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NEW YORK -- Excerpts from strike instructions sent to teams
Monday by the commissioner's office, as obtained by The Associated
Press:
The clubs are not required to finance a strike themselves. You
have the right, unless you have agreed otherwise in guarantee
language, to discontinue paying the players on your active roster
beginning on Aug. 30. ...
Players have no right to accrue service credit during a strike.
In the past, the clubs agreed to give players lost service credit
in back-to-work agreements with the MLBPA. Whether the clubs would
agree to that again is a bargaining decision. ...
Are clubs required to continue special privileges such as sale
of equipment to players, shipment of personal or family gear, use
of club automobiles, etc.? No. These special privileges are a form of compensation that
should not be provided during the strike unless there is a
contractual understanding between the club and the player to the
contrary.
Clubs should be careful, however, not say anything to players
that could be interpreted as a commitment to providing special
privileges. For example, if a club tells a recently acquired player
that the club will provide housing for the player for the next
three months, the club may have a duty to provide such housing
regardless of the strike. ...
Are clubs required to continue to pay termination pay during a
strike? Yes. Once a player is terminated, the club has an obligation to
pay the remaining guaranteed ... portion of the contract. A strike
does not relieve, even temporarily, a club from this obligation.
...
Once the players strike on Aug. 30, all payments of meal money,
allowances, etc., should be terminated immediately. If your club
will be on the road on Aug. 29, you should give players meal and
other allowances only up through Aug. 29. Further, you have no
obligation to provide players with transportation home from a road
trip. You may inform them that they are responsible for their own
transportation home. To the extent players request assistance in
making their personal travel arrangements on Aug. 30, clubs are
permitted to accommodate such requests. ...
No equipment should be furnished to players for workouts or
exercise. ...
No training, exercise or club facilities should be provided or
arranged by the clubs. Moreover, workouts with minor league clubs
should be prohibited. If a club makes its facilities available to
players during the strike, it could incur workers' compensation or
some other liability of a player is injured during a workout. ...
Each club should make arrangement for reasonable access for
players to come into the clubhouse and remove their personal items.
Players who do not arrange to have their personal items removed
from the clubhouse during this time should not be given access to
them until the strike is over. ...
Must clubs continue to provide medical treatment to players on
the disabled list? Yes. ... players sustaining injuries in the
course of their employment are entitled to reasonable medical and
hospital expenses for up to two years from the date of their
initial treatment. ...
Injured players may exercise their right to strike by refusing
to report to rehabilitation assignments to medical treatments...
If a major league player on a rehabilitation assignment wants to
continue his assignment during the strike, is the club obligated to
let him? No. Clubs should inform such players that their rehabilitation
assignments are over and that they are not to report to the minor
league club once the strike begins. ...
If a player wants to continue to use the club's rehabilitation
facilities for medical treatment, the club may let him. They player
should not, however, be permitted to work out outside of any
rehabilitation program prescribed and monitored by the club's
doctor and/or trainer. ...
If the club's active roster is at 25, a roster move would need
to be made if the disabled player is restored to the active roster
before Aug. 31. At least initially, rosters will not be frozen
during the strike ...
Can the union direct option players to strike? Yes. All 40-man roster players are in the MLBPA bargaining unit.
That means that the MLBPA could direct the option players, as
members of the bargaining unit, to honor its strike. The union has
not done so in the past, however, and it is not likely to do so
this time. ...
Must clubs continue to pay option players after the close of the
minor league season? No. If the strike has not been settled yet, clubs could recall
their option players at the close of their minor league season
(including any postseason) with instructions that they report to
the major league club and then stop paying them. If the strike ends
before the end of the season, however, clubs doing this could have
to pay those players at the major league level for the remainder of
the major league season. ...
Roster will not immediately be frozen. Unless and until you
receive contrary instructions from the office of the commissioner,
the 25-man and 40-man rosters will operate as usual during the
strike. ...
May a club assign a player to a minor league affiliate in
anticipation of the strike? The clubs should make assignment decisions based on the same
baseball consideration that drive such decisions in years not
affected by a potential strike. ...
Each club should, in consultation with its local counsel,
examine all of its contractual obligations, including agreements
with other unions, employment contracts, leases, etc. to determine
what cost-saving measures may be taken during the strike. All
operations should be carefully reviewed with an eye toward reducing
overhead costs during the strike.
Some manager, coaches, trainers and scouts have contracts that
provide that they can only be terminated for cause. Such an
employee cannot be terminated for lack of work during the strike.
If you decide to terminate the contract of an employee who does not
have this provision, you should understand that he will be free to
sign with another club. Further, the commissioner has the authority
to suspend Uniform Employee Contracts when there is a players'
strike. No decision has been made regarding the exercise of this
authority in the event of a strike. ...
Are clubs responsible for what managers and coaches, etc., say
to players? What guidelines should the clubs give those managers,
trainers, etc., for communicating with striking players?
Statements by supervisory personnel could be used by the MLBPA
to support unfair labor practice charges. All management personnel,
including field personnel, not specifically designated by the
office of the commissioner to speak on labor matters should be
instructed not to discuss with players or agents the strike or the
parties' respective negotiating positions. The office of the
commissioner will provide more detailed guidelines with respect to
club officials' communications with players, press and others in
the near future. ...
Club personnel should be prohibited from supervising or
participating in a workout organized by the players. ...
The clubs do not have a contractual right to require option
players to play in the Arizona Fall League during a strike.
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