Outside Oberlin

Miller gets my Cooperstown vote

Amidst all the hubbub about the LeBron James saga, Iron Mike’s resurgence and Kobe Bryant’s dominance, another newsworthy item may have escaped your eye. On Wednesday, Feb. 26 the Veterans Committee convened, and to the shock and dismay of this columnist, failed to elect a certain white-haired ex-union rep to Cooperstown with other members of baseball’s elite.
The baseball gods opened the door. As they are prone to do when a situation arises that needs to be remedied, these hallowed immortals presented the Committee with an opportunity to restore some of the luster and reverence that has befallen our national pastime in recent years. Between threats of contraction (the Minnesota Twins, one such franchise “allegedly” targeted to be downsized, surged to the ALCS last Fall), and the All-Star debacle led by Bud Selig and his henchmen and their preposterous “solution” to that debacle — whereby this meaningless July exhibition game would decide home field advantage for the World Series —baseball has been in the news for all the wrong reasons.
But alas, to quote the Foundations, “Why do you build me up buttercup?” What this all means is that Dr. Marvin Miller, former union head of the MLBPA, must wait his turn. The venerable ex-labor man is now eighty-five and because of a clause in the voting process that I refuse to explain (it’s just as confusing as the BCS), the aforementioned Veterans Committee will not assemble until 2005.
Born in the Bronx on April 14, 1917, Miller, a labor economist, served at the National War Labor Relation Board, Machinist Union and the United Auto Workers before settling in at the United Steelworkers union and emerging as lead economist and chief negotiator.
When asked to become the first full-time director of the Major League Baseball Players Association in 1966, Miller, a New York Giants fan, was unable to resist an offer to combine two of his lifelong passions.
Miller's legacy provided irreversible alterations to the landscape of baseball. He realized that the structure and content of baseball’s standard players’ contract — which Miller classified as “one of the worst labor documents” — would have to be reconfigured in the players’ favor.
When management blocked his attempts to ascertain accurate player salary information, Miller delegated team representatives to anonymously report each player’s salary. By 1968, in just two years, Miller succeeded in raising baseball's minimum salary from $6,000 to $10,000 (the first such raise in over two decades), a precedent that cleared the way for baseball salaries to become the envy of all professional athletes.
For a firsthand account of these nefarious methods, read ex-Yankee great Jim Bouton’s detailed account of the 1969 season, Ball Four.
Probably Miller’s greatest achievement was the establishment of modern free agency. In 1975, Miller wrestled from the owners a right for players to sign employment agreements with other teams once his contractual obligations with his old team concluded.
Despite the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Curt Flood case, he propelled pitchers Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally to an arbitration that eradicated the “reserve clause” in 1975.
He understood that absolute free agency was not in the players’ best interest, since it could overburden the market with players and keep salaries low. Miller struck a “compromise” with the owners, and secured players the right to free agency only after six years in the majors.
In 1981, Miller rallied the member players and saw them through a 50-day strike, which he has labeled as the “association’s finest hour.” Deciding to leave on a high note, Miller stepped down from his position with the union in 1982 and now serves as a consultant for his prodigy, current union head Donald Fehr.
Despite all Miller’s accomplishments, he is still not in Cooperstown. Rule 6(b) of the provisions governing eligibility for election into the Hall of Fame provides for the selection of retired baseball executives. While the definition of “baseball executive” is not stipulated, there is debate concerning whether only league executives are eligible, thus excluding union men. However, the real issue is not confusion regarding interpretation, but rather that the baseball owners do not wish to see Miller, a professional management killer, worshipped in their shrine.
When Miller was asked in a recent interview what he would want his plaque to read if and when he is enshrined, the august former union chief said, “He was the leader of the first true union in the history of the game, and working closely with the players he helped form the structure of what has been termed one of the strongest and best unions in the country. And contrary to certain beliefs, the arrival of the players union coincided with, and was instrumental in, the greatest prosperity and expansion the game has ever seen.”