Play ball, again

By Bob Kenney, Courier-Post Sports Editor

They'll be walking the line at Veterans Stadium tonight but it won't be the picket line. It'll be the base line, since the baseball strike was avoided early this morning.

Baseball mediators went into extra innings last night, then rallied to save the rest of the 1980 season with a 5 a.m. announcement that the strike had been averted.

That spelled R-E-L-I-E-F in a big way to all concerned with the Phillies, who have been playing some of their best ball of the year recently.

"I'm just happy for the game of baseball," said Phillies Manager Dallas Green. "Selfishly, I'm happy for the 1980 Phillies because of the way we have been playing, but I'm more happy for the game. It could have been disastrous."

The settlement will move the Phils into a pair of crucial series starting tonight in the Vet. The Houston Astros, led by pitcher Nolan Ryan, open a three-game set tonight and the Pittsburgh Pirates begin a four-game visit Memorial Day.

Greg Luzinski, who has been swinging a hot bat of late with seven hits in his last nine times at bat, can't wait.

"Personally, I'm really happy and glad it's settled," he admitted. "It's the best thing that has happened for our team because we just started to put things together. We should all have a clear mind now.

"Our number one concern at this point is playing baseball," said the Phils' left fielder, who currently leads the National League in homers with 11.

Catcher Bob Boone, the Phillies team representative, agreed. "I'm relieved and I believe most of the players are, too. I'm confident it's a good settlement for the players but I'm really pleased we avoided the strike for the good of everybody involved."

So are officials of the Phillies. Missing just the upcoming seven games against the Astros and Pirates could have meant over 300,000 lost admissions to the team. That could have gone a long way toward deciding whether the Phils would have ended the season in the black or in the red.

Of course, there are other reasons for the Phils' brass to be happy over the settlement.

"Obviously, I'm very pleased that baseball will continue," said team owner Ruly Carpenter. "My' main concern, however, was the game itself and what it means to the fans and the so-called little people in the game.

"I'm not totally familiar with every detail (of the settlement) but I have all the confidence in the world in the player relations committee and stand by their position."

 General Manager Paul Owens, one of the few optimistic people during the negotiations, was in the position to say "I told you so" after the settlement was reached.

"I just felt all along it would be settled. Both sides had to realize how important it was to the game. I never felt either side could have afforded to go out. I'm tickled to death we're playing again," said Owens.

It will be a much-relieved group of players that takes the field tonight at 8:05 when Ryan and Steve Carlton square off. They have totaled 5,703 strikeouts between them during their careers.

Looks like there might be a few more strikes tonight.

Major League Talks Approach Deadline

NEW YORK (AP) — The deadline for the first midseason players strike in major league baseball history drew closer Thursday night as negotiations in the stalemated contract talks resumed at 10 p.m. EDT after a four-hour recess. 

The chief negotiators for the two sides, Marvin Miller, for the player association, and Ray Grebey, representing. the owners, met briefly in informal talks during the recess. 

Miller, executive director of the players group which has threatened a strike following Thursday's, games, returned to the midtown first at 9:30 p.m. He was followed a half hour later by Grebey and the management negotiating team. 

It was the third time Thursday the negotiators had arrived at the hotel. And on each occasion, the owners representatives were late for the meeting. 

"We are still working away," said Grebey as he rushed into an elevator to the 17th floor meeting room. 

The two sides met for a total of about 2½ hours in their two earlier sessions with Federal Mediator Kenneth Moffett.

After his return from the four-hour break Miller said: “There is no reason to stop the clock. We need an agreement." 

He said of his talk with Grebey: "There is no way to say if it helped… I have no more assurances than the last time I left here.” 

Earlier, David Vaughn, counsel for Moffett said of the negotiators: "There is no guarantee that they will be back together again tonight,” Vaughn said. “The strike deadline remains in effect. There had been no indication on the part of the players to extend the deadline.” 

Only six major league games were scheduled to play last night, and they seemed certain to be the last contests to be played for some time as negotiators remained deadlocked in fruitless talks. 

The strike was set to start this morning and nothing that occurred yesterday between the two sides changed the bleak outlook. 

“It would take a small miracle to prevent a strike,” said Miller “It could be a long one, but nobody has a crystal ball.” 

The players voted virtual unanimous strike authorization during spring training when contract negotiations became stalled. On April 1 in Dallas, the executive board of the players association voted to strike the final week of spring training exhibition games, wiping out 92 contests, and then to walk out again on May 23 if no contract was reached. 

Talks since then have made little if any progress with the two sides deadlocked over the issue of compensation for premium free agent signings. The clubs have demanded a system be implemented permitting them to replace certain free agents who sign with other teams. The union has rejected that idea, saying it would be attack on the free agent system which has produced a huge jump in player salaries.

The last management proposal on compensation called for ranking players statistically, either by at-bats or, in the case of pitchers, by game appearances, and then classifying the top half of each category as “premium” players. Such players would have to satisfy other criteria such as selection by eight or more teams within a set number of re-entry draft rounds. Those players would qualify for compensation with teams permitted to freeze a set number of roster players before losing a compensation replacement performer. Miller called that proposal “an impossibility.” 

With the strike deadline only hours away, federal mediator Kenneth Moffett said the compensation issue had not even been discussed at the morning meeting. “We went over minor issues and nothing happened,” he said. “There was no progress.” 

Miller said a clique of owners has been working to provoke a strike of the players. 

“It’s the same group who in 1976, within a day of our last agreement, made public statements of what they planned to do to us four years hence,” said Miller. “That is unheard of in labor relations.” 

The union chief charged that the management negotiators, headed by Ray Grebey, had displayed “a lack of good faith from beginning to end” in these talks.