https://theathletic.com/3182166/2022/03/14/how-does-the-new-cba-affect-the-mets-specifically/The Impact on the Mets: Nowhere did the owners act more explicitly against Cohen than in the addition of the fourth threshold. Only two teams in the last five years had crossed even the third threshold — the 2018 Red Sox and the 2021 Dodgers — and one of them traded one of the best players in baseball shortly thereafter to duck below the luxury tax again. Even Los Angeles has reset its payroll to get below the tax and avoid the repeater penalties, which means Cohen is the only owner who:
A. Has shown a willingness to spend above the tax threshold
B. Hasn’t been brought to heel by the penalties to get below the tax
That extra threshold seems like a just-in-case move by the owners. Maybe no one ventures that far into the tax and it’s not really needed. Maybe someone — cough, Cohen, cough — does spend that much for a little while, and the penalties rein him in.
As we are remember during the CBA negations the owners and MLBPA agreed to add what at the time was coined the "Steve Cohen Tax".. As the Athletic quote above notes, it seems like it was done as a Just in case, since nobody expected the mets to spend as much as they did this offseason even with that new "Steve Cohen" tax added in..
Also during those same negotiations owners and the MLBPA briefly discussed a (salary floor) that of course went nowhere...
This does have me wondering if this lead to the possibility of a salary cap and Floor being bit more likely to be implemented during the next CBA talks.. ( I would assume any Salary cap or floor would need to be modeled after the NBA or NHL (since both leagues have teams based in Canada) so the floor and cap would need to fluctuate depending on the global market and not just the US)
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