BASEBALL STRIKE REPORT : No Talks Are Expected Until at Least End of Week, Ravitch Says

Day 5 of the strike by major league baseball players passed uneventfully Tuesday. There was no communication between negotiators and no meetings were scheduled, although the owners’ negotiator, Richard Ravitch, said he expected to resume talks with Donald Fehr, executive director of the players union, by the end of the week.

Fehr spent Monday and Tuesday in Washington, trying to re-interest Congress in a bill that would remove baseball’s antitrust exemption.

Ravitch, meanwhile, said the owners do not intend to resume the schedule by bringing up minor leaguers as replacements for the striking players.

“There has been no serious thought given to that,” he said.

In Boston, John Harrington, owner of the Red Sox, said at a news conference that if the rest of the season is wiped out, along with the playoffs, the Red Sox will lose $14 million rather than make $1 million. He said it would be the club’s first loss since the early ‘80s.