McAdam: Fans will soon have the power to send MLB players and owners a message

Bit by bit, details are emerging for the 2020 MLB season -- health and safety protocols, roster guidelines, tweaks to the rulebook and everything associated with returning the game to the field.

As contentious as the negotiations were for the previous three months, resulting in an implemented schedule rather than a negotiated settlement, even the players and owners seem to have made nice.

"As an organization, we were 100 percent and are 100 percent committed to playing,'' said Red Sox president and CEO Sam Kennedy earlier this week, "and wanted to play and get back on the field as soon as possible.''

At the same time, Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom reported the Red Sox expect 100 percent participation from their roster -- that is, they've received no word than any players intending to opt-out of the 2020 season.

In the big picture, there might be some lingering ill-will between owners and players, and that undoubtedly will manifest itself in 2021 when a new CBA will have to be negotiated. There's more ugliness ahead. But for now, on a more micro level, the Red Sox are not a divided house. Though the 60-game season may not be perfect, both sides are willing -- maybe even eager -- to get back to work.

So the principals have agreed to work together for the time being.

But what about fans? Chances are, they're not as magnanimous. By whatever measure you choose -- social media, sport talk radio, comments from BSJ subscribers, or just anecdotally -- there is widespread anger if not outright disgust from fans.

Some are livid with both owners and players. Some have chosen sides. In the end, however, what's clear is that months of back-and-forth filibusters -- what took place could hardly be accurately labeled negotiations -- have turned off large segments of the game's already shrinking fan base.

At some point, it doesn't matter who's to blame when fans are sufficiently disillusioned.



None of this can be classified as unexpected. In past work stoppages, there's always been short-term fallout. Fans, feeling ignored and disrespected, insisted they would not embrace the game's return. And indeed, attendance figures dipped significantly the last time Major League Baseball lost games.

In 1994, before players struck in July, MLB averaged 31,256 fans. By the time baseball returned, in late April 1995 -- with a World Series sacrificed in the interim -- fans voted with their feet ... and wallets. For the rest of 1995, the average attendance at MLB games had dropped to 25,021. That represented a falloff of 20 percent.

This time around, of course, there are no games or tickets to boycott -- at least not initially. In time, some teams are hopeful of having a limited number of fans in ballparks, depending on guidance from local government and medical officials. Even the Red Sox, as Kennedy noted Wednesday night, have not given up hope of having some fans at games at Fenway later this season.

Until such time, however, games will be consumed from home only, via TV and radio. Fans can express their disappointment by not listening or watching, and I suspect many will.

But even angry fans may be willing to watch out of sheer desperation for live sporting events. For the first few weeks of its resumption, MLB will be alone among the four major North American sports in returning to play. (It could have been a far longer period of exclusivity, but then the two sides needlessly bickered and showed little sense of urgency in their talks -- yet another abject failure.)

Both hardcore baseball fans and casual sports fans are rightly asking: why did the NHL and NBA hatch plans to return and reach agreement with their respective player unions so easily, while baseball fumbled and called names? At this point, the answer (rooted in years of mistrust) is basically irrelevant; what matters is the message sent to fans. And fans will remember that it was baseball which didn't seem to notice -- or care -- that all of this was being done against a backdrop of a pandemic and mass economic misery.

That's the stink that won't go away for baseball — the unmistakable notion that players and owners, at a time of national crisis, was too self-involved to acknowledge the very real-world issues that existed all around it.

That type of behavior isn't about to rewarded anytime soon.

Next season, fans will be able to register their protest by staying away from the ballpark. The resulting downturn in attendance, exacerbated by those too skittish to sit in a ballpark again, could cripple the game economically.

For now, all baseball fans have at their disposal as a means of protest is a remote control device. The TV ratings will reflect the fans' apathy and send an ominous message to both sides. To wit: while fans can survive without baseball, the opposite is not true.