Dodgers’ Walker Buehler tweets and deletes impassioned lockout statement

The Los Angeles Dodgers won’t resume their on-field preparations for the 2022 season until the players and owners come to some semblance of an agreement on a new CBA.

After four face-to-face days in a row, and while butting up against the ownership-imposed Feb. 28 deadline for a full MLB season, the two camps seem to have agreed on precious little. Both are making incremental moves, but neither has discussed in detail a new luxury tax threshold, the main issue separating the two.

And by separating, we mean seeeeeeeeeeeeeeparating.

MLB’s proposals are dwarfed by the MLBPA’s ideas, meant to raise the line at which teams are taxed, allowing them to sign more free agents/be more competitive without paying penalties. MLB’s idea of a good time, though, is avoiding said penalties and hoping expanded playoffs work themselves out.

Every owner’s dream appears to be winning a title as a seven-seed, raking in gate receipts while paying as few players as little money as possible — and Walker Buehler, among hundreds more players, is sick of it.

He laid out his case to the fans in a pair of tweets Thursday night, letting them know that he feels their disappointment and anger, but explaining that nobody on the players’ side is asking for exponential growth here. They would just like to be paid commensurate with the inflation rate, at the very least.

Dodgers’ Walker Buehler just wants players to be paid

Buehler’s main argument is an effort to remove the “millionaires vs. billionaires” tag that has unfairly populated fan sentiment (even though … billion is a lot more than million …), while helping folks realize that players are just fighting for a reasonable hike, not a massive leap.

Unfortunately, someone got to Buehler before Friday’s bargaining session, and he sent the tweets directly into the wastebin — after they’d already amassed thousands of likes.

What prompted this? Did Max Scherzer tap him on the shoulder and tell him to be less outspoken? Because that would certainly be, uh, a change of pace for the way these negotiations have been going in the public square.

Or maybe the MLBPA just wanted to let the facts and figures speak for themselves.

Reports of the Atlanta Braves’ profits leaked on Friday morning, and they do more work for Buehler and the players’ cause than any rhetoric ever could.

Apologies for screenshotting your tweets, Mr. Buehler, but you made salient points.

Hopefully, you can re-post them if and when a deal gets done and it’s safe to go back outside.

3 trade packages that can help Dodgers acquire Jose Ramirez

The Los Angeles Dodgers can really flip the NL on its head if they went out and trade for Cleveland Guardians star Jose Ramirez.