Manfred: Pitch clock this spring, free agency not broken

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Rob Manfred doesn't know when you'll see Bryce Harper, Manny Machado and the other still unsigned free agents report for spring training, but he expects it to happen soon.

Major League Baseball's commissioner does know when you'll see a pitch clock ticking down during games: Next weekend, when the Grapefruit and Cactus leagues open play.

During a 26-minute Q&A with reporters here this evening, Manfred revealed the league's intention to start using a 20-second pitch clock during exhibition games this spring. There won't immediately be any penalties instituted on players who let the clock expire before throwing a pitch or stepping in the batter's box, but MLB will use the spring to help everyone involved get used to the change.

For now, there is no firm plan to use the pitch clock when the regular season begins, but Manfred clearly is pushing for it whether the players' union formally agrees to it or not.

"It'll be kind of a phase-in to get everybody - umpires, players - used to it," Manfred said. "But we're still hopeful that we're going to make an agreement with (union chief Tony Clark) on pace-of-play initiatives. I just think whether it's by agreement or otherwise, the only prudent course for us is to be in a position to proceed, if in fact we have an agreement or decide to do it under our collectively bargained right to do that."

Because MLB formally proposed the 20-second pitch clock one year ago, the Collective Bargaining Agreement gives the league the right to unilaterally implement it for the 2019 season. Manfred would prefer the union signs off on that, plus any other pace-of-play changes the league is seeking.

Despite recent discussion of other drastic rule changes - the designated hitter in the National League, the three-batter minimum for relief pitchers, plus others - they cannot be unilaterally implemented by MLB this season because they were only proposed in the last year. If the union were to agree to any of them, they could be instituted by opening day, but Manfred reiterated the universal DH will not happen in 2019.

As for the other overriding story surrounding baseball this spring, Manfred expressed confidence that Harper and the other top free agents still unemployed will sign deals soon. The commissioner shot down suggestions from several reporters that MLB is facing a crisis over this matter or that the lack of signings is evidence of franchises not trying to win.

"There are 11 players who had a WAR above 1.0 last year that aren't signed," Manfred said. "I believe that, just like last year, that market is going to clear in some point here in the next few weeks. Those players are going to get signed. Do I wish, if I had my way, that Scott Boras would find a way ... to make a deal with some club sooner rather than later? Yes, I do. But we negotiated a system that allows the market to operate, and I have every confidence that for those players I just described that market is going to clear before we get to playing real games."

Manfred insists the slow-developing market was a product not of one factor from one side of the equation but multiple factors from all sides. He cited teams' changing philosophies on signing free agents, player agents setting unreasonable standards years before their clients are eligible to negotiate and a market in which it's becoming more difficult for two competing parties to find common ground.

"We've had a lot of change around the game," the commissioner said. "People think about players differently. They analyze players differently. They negotiate differently. Agents negotiate differently. Everybody seems to approach this issue from the perspective of: 'Gee, why aren't the clubs signing players?' I think there's lots and lots of offers out there, and it's a bilateral process. Players haven't accepted those offers yet. That's how a market works. We bargained for a market system. That market's out there operating. And I don't have any choice but to live with that right now."

Though he didn't mention Harper by name, Manfred did appear to take a direct shot at Boras for throwing a big number out there well before anyone knew what the star outfielder might actually make in his next contract.

"When you pronounce three years ahead of somebody's free agency the player's going to be a $400 million player - when there's never been a $400 million player in any sport - that becomes an impediment to the bargaining process," Manfred said. "I do believe that. But it takes two sides to make an agreement. And I do believe with respect to these players, clubs and the agents who represent these players will find a way to make a deal."

The Nationals, who according to sources made Harper a 10-year, $300 million offer in late September but informed him that offer would expire once he was eligible for free agency in early November, have been careful not to say much about the 26-year-old slugger since reporting to camp.

Asked today where things stand with Harper, general manager Mike Rizzo responded: "We're going to talk about players we have on the team. We're not going to talk about players we don't have on the team."