You would think there would be an opportunity to talk about how to build rather than how to go backward. What the interests are that they have is taking the game backward.”
Clark even went as far to say that the concept of a salary cap could be considered “institutional collusion.”
“A cap is not about a partnership. A cap is not about growing the game,” Clark said on Tuesday. “That’s not what a cap is about. As has been offered publicly, a cap is about franchise values and profits. That’s what a cap is about. If there are ways that we need to improve the existing system to polish some of the rough edges that otherwise exist, we have made proposals to do that. We will continue to make proposals to do that, and believe that that’s the best way to go.”
The current MLB collective bargaining agreement is set to expire on Dec. 1, 2026, at 11:59 p.m. EST. If owners and the players’ union can’t come to an agreement, a lockout could potentially delay the 2027 season.
