Atlantic City Press - May 22, 1980
As the Curtain Falls?
Phils Don’t Knock Opportunity This Time, Tip Reds 9-8
Philadelphia 9, Cincinnati 8
By Harry Hoffman, Press Sports Writer
PHILADELPHIA - It was a helluva way for the baseball season to end.
After blowing an early 7-3 lead, the Philadelphia Phillies came back with two runs in the bottom of the ninth to nip the Cincinnati Reds 9-8 Wednesday night at Veterans Stadium. This despite the player's strike threat at midnight tonight hanging over their heads.
Mike Schmidt started the decisive inning with a bat, legs and bellyflop-slide double off loser Tom Hume, the fourth Redleg pitcher. Schmidt’s hard ground ball exploded past third baseman Ray Knight into the left field corner, and never broke stride until he slid around second baseman Junior Kennedy.
“The Manager (Dallas Green) wants us to play aggressive baseball this season. I just figured it was an aggressive play. (Reds’ left fielder George) Foster doesn’t have the best kind of arm, and I thought I might catch him a bit by surprise," Schmidt said.
Greg Luzinski, who earlier had hit his 11th homer and a single, lined another single to left to score Schmidt with the run that tied it at 8-8.
“Sure, being in this kind of groove, I’ll feel a little frustration if we stop playing,” Luzinski admitted. “But I'm behind what we are doing all the way.
“It might even help me in a couple of years when I can become a free agent. But the main thing is, we must stick together and battle for what we think is right.”
Lonnie Smith ran for Luzinski and went to second as Hume walked pinch-hitter Del Unser. Garry Maddox twice fouled off sacrifice bunt attempts before flying out to right field.
Manny Trillo followed with a line drive toward right field. Dave Collins charged the ball, had it in his glove then dropped it for an error which allowed Smith to score the winning run. Had Collins caught the ball, he would have had an easy double play, with both runners on the move.
Ron Reed, the fourth Philadelphia pitcher, wound up with his second victory in as many decisions. Hume is 3-4.
Two other Phillies, catcher Keith Moreland and shortstop Ramon Aviles, wound up with their first major league home runs. Moreland, starting in place of Bob Boone, followed a two-run homer by Luzinski in the second inning with his solo blast.
Aviles, who started for the ailing Larry Bowa, made it 7-3 with his solo homer in the third.
“A pitcher gets a heart attack when I hit a homer off him," said Aviles, an 11-year veteran of the minor leagues. “I’ve been waiting a long time to get up here. I hope we keep playing. But I know the strike is for the best.”
Phillies’ starting pitcher Larry Christenson had another sub-par outing while giving up six runs on six hits in the first three innings. Knight tripled home three runs in the top of the first. He also contributed another triple and a single to the Reds’ attack.
Three runs figured to be enough for Cincinnati starter Tom Seaver. But Maddox singled home two runs in the bottom of the first, and a bases-loaded walk to Aviles tied it up.
A two-out double by Schmidt and Luzinski’s 11th homer, followed by Moreland’s shot made it 6-3 in the second, and Aviles made it 7-3 with his solo blast in the third.
But John Bench doubled home two Cincy runs in the fourth inning, went to third on a single by Ray Oester and scored as Collins grounded into a force play at second to make it a 7-6 game.
Cincy tied it off southpaw Kevin Saucier in the sixth inning when pinch hitter Rick Auerbach tripled and scored on a double by Kennedy. With Reed pitching in the seventh, the Reds went ahead on a walk to Dan Driessen and Knight’s second triple.
But unlike Tuesday night, when the Phils wasted four homers in a 7-6 loss, they grabbed the victory with a little help from Collins.
Now what happens? No one can be sure until the midnight hour tonight.
Baseball Talks Taking Toll On Representative Boone
Tales of Hoffman by Harry Hoffman
PHILADELPHIA — Bob Boone’s eyes are sunk deep in their sockets. One month into the baseball season and the Phillies’ catcher already has a haggard, run-down look. His batting average also looks sick at .214, and it’s falling.
There is a correlation between Boone's tired appearance and his ailing batting average. He is the National League players’ representative and has been involved in the frustrating negotiations with the owners since day one. Now it is zero hour.
If a basic agreement is not signed bewtween the Players Association and the owners by midnight tonight then the players have voted to go on strike.
Boone would like to be able to bring his teammates some good news from a final negotiating session, set for New York today.
“If we can find a way to avoid a strike, we will. But right now I don’t see how,” Boone said. “The owners want us to keep working on a contract hammered out in 1976.
“They want us to forget about inflation. They want that or they want us to give up the most important thing we gained in the 1976 contract, the right to become free agents after six years in the major leagues.”
What has happened since then, Boone states, is something the owners brought on themselves.
"We the players are not responsible for the huge contracts some of the owners have paid players,” he said. “They (the owners) have gotten into their own bidding wars. Now they want us to bail them out. They want us to make all kinds of concessions in the compensation clause that would take all the bite out of it, and we won’t.”
Boone pointed out when the courts made Andy Messersmith a free agent the players then were in a position to all become free agents whenever they chose.
"We were wise enough to realize that could lead to chaos and perhaps make baseball a travesty,” Boone said. “So we actually agreed, under the leadership of Marvin Miller, to the six-year rule. Thus we made a concession to the owners in the 1976 agreement. Now they want to wipe out all our gains and that is not about to happen even if we must walk out.”
Under the present agreement when a team loses a player through the free agent draft that team inherits a first round draft pick. The owners want it to be a player off the major league roster.
“They want a club to be able to protect only 15 players when what they deem a ‘quality’ player is lost. We might settle tor the 30th player through negotiation,” Boone said.
There are many players, including Larry Bowa, player representative for the Phillies, who believe the owners have banded together in an effort to break the Players Association.
“The owners would like nothing better to see a Pete Rose or a Mike Schmidt show up in the clubhouse the day after the strike. They are gambling this will happen and they will lose,” Bowa said. “Many of us don’t have that much to gain from a strike. But the young guys coming behind us and the young guys already on our club have everything to gain. The veterans did not let us down years ago, and we are not about to let them down.”
Most observers feel if the strike begins at midnight tonight it will last a long time. The owners have taken out strike insurance that doesn't go into effect until after the first 15 days. After that they start collecting insurance money while the players collect nothing .The owners thus feel they can break the backbone of the strike and the Association by just holding out long enough.
“I know a lot of fans think the players are being greedy,” Boone said “They think in terms of all of us making $130,000 or more. They think we should be satisfied with what we get for playing a game.
“But there are a lot more players who earn $30,000 than earn $200,000. There are only a minimum of players who last through six major league seasons. We want our Association to keep moving forward to help the young men coming along. We have been bargaining in good faith. The owners have not. It is as simple as that.”
The two groups have been meeting for months and months with no real movement on the compensation clause. Since the players will not take the field Friday without a basic Agreement it looks as though everyone is going to get what no one wants.
A strike.
Talks Make No Progress, Strike Deadline Is Midnight
NEW YORK (AP) — Deadlocked talks between owners and players in the continuing baseball contract dispute made no progress Wednesday, leaving the two sides about 24 hours away from a threatened strike which would interrupt the l§80 major league season.
The players association offered a new proposal in an effort to settle the dispute, according to Marvin Miller, executive director of the union. “They noted the proposal with no comment,” said Miller. “We did not make progress today.”
Miller described the negotiations as taking place in “a tense atmosphere.”
The two sides met for less than an hour before adjourning to separate caucuses which lasted about 90 minutes. They returned for another 1½ hours before finishing for the day.
“I’m guardedly optimistic,” said Ray Grebey, chief negotiator for the 26 clubowners. “This is a tough emotional problem.”
Grebey described the union proposal as containing nothing new.
“The players association proposed what it considers the basis for a settlement,” Grebey said. “It contained nothing we had not already talked about and there was a serious omission. It didn’t deal with compensation.”
Management had insisted throughout these talks that the union agree to a system of compensation for teams losing free agents in the reentry draft. The players association has balked at that suggestion.
"Our proposal revised a number of items downward substantially,” said Miller. “To say as Mr Grebey did that it contained ‘nothing new,’ well technically that’s true. But he led you to believe that it didn’t change anything and that’s misleading. We made important revisions and deletions and reduced many of our demands. I love the way he (Grebey) obscures the truth.”
Asked if the talks had been productive, Miller frowned.
“There was nothing in the way of movement,” he said.
Miller said he would meet with Grebey again today. The players’ strike deadline is midnight tonight.
“I’m never going to give up,” he said. “Telegrams have been sent to the player representatives setting forth the unanimous decision of the executive board on Apr. 1 that if there is no agreement prior to May 23 a strike begins May 23. Nothing changes that except an agreement.”
Miller said that management has proposed removing the strike deadline in order to permit contract negotiations to continue.
“A strike creates pressure,” he said. “Removing the deadline creates no pressure.”
Issues To Be Settled
NEW YORK (AP) — Major unresolved issues in the baseball contract between the Major League Players Association and the club owners’ player relations committee include:
1. Compensation for loss of free agent — Owners are asking that a team losing a “premium” free agent in the reentry craft be compensated by a roster player from the signing team, replacing in certain cases, the present compensation, a choice in the amateur free agent draft. Under the clubowners’ proposal, the team losing a roster player would be able to protect a certain number of players, 15 or 18 depending on the circumstances, from selection by the team losing the free agent.
At issue is the definition of “premium player."
2. Pension plan — The players want the clubowners to increase their contribution (from television revenue) to $16.5 million from the present $8.3 million. The clubowners have offered to increase their contribution to $14.4 million
3. Minimum salary — The players want the amount raised to $30,000 from the present $21,000 The clubowners have offered to increase the amount to $27,500.
