Latest CBA proposal would be great for the St. Louis Cardinals

The latest CBA proposal would be great for the St. Louis Cardinals, surely arming them with more draft picks as they continue to win.

Major League Baseball and the Players’ Association continue to meet daily this week in an attempt to hammer out a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. No deal is close, and there is serious doubt whether a full 162-game season will be played in 2022.

But the latest offer from the MLBPA would be especially favorable for the St. Louis Cardinals, with Jeff Jones of the Belleville-News Democrat saying that the proposal “would be such a positive for the Cardinals that it might be on a poster in the executive suites somewhere.”

Part of the offer, via Jeff Passan of ESPN:

• Lottery for the top-7 picks among the 18 teams that miss the postseason.
• Remainder of picks after the 7 that are in the lottery go in reverse order of winning percentage unless…..  For teams that don’t pay revenue sharing: Finish bottom-8 in winning percentage for three consecutive seasons, can’t pick higher than 10th. Finish bottom-8 in four consecutive seasons, can’t pick higher than 18th.
• For teams that pay revenue sharing: Finish bottom-8 for two straight years or bottom 12 for three consecutive seasons, can’t pick higher than 10th. Finish bottom 12 for four straight years, pick 18th.

There is more to the proposal, which includes more draft picks that are built in with success. And for the Cardinals, who are notoriously one of the most competitive teams on a yearly basis, that would be a huge win – and is absolutely something that president of baseball operations John Mozeliak would love to have happen.

There is a chance that the eventual agreement between MLB and the MLBPA looks significantly different than that, of course. But Mozeliak having more opportunities in the early rounds of the draft could set the Cardinals up for even more long-term success, especially with their recent draft history that includes the selections of Nolan Gorman and Jordan Walker, two of the consensus top prospects in baseball.