The Major League Baseball lockout is over. Pending ratification by both sides, MLB and the MLBPA have agreed on a five-year deal. The new agreement touches on multiple contention points between the two parties, although an international draft, which was the final major area of disagreement, will remain under “evaluation.”

The agreement reportedly includes:

• A jump in minimum salary;

• A draft lottery system to, at least in theory, reduce the temptation to tank in order to enhance a team’s draft position;

• Draft pick penalties to discourage deliberate, player time manipulation (the number of days a player spends in the major leagues) in order to avoid salary considerations;

• An expanded post-season from the present 10 to 12 teams;

• A universal designated hitter;

• Advertising on batting helmets and jerseys. (We at the sports desk located somewhere below decks of the Good Pirate Ship RedState are not amused by this.)

Spring training will begin on Sunday, March 13th, with players having the option to report starting Friday. The regular season will start on Thursday, April 7th. A full 162 game schedule will be played. Scheduled doubleheaders will make up the games canceled earlier in the negotiations. MLB will mercifully eliminate the gimmick rules from the past two years: seven-inning, doubleheader games and extra-inning games having a runner on second base at the start of each inning.

While assuming ratification will take place ensuring labor peace for the next five years, major structural flaws in how baseball conducts its financial business, as compared to the other three major professional sports, regrettably remain firmly in place. The lack of a salary cap, both at the top and the bottom, ensures teams with no genuine desire to be competitive remain under no compulsion to do so.

For example, it is almost a given that the Oakland A’s, doing some housecleaning for what seems to be their inevitable move to Las Vegas in the next few years, will trade star players Matt Olson and Matt Chapman ASAP, rather than make even a nominal effort to re-sign them in this, the final year of their present contracts. The team will do this under the auspices of crying poor due to lack of attendance at the miserable and literally falling apart Oakland Coliseum, while the team and city endlessly argue over a new ballpark. Minus a minimum salary cap, the A’s, Pirates, Orioles, and others will continue to embarrass their few remaining fans by refusing to spend the necessary dollars to be competitive. Even Tampa Bay has begun loosening the purse strings a bit, and the small-market San Diego Padres are spending like mad to compete with their money-drenched arch-rivals the Los Angeles Dodgers. The new CBA promises more of the same financial chicanery.

At least we have major league baseball again. Still thinking I’m going to see if the Lansing Lugnuts can be caught on a streaming network somewhere, though.