The MLB Players Association in 2015 built its asset base up to its largest point in four years as it once again prepared for formal collective bargaining with the league, according to the union’s newly filed annual report.
The document, filed with the U.S. Department of Labor and representing calendar year 2015, showed the union’s total assets at $141 million, up 21 percent from the prior year and the highest since 2011. Over the past two years, union assets have grown 52 percent.
The union historically has withheld licensing disbursements to members as it nears the expiration of a collective-bargaining agreement, a practice that continues under Executive Director Tony Clark. The current five-year deal expires Dec. 1.
The intention is that the money can be used for litigation and other costs arising from a work stoppage, with the money then returned if a stoppage is avoided. Much of that saved money is in U.S. Treasury securities and other investments. Formal labor talks between the two sides began earlier this spring and are expected to stretch at least through the summer.
The union’s financial savings also was reflected in per-player licensing disbursements shown in the annual report. MLB players early last year received a distribution of 2014 licensing funds totaling $5.3 million, with a peak of $5,567 a player, depending on service time, down from a peak of $13,660 last year.
The union’s 2010 annual report, representing a comparable point before the expiration of the last labor deal in 2011, showed maximum distributions of $12,919 a player.
Clark in 2015 received a salary of $1.96 million, down very slightly from the $1.99 million he received in 2014 (see chart below).
The 2015 annual report for the union also showed revenue from “other receipts,” where licensing income is listed and itemized, at $44.2 million, down 10 percent from a year ago.
Payments are credited in the years they are received and not earned, and the report, known as the LM-2, is based on cash and not accrual accounting. As a result, views into the financial state of the organization can be deceiving, and the union’s decrease in licensing receipts may not necessarily represent a decline in its commercial business.
Still, there were notable shifts in income from licensees. Longtime trading card partner Topps remained the union’s largest licensee at $9.35 million, down from $10.45 million in 2014. MLB Advanced Media ranked second at $6.02 million, more than twice the $2.63 million listed in the 2014 report, though executives there said the most recent number reflects two years’ worth of payments.
Sony Interactive Entertainment, maker of the video game “MLB: The Show,” ranked third at $5.3 million, down from $5.59 million the prior year. Majestic parent VF Knitwear, the union’s second-largest licensee in 2014, fell from $6.68 million in payments to the MLBPA that year to $1.42 million last year.
The MLBPA declined to comment on the report.
Staff writer Liz Mullen and research director David Broughton contributed to this report.
| Employee, title |
Gross Salary Disbursements (before deductions) |
Disbursements for Official Business |
Other Disbursements |
Total |
| Tony Clark, executive director |
$1,958,333 |
$42,678 |
$147 |
$2,001,158 |
| David Prouty, general counsel |
$705,000 |
$20,122 |
$380 |
$725,502 |
| Rick Shapiro, senior adviser |
$705,000 |
$8,486 |
$166 |
$713,652 |
| Kevin McGuiness, COO |
$669,000 |
$18,724 |
$119 |
$687,843 |
| Ian Penny, senior labor counsel |
$565,000 |
$20,036 |
$196 |
$585,232 |
| Timothy Slavin, director of business affairs |
$560,000 |
$11,902 |
$105 |
$572,007 |
| Omar Minaya, special adviser |
$540,833 |
$12,296 |
$69 |
$553,198 |
| Bob Lenaghan, assistant general counsel |
$485,000 |
$16,890 |
$216 |
$502,106 |
Source: U.S. Department of Labor LM-2 report
