The new Collective Bargaining Agreement has a lot of words in it, with most of them detailing uninteresting contractual things. But it was light a few words, apparently, and the Players’ Union and Major League Baseball decided to do away with a few things. From Jayson Stark:
MLB Doing Away With Milestone, Personal-Service Clauses
Major League Baseball and the Players’ Union did away with some contract provisions, according to Jayson Stark.
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Major League Baseball and the players' association have informed teams and agents that they no longer will approve personal-service deals and special "milestone" bonus clauses similar to those contained in Albert Pujols' contract with the Los Angeles Angels, officials of both agencies told ESPN.com.MLB and the union agreed to the changes this month in the wake of Pujols' 10-year, $240 million contract and Ryan Zimmerman's six-year, $100 million extension with the Washington Nationals, which also contains a personal-services option following his playing career.
After their respective contracts, both Zimmerman and Pujols have $10 million “personal-services contracts”, which probably fall somewhere between waxing Biff Tannen’s car to a fine shine and appearing at every single team function to shake hands and sign autographs. The union and MLB thought that the contracts extended beyond the players’ playing careers, which was something that violated the Basic Agreement.
Also done away with are milestone perks, such as Alex Rodriguez getting paid $6 million for home runs 660, 714, 755, 762, and 763. The union and MLB agreed that such clauses were akin to statistics-based contracts, which are not allowed under the CBA.
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