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MLB News and Notes: Owners Look At 50 Games

While sports like the NBA and NHL are excitedly welcoming a return to action, Major League Baseball continues to be stuck in a holding pattern as the owners and players struggle to come to an agreement on a return to play. With that in mind, let’s take a look at where the two sides currently stand as well as other news from around the league this week.

League Could Consider A 50-Game Season

Commissioner Rob Manfred and Major League Baseball have wanted the owners and the players to come to an agreement in terms of what the 2020 baseball season would look like. Unfortunately, though, as the two remain at a standstill, Manfred could take matters into his own hands.

Back in March, the two sides agreed to prorated pay for the players in the case of a shortened season. The agreement also gives Manfred some leeway in deciding how long or short a potential season could be.

With the two sides unable to reach an agreement and with owners concerned about the money they could lose with no fans in attendance, it appears that the league and Manfred could be considering a shortened season in the neighborhood of about 50 games prior to a postseason.

Under this scenario, the players would get their full prorated money but would still sacrifice over 2/3 of their contracts due to the shortened season.

This is certainly not appealing to the players, who had proposed a season of approximately 114 games at the prorated deal, only to have it shot down by the owners.

This could certainly be bad for baseball as a shortened season does not always allow for the ups and downs for a ballclub’s season. For instance, the Washington Nationals, who won the World Series last year, were just 19-31 after 50 games.

Obviously, there are still a lot of hurdles that need to be jumped through, but as it stands, there are more uncertainties as to whether a season will be played in 2020 than ever before.

If There Is A Season, Archer Will Be Out For It

While most of baseball waits to see if a season can be played, one player already knows he won’t be playing in 2020. Chris Archer of the Pittsburgh Pirates will be out for any potential season as he had surgery to deal with issues he was having related to thoracic outlet syndrome.

Some have already speculated that this could end his disappointing tenure with the Pirates. While the club holds an $11 million club option for 2021, they very well could decline his option given his poor performance thus far with the club.

Last season, with the Pirates, Archer went 3-9 in 23 starts with a 5.19 ERA, 1.41 WHIP, and struck out 143 in 119 2/3 innings.

The Pirates thought they were getting an ace in Archer when they traded Tyler Glasnow, Austin Meadows, and Shane Baz to the Rays in exchange, but that deal looks atrocious for the Pirates now. If this is the end of the road for Archer in Pittsburgh, it will undoubtedly go down as one of the worst trades for the franchise in recent history.

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