The lockout

Emma Arnold, Sports Writer

On December 2, 2021, a Major League Baseball lockout began. With no progress being made, spring training games were postponed through at least March 5. What is a lockout? In the area of the Major Leagues, a lockout is a type of work stoppage used by the owners of a business during a labor dispute. What does it mean for the Major League players? There are no trades during the lockout period along with players being barred from using team facilities during the lockout. The league was set to start camps with the arrival of pitchers and catchers on February 15, 2022. This did not happen, as the MLB lockout is ongoing. The MLB organization released a statement on February 26 following the announcement of the lockout. “We regret that, without a collective bargaining agreement in place, we must postpone the start of Spring Training games until no earlier than Saturday, March 5th. All 30 Clubs are unified in their strong desire to bring players back to the field and fans back to the stands,” the organization said. In the next few weeks, the Major Leagues will start to finalize their decision. If MLB wants to start spring training in mid-February as planned, the specific sides need a deal by the end of the first week of March at the latest. The lockout has led some fans to wonder if they should be concerned about the upcoming MLB season. If there is not a deal by the end of February, MLB games being or lost becomes real. That is when spectators should start to worry about whether they will be able to watch their favorite player. Brody Hoffman, a junior who was a part of the Saints baseball team that placed third at state, mentioned his thoughts about the lockout. “The lockout is a terrible thing because players aren’t allowed to play and people don’t get to watch any baseball,” Hoffman said. “I think it will impact them a lot if they don’t get to play right away and they may even consider not playing baseball anymore if this continues.” The MLB.TV has around 3.5million subscribers watching their baseball teams on television and over 20,000 attending the games. Some are concerned about what will happen if there is no MLB season. Certain critics believe fans could react out of anger and cancel their MLB subscriptions by March 1. Dan Halter, Xavier Varsity Baseball Head Coach, agrees that this may be harmful for the future of baseball. “It’s a bad deal all around for baseball. It’s frustrating that there hasn’t been a real ‘sense of urgency’ from the players association or owners to figure out a way to get this resolved,” Halter said. “It will be bad for the game if they can’t get together to make sure they don’t miss any regular season games.” As the lockout continues, the fate of the MLB is still questionable.