It wasn’t clear why, after months and months, the two sides had to resort to this high-wire act to settle. What was clear, though, was that in the end fear trumped Fehr, as in Donald Fehr, the union’s indomitable chief. The players were acutely aware that a walkout, with the nation’s economy stuttering and its 9-11 grieving about to be reengaged, would have unleashed unprecedented wrath from fans. If they had any remaining doubts as what might have rained down upon them, they might have been dispelled by the ugly atmosphere at last night’s game in Anaheim, Calif., which would have been baseball’s swan song had the players walked off the job today. The fans there tossed expletives and balls, both beachballs and baseballs, at their own hometown Angels. Angels starting pitcher Kevin Appier was remarkably conciliatory, despite nearly being hit by a baseball thrown from the upper deck. “They got a little rowdy, but I kind of understand it,” he said.
They seemed to understand it across the country in New York, as well. Both sides, said National League players’ rep Tom Glavine, “had too much to lose if we didn’t get a deal done.” Fehr and baseball commissioner Bud Selig both looked exhausted and completely drained by what Selig termed “an historic agreement.” “This was a day that many people never believed would happen,” he said. Selig may have been one of them. All along he has preached that those who don’t remember history are condemned to repeat it. But baseball appeared the unhappy exception, where even those who remember history in excruciating detail-five strikes and three lockouts, including the walkout that forced cancellation of the 1994 World Series-are doomed to repeat it anyway.
Indeed baseball has been sports’ most uncivil war. Its emotional terrain in recent years had begun to resemble that of the West Bank, with deep-seated hatreds and historical grievances jeopardizing any chance of a meaningful peace pact. Selig, whose presence almost anywhere–from a funeral to a celebration–can prompt a cascade of boos, says there is no way to hide baseball’s “40 years of the worst labor history.” But in a recent interview, Selig told NEWSWEEK that at a certain point, ‘You can’t go on blaming what happened in the ’60s and ’70s and ’80s. To go back and revisit Marvin [Miller] and Bowie [Kuhn], none of that is helpful. We didn’t address our problems back then. So the problems got harder and now require a more significant solution."
Whether or not baseball forged the ultimate solution to its myriad problems this time around, it certainly qualifies as a “more significant” solution than the status quo agreements of the past. Both Fehr and Selig treaded very carefully on the sensibilities of their constituencies and refused to discuss the deal in terms of “winners and losers.” “This agreement, in my judgment, is in the best interest of the game,” insisted the commissioner. “The thing that makes me the happiest is that we can now once again turn our complete attention to the field.”
But first there will be a whole lot of attention paid to parsing this new contract. After years of being spanked by a union that never budged, certainly not backward, and that played errorless hardball in court to boot, management appears finally to have scored a decisive triumph. The deal strikes at what owners believe is the game’s inherent competitive imbalance, boosting the revenue-sharing obligation of wealthier teams as well as the luxury tax imposed on the highest payrolls. The owners also gained a first-ever concession on drugs, implementing random testing for steroids, the drug that has cast a shadow over the game’s record books. Asked what the players got in return, Atlanta Braves veteran B. J. Surhoff, a member of the union negotiating committee, retorted: “How do we benefit, other than not going on strike? Isn’t that a pretty good quid pro quo right there?” For sure the fans think so.
