Blake Snell Preparing to Sit Out 2020 Season
Owners approved a potential plan to return to play in major league baseball earlier this week with an 82-game schedule with limited travel and teams playing home games in their own parks. There are some stumbling blocks to get everything worked out and getting teams back on the field with one of the biggest ones being centered around revenue sharing. The owners and the players association worked out a deal to front $170 million of salaries to cover April and May for players, giving them some financial structure to work with in the early part of this pause. There is a ton of pushback about further salary reductions and the 50/50 revenue split that has come from the owners’ proposal.
Earlier this week, Tampa Bay Rays pitcher and former AL Cy Young winner Blake Snell made some strong comments on his Twitch stream about his plans for the 2020 season. For the record, those plans are simple: to not play at all and look forward to the 2021 campaign. What’s the driving force behind his tirade and his decision? Well, of course, it comes down to money and the fact that Snell wants what he’s owed according to the terms of his contract. In his tirade on Twitch, Snell had the following to say about the situation:
"Y'all gotta understand, man, for me to go -- for me to take a pay cut is not happening, because the risk is through the roof. It's a shorter season, less pay. No, I gotta get my money. I'm not playing unless I get mine, OK? And that's just the way it is for me. Like, I'm sorry you guys think differently, but the risk is way the hell higher and the amount of money I'm making is way lower. Why would I think about doing that?"
Snell was slated to make $7 million in the second year of a five-year, $50 million deal that he signed before last season. He said that he loves baseball but he wasn’t going to play if it meant that he was going to see his salary chopped, sliced and diced like a julienne salad. His rant went on to say: "Bro, I'm risking my life. What do you mean it should not be a thing? It should 100% be a thing. If I'm gonna play, I should be getting the money I signed to be getting paid. I should not be getting half of what I'm getting paid because the season's cut in half, on top of a 33% cut of the half that's already there -- so I'm really getting, like, 25%. On top of that, it's getting taxed. So imagine how much I'm actually making to play, you know what I'm saying?"
While it’s understandable that Snell is upset about the financial situation that he and other players are facing in this unprecedented situation, he needs to think before he speaks. Even 25 percent of his salary is still $1.75 million, which is far more than the average American sees in an average year. Everyone has had to make sacrifices and deal with unfavorable situations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sure, he’d be losing money but his argument about being on lockdown and away from his family is something that had been talked about by the owners. Teams would be playing in their home parks, which would reduce or eliminate players being quarantined away from their families. With Florida open for business regarding all sports now, there’s little reason why that part of the argument would have validity at this stage. It basically makes Snell out to be a petulant child and someone driven solely by avarice as opposed to love of the game.
One has to wait and see how things unfold and whether the players hammer out an agreement to return to action this season. At that point, we’ll see if Snell is solely about the money or if he’ll actually take the field and try to help the Rays chase a World Series title in this shortened season.