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Rob Manfred Expected To Implement 60-Game MLB Season

After contentious months-long negotiations produced only a stalemate, MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred now plans to unilaterally implement a 60-game regular season if the union agrees to health and safety protocols and a Spring Training start date of July 1 by 5:00pm ET today, a source familiar with the negotiations told THE DAILY. The move to mandate the length of the season was expected after the MLBPA's 38-member Exec Board yesterday overwhelmingly rejected MLB's final proposal of 60 games. The March 26 agreement between the two sides gives Manfred the authority to mandate the season's length if the league pays players full prorated salaries.

Manfred has viewed the unilateral mandate as a last resort for two central reasons: The union will now retain its right to file a grievance, in which it could claim that the league did not act in good faith in trying to schedule as many games as possible. And the league now is expected to be without its lucrative expanded ‘20 postseason, which was proposed to include as many as 16 teams (up from 10) and generate nearly $1B for the league.

MLB issued a statement saying that its 30 clubs unanimously voted to proceed with the '20 season under the terms of the March 26 agreement. The statement added that MLB was "disappointed" by the MLBPA rejecting the "agreement framework" developed by Manfred and MLBPA Exec Dir Tony Clark during their four-hour meeting last week in Arizona. The union has emphatically refuted that there was an agreement even in principle.

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