Owners’ Bill in Collusion: $10 Million

Arbitrator Tom Roberts fined the 26 major league baseball clubs $10,528,086.71 Thursday for violating the collective bargaining agreement by colluding in the winter of 1985-86.

The fine, translating to $404,924.10 a club, was levied on behalf of 139 players, including 62 free agents, who claimed through the Major League Players Assn. that they were monetarily damaged by collusion.

The $10.5-million figure is only a minimum, Don Fehr, executive director of the players’ association, said in interpreting Roberts’ 30-page ruling.

Fehr said that the figure deals only with what Roberts called “salary shortfall” in 1986. Players who contend that collusion had an adverse impact on the length of multi-year contracts, bonus provisions, buyout options and other special covenants during the winter before that season are entitled to pursue those claims in further proceedings, Roberts ruled.

In addition, Fehr said, the union will ask for interest on all the financial awards, plus attorney fees.

He said he was unable to estimate how much higher the figure might climb but predicted that it was likely to seem modest compared to the monetary damages expected in the Collusion II case, dealing with the winter of 1986-87. Arbitrator George Nicolau, having found the owners guilty of collusion in that case, is currently conducting the remedial phase. His decision is not expected for several months.

“We’re very pleased,” Fehr said of Roberts’ decision. “We didn’t get everything we asked for, but we got most of it, and our essential position has been vindicated. This sets the stage for a much larger award in the next case.

“Everybody on both sides agrees that 1985-86 was just the tip of the iceberg and that the award would be small compared to what follows. I mean, the collusion of the next year was much more extensive and had a much greater impact on salaries.”

It has been speculated that when the decisions are reached in all three collusion cases--Nicolau is also hearing the Collusion III case from the winter of 1987-88--the owners may be fined more than $40 million, a stunning legacy of former commissioner Peter Ueberroth, under whom collusion took shape.

Ueberroth, who has denied that he orchestrated collusion and claimed that it stemmed from the owners’ shock when they opened their books during the collective bargaining negotiations of 1985 and learned how much money was being lost, reportedly was vacationing with his wife, Jenny, in celebration of their 30th wedding anniversary and unavailable for comment Thursday.

Bud Selig, owner of the Milwaukee Brewers and chairman of the owners’ Player Relations Committee, said in a statement that the PRC Board will put the $10.5 million into an escrow account for the benefit of the affected players and that there will be no comment on the “substance of the award.”

“The board believes the award represents a beginning in the resolution of the dispute between the clubs and the union over free agency during the term of our current labor agreement,” Selig said in his statement. “Both parties, we believe, have learned that the current system of player compensation requires substantial change.

“The PRC . . . will pursue that goal in the upcoming (collective bargaining) negotiations. We will make every effort to bargain for a new baseball partnership based on a system of player compensation that is fair for all involved . . . “

A number of owners contacted said they will stand by that statement and refused additional comment. Angel owner Gene Autry added only that he still does not believe collusion took place and that he would not have participated in any ordered procedure of that nature.

The 139 players affected by Roberts’ ruling will not immediately share in the $10.5-million award, which if divided equally would be $75,000 a player. The union and PRC must design the process through which the individual awards are determined. If they are unable to agree on a process, Roberts will determine it.

In addition, not all of the 139 may be able to prove damages, eliminating their claims.

Among the affected players are Kirk Gibson, Carlton Fisk, Lance Parrish, Frank Tanana, Tom Brookens, the late Donnie Moore and a number of players no longer active, among them Don Sutton, Tommy John and the Niekro brothers, Joe and Phil.

David Pinter, Moore’s agent, said he will seek $1.6 million on behalf of the pitcher’s estate. Moore, having saved 31 games for the Angels in 1985, re-signed with the club for three years at $3 million that winter.

Pinter said that Moore would have normally received a four-year contract at $1.2 million a year if it hadn’t been for collusion and he will seek the difference.

Doug Baldwin, Gibson’s agent, said that Thursday’s ruling was “too ambiguous” to predict what will happen or what course he will pursue.

“Are they going to have 139 separate hearings?” he asked. “How long will that take?”

Gibson, a free agent, re-signed with the Detroit Tigers when he was unable to sell his services elsewhere after the 1985 season. He was one of seven players to be declared a modified free agent by Roberts in the first of his remedial decisions in January of 1988, about 3 1/2 months after Roberts ruled that the owners violated the bargaining agreement by acting in concert to restrict free agent movement.

Gibson signed a three-year, $4.5-million contract with the Dodgers, the only one of the seven freed player to switch teams.

Will that contract mar his claim to additional compensation because of the collusion of the 1985-86 winter?

“Not at all,” Baldwin said. “The ruling, as I understand it, deals only with salaries in 1986. Kirk would have been with a new team then if it hadn’t been for collusion. What happened subsequently should have no impact on what happened to him in his first year of free agency.”

The penalty hearing that culminated in Thursday’s decision spanned 38 days and produced 4,967 pages of testimony. In reaching the $10.5-million figure, Roberts cited a number of complicated processes, some advanced by the Players Assn., others by Louis Glassman and Donald Martin of the Glassman-Oliver Economic Institute.

Roberts refused to expand when reached at his office in Rolling Hills Estates.

The agents for the 139 players filed claims for $16.6 million, but Fehr said union projections ranged from below $10 million to more than $20 million.

“We never expected the arbitrator to come in at the highest number,” Fehr said. “We’re content with the figure.

“It will be more before we’re through, and it will be considerably more in the next case.”

However, some agents think that the owners, who returned to the free-spending of the pre-collusion years last winter, accomplished their goal.

“Even if the three cases cost them $35 million, they got away with murder,” Pinter said. “They held the salary and arbitration structure way down for three years.

“I think they would have gladly continued if they knew it was going to cost them only $10.5 million a year.”

Agent Alan Meersand agreed.

“We’re not even talking $500,000 a club,” Meersand said. “That seems like a joke. If, in fact, the 26 clubs were colluding under any kind of directive, it’s a small price to pay for violating the agreement and illegally impacting salaries. I always envisioned $1 million or $1.5 million a club.”

It may get to that--before it’s over.