Looking for positive news about the baseball strike? Don't look to sports agent Tom Reich.
Reich, president of Reich & Reich Hockey and Reich, Katz & Reich Baseball, agencies that represent professional hockey and baseball players, spoke to a group of about 50 students at the Duke Law School Friday afternoon. Reich's past and present clientele includes hockey stars Mario Lemieux, Chris Chelios, and Paul Coffey, as well as baseball greats Joe Morgan and Tim Raines.
Making only a few speeches each year, Reich took this opportunity to discuss and analyze various topics in sports law and labor disputes, most notably the major league baseball strike that has lasted over a month and now threatens to wipe out the rest of the season and the World Series.
"The thought of it nauseates me to the core," Reich said. "Baseball has been my life since I was six years old. It will be the greatest single disaster in the history of sport."
Working harder and not getting paid because your clients' paychecks are being withheld is a difficult part of the business, Reich said. But as a self-proclaimed, life-long fan, Reich saved his strongest words for the possibility of an October without a World Series.
"I cannot believe how little concern there has been over the loss of the postseason," Reich said. "I cannot believe they are not doing more to ward off the biggest tragedy in American sports.
"If this blows out the season, we're going into uncharted waters. All bets are off and anything can happen."
Reich offered warnings for anyone expecting a resolution to the baseball conflict in the near future, cautioning that the two sides are still very far apart. He expressed severe pessimism about the owners' plans to implement a salary cap, which would limit the total payroll a team could offer its players. The salary cap was what motivated the players to walk out mid-season.
"This is a purely defensive strike by the players," Reich said. "There isn't going to be a cap in baseball, and you can take that to the bank.
"In baseball, a cap would be a disaster. The cap does destroy free agency. Those free agency rights are hard fought for and hard to earn. You can't just legislate them away."
Reich said it takes the average professional baseball player four to five years to reach the major league level, and then another six years to be eligible for free agency. Many players never make it that far. Among those that do, some have a bad year and get released, only to re-sign for less money, Reich said.
Reich used the stalled baseball talks as a teaching tool about the difficulties of making deals. "This is not a simple negotiation over a piece of real estate," Reich said. "When you don't like the people on the other side, it is hard to cut a complicated deal. There's not a penny of goodwill on the table."
Reich said he also felt that the two sides sitting at the table weren't who this battle was really about.
"What this is about more than anything is good management versus bad management," Reich said. "It's big revenue teams versus little revenue teams, letting the [players'] union pay for their own stupidity."
But currently, none of the teams are taking in big revenue, and the players continue to go without paychecks. Reich defended the players' timing of the strike because it offered time for a settlement before the season ends, but said he and his fellow agents needed to do something to generate revenue for themselves and their clients during this period.
"I guarantee you this, we're going all out . . . about providing alternative activity," said Reich, adding that a game between North and South American players was a possiblity. "Use your imagination, because we're using ours."
Reich said he doubted the owners would use their collective imagination to conjure up holding games with minor league players, free agents and strike-breakers as the National Football League did several years ago during a strike by their players.
"I do not believe that they'll try to do that because baseball is so tightly knit," Reich said. "This is the strongest union I've ever seen."
Reich later spoke about labor difficulties in hockey and the problems with the salary cap in professional basketball. In fact, part of Reich's concern about the baseball strike stems from prospects of a simultaneous hockey lockout by the owners before the start of the season in October.
He also explained why he was not involved with professional football and basketball players.
"What goes on in recruiting for those blue chip guys would blow your doors off," Reich said. "I hate that nature of the business, and I'm sorry to say that.
"The hypocrisy in college sports is incredible. It's time to pour water on the sandcastle and start over. It's a huge business. These guys should at least not have to work part time or take money under the table."
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.