Rosenthal: Nolan Arenado on talks with MLB, health risks and wanting to play

CLEVELAND, OH - JULY 09:  Nolan Arenado #28 of the Colorado Rockies looks on from the dugout during the 90th MLB All-Star Game at Progressive Field on Tuesday, July 9, 2019 in Cleveland, Ohio. (Photo by Alex Trautwig/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
By Ken Rosenthal
May 15, 2020

Nolan Arenado heard all about Blake Snell’s comments. And he wanted to offer some thoughts of his own.

Snell, the Rays’ All-Star left-hander, created a stir throughout baseball with his response Wednesday night to a fan on his Twitch channel, ClassiclyFamous. The fan asked about the possibility of players accepting a further reduction in pay after they already had agreed to pro-rate their salaries in a shortened season.

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The owners want to limit player compensation because the COVID-19 pandemic will force games to be played without paying customers for an indefinite period. Snell, who originally was to earn $7 million this season in the second year of a five-year, $50 million contract, was having none of it.

“Y’all gotta understand, man, for me to go — for me to take a pay cut is not happening, because the risk is through the roof,” Snell said. “It’s a shorter season, less pay. I gotta get my money. I’m not playing unless I get mine, okay? And that’s just the way it is for me.

“Like, I’m sorry you guys think differently, but the risk is way the hell higher and the amount of money I’m making is way lower. Why would I think about doing that? You know, I’m just, I’m sorry.”

Arenado, the Rockies’ five-time All-Star third baseman, had no problem with Snell speaking his mind. But he wants fans to understand the players’ perspective — and yes, he knows that often can be difficult, considering how much money players make.

Arenado’s $35 million salary in 2020 — the second year of his eight-year, $260 million contract — was to match the third-highest in the majors, behind only the Angels’ Mike Trout and Yankees’ Gerrit Cole (both $36 million).

In a telephone conversation Thursday night, Arenado talked about Snell’s comments and the other issues of the moment: health and safety, fans’ perceptions of players and the union’s negotiations with Major League Baseball.

This interview was edited slightly for length and clarity.

Let’s start with Snell’s comments. He said, “I gotta get my money. I’m not playing unless I get mine.” When you heard about that, what did you think?

I think he was being honest, just being real. He made a lot of good points. There are some points he made that were true, that are facts. A lot of it gets misperceived. Trying to get the public to understand us, it’s not going to work very well in our favor.

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We’re baseball players, right? We make great money. Regardless if we don’t make the money we want, we’re still making great money. A lot of people in this world are struggling a lot harder than us. Some people might see him as a complainer. Some people might agree with his views. At the end of the day, he made some points I agree with. But he also made some points where it’s just going to be too hard to get everyone on our side.

I guarantee if you read the comments, you’re probably thinking, “You don’t have to work 12 hours a day. You’re not the one without a job. You’re still getting paid.” Those people have a right to say that.

What do you say to the public? What would you want the public to know about your position?

The public should know that we want to play baseball. As long as it’s right, as long as it’s fair, we want to be out there. We want to go play.

The misconception is that players don’t want to play if it’s not perfectly set up. That’s not the case. We understand nothing is going to be perfect this year.

I know some people think, “They just want to play if they get all their money.” We’re not going to get all our money regardless. We understand we’re not going to get paid everything we thought we were getting this year. But we still want to go out there and play and earn our contracts and put on a show for the fans. It’s important for us to play, important for free agency, everything. Players understand that.

It’s pretty sad now what’s going on in our country. It would be great to bring joy. And I think baseball is a great sport to do that.

Snell said, “The risk is through the roof.” Do you agree with that?

It’s hard to say. People are risking their lives in a lot bigger ways than we would be. It’s a risk, but I don’t think it’s as risky as what other people are doing to make ends meet, to try to earn money.

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I understand what he’s trying to say. It’s a risk, yeah, but I don’t think MLB would approve of this if the government or whoever is in charge of making sure we’re good to go didn’t approve of it. They obviously approved of it. They feel we can play and that there will be a plan in place to take care of all this. I feel like that wouldn’t happen if it wasn’t going to be OK to play.

How concerned are you personally? Does the idea of playing worry you?

Not at all. I would be worried if they had no plan. I feel like there’s a plan. It’s taken this long for it to develop because there are a lot of Xs and Os that needed to be taken care of. And I feel like they are. Obviously, everyone has questions about it. But I feel like those questions will be answered if they say we can go back and play baseball.

Some players also have said, “We’re taking all the risk. That is why we are so adamant about not taking an additional pay cut.” How do you view that?

I get that. And I agree. It is a risk. We did negotiate a deal. I think that’s the thing: We negotiated a deal. Now let’s go play. Let’s get to work. That’s where we as players are coming from. Obviously, there are discussion about revenue (sharing) and changing it up a bit. But we already discussed that. Let’s get to work now.

The league will propose a series of protocols about health. What do you want to see most in those protocols? What is your biggest concern, health-wise, about playing?

We all would like to know if there is going to be testing every day (commissioner Rob Manfred said Thursday night in an interview with CNN that players would be tested multiple times a week and undergo supplemental antibody testing). And we would like to know if someone gets it, how do you continue to play while someone tested positive for the coronavirus? If you’re going to play, you want to be able to play and not shut everything down because one person got it. That’s the question we’re all kind of wondering. But I assume they’re going to have those answers. They wouldn’t approve of this plan if those questions weren’t about to be answered.

The owners’ position on money might be, “The first agreement was negotiated when we weren’t sure we would be playing without fans. Now we know we’ll be playing without fans. That’s why we want to do something different.” What is your reaction to that?

I don’t necessarily understand that view. We all knew we weren’t going to be playing in front of fans when this first got stopped. Once that happened, the talk was that no fans were going to be around for a long time. I feel like that is something that should have been known when we signed our pro-rated deal. You can’t sit here and tell me that we would have been selling out these games in four months. I don’t know how anyone would have assumed that.

An AP story today said the union asked the owners for their financial records. If the owners did that and you saw the clubs were in distress, would you be more open to hearing what they have to say?

I’m going to listen to our (Players Association). I believe our PA is looking out for our best interests. They’re trying to get us back on the field. We want to play baseball. Don’t ever believe that we’re not trying to get back out there, or (union chief) Tony (Clark) doesn’t want us to get back out there. He wants us to get back out there. But it’s gotta be right.

I don’t know if (seeing their books) would change my mind. I just know there’s a deal to be made. It can be made. It’s just a matter of who wants to get it done. As baseball players, we want to get the deal done as long as it’s right. That’s it. We’re ready to go work. We have an obligation to these teams to go out and compete to the best of our abilities. The teams do really well when we go out and compete and they’re winning. That’s all we want to do.

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Does it bother you that this discussion is taking place so publicly?

It’s better if we keep it private. A lot of things we heard from the owners are through the media. I don’t know what’s true and what’s not. That’s the hardest part. But it sounds like everyone has an idea of what the (owners) are talking about. I feel like the PA and the players are mostly doing a good job of that, keeping it between us. I feel like we’ve been pretty quiet. Some guys have voiced their opinions and that’s OK. They have the right to do that.

How much does it bother you when fans think and say, “The players are greedy. They don’t get it. The players don’t have a clue?”

The fans have the right to say and believe what they want. I get that it’s frustrating. Baseball players get paid a lot of money and then to see us not be able to come to a deal yet, they’re probably like, “You get paid all this money and you’re complaining about this and that.” It’s not really about that. We want to put on a show for them. That’s our whole focus as baseball players. But there are a lot of things that have to get done first.

It’s OK to hear fans complain or get mad. That’s just part of it. At the same time, they’re not in our shoes. They don’t understand what we’re thinking about or what we’re going through. They don’t understand how hard this game is. I’ve heard a lot of people say, “Sports shouldn’t come back.” What do you mean? You guys (fans) look at it as a sport. But if you ask us as baseball players we look at it as a job. We want to go back and do our jobs, as soon as we can.

Do you have a feel for how bad this will look if everything is in place and this breaks down over money? It will look bad for the owners and the players.

Yes, I do. Collectively, I believe it would be disappointing. Hopefully we won’t have to deal with that, because hopefully we get a deal done.

Players are ready to get to work. At the same time, we do have to stand our ground. We can’t back down. In talking to players, talking to the PA, we don’t feel guilty. We want to go out and play.

The people of this country and fans deserve to see the greatness of some these players we have in the game.

(Top photo of Arenado: Alex Trautwig / MLB Photos via Getty Images)

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Ken Rosenthal

Ken Rosenthal is the senior baseball writer for The Athletic who has spent nearly 35 years covering the major leagues. In addition, Ken is a broadcaster and regular contributor to Fox Sports' MLB telecasts. He's also won Emmy Awards in 2015 and 2016 for his TV reporting. Follow Ken on Twitter @Ken_Rosenthal