Balls and Strikes: The Money Game in Professional Baseball

"Impressively researched and well written, this valuable study by a business professor at the Universiy of North Florida. . . traces the erosion of the reserve clause and the rise of arbitration in salary disputes, examining the participants in negotiations--players, owners, managers, agents, even commissoners--and showing the stake each has in the money game. Many striking points are made, i.e., there is no discrimination in salaries of minority players and there is little relationship between pay and performance." Publishers Weekly "Jennings . . . gives a detailed account of collective bargaining in baseball during the last 25 years, leading up to the owners' lockout this year. He discusses the participants on both sides and how disunity among the clubowners has contributed to the union's ability to achieve large bargaining gains. He also deals with salary arbitration and how it has been used to settle pay disputes, noting that it can resemble 'a high-stakes crapshoot' that leaves...