#Derek Jeter: Baseball will suffer from ‘embarrassing’ MLB talks

Derek Jeter didn’t sugarcoat the contentious and failed negotiations between MLB and the Players Association, calling the talks to play a shortened season amid the novel coronavirus pandemic “embarrassing at times” and “pretty sad to see.”

The Marlins’ CEO painted a bleak picture of the relationship between the two sides after commissioner Rob Manfred was forced to implement a 60-game schedule to save what was left of the season.

“There’s no trust, I should say is the best way to put it,” the Hall of Fame shortstop said on the premiere episode of “The Line Drive” with Marlins radio broadcaster Glenn Geffner.

The two sides couldn’t agree on prorated salaries and the number of games to be played, leading to public backlash from fans.

“It was pretty sad to see the back and forth being played out publicly in a time like now,” Jeter said. “You have so many people filing for unemployment throughout the country. Over 30 million people, 40 million people with no jobs. They really don’t want to hear owners and players going back and forth about how much money they deserve and how much money they need.

“I get it. Look, I was a player. I feel as though players should fight for everything that they feel as though they should have. And I’ll always support them in that sense. But, in this particular case, I think some things should have been done behind the scenes. …. There is no winner. It seems like sometimes people are trying to win a PR battle and ultimately it’s going to be the sport that’s going to suffer.”

During the talks, there were reports of certain owners that were willing to burn an entire season, with the Collective Bargaining Agreement up after the 2021 season. The Marlins were not one of those teams, Jeter said.

“I understand that, look, there are negotiations and people are going to have a difference of opinion, and that’s fine,” he said. “That happens in every industry. But you just hope that moving forward there is a little trust build and you have some civil negotiations.”