Can Baseball Solve Major Problems in Offseason? : Free-Agent Compensation System, Salary Arbitration and Labor Wars Are Woes Facing Major League Team Executives and Agents for Players

Baseball’s playoffs have only just begun. But after a year of unending turmoil, it is apropos for this distressed game that we be more focused on what will happen after the season.

It is unlikely an offseason has ever been looked to with greater fear, loathing and morbid curiosity.

Here are some of the reasons for apprehension:

Free agents: Everyone knows about the long list of glittering names that could be available in the open market. But as interesting as it will be to see where megastars such as Barry Bonds, Kirby Puckett, Greg Maddux and Doug Drabek wind up, it will be just as fascinating to see what happens to the approximately 150 other potential free agents.

Club executives and player agents predict this could be a watershed winter. With uncertainty surrounding future TV revenue, bloated payrolls, and many clubs claiming large financial losses, there is a growing consensus that after the top 10 or so stars, the rest of the free agents will have difficulty matching their present salaries or, in many cases, even finding jobs.

What this means is that for the first time in baseball’s free-agent era, the market will create less demand at the current price scale.

If the marketplace is free of any hint of collusion, agents and their players have to accept the law of the free-market system. When General Motors, for instance, produces 14 million cars and sells only eight million, prices drop.

It’s called supply and demand, something college students learn in Economics 101. However, this generation of baseball players has never learned the existence of such a theory. They might learn this winter.

Salary arbitration: The process by which players compare their salary demands with others and argue the merits of their numbers against someone making far more money to an arbitrator--and getting that raise in most cases--has been the owners’ biggest headache. However, it might finally be dawning on some clubs that there is a more intelligent way to deal with it.

Look for clubs to try the strategy employed in recent years by the Chicago White Sox and Cleveland Indians. Those clubs have signed some of their top arbitration-eligible players to multi-year contracts, in effect buying some of the players’ arbitration years. The player receives a long-term guarantee as a hedge against injuries or off-seasons. Meanwhile, the clubs build more predictability into their future payrolls, something arbitration largely prevents.

This year, a lot of clubs will avoid arbitration altogether with many players otherwise eligible. How? They will likely approach second-echelon players in early December with a choice--accept a contract offer now or you will not be tendered a contract by the December 19 deadline, making you a free agent. Given the marketplace, players in that position might be advised to take an offer if it comes or risk being replaced by a minimum-salary player from the minors.

Though the Players Association might howl, all this is completely legal and good business, again something with which this generation of players has no experience.

Labor wars: The Players Association and much of the media keep feeding the notion that the game “will be shut down” next year.

Though there are some hard-line owners who are in favor of such harsh remedies, there is a growing number of clubs that believe the game is in serious trouble in the public eye, and shutting down the game now could cause irreparable damage.

Sources throughout baseball say the growing likelihood is that the owners will reopen the Basic Agreement but use the threat of a lockout only as a bargaining chip.

A reopener would allow talks to begin--with the present system in place--more than a year before the real deadline, because the Basic Agreement does not expire until the spring of 1994. With that extra time, the housekeeping chores could easily be negotiated so that much more time can be spent trying to reach a consensus on the major issues historically negotiated with a gun pointed at both sides.

It would allow the time for the owners to complete the restructuring and choosing of a new commissioner.

It would allow time for the owners’ realignment committee to get a consensus on likely possibilities such as a three-division system, an extra round of playoffs, a slightly shortened regular season, the addition of two more teams to create six five-team divisions and eventually some interleague play.

It would allow the time for the television networks to be finalized, giving the clubs an idea of their future revenue before finalizing any labor deal.

It would allow the Colorado Rockies and Florida Marlins time to begin their first seasons without the cloud of a work stoppage.

Such strategy makes so much sense it’s hard to believe baseball is actually considering it.

There is talk that some owners are considering the possibility of dropping the free-agent compensation system, which awards amateur draft choices to teams losing free agents.

By eliminating that system, the clubs would be better able to change the amateur draft and thus control the ludicrous sums of money being given to unproven draft choices. The clubs’ attempt to change the system last June was struck down by an arbitrator because of its potential effect on the free-agent system. Because the value of draft choices might be changed, the value of compensation might be changed, That would also change the value of compensation.

It does not make sense for clubs to give $500,000 signing bonuses to draft picks who might never make the majors and then eliminate instructional league teams, farm clubs and scouts in order to save money.

Around the bases: Look for the Cardinals to make a serious attempt to sign Ozzie Smith this month. Never mind the public relations benefit of keeping the popular Wizard. St. Louis, which should be a contender next season, cannot afford to lose a shortstop who hits close to .300, steals 40 bases and remains an artist in the field. . . . Free-agent update: Boston likely will show interest in reliever Todd Worrell and could make a strong pitch at Mark McGwire or Kirby Puckett. Atlanta should be in the Barry Bonds chase. Philadelphia, looking for a starting pitcher, is pushing for left-hander Greg Swindell. The Yankees likely will sign David Cone. The White Sox could make a big attempt to sign Greg Maddux. Look for the Cubs to make a pitch for Bonds and Doug Drabek, who would like to stay in Pittsburgh if the Pirates can make an offer roughly in the same ballpark as what the open market will generate. . . . Rene Lachemann, an A’s coach who briefly managed the Mariners and Brewers, has emerged as one of the top choices of Colorado and Florida, though the expansion teams cannot talk to him until after the A’s season is over. . . . One of the more interesting clubs to watch in the new Arizona Winter League is the Grand Canyon Rafters. They feature three of the top outfield prospects in baseball--Atlanta’s Mike Kelly, Montreal’s Rondell White and the White Sox’s Shawn Jeter. . . . The Orioles would be making a mistake by standing pat, expecting to improve because, say, Cal Ripken has to have a better year in ’93. Baltimore fell out of the race during a 22-game stretch in September in which it never scored more than four runs. The Orioles, who could use some additional punch, attempted to trade for Andre Dawson in August and could try to reopen those negotiations, although there has been some indication Dawson might wind up with the Florida Marlins. . . . If the Rangers do not go after Toronto free-agent reliever Tom Henke, they likely will try to sign Jeff Russell, who has a new home in the Arlington area. However, Russell, who went to Oakland in the Jose Canseco deal but will be a free agent, has a cranky elbow.