MLB: How to Fix Baseball’s Modern Day Reserve Clause

Service time manipulation is just the new reserve clause. No one looks good when it’s employed which is why It’s time to change that and make MLB better.

Service time manipulation in MLB is a joke…Ok, that sentence isn’t really true, at all. It isn’t a joke to the players who are the subject of it, it isn’t a joke to the managers who don’t have their best players on the field, and it isn’t a joke to the fans whose teams are consciously not fielding the best players.

Fortunately, I have a solution.

But first, the players. Service time manipulation is simply a continuation of the reserve clause. Teams view players as property, and they want to own their property as long as possible. As long as service time is an issue, then the reserve clause will have never really gone away in MLB.

As for the managers, they have to win to keep their jobs. Art Howe, quoted by Jeff Miller in the Chicago Tribune, said, “The bottom line is always the players. If they execute, you look smart. If they don’t, you look stupid.”

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Managers need their players to execute. And for that to happen, they need their best players.

If the 20+ games played in April without a team’s best players lead to a manager missing the playoffs, they could be fired. Now, if a manager can’t rally his team down the stretch, that’s another matter. Winning in September and October is really what matters.

And now we get to the fans, the ones who pay money to attend games, buy merchandise, watch games and ads on TV, and basically fund teams in every way. Why would a fan attend a game at the beginning of the season when they know the team is holding an “absolute beast” in the minor leagues?

The problem for teams is that fans have more access to minor leaguers than ever before. The league and teams hype prospects on Twitter accounts and much is written about the up-and-comers every year.

Fans know when a team is tanking, or at least manipulating service time for a month or so.

I, personally, would not spend money to go watch a game like that. If I was a Blue Jays fan, I’d stay away from the ballpark until Vlad Jr. is up (although the Jays will most likely get a pass after Vlad’s oblique injury).

The Padres just spent $300 million on Manny Machado and that will be a temporary distraction from the possible minor league demotion for Fernando Tatis Jr.but it doesn’t help club executives that Machado is lobbying for Tatis Jr. to be on the opening day roster.

But for Chicago White Sox fans, there is no injury holding back their next superstar and there is no big-signing free agent to distract them, either.

No, Eloy Jimenez will be held down in the minors, and fans have every right to be angry. There isn’t much for the fans on the South Side to grasp onto this year, and Jimenez will be a primary reason to go to the ballpark—once he gets there.

The thing is, it might not be so noticeable if team executives didn’t draw attention to it every so often, such as Thad Levine of the Minnesota Twin or Ross Atkins of the Toronto Blue Jays. But they do, and here we are.

So what can be done about service time manipulation in MLB?

That’s simple, change the collective bargaining agreement  (CBA) when it expires in December 2021to this: no more service time and no more counting years.

Teams have total control of a player until he reaches age 25½. This could be baseball age, which would be the players’ age on July 1 of a season, or, as I propose, at the beginning of the season, Opening Day—teams would like Opening Day more because they’d be able to hold onto the group of players whose half-birthday would fall between Opening Day and July 1.

If a player is 25½ on Opening Day, then he will become a free agent the previous offseason. It’s as simple as that. It doesn’t matter if the player is in the major or minor leagues. No more suppressing players, no more clamoring from fans, no more awkward gaffes for team executives.

Players would then be free agents in their prime and able to cash in earlier. We wouldn’t have so much talk about a breakdown during free agency with players getting paid earlier, and veterans (hopefully) wouldn’t feel so slighted when teams balk at paying large contracts for players aged 30+.

Yes, there are flaws with this system, but there will always be flaws. Teams will complain that they invest too much time and money into developing players that they don’t get to hold onto for longer. This is true. But it will happen to every team.

The Cardinals will develop player A, who will get picked up by the Twins because he isn’t big-league ready yet. The Twins will develop player B, who will get picked up by the Giants, and so on and so on.

It will solve service time in MLB and it will solve free agency. It will make baseball better for everyone.

Note: Immediately before posting, the Chicago White Sox announced the Eloy Jimenez is being optioned to AAA. Sorry, Sox fans.