Strike Deadline Extended!

[Danmel]

According to a report I just heard on WCBS Radio, the strike deadline was extended into Friday afternoon. Maybe they are getting close and new a few more hours to hammer out the final details...let's keep our fingers crossed here !!

[Bub]

I thought the window went from midnight to 1:00 PM tomorrow anyway? Sounds promising though.

[silverdsl]

I thought the deadline went until 3:20 tomorrow afternoon. How much later did they extend it?

-Deborah

[NYYFAN]

I believe that was the deadline anyway. Nothing is being reported anywhere about an extention...

[Chris]

The only reason it went to 3:20 is because that's the start time for the first game of the day, I'm guessing that if it was extended beyond that it was extended to allow the afternoon games or maybe all the games to be played

[patrick.o]

I'm pretty sure the strike date was 12:01 Friday morning and that Chris is correct about why some people were saying 3:20.

This is great news. Deeadlines don't get extended if there is no hope of getting a deal done.....Please baseball gods, make them play.

[yankeesrule2000]

Sounds like good news, let's Get A deal done !!!

[Danmel]

As I understood it the deadline was midnight tonite. WCBS radio announced that the deadline was extended into tomorrow afternoon. That was all that I heard. It is not on their website, but it would seem to indicate that they are close because Stanton said there would be no extensions. Let's hope they demonstrate some common sense and work this thing out today.

[Zzyzx]

That's the impression I got when I heard this announced this morning. The deadline is a bit before the first game starts, not midnight, but I don't think it was changed as much as they didn't want to think about the details until right about now.

[jroll]

This could be very signficant if it's as reported here. As I understand it a lot of teams who have today off and need to travel for Friday's games have pushed back the flights until Friday morning. If the union says the deadline is now mid-afternoon Friday, it is in effect telling the teams, including its player-members to go ahead and travel. It's a least a sign that they think they're close and may only need a little more time to work out minor details.

[Chris]

I'm not sure it's worth anything or not but I just walked over and asked some of the media if they'd heard anything about it and they all said no.
Steve Fehr also just returned to the MLB offices and he had nothing to say about it.

[Carissa]

08/29/2002 2:29 pm ET
Talks continue as deadline looms
By Barry Bloom / MLB.com
http://yankees.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/mlb/news/mlb_news.jsp?ymd=20020829&content_id=116409&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp


NEW YORK -- Labor negotiators for Major League Baseball and the players association met for nearly two hours Thursday morning in an attempt to settle their final differences on a new collective bargaining agreement with a possible strike pending at about 1 p.m. ET on Friday.
It was the fifth meeting in less than 24 hours. A subsequent early afternoon meeting had yet to materialize.

The sides met up until midnight Wednesday and are believed to have narrowed gaps on the core economic issues of revenue sharing and the competitive balance tax. The key compromise seemed to be the owners accepting the union's concept of a phase-in on revenue sharing over four years, while the players agreed to the tax in the fourth year of the agreement.

The sides were still negotiating the amount of locally generated revenue to be shared over the four years, plus the tax thresholds and percentages. In the union's last proposal of a $120 million threshold for 2003, only the New York Yankees and Texas Rangers would be affected. In the owners' last proposal of $112 million in the first year, four other teams -- Los Angeles, Boston, the New York Mets and Arizona -- would also have to pay a tax, although the burden on each of those teams would be modest.

The players are reportedly seeking threshold increases to $130 million in 2004, $140 million in 2005 and $150 million in 2006 while the owners want to remain at the $112 million level for at least the first two years of the contract.

Atlanta pitcher Tom Glavine, the National League's player representative, was scheduled to fly to New York after pitching in Pittsburgh on Thursday to take part in any last-minute negotiations.

Mark Loretta, a Brewers infielder and a member of the union's executive board, said for the first time Thursday that the strike deadline could be extended past 3:20 p.m. ET, the scheduled first pitch of the first game Friday at Wrigley Field. Emphasizing that the executive board had not formally discussed that contingency, Loretta said they would have to if sides seemed close to a deal in the final hours.

"I think that would have to be a decision at the last minute," he said. "It could happen. Anything is possible at this point."

Spokesmen for both MLB and the union said neither side would comment until much later Thursday and that negotiations could very well last all night as baseball tries for the first time in its labor history to negotiate a deal without a work stoppage. The first eight resulted in five strikes and three lockouts.

On the eve of the last strike, which began on Aug. 12, 1994, lasted 232 days and cost 921 games, plus the playoffs and World Series, there were no active negotiations.


Barry M. Bloom is a regular contributor to MLB.com. He can be reached at barry.bloom@mlb.com. Adam McCalvy of MLB.com contributed to this article, which was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or any of its clubs.

[Sixty one]

Extending the deadline could only mean that they are very close to a settlement and need the extra time to make sure that the lawyers can study all the fine print and make sure that everything is in order before it can be offically announced. At least that's what I hope an extension means!!

[DiMaggio5CF]

Originally posted by Sixty one
Extending the deadline could only mean that they are very close to a settlement and need the extra time to make sure that the lawyers can study all the fine print and make sure that everything is in order before it can be offically announced. At least that's what I hope an extension means!!

Or it could meant that they haven't worked out a deal yet, and the feel like they'll need extra time to do so because the way things are going, it doesn't look like they'll work anything out by the scheduled deadline.

[silverdsl]

Based on the article Carissa posted the strike deadline has not been extended. Rather the union would consider extending it if they were close to a deal.

-Deborah

[b-ball-lunachick]

Originally posted by silverdsl
Based on the article Carissa posted the strike deadline has not been extended.

I think you're right Deborah...I had read in one of the 50 articles this morning that while the real deadline was at the first pitch of the Cubs/Cardinals game, it was technically around 10am I think -- which was the time the doors would open at Wrigley -- they don't want to have all the fans show up for a game that would be called at game time...

that would be in especially bad taste since it was those two teams that had met at Wrigley earlier this year when they called the game for Darryl Kile's shocking death...

[jroll]

I've read a bunch of stories now and I haven't seen anyone reporting any extension of the deadline. Sounds like wishful thinking on someone's part.

[Me]

Stanton just said they won't extend the deadline.

[NYYRules#1]

Hopefully they do extend it, although it sounds like they won't. :(.