With a lockout looming over Major League Baseball later this year, the players’ union is losing its chief, as MLBPA executive Tony Clark is resigning, according to multiple reports on Tuesday.
Clark’s decision to step down comes on the heels of the Eastern District of New York’s federal investigation into alleged financial improprieties, which found that MLBPA officials licensed “money or equity to improperly enrich themselves,” according to The Athletic.
New York Mets second baseman Marcus Semien, who is a member of the MLBPA’s subcommittee, believes Clark is resigning to focus on that (h/t Joel Sherman, NY Post).
The players’ union was supposed to hold its first meeting on Tuesday at the Cleveland Guardians’ spring training camp, but it was hastily canceled after Clark’s impending departure came to light.
The 53-year-old’s resignation leaves the players high and dry just months before they meet the league and its owners at the negotiating table. MLB’s collective bargaining agreement (CBA) expires on Dec. 1, which leaves the two parties on the cusp of an immovable stalemate that features a battle for a salary cap — something the owners are in favor of but the players are not.
That topic will be the flashpoint of differences that will eventually lead to a lockout ahead of the 2027 season. The salary cap is something owners have wanted for years, with MLB commissioner Rob Manfred laying the groundwork last season by visiting clubhouses and claiming that billions of dollars had been lost because the players’ union had not agreed to a revenue-sharing system. That would provide a fixed percentage of MLB’s revenue to both the owners and players each year.
Such a system is found in professional sports leagues with a salary cap, and Philadelphia Phillies star first baseman Bryce Harper called Manfred out on it when he arrived in his clubhouse over the summer, claiming that the commissioner was beginning to push to institute a cap.
Clark has been the players’ voice for much of the last two decades. He began as a director of player relations before being hired as the union’s executive director in 2013, all the while playing a considerable role in negotiating previous CBAs for the players.
He shepherded negotiations for a return-to-play plan in 2020 during the COVID pandemic and navigated the tense stand-off of the 2022 preseason lockout. Opening Day that year was postponed by a week after negotiations stretched into March.
A successor is not yet clear, but MLBPA deputy executive director Bruce Meyer is an initial candidate, having been present during the 2022 stand-off. However, he has a mixed reputation at best, with players reportedly calling for his firing in 2024. Those players called for lawyer Harry Marino — one of the most influential figures in the unionization of minor league baseball players in 2023 — to take Meyer’s role.
