Abstract
For more than a century, labor disputes have tormented the relationship between American professional baseball players and management. Although Major League Baseball players unionized in the 1960s, disagreements over workplace conditions and ever-growing profit allocations endured for decades. The first thirty years of collective bargaining between players and League post-unionization fostered notable improvements in players’ labor conditions. However, those years were also plagued by acrimonious negotiations, grievances, lawsuits, lockouts, strikes, and eventually, the cancellation of the 1994 World Series. The story in Minor League Baseball is altogether different. Its players, despite their close nexus with the Major League game, did not unionize alongside their Major League counterparts sixty years ago, and the workforce has suffered the consequences. Further frustrating MiLB labor progress is the sport’s long-standing exemption from antitrust law and its exclusion from minimum wage and overtime requirements at both the federal and state level. These harms perpetuated severe working conditions, including long hours, grueling travel schedules, minimal job security, and fixed wages, placing Minor League players squarely in the throes of poverty.
Recommended Citation
Chris Rowley,
It’s Past Time: Unionization and Self-Determination in Minor League Baseball,
95
U. Colo. L. Rev.
1157
(2024).
Available at:
https://scholar.law.colorado.edu/lawreview/vol95/iss4/6