Full Description
The 1994 Major League Baseball season promised to be memorable. Long-standing batting and pitching standards were threatened, including the revered single-season home run record. The Montreal Expos and New York Yankees were delivering remarkable campaigns. In August, acting commissioner Bud Selig called a halt to the season amid the League's latest labor dispute. The shutdown led to a lockout as well as cancellation of more than 900 regular season games, the scheduled expanded rounds of playoffs, and that year's World Series. Like all labor struggles, it was fundamentally about control--of salaries, of players' ability to decide their own fates, and of the game itself.
This book chronicles Major League Baseball's turbulent '94 season and its ripple effects. It highlights earlier labor struggles and the roles performed by individuals from John Montgomery Ward, David Fultz and Robert Murphy to Marvin Miller, Andy Messersmith, Jim "Catfish" Hunter and Donald Fehr. Also examined are the ballplayers' own organizations, from the Players League of the early 1890s to the still potent Major League Baseball Players Association doing battle with team owners and their representatives.
Contents
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Preface
1. The Strike
2. The Players' League
3. From the Protective Association to the Fraternity and Beyond
4. The American Baseball Guild and Jumping
5. The Major League Baseball Players Association
6. Miller Time
7. Free Agency and Arbitration
8. We're on Strike! No, You're Locked Out!
9. The Adversaries: Donald Fehr vs. Bud Selig
10. The State of the National Game
11. Commissioner-Less Baseball
12. It Happens Every Spring
13. The Best Player in Baseball: Barry Bonds
14. The Natural: Ken Griffey, Jr.
15. Opening Days
16. May Days
17. A June Swoon?
18. July Was the Hottest Month
19. August Showers
20. Discord Continues
21. Labor Woes and the National Pastime
Chapter Notes
Bibliography
Index
