Rant Tuesday: F*ck this Stupid CBA Bullcrap

Hot Sporting Action!

So, I've been really bad instituting theme posts, like bargain-basement Wednesdays, or Rag on Big Soccer Sundays. So I may never return to this again, but Tuesday is literally the worst day of the week, and I feel compelled to go stream of consciousness on a few things.

Things like the Major League Soccer Collective Bargaining Agreement. Ok, outside of a few trades here and there and the Super Draft this past month, there is nothing going on in MLS except for the CBA, which is maybe this way, maybe that, read up on this court case, talk about some contract law, read a player's tweet, Don Garber coughed etcetera. This topic has been in my reader for what seems like years now, and I respect that it needs to be covered because we all need to work out whether there will be an MLS season this year, but I'm not sure I can take it any more.

Here's an uncredited smattering from various great writers brought low by labour talks:

"If the MLS season (or MLS as a league) goes down the tubes, where will most of these players go? It doesn’t look like USSF Div II will accept striking/locked-out MLS players into its ranks in 2010, and if the MLSers had the skill set to catch on elsewhere, well, they probably would have done so by now." Yeah...

"Having the individual clubs negotiate contracts could weaken the claim that MLS is a single entity that can act unilaterally to reduce competition under the Sherman Act. As such, the players are toying in a very real way with cutting out the heart MLS and using the change in situation to remove the barriers to taking the league back to court." ...I'm going to need you to come in on Saturday.

"Major League Soccer’s players are well within their rights to hold out for better pay and working conditions. The current CBA has been in place since December 2004 and in the eyes of many observers the league has come on in leaps and bounds since then. The introduction of the designated player rule along with the tireless work of pro-MLS journalists and bloggers have raised its profile in foreign markets and matches are now available regularly on television screens in England." ...And why don't you just go ahead and come in on Sunday too?

The obvious winner in all of this is Jason Davis, whose series on the mechanics of this whole thing at least tried to parse it out with good humour. But reading up on this stuff, even with Davis' energetic prose, and I start to feel like Glendenning i.e. fuck this shit. Does that make me a bad "citizen journalist"? Yes. Bad blogger? Well, my numbers speak for themselves, so yes. Normal? I hope.

This is also bad for the MLS news cycle. I mean, the SAINTS ARE IN THE SUPER BOWL! So when exactly is Johnny Sunday Paper going to take the time to pony up on sports labour laws 101? Not that MLS bloggers care much for Johnny Sunday Paper, but we might need him down the road. So this is what I'm going to do from now until the end of this CBA bullshit. I'm going to make up my own MLS news, what I would like to actually have going on in the off-season. There. Problem solved. See you later.